Yes, this is part 1 of 2
No, your hearts are not yet safe…
A broken knight remembers what brought him to Narkin, and the memory that haunts his dreams…
"Hey," Kira's soft voice called out to me. "It's time to wake up, Ronin."
I wanted to pretend I was still asleep, but our emotional connection betrayed my state. I groggily opened my eyes as my powers sharpened with continued focus. The tent flapped as some light wind brushed up against it, the entrance remained open, early morning sunlight pouring in through it.
Kira was on her knees, bent over to whisper in my ear. The Gardevoir was beautiful, as always.
I chuckled. "We've got all the time in the world, what's a few hours used to sleep in a little?"
"Hours that would be better put to more productive things." Something pinched my arm, the sharp pain abruptly running up my arm and jolting me awake.
"Ow-" I rubbed my right arm. "You don't have to be a goon about it."
She laughed softly into my ear. "Oh chivalrous Gallade, the morning just isn't the same without your face, come on."
A weary smile grew on my face as I carefully got up and followed her out into our campsite. There was a fire going, surrounded by stones and a floating metal pan with sizzling meat in it. I was hungry already merely at it's sight.
"This should keep us going for a while, considering that I'd rather not have to eat while exploring for human artifacts." She sighed before the meat on the pan flipped seemingly by itself. "We've got a few hours, and a hope that it's worth our time."
I sat by the fire on the opposite side of her. "I'm sure it will be."
"Well at least we'll see something new… even if we find nothing to bring back." Kira mused as her eyes met mine.
Our crystal hearts briefly glowed pink. Her emotions flowed into me, them consisting of sharp skepticism, radiating hope, and glowing happiness. The feeling stopped, though our lingering emotional connection never dared falter.
It held us together after all. Our hearts were one, our minds and emotions were open wide like a book to one another in a way I could never describe perfectly. In my mind it felt like the ultimate completion of myself.
The sun was softly shining through the leaves of the forest trees. I squinted a little, but still saw her face clear as ever. "Far from home, but together we are."
"I swear there was more to that old saying, it's just on the tip of my tongue…" She snapped her fingers before groaning in annoyance. "And now I lost it. Oh well."
I lightly grinned in amusement. "We'll have plenty of time to remember while we're out there."
"Psh, nonsense… we'll be too busy staring into each other's eyes."
She flipped the meat in the pan again as I chuckled. With a satisfied look, she split the meat evenly onto two plates. Carefully she handed me one and sighed. Contentment surrounded us like a cloud of mist.
We ate in silence, there wasn't much to be said. We had a plan for the day and each other. That was all we needed. Normally we would have berries, but we were running out of them rather fast… despite our rationing of them already. But we did have meat, mostly for emergencies when we really had nothing else. It tasted odd to us but it wasn't bad.
Travelers cannot always be choosers. Especially when they're out in places unexplored by anyone.
We had packed our campsite easily, we barely had anything other than the tent and some blankets. We carried so little that we ended up with only a single pack that we swapped carrying every hour. I had made sure to cover our tracks before we left.
Kira and I had exited the forest shortly after beginning our trek, we intended to stop by a new town that had recently popped up by word of mouth. Though I was skeptical… it being so out on the frontier just didn't sit right with me.
Narkin was its name, and it apparently was in the process of installing a port. This was the furthest we'd ever been from home… but we wanted to go further still. Nowhere was ever far enough…
I noticed we broke out of the thick forest, now overseeing the seaside town from atop a hill. I stopped in place and squinted. The town looked early in development, I didn't hold hope that it would hold out. There were wooden houses… what looked to be a market… and a port was definitely being built… but not much else.
At least this place looked like it wasn't a den of thieves and thugs.
"So what do you think?" Kira asked wearily. "Does it look safe?"
I sighed before continuing to walk. "We don't know until we get there."
Some level of fear had run into my mind and heart. Though it was mostly because I did not know how to fully use my newfound powers as a Gallade. Kira and I only evolved together recently, but our relationship stretched far beyond that.
I muttered under my breath to myself. "Steel thy heart."
It was always much easier said than done.
Our approach did little to quell the growing feeling of dread in me. I tried to desperately hide it from her… but I knew it was impossible. I could only minimize it and hope she didn't bring it up. For both our sakes, it was best that we both spoke not of our fear.
A Pokémon stood at the entrance, leaning against the wall of a building. Some dust from the path kicked up in a sudden breeze. The Inteleon stared to the sky, its gaze sometimes shifting down to path seemingly out of boredom. I could tell it knew we were approaching.
"So what brings you to Narkin, chaps?" he suddenly asked, a single eye looking towards us.
I responded evenly. "We're travelers, just stopping to get some supplies before we head off on our way."
"Ah, I see." He pointed to the town's center. "Market is that way… though things have been quite scarce lately. Odds are you'll have to trade goods instead of using Poké. We've… had a rough couple of days."
I squinted a little, nothing seemed wrong visually with the town itself. "What happened?"
"The old coot in charge sent a Guild team out on a supply run to a mystery dungeon we recently found. Long story short, all of them turned up dead. And now we've got our work cut out for us." I noticed rising anger in him. It seemed directed to whoever this 'old coot in charge' was.
Kira piped up. "We're sorry to hear that, for what it's worth."
He wordlessly nodded before his eye turned back to the sky. Frustration was creeping throughout him, both inside and out. His expression had changed, now a blank stare gazing up at the blue abyss above. I dared not pry about anything.
"Just do your thing," he said with a sigh. We passed by him, about to go where he directed. But his voice rang out again. "Oh, and have a good day."
Kira wearily smiled. "You too."
A short walk brought us to the center of the town where there was a surprising amount of other Pokémon going about their day. Much of it turned into a blur of supply shopping and general sightseeing, turns out mostly everyone in the market was actually living there according to some of the shopkeepers who noticed our obliviousness of the area.
Nonetheless, we had everything we needed for the foreseeable future. We had started to make our way out of the town again, but we were stopped by a Rockruff.
They approached with their head tilted to the left in curiosity. "Wow, are you travelers?"
"Yes." I responded evenly. "Though we were just leaving. I'm afraid we have things to do."
She let out a disappointed sigh with the innocence of a child. "Aw, but I wanted to ask some questions…"
Kira looked at me with one of those expressions. I didn't even need to feel her emotions to know what she wanted.
[Are we missing anything that I can grab so we can at least justify not being there on time?] I telepathically asked her.
[Not particularly… but…]
I rolled my eyes. [Alright fine. A few minutes doesn't really change much anyway.]
"We have some time," Kira said happily to the Rockruff with a welcoming smile. "Ask away."
Her eyes lit up with her tail wagging a little in response. "Yay! What place did you last explore?"
"We were at the human ruins on the island of Cretia." Kira answered.
Awe flashed across her expression. "Did you sail a boat to get there?"
Kira went on to explain what we did in Cretia.
Originally, we had planned to hitch a ride on a Pokémon that was able to fly, and who were willing to do so for payment of some kind. We wanted to be there quickly. But that had changed when we discovered that the trip wasn't possible over the ocean by air. So we instead opted to enlist the services of a Lapras to get there, we spent much longer at sea but we made it without too much of a hitch.
Cretia had no towns or settlements, so we had to make due with what we found there and packed with us. No settlements could feasibly be made without a lot of proper monpower, and with it so far out on the frontier, the only thing Pokémon could do was travel and explore it before heading back. We came prepared for the worst that we heard it had to offer…
Our first day there was spent trying to figure out where we were, and how to get to the ruins. We had eventually decided to climb a steep cliff to get a better view. It was astoundingly treacherous, one of us had nearly fallen every minute, a few times we had to catch each other with our powers…
But eventually, we pressed upwards and made it to the top. The pain wasn't for nothing. We had a view of the ruins a long whiles walk away from us up north. Though it was starting to get dark… and neither of us had the desire to climb down during the night.
We had set up camp on the side of that mountain…
I remember staring up at the stars above us, endless in number and splendor, and the twist of fate ending me up being there with Kira. In that moment, I felt like the smallest of bug types against the world. Insignificant. Miniscule.
