Vic's memories have been restored to her! She remembers her time spent with Alcea and Shaymin, and now she returns to the present! But how will this knowledge affect her? How will her memories of Alcea and the time they spent playing together cause her to treat the redhead differently? Or will it? Let's see what her reaction is!

So far, we've got some great girls running in the Nomination Round! Any others we want so far? We've got a little over a week left! If there are any other girls you think should be added, make sure to add them in the reviews! Let's see who the third Best Girl will be!

Currently Nominated: Ange, Ayame, Caelia, Cynthia, Donoma, Elaina, Maddi, Marion, Misato, Sango, Satsuki, Sylvia, Vic

Pokemon Academy: Beginning of Beginnings

Chapter 954

Vic had spent hours playing with Alcea when they were kids. They'd shared an entire afternoon together. And as those memories returned to her, she watched those events play out in the span of seconds as they flooded her mind like a tidal wave.

It was so intense she nearly fell over, and then she came back down to earth. She was still in that clearing, but now she was with her parents and Ryoko, not Alcea. Her memories had come back, and they were burning at the front of her mind, reminding her of just what had happened that day, with her very first friend.

Before she could even stop to think, her anger got the better of her, and she lunged forward, punching Ryoko in the face with everything she had.

"Victoria?!" Rui gasped in horror.

"What are you doing?!" Wes demanded.

Ryoko didn't even flinch. Vic's punch looked like it had practically torn her head off, but her cheek wasn't even red. She turned back to give her a stare filled with guilt and sorrow.

"It is alright," she said, raising her hand to stop the two adults without ever letting her eyes leave Vic's. "Her response is perfectly understandable. I am not harmed."

"How could you?!" Vic demanded, tears welling up in her eyes. "How could you do that? How could you take that from me!?"

Ryoko's response was cold and clinical. "If I had brought your mother to take care of Shaymin, then she would never have permitted Alcea to leave with the Oracle. If I had not erased your memories, then you would have told your parents what happened to you, and they would have tried to interfere with the progression of time. This could not be permitted. So I removed the possibility of that occurring, knowing that, when the time came, I would restore your past."

"And that… makes it okay?" Vic hissed, clenching her fists. She wanted to smack the girl all over again she was pissing her off. And what pissed her off the most was the fact that she couldn't form an argument, either. Because Ryoko was right, those events would have played out exactly as she said they would have. The fact that she was justified in her actions made it even worse.

Rui glanced down, and Wes looked a little perturbed himself. They both knew they shared in the guilt of what had happened. Even if they didn't know the extent of what their daughter had lost, they could tell just by looking at her how much pain she was in.

"When I went to the Relic Stone after you came back… I saw that the Oracle was gone," Rui admitted, her face flushing with shame. "I asked Ryoko what happened to it, why Shaymin was feeling so much better, and she said that it was the power of destiny at work… if I had pushed harder, insisted on knowing the truth, then maybe I…"

"Mom…" Vic glanced back at her mother, her heart stinging a little. "That's…"

"I would not have given it to you," Ryoko sharply declared. "There is no reason for you or your husband to feel guilty about the events that transpired that day. You were only doing your duty to your family, nothing more. This sin is mine and mine alone to bear, as the guardian of eternity." She turned back to Vic.

Then, she did something that Vic never would have expected.

She lowered her head.

"I am truly sorry for all that I have done to you, Victoria," she apologized, her voice boasting both great wisdom and sorrow, as well as true remorse for her actions. "I understand that such a thing is of no use to you, and that these words are meaningless, but please believe me when I tell you that, if there were any other choice, I would not have forced you into this situation. I am truly very sorry."

Vic could hear the sincerity in her words, but she was still furious. She didn't want to forgive Ryoko. She didn't ever want to see Ryoko again.

And there was something else that pissed her off even more, another reason why she refused to accept the woman's apology.

"If you're truly sorry," she growled, "then you should have no problem making it right."

