MOATS

"Hm?"

They were in the sewers. They were actually in the sewers, below Viridian itself, on a brick precipice over brown and filthy waters. Vaults and keystone arches sprawled out like torments on every side, and most of the floor was soaked in slop. Only a couple of walkways rose above the streams, covered in damp moss. It smelled like Martha's worst cleaner's nightmare.

The old woman – Agatha, that was her name – stood a few yards ahead of Martha, half-turned her way. "You were saying?" she asked.

"I, uh, I'd like you to repeat that, please." Martha tried to stand up a little straighter. "Please," she repeated.

"Right now, the world up there" – Agatha pointed towards the surface overhead with her torch – "don't know you exist. That's the gist of it, anyway."

"But –"

"Lady. I'm sure you have lots of questions, but this definitely isn't the best place for a conversation."

– then why bring me here –

– then why follow –

– because I have nobody else to –

"– me, and I'll take you to the Blood King. You'll get your answers there, and then… We'll see." The woman sighed, and set off ahead. "It's a bit of a walk, sorry about the stink."

And Martha –

– followed.

Mer was completely quiet in her arms. It didn't move, not even with breath, did turtles even do that or was the shell too hard? She rubbed against its side with her thumb, it was stiff and coarse, like a loofah, dry against Martha's blouse but felt like it ought to be wet, like a peeled carrot. 'Squirtle', Agatha had said. Squirtle. Squirt. Water, wet. Water?

"So… Why'd you leave Pallet?"

Martha hadn't realised that she had been walking. Now she saw the filth floating by only a couple of feet to the right; she recoiled.

Agatha had stopped right before a junction, was looking back at Martha. "I mean, that's a pretty steady gig, isn't it?"

"I, I suppose so?"

"So why'd you leave?"

"Because –"

– Oak's crinkled face, the piles of books on his workdesk, the weak table lamp that left the corners of his office in a dusty darkness, the sound of paper slowly sliding, sliding; Oak's shocked face, the confession she made while half out of breath, the flicker of the bulb as she grabbed the desktop, the noise of nineteen years of loaded springs coming unloaded; Oak's broken face, the final plea, the light growing darker, the silence that followed, Oak's face –

"– because I don't..." She swallowed, tried to force the images down with the spit, tried to push them out of her head, why, Martha, why, push them out, Martha, why –

"… I don't want a steady gig," she managed. "Not any more."

Agatha nodded. "Well, I can tell you you got what you wanted," she said, and glanced off to the side. "I think it's pretty darn safe to say you got the opposite of what you didn't want."

The opposite of what she didn't want…

"… Agatha?" She was surprised to hear her own voice, swallowed again but decided to press on.

"Yes?"

"You said, people don't know I exist."

"Correct."

"What, uh, what do you mean?"

Agatha sighed again, glanced down at Mer. "It's a thing that happens when you leave a steady gig," she said. "I won't explain it all here. But it's on that Squirtle, too."

That Squirtle – Mer. Outside the Pokémon centre, across the road. In her arms now, even though it was hit by – a car…

The shell was in Martha's arms but it was still still, silent and dry, and the doctors had never looked at Mer, and she didn't dare to look down in case she saw a wilted blue husk, she stared at Agatha instead, asked –

"Am I dead?"

The truck, she really had been hit by a truck, she hadn't just collided with Agatha but with traffic and now her body was by the roadside, being loaded into an ambulance to be taken to a morgue and –

"No. You're not."

– she wasn't.

"If anything, I'd say you're more alive now than before." The words were happy, but the face was not, and the voice was calm, far too calm to be delivering good news. "But… You may come to regret that."

"Why?"

But Agatha didn't reply. She reached out an arm instead, and touched the disgusting green-brown wall, like she hadn't even heard she's ignoring you she's ignoring me she's hiding something from you she's hiding something dirty old bat please don't let her have heard that

"Why?" Martha asked, more pointedly this time. "Why will I regret that?"

"No time for questions now," said Agatha, running her hands up and down the wall. "Wait 'til we get there…"

And Martha said – nothing. She opened her mouth, but no words came out at all – this time, the "Why?" died in her throat. She looked down at Mer. The Squirtle was quiet, as quiet as the words Martha was unable to speak aloud, but it peered back at her, anxious, but still didn't move, and she tried to smile, but didn't.

And then –

"Right, that should do it. Grab my hand, lady – keep your grip tight round that tortoise, too." Martha obeyed before she even registered that Agatha was talking to her, before she even noticed that the wall had parted somehow, a glimmering gap like a tear in trousers; and she clutched Mer tightly with her one arm and reached the other out towards Agatha, and the old woman took it, nodded, said "Don't let go" –

– and stepped into the hole in the wall.