But in me stirred contentment. I was happy, I was with Kira, and we had our entire lives to look forward to. No matter how insignificant they were compared to the grand expanse of the infinite. At the end of the day… the stars themselves bore witness to our trials and hardships.
"Did you get to the ruins and explore them?" the Rockruff asked curiously while tilting its head.
Kira nodded. "We traveled there the next day. Wasn't as hard as we thought it would be… despite that horrible swamp that was in the middle of the island. The ruins themselves were quite the sight. Towers of an unknown material that stretched into the skies above… odd metal box-like things that were on these large pathways… and we got a few things that we brought back to the research Guild for a reward."
"Wow- didja keep anything?"
"No," I answered while shaking my head. "We weren't there to collect things. Though we did see plenty of curiosities while there."
Her ears perked up as her eyes almost seemed to glow. "My mom and dad explore places like that for our Guild! They tell me about all sorts of things that they find… though I never get to see any of them."
"I'm sure they have their reasons. Who are they?" I wearily asked. For some reason… I couldn't shake an odd feeling of dread as to who they were.
She looked me in the eyes with an innocent smile on my face. "They're both Lycanroc and work for the Guild as explorers! Also… have you seen them by any chance? They went out on a mission to the mystery dungeon and haven't come back yet…"
The dread I was feeling was suddenly reciprocated by Kira. The words of that Inteleon rang back into the center of my mind. Kira glanced at me worriedly, we both knew where this was going… and neither of us had the heart.
"No, we haven't seen them." I barely croaked out.
"Oh, okay…" Her ears folded back in disappointment. "It's been two days… and they said that they would be back much sooner than that… I'm starting to get worried…"
A grimace had been planted on Kira's face, her voice was laden with emotion. "We'll… tell you if we find them."
"Thank you!" the Rockruff yipped happily.
My heart briefly glowed as I glanced at Kira. [We can't in good faith leave her like this…]
[Let's go talk to the Inteleon by the entrance again and see what they plan to do about her situation.] Kira firmly responded with.
"Are you two okay?" the Rockruff asked while tilting her head again.
Kira nodded. "Don't worry about us, we're fine. We never did ask for your name, did we?"
"Oh right," the Rockruff exclaimed in relaxation. "My name is Lily, and I want to be an explorer like my mom and dad!"
"My name is Ronin, and her name is Kira. I'm afraid we do actually have business to attend to now."
Lily nodded. "Okay mister Ronin, goodbye."
We walked away, making our way back to the Inteleon. A darker tone had taken hold within the both of us. The cheery demeanor we had before was long gone, replaced by dreary expressions and gloomy emotions.
Our walk back was faster… or at least had the illusion of being so. We found ourselves face to face with the Inteleon again. On our approach, he turned and faced us.
"Hello again, chaps. Are you heading out?"
I shook my head. "Not quite yet I'm afraid, we had a few questions about something."
"I can see the doom and gloom all over you…" He sighed. "I'm going to guess you met Lily… and put two and two together, right?"
Kira's voice was laden with emotions. "She doesn't even know yet. What is going to happen to her?"
"Our Guild leader wanted to get someone to take care of her from now on. Though so far, nobody has come forward wanting to do so. In the meantime he doesn't want anyone to tell her what happened."
"There is at least a plan for her future?" Kira asked tentatively.
The Inteleon nodded. "Yep… though she deserves better than this. Especially since her whole family already… Never mind, I'm trailing off. Did you want to ask something else?"
"… No."
"Well if you end up with some, you can find me at the tavern by the Guild. Have a good evening." He waved goodbye as he walked back into the town.
"It's evening already?" Kira gasped. A look at the sun told us everything, it was starting to set in the distance. We must had spent more time trading for supplies and talking then we realized.
I looked back into the town. "Maybe this is for the better. If we stay, we can see if the Guild has jobs for people like us that we can take since it's a fresh frontier town. And possibly a want for human relics."
"… And we'll get to see what happens to Lily," she added. "Thank you."