"Victoria, she's given you back your memories and she's apologized," Rui said softly. "What else do you want her to do? It's not like she can-"

"That's not it, mom," Vic snapped, glaring at Ryoko coldly. "It's not done yet, is it? There's still someone else you have to make amends to, isn't that right?"

Ryoko raised her head to meet Vic's venomous glare with a look of stern ambivalence. She did not say a single word.

Vic snarled, spat on the ground, and turned on her heel. "Fuck this, then," she hissed, stomping back in the direction she came.

"Victoria!" Rui exclaimed, moving to chase after her daughter, but she was stopped by Wes's hand on her shoulder. "What are you doing?" She demanded of her husband. "We need to go after her, we can't just-"

Wes shook his head. "Right now, our words won't be able to reach her," he said quietly. "If we want to make things up to her… then we need to show her through our actions how much we regret what we put her through."

"…O-Oh…" Rui sighed, hanging her head in shame. She knew he was right, of course, but as a mother, and as a person with harmonia who could feel just how much Vic was suffering right now, she felt even worse not being able to help her.

Back in Agate Village, everyone had returned to the Carvers' house, and were just gathered in a circle outside, feeling kind of awkward about the whole thing. Both of their hosts, along with their daughter, had just left everybody there, and now they didn't know what they were supposed to think about this. Could they even go inside?

"So… should we wait for them to come back, or what?" Tommy asked, getting a little frustrated. As someone who was easily bored, he didn't like Agate Village all that much. He'd enjoyed setting up the campsite, but that had kept him occupied yesterday. Now there was nothing to do.

"Why don't you take a hike?" Maddi asked, almost making it sound like a genuine suggestion and not the cutting retort that her naturally-sarcastic voice turned it into. Tommy glared back at her, and she pointedly ignored him to look at her phone.

"When do you think Victoria's coming back?" Callie asked, feeling a little worried. Although she'd left with her parents with a smile on her face, in one of the best moods that Callie had ever seen her in, Callie was still worried about her. After all, she had gone through some serious emotional leaps during that fight, both positive and negative, and that wasn't a good sign.

How long before she had another negative moment and got dejected again? Or worse, before she burst into tears? Callie didn't want to know, she just wanted everything to be okay. She wasn't good at stressful situations like this.

Callie hadn't asked her, but she was look Alcea's way when she'd asked her question. But Alcea didn't have an answer to give her. All of her thoughts were on the strange atmosphere she felt in Agate Village, how familiar it seemed to her, as if it was something lost in her memory somewhere, struggling to surface. She clutched her flower pot a little tighter in her arms as she tried to scrape away at her memories, to imagine if her parents had ever taken her to Agate Village as a little girl once, perhaps, and she just had forgotten. She wasn't getting anywhere, and Callie could see that she was occupied, so she didn't push the issue.

Alden, on the other hand, answered her question truthfully. "When they're done, of course," he said, offering nothing constructive to soothe Callie's worries in the slightest. "Vic's a tough one, she'll be just fine."

Callie didn't know Vic well enough to contradict him, but she certainly didn't feel GOOD about his assertion, either. Even the toughest ones had their soft sides, and that was proven by Vic's response this morning.

"She's probably having fun with the wild pokemon," Keya suggested, trying to sound excited for her when really he was just feeling glum himself, not being able to see whatever it was that was hiding in that cave.

That didn't make Callie feel very much better either. She sighed, and glanced down at the grass, just wishing this awkwardness would go away.

Then, as if all of her worries had been materialized in physical form, the very face of her concern stomped through the fields, approaching the group of students with a hard look in her eye, a fierce stare aimed directly at one person in particular.

Alcea.

Everyone turned to see her, asking what was going on, what she had done in Relic Cave, what the wild pokemon was like, stuff like that, but she rebuffed them all without a word.

Even Alcea looked up to see her approach, a perplexed expression on her face as she tried to figure out what the complex look Vic was wearing met. The other girl stopped in front of her, and for a fraction of a second they were staring eye to eye.

Then Vic through her arms around Alcea and hugged her tightly, and everyone lost their collective minds. With the exception of Mason, of course, who stared at with the same detached disinterest he gave everything.

"I'm sorry," Vic sobbed into her shoulder, tears rolling down her cheeks. "I'm so, so sorry…"

"I… what is… je ne comprends pas?!" Alcea sputtered, so shocked by the display of affection she slipped back into Kalosian for a moment.

"What the FUCK?" Maddi said plainly, putting words to what everyone was feeling at the moment. Then, utter bedlam ensued.

"Well, that wasn't the reaction I expected, but see? She's doing just fine!" Alden smiled, not at all fazed by what he was seeing.

"Vic's hugging somebody?!" Tommy exclaimed. "And it's a girl?!"

"Well, that's certainly surprising," Ross smirked.

"I definitely didn't expect a transformation like that," Keya said, stunned.

Chloe's mind kind of short-circuited as she stared at the two of them, and by the time she regained her mental faculties she was grateful that her brain had stopped working for a moment, because if it hadn't she would have said something even more shocking than Maddi had.

"What… but… but that's…" Callie looked back and forth between Alcea and Vic as her brain struggled to put what was happening now into a framework that she could process.

Alcea likes Alden.

Vic likes Alden.

Alden seems uninterested both

Alcea polite Vic

Vic… likes?! Alcea

She fell to her knees as her brain overheated. UTTER BEDLAM! She screamed internally.

At least she was handling it better than Alcea, though, who STILL had not managed to form any sort of response to the sudden hug that wasn't awkward stuttering. She just stared ahead at the waterfall, wondering what the fuck was going on.

"What the fuck is going on?" Slipped from her lips before she could stop herself, and for the second time in as many minutes everybody completely lost it.

"Was that a swear word?!"

"Alcea Vermeil of all people used a swear?!"

"THAT Alcea?!"

"You've gotta be shitting me!"

"Wow, this is really quite a day."

"What the fuck is going on?!" (That one was Chloe)

Finally realizing that she was making a scene, Vic pulled back from Alcea, her face still flushed and her cheeks still stained with tears.

"I… I…" What could she even say at a time like this? It wasn't like she could explain why she'd hugged the other girl or what she'd seen, they'd all think she was crazy! …Which wasn't too different from how they pictured her now, she realized, finally taking her eyes off of Alcea.

Her voice died in her throat.

Then, Alcea gave her a polite, almost sweet smile, and withdrew a red handkerchief from her breast pocket. She gingerly wiped away Vic's tears.

"Calm down and tell me what's wrong," she said with the soothing voice of a mother, even though she was younger than the other girl.

And just like that, those memories Vic had, of feeling like the Alcea from back then was her older sister, pushed their way to the surface and out of her eyes once again and she started to sob. She didn't care that her image had been completely destroyed, and she didn't care that everyone could see. She just wanted to cry.

And just like before, Alcea wiped away her tears, no judging the other girl in the slightest. Before coming to Agate Village, her relationship with Vic had been frosty at best, only slightly better than her relationship with Olivia. But now, there was something about Agate Village that soothed away those rough edges and made her feel that showing the other girl this kindness was natural. She didn't know what had come over Vic to make her act this way, but it didn't matter. She wanted to comfort her all the same.

It was finally too much.

"What the actual fuck is going on here?!" Mason exploded, and everyone turned to look at him in shock. He was panting, his hair sticking up from the humidity, and his glasses were askew. He looked completely enraged.

"Uh… Mason? You good, dude?" Ross asked.

"No, I'm not! I'm fucking done!" Mason exclaimed. "What's going on here?! Why is Vic crying so hard in Alcea Vermeil's arms, of all people?! Why is nobody commenting about the fact that Chloe just cursed?! Is everyone going crazy or something?! And why the FUCK is nobody talking about the fact that we saw FUCKING CELEBI OF ALL FUCKING POKEMON just yesterday?! Most people go their whole LIVES without seeing a single Mythical Pokemon and this one just pops up and we don't even CARE?! Is there something in the WATER here, or something?! I CAN'T TAKE IT ANY MORE!"

He was practically tearing his hair out at this point. He broke down, panting, and fell to his knees in the grass while everyone stared at him in quiet shock.

"Celebi!" A flutter of wings rustled through the leaves, and the scent of lilac, lavender, and mint filled the air.

Celebi herself danced through the clearing, circling around the students, serving as forerunner to Ryoko who walked calmly up to them.

She raised her hand in greeting. "Hello there-"

"TWICE! That's FUCKING TWICE! TWICE in TWO DAYS! This shit isn't real!"

"Shut up, Mason," Maddi snapped.

Ryoko cleared her throat. She actually looked a little embarrassed by the outburst, which was rare for someone in her position.

"…As I was saying. Hello there. It is a pleasure to make your acquaintance again so soon after our last meeting," she said, her eyes scanning over the students. They landed on Maddi for a briefer instant than the others and the brunette raised her eyebrow curiously, but by then she had already moved on to Keya.

Finally, her gaze landed on Alcea and Vic, who were staring at her with curiosity and suspicion, respectively.

"What are you doing back here?" Vic grumbled. "If you're worried that I'm going to tell, then don't be, because I wouldn't-"

"Not at all," Ryoko said, shaking her head. "I am here to do exactly as you asked."

Vic was taken aback. "W-Wait, what?"

"You said that you wanted me to make it right, correct?" Ryoko said, approaching Alcea, to the confusion of everyone there. "And that is exactly what I intend to do."

"Hey, wait, Ryoko, what are you doing, huh?" Callie demanded. She had a little bit more familiarity with the time traveler than the rest of them, but that didn't mean she was okay with letting something like this happen. She ran up in front of Alcea, holding her fists up to defend her friend.

Ryoko smiled down at her.

"There is no need to worry," she assured Callie, the soothing aroma wafting off of her and the tenderness in her voice lulling Callie into security. "I am merely here to right a wrong I committed on your friend many years ago."

Alcea blinked, now feeling as suspicious as Vic did. "A wrong… is it? May I ask what you mean by that, then?"

Ryoko gave her an enigmatic smile. "I believe it will be best to let you see for yourself," she replied, and raised her hand. She pressed two fingers against Alcea's forehead, and in an instant Alcea remembered everything about Agate Village just as Vic had.

Unlike Vic, though, Alcea hadn't been expecting her memories to be returned. She didn't even know they were missing until they flooded back to her, overwriting her previous blurry thoughts and sharpening to crystal clarity.

She saw it all. Her, wandering into the forest. Celebi, appearing before her, luring her in deeper as if they were playing a game. The flash of green light and then appearing in that clearing- not a clearing on the island that had mysteriously disappeared, but one here, in Agate Village.

And she remembered Victoria. Vic. And also Shaymin.

It overwhelmed her and she nearly collapsed, except for the timely intervention of Vic, who reached up and caught her, preventing her from stumbling and dropping her flower.

"Alcea, are you okay?!" Vic asked frantically, and Alcea shook her head to clear her thoughts, her eyes landing on Vic.

It was like she was seeing her for the first time. Her mouth dropped open and her eyes widened with wonder as she pictured that small girl she had forgotten, now grown up and standing right in front of her. Both girls were as plain as day to her eyes.

"…Victoria?" She whispered in recognition, and the other girl's face lit up with joy. With their memories both restored, the two old friends had found each other at last.

Aww, Alcea got her memories back at last! Now she and Vic can become friends again! This chapter and the last few had some really sad points, so I wanted to end things here on a nice, heartwarming scene of reunion. They both deserve it after what they've been through. But things won't end here, we have a little more time to spend in Agate Village, before we head off somewhere else!