This chapter took a bit longer than usual, and you can blame exams for that. Oh the joys of being in university. The next chapter is also going to take a while, both because of more exams and that I really need to post chapters for the other stories I've been neglecting. That said, enjoy the chapter and please review! Imagination cookies for all who review!
Sol didn't like using absolutes. In just about every group there are dissenters, those with differing opinions that didn't fit with those around them. So she stuck words like 'most', 'pretty much', 'virtually', things like that, in front of absolutes to account for those people. But as Eevee stood in front of the assembled guildmembers and Espeon, Sol felt comfortable saying that absolutely everyone wasn't believing a word of it.
When they had first returned to the guild, sneaking through Treasure Town once again, the other apprentices had shed tears of joy. Espeon had been right. Everyone had been really worried about them, and the relief was palpable. Even Chatot seemed genuinely glad to see them all returned safely. It made Sol feel a little guilty about her plan to stay hidden.
But then the story had come out, and Sol felt perfectly justified in her original plan once again. She was glad Grovyle was already on his way to Treeshroud Forest and out of immediate reach of the guild. With the way things were going here, Sol thought the apprentices would tear Grovyle apart for 'indoctrinating' team Wanderers (Chimecho's words, not Sol's).
"But it's true!" Eevee cried.
"I'm sure you believe it is," Chimecho said. "I know you wouldn't intentionally lie about something like this, but Grovyle must be tricking you."
"There's no way DUSKNOIR could be bad!" Loudred agreed.
"Look, I know it's farfetched, but do you truly believe someone, anyone, would be capable of tricking all four of us into believing something like this? Between me, Eevee, Jak and Ren, is there not one of us that you can trust not to fall for an outlandish story? We saw the future, we even heard Dusknoir confirm it ourselves."
"Hey, hey! You want us to trust you? It seems to me you never trusted us. Why didn't you ever tell us you were once human?"
Sol winced. It had only been a matter of time before someone brought that up.
"I, like, find it hard to believe that Dusknoir is bad… We, like, never saw the future ourselves, but we did see Grovyle steal the Time Gears. That's what we totally know for sure."
"Did everything we just say fly completely over your heads?!" Sol demanded.
"But that means the Time Gear thief is out there again!" Loudred said, ignoring Sol. "We need to find him and catch him before he can do any more damage!"
"Golly, do you reckon Dusknoir will be coming back to get Grovyle?"
"We can't wait for that! We should go catch him now!"
Sol was helpless and could only watch as the guild hashed out a plan to go to Treeshroud Forest and capture Grovyle. It hurt to see her guild mates, the ones she called friends, dismiss her words so easily.
"Wait!" Eevee cried. "You can't do this!"
"Wouldn't it be best to at least think things over before acting rashly?" Espeon asked hesitantly. While Sol got the impression she didn't believe them either, at least she was willing to listen.
"Hey, hey! This is guild business!" Corphish said, silencing her.
"What about team Wanderers?" Loudred asked. "We can't let them try to interfere!"
"It'll be best if we, like, keep them in the guild."
"WHAT?!" Sol exclaimed. "Not only are you calling us lying idiots, but you're going to imprison us as well?!"
"It's for your own good," Chimecho said. "We're not blaming you for any of this. You're scared and confused, but we can help you after all of this is done. In the meantime, we need to make sure you don't get yourselves hurt."
"You can't be serious!"
"Jak is not a child to be taken care of and controlled!" the Charmander snarled, backing up against a wall and poised to fight.
"SQUAWK! Enough!" Chatot yelled. "That will not be necessary, Jak."
Jak eyed Chatot suspiciously, but slowly left her attack position.
"Truly, I expected better from the guild's apprentices!" Chatot said, pacing back and forth in front of the assembled Pokémon. "Turning on your fellows! Jumping to conclusions! Ignoring facts! Refusing to think!"
Chatot stopped and spun to face Loudred, radiating disapproval.
"You! Tell me exactly what you saw when Dusknoir returned to the future."
"Well… there was an accident… and Sol and Eevee fell through the portal…"
"An accident! Tell me, then, why would Dusknoir yell 'You two are coming with me!' if it was just an accident?"
"Well… uh…"
"And Corphish, you were the one who found Sol in Crystal Lake. Do you think she would be willing to trust Grovyle after that unless there was indisputable proof that he is telling the truth? And Bidoof, the only one who worshipped Dusknoir more than you is Eevee. What do you think it would take for his perception to change so dramatically?"
Chatot's questions were met with stunned silence. Sol was more surprised than anyone. Never would she have thought Chatot of all people would be standing up for her.
"I thought we had trained you better than this! Seek out all the information you can, review the facts, and above all, think. That is what we try to teach you all, but it would seem it fell on deaf ears. I've known too many apprentices lost due to their own rashness and stupidity, and I will not let it happen again!"
For a moment Chatot stared off into the distance, lost in a memory. He shook himself free, then narrowed his eyes at the Pokémon.
