KANE OSAKA
A/N Making up a religion is insanely difficult.
"Mew guide my steps, know my path, light my way." The words came unbidden to his lips, the familiar prayer soothing in the dim light of his motel room.
If he hadn't gotten lost, Kane might have stayed at the place of worship here in Saffron. That had been his original plan. It was a narrow, but long, building in the centre of the city, where people could pray in safety and those dedicated to their faith could stay for a few nights. It housed rooms of worship for all deities – except the new Unovian religion. Kane had asked Elder Fuji about it a few weeks before he'd left on his journey. It was a religion that stemmed back centuries, to the Mayan and Aztec times. It was the worship of the three Unovian weather gods: thundurus, tornadus, and landurus. Together, much like the holy bird pokémon, the kami trio symbolised the different domains of the world: landurus of the land, tornadus the heavens, and thundurus the in-between.
Kane felt uneasy when he thought of the kami religion. He held no prejudice against the Unovian ways of practices: that was not the way he had been taught. Privately, he believed in the birds and the dogs, with mew as the ultimate guardian of all.
Shaking his head at his thoughts – your goal is to understand all deities, Osaka - Kane closed his eyes even tighter and bowed, his forehead touching his crossed knees. The candle before him flickered gently, casting up strange, slender shadows on the stained wallpaper of his room.
Eventually, he rose. Turning on the stuttering lamp on the bedside table, he then extinguished the candle. He'd brought twelve candles with him on his journey, one for each month he'd spend abroad. After a year, Kane planned to return to Lavender for a brief respite before travelling east to Johto.
Kane packed away his prayer items and sat on the bed. Outside, the sky was black, punctured by small white stars that managed to decorate the otherwise smoggy night sky. The glow of occasional traffic and streetlights coloured the building opposite the motel in an eerie ghostly light. He felt totally alone in the world.
He twisted around to look at yamask. The ghost pokémon was floating serenely in front of the door, eyes unblinking. Kane was glad for its company. He'd only owned yamask for half a year, its absence so perfectly aligned with Rina's disappearance. Ducking his head, Kane stared blankly at the bedspread. Thinking about Rina made him feel… unholy. It made him lose sight of his goal. It made him want to seek vengeance, though on what or whom, he could not say.
Kane raised his head to meet yamask's gaze, the pokémon now drifting in front of him.
"Thank you for being with me, yamask," he murmured, allowing himself this one moment of weakness.
The ghost pokémon nodded, then one translucent hand reached up to cup his cheek gently.
Kane stared at yamask in astonishment. His pokémon had never before done anything other than stare and float about and occasionally nod. It was the ultimate example of piety and control, one that Kane hoped to emulate.
But as Kane gazed at yamask in this moment, he felt… whole.
It was an odd sensation. The ghost pokémon did not quite touch him, but its hand hovered above his skin, at once both freezing cold and hot. Kane felt himself start to sweat, as if he had broken out in fever.
For minute or so more, they simply stared at each other, then yamask drew its hand away and floated backwards.
"I… thank you," he managed breathlessly. He felt light as air, as if he too could rise up, passing through the roof of the motel and upwards into the heavens, taking Rina's cold hand in his own and staying with her for eternity in mew's grace…
Kane breathed deeply, suddenly overwhelmed. His eyes prickled with unshed tears; his throat constricted. Kane fell back onto the bed and curled up in the foetal position, covering his face with his hands.
How can I complete my journey? he thought wretchedly. I can hardly manage myself.
Although he could not see, cocooned as he was in his world of darkness, his hands shielding his eyes, yamask's hand hovered over his left cheek once more. Kane shuddered violently, this time the sensation ten times more powerful. Waves of ice and flame, like great shelves of snow or volcano ash in a storm, rushed over him - draining him - until Kane managed to heave himself up with a great expense of his remaining strength to stagger into the dingy adjoining bathroom. He clutched the sides of the grimy toilet and retched and heaved until nothing but sickening dribble slid down his chin.
Gasping for air, Kane started to cry in earnest, huddled over the stinking toilet.