A smile crept across my face as we held hands. A little cheeriness had returned. "We're just doing the right and honorable thing."
"Oh you, let's go find a lodging to put our stuff away in."
"Agreed, heh."
We walked around town, eventually finding lodging. We paid for a room and put our supplies there for the time being. We wouldn't need them until we went out on our exploration of those ruins. Today certainly went off course… though we at least get to potentially make the life of an unfortunate victim of this cold world better.
After a while we met with the Inteleon again at the tavern. He gave us his name, Ace. We talked about our exploits and what brought us here. It was then that we found out that he disagreed vehemently with what the master of the Guild wanted to do with Lily.
Ace was a friend of her parents. Not a close one… but someone who still cared. He wanted the best for Lily, something along the lines of an apprenticeship to eventually be an explorer. Apparently the Guild master disagreed, instead wanting to send her back to Vicol despite not having any family there to take her in.
He told us that the Guild master's reasoning was that Vicol was the safest region to send her to. While Ace argued that she would be completely alone if she got sent back, she knew the Pokémon here, and not much else.
As quaint as this place was, it was Lily's home. The image left in our head was that odds were that the Guild master would put his foot down and send her back. Ace called him a stubborn old coot for a good reason it would seem.
Eventually we left the tavern behind. The sun had nearly completely set. It's golden rays were still basking the town and ocean in its splendor. We went up the hill while following the forest's edge to where apparently near where the mystery dungeon was according to Ace.
We sat on the cliffside, staring out into the sunset and town below. Both of us were content.
"This town isn't that bad." Kira remarked.
I nodded in agreement. "I'd go so far as to say it's rather fine."
"I wonder if they need doctors…" she trailed off and glanced at me. "All my practice and knowledge might not go to waste after all."
I shrugged. "I don't think this will be a permanent thing. We're going to be exploring those ruins, then coming back here for a while before moving on to the next. Like we always do."
"We've run far enough away from Vicol to where we feel safe, haven't we? It's not like we can even go any further even if we wanted." She stated while looking towards Narkin.
I sighed wearily. "Maybe this could be a good place to finally settle down…"
Rustling in the bushes behind us caught our attention. It was brief, but we both knew someone was there. Our powers flared up as we felt for what it could be… surprise taking hold as it took the shape of a familiar Rockruff.
"Come out, Lily, we know you're there." Kira called out.
The Rockruff showed herself, waltzing out of the shrubbery with a confused look on her face.
I rolled my eyes. "It's rude to stalk your fellow 'mon you know, and shouldn't you be indoors?"
"Sorry mister Ronin… and missus Kira. I just thought that you were leaving town for good… I got excited when I found out that you were still here."
Kira giggled as she gestured for Lily to come closer. "Well you followed us all the way up here, might as well enjoy the view."
Lily sat between us and stared out into the sunset with awe. Her head slowly tilted slightly with her tail wagging, like she wasn't paying attention to what her body was doing. The look persisted on her for a few minutes as we sat there.
Eventually she broke the silence. "I've never been out this far from the town before…"
"When you grow up and become an explorer, you can go out as far as you want from town." Kira said in a wistful tone. Lily's look darkened in response.
"Mom and dad always told me that it was dangerous… sometimes they'd come back with big cuts and have to be healed." Something seemed to break within her heart. Tears began to well up in her eyes. "It's been too long… they're gone… aren't they?"
I looked at Kira. What was the right thing to do here? I was at a loss, my mind blank and without any meaningful thought. Maybe she knew. I'd trust her judgement here, I wasn't too good with this sort of thing.
More rustling in the bushes sounded out behind us…
I jumped to my feet and turned around, finding us surrounded by Pokémon with weird badges and hoods. I felt nothing but malicious intent from their emotions.
My blades extended out as I stepped out-
Pain riddled through my chest as something sent me flying into the air. I reached out to catch myself, but seeing nothing but Kira's horrified expression above me as I continued to fall. I saw her try to fight them off as I fell…
The ground approached far too fast, air whining past me with every second. I braced for it as I closed my eyes.