"It has been a long time since something like that has happened, before any of you joined, so you have likely not seen just what can happen out there."
A shadow passed across Eevee's face, a look of sorrow of loss. It was missed by most, only there for a brief moment, but Sol saw it.
"You don't know what can happen when you jump to conclusions," Chatot said. "We can't assume team Wanderers has been tricked. That said, despite what I may think at the moment, we shouldn't assume that they are correct. I propose we all go to Treeshoud and see for ourselves. It would cost us nothing, but we will get a clear view of what's going on. I trust this is agreeable, Guildmaster?"
Wigglytuff jumped as he was mentioned, having been staring off into the distance, completely zoned out.
"Uh… yes?"
Chatot nodded, satisfied.
"Then let us be off!"
"I think I'll go back into town, tell people Eevee's story," Espeon said. "Maybe that way they'll have time to adjust to the idea, so it all won't be as much of a shock when you get back with confirmation."
"No, I don't think that would be a good idea," Chatot said. "If you start telling people that Dusknoir is the villain, well, things will get bad, fast. Attacking someone's idol is like throwing a Shinx into a swimming pool. It never ends well. Tell people that team Wanderers has returned, but don't go into detail. It'd be best if they hear the whole story from all of us with evidence that it's true."
"Ok, I can do that," Espeon said.
Sol was stunned by all of this. Chatot was the only one who believed them? Chatot was the only one able to piece this together? Perhaps there was a reason he was the guild's lieutenant. Sol would have to think more on this later.
"Now, assuming everyone is done acting impulsively, let us be off to Treeshroud Forest. I'm curious to see what's going on there."
Chatot went up the stairs of the guild. The apprentices glanced at each other, looking embarrassed and ashamed, then followed. Many mumbled apologises but Sol refused to even look at them. She was pissed. Eevee may have smiled and said it was all right, but Sol and Jak weren't so easily appeased.
"You're going to forgive them, just like that?" Sol whispered to Eevee as they followed the group out of the guild.
"They are our friends. Why shouldn't we forgive them? They said they're sorry."
"If they really were our friends, they would have believed us, not start talking about locking us up."
"Individually, Pokémon are smart. In a crowd, they are sheep. Pokémon would do in a group what they would never do on their own."
"Ok, even I can't tell what that's supposed to mean, Ren. Are you agreeing with me, disagreeing with me, or just making a general comment?"
"Come on, Sol! They are our friends. You have to forgive them."
"Jak does not understand. This one thought 'friends' were Pokémon that could always be relied upon. This has been proven false with these 'guild mates', yet you still call them friends?"
"Everyone makes mistakes sometimes," Eevee said.
Sol sighed. "Can we just drop this for now? I'm already mad at just about everyone else I know for one reason or another, and I'd rather not get into a fight with you, too."
"All right, but you can't hold this against them forever."
"One action cannot completely define a person," Ren said.
Sol supposed that was true. There were times when she hadn't made the best decisions, and she wouldn't like one screw up to colour how everyone else viewed her from then on. Speaking of which…
Sol quickened her pace until she made it to the front of the group where Chatot led. She walked beside him for a few minutes, unsure of how to begin.
"Thank you for believing us," Sol finally said.
"I did not make it this far by ignoring the facts," he said.
There was an awkward pause.
"I'm sorry," Sol blurted.
"Whatever for?"
"For being a stubborn, arrogant hypocrite."
"What do you mean?"
"We got off on the wrong foot, and I've been holding that against you this whole time. I get set in my beliefs too easily, and too often refuse to see that things change. I thought you were nothing more than a corrupt jerk and ignored everything else."
"We all have our faults, and mine does happen to be money," he chuckled. "I know I'm not the friendliest Pokémon around, but that's because I can't afford to coddle apprentices. The Guildmaster is the best explorer I've ever met, but his method is… unusual. Most, if not all other Pokémon, require a more hardened approach to things if they wish to stay alive in the mystery dungeons, so it falls to me to make sure the apprentices know that life isn't fair and things don't get easy just because one thinks it's too hard."
"I guess that makes sense."
"As for the 'corruption', as you put, money may be my weakness but it all does go to the guild. It may seem steep, but the Guildmaster is not very responsible with money… He sees something he wants, he gets it, and the only income we get is from apprenticeship dues, since everything we gain from expeditions and such ends up distributed amid the townspeople."
Chatot sounded annoyed by this fact, but he never claimed to be a saint. Sol felt even more embarrassed now than when Chatot stood up for them. Like always, she had her perception on things and didn't bother to look for more information.
"Well, know I'm even sorrier for how I acted."
"There's no need. I thought that party was apology enough."
Sol sighed. "That wasn't me. Wigglytuff did all that, then said it was me. I didn't even know he was planning anything like that."
"Hmm. It does sound like the Guildmaster to do something like that. Thank you for telling me the truth."
There was silence between them for several minutes.
"Well, this is awkward. I'm just going to go back to the others…"
Sol fell back to the end of the group where Eevee, Jak and Ren walked.
"You're right, Eevee," Sol said. "I can't hold this against them all forever."
"So you forgive them? That's great!"
"This one thinks it is foolish."
"I didn't say I was forgiving them, at least not know. I'm still pretty ticked off. What I am going to do is wait and see if they can earn my trust back."
"It is wise not to jump blindly between extremes," Ren commented. Sol had nothing to say to that, but nodded her head in agreement.
…
It was if they had fallen into a portal to the future. Not far into Treeshroud Forest, the vibrant green of the leaves and the warm brown of the tree trunks all turned to a cold and uncaring grey. It was unnaturally still, everything frozen in time, the silence making everyone tense and on edge. Even the sound of their footsteps seemed muted.
Not a word was spoken between the Pokémon. They all glanced around at their surroundings nervously. None of them wanted to be here. It was like seeing their worst fear come to life. The planet's paralysis.
"I don't understand," Loudred said. Known for his ear splitting volume back at the guild, he know whispered here. "If time has stopped, why can we still move around?"
"Because life is persistant."
The voice startled the group. They all looked around before finding its source. Sunflora gasped at the sight of Grovyle, the Time Gear thief, lounging in a tree.
"The natural always fights against the unnatural. While things without minds or conscious thought are easily frozen, Pokémon persevere. We adapt."
Grovyle jumped down to the forest floor, causing the apprentices to retreat back a few steps. Despite hearing team Wanderer's tale, this was still the Pokémon the whole world feared not too long ago.
"You ask why we are not frozen like the trees? Celebi told me time is an unusual thing, that we are as dependant on it as it is on us. Without things to experience time, without things to mark its passing, does time still exist? She told me we all carry a piece of time with us, marked by the beating of our hearts, and that is why we continue to survive. I'm not sure how true this is, or if I even believe it, but the fact remains we can still act."
"It would seem that someone here is a fan of dramatic entrances," Sol said and walked up to Grovyle, unimpressed. "If you're done freaking everyone out, can we get a move on? And I think you're comment on time being dependant on us broke Ren. You owe me a philosophical Cubone. A new one."
Grovyle smiled, then look of sadness and loss passed over his features.
"The Time Gear is this way," he sighed.
They followed Grovyle a short ways further into the forest, and there they found it. A Time Gear. But… something was wrong. The Time Gears they had seen before had glowed vibrantly, bathing their surroundings in green and blue light.
This one, however, struggled to retain its glow. The coloured light sputtered in and out of existence, and the Time Gear itself had tiny cracks and fractures all over its surface.
"What's wrong with it?" Chimecho asked.
"Temporal Tower is close to collapsing. The Time Gears can't handle the strain. It's only a matter of time before they too are destroyed."
"What?!"
"There is a reason why we didn't just find the Time Gears in the future and simply took them back to the past with us. When the planet's paralysis is complete, the Time Gears will disintegrate. It… will not be pleasant. I would not want to be in the area when it happens."
"Do you believe us know?" Sol demanded. The apprentices hesitated, looking conflicted, before nodding.
Grovyle walked up and took the Time Gear. It stopped glowing completely once it was taken from its place.
"We must move quickly and get the rest of the Time Gears," he said.
"Sounds good, but I don't think you should be the one to do it."
"Why not? I've done it before and know exactly where they are."
"The fact that you did it before is precisely why you can't be the one to do it know," Sol said. "People see you as a criminal, and will panic if you start taking them again, regardless of what we say."
"We can get them instead," Chimecho said. "We already know where three of them are, and I'm sure Uxie, Mesprit and Azelf will understand when we explain it to them. Perhaps if we explain it to just one of them, they'll be able to tell the others through telepathy and then they can bring them to Treasure Town themselves, saving us some time."
"I can get the fourth," Wigglytuff said suddenly.
"You know where it is?" Grovyle asked incredulously.
"Of course! It's in Limestone Cavern. I've seen it before."
"But what of the dangers within? The things I saw in there…"
"What? Ditto must have stepped up security since I was there. Or maybe he tricked you. Doesn't matter. Bye bye!"
Wigglytuff ran off. Chatot stared, then narrowed his eyes and gave chase.
Sol rolled her eyes. "So, that leaves us with the other three to get. I think we should start with Azelf. Mesprit is, well, emotional, so she won't see past her dislike of Grovyle, and Uxie is a suspicious bastard."
"What do we do with the Time Gears after we get them?" Chimecho asked.
"We take them to Temporal Tower, of course."
"But where exactly is that?"
"Uhhh… Grovyle?"
"It's in the Hidden Land."
"There you go, the Hidden Land! … Where is that?"
"I don't know. We never got that far."
"I guess that means we need to find it," Sol sighed.
Why wasn't anything ever simple?