The Six give me strength. Mew guide my way. Mew guide my way. Mew…
His head spinning, Kane's vision blacked out once, twice, until he toppled sideways, hitting his head on an exposed pipe and didn't move for a long time.
Yamask gazed down at his master lying crumpled on the grey floor of the motel bathroom. The contents of the toilet rose in putrid fumes, although yamask could not smell it.
The ghost pokémon moved to hover over Kane Osaka. After a moment, its eyes started to glow.
At once, the light in the motel room trembled, then cut completely. Cries of confusion echoed into the room from the other clientele of the motel, though yamask paid this no mind. In the darkness of the dingy bathroom, the colour of its red eyes grew in saturation, like a beacon in the night or an exploding star.
The temperature in the bathroom dropped. The form of Kane Osaka started to shiver, his body coping with the change of its surroundings automatically, his brain functioning only on autopilot. Ice formed on the cracked mirror and the grimy porcelain surfaces. The fluorescent tube on the wall burst.
In the stillness of room 29, the ghost pokémon started to chant. The song was a song of old, when Black Europe was verdant and populated, and great human-built structures straddled the Earth. Yamask sang not from experience, but from memory, drawing on the powers of the in-between.
Slowly, shadows started to play upon the walls. Yamask had noted its kin from before, when Kane Osaka had trembled and knelt before his stuttering candle, praying quietly, unknowingly drawing spirits to this opening between worlds; the rift that formed as Kane Osaka prayed to The Six and to mew, the shields around his world fading away like melting ice.
The shadows mutated, their beings so black and void less that when yamask glanced at them, he could glimpse the parallel beyond. In the darkness, faces flashed in and out of sight, the ghost pokémon's human masks the only acceptable form they could take.
As the chanting swelled, the shadows started to move in a vortex about the room. Their forms slipped over the walls and floor and ceiling, racing racing racing like a whirlpool or a thunderstorm, building to a great cacophonous climax, the high chords of the song reaching impossible levels – the mirror split down the middle, the knobs on the taps burst off and water gushed forth – and yamask hovered above Kane Osaka, singing wonderfully, horribly, until…
Kane's eyes drifted open, slow as molasses. The first thing he was aware of was how wet he was. He shifted his head, feeling the water beneath his body stir gently with the movement. When he attempted to hoist an arm beneath him, his clothes dragged with the added weight.
Gradually, he became aware of other things. Like the sounds coming from the street – hover car horns and people talking. There was banging coming from the room next to his, someone yelling down in the foyer, a murmured conversation buzzing past in the hallway.
He was cold, though the water he lay in had been warmed by his body. Surprisingly, Kane felt no different than if he had awoken from an extremely deep sleep; the sort of slumber in which one does not move or dream.
Kane lay curled on the floor for a few more moments, before pushing himself up. The whole right side of his body ached with lying on the tiled floor. His breath hitched as he clambered to his feet, though he nearly fell with the effort. Clinging to the rim of the sink, Kane took in his surroundings.
The entire floor of the bathroom was covered in a thin layer of water. The knobs off the taps had come off, lying partly submerged on the floor. The shower curtain had been ripped down and was draped over the side of the bath. Kane turned around, catching a sudden whiff of the mess in the toilet, to see the mirror above the sink was patterned with cracks, like a kaleidoscope.
Resisting the urge to vomit again, Kane clutched his way blindly over to the toilet and flushed it. He held his head in one hand, feeling the thudding pulse of blood beneath his fingers.
"Yamask," he called eventually, his voice quiet and hoarse with disuse. He cleared his throat. "Yamask?"
The ghost pokémon floated around the doorway into the bathroom. Kane nearly fainted with shock.
Yamask was no longer yamask. Its body had elongated into a rough rectangular shape, the dim morning light glossing over the surface to gleam gold. A pair of red eyes peered from a black mask at the top, and as Kane watched, a gash of a mouth slid open, revealing rows and rows of neat pin-sharp teeth.
Kane couldn't speak. On either side of yamask, two arms appeared, the four limbs together nebulous, though translucent. Its two left arms extended, four fingers sprouting from each stump.
"Yamask?" Kane could hardly get the question out. When the pokémon before him nodded, its entire body rocking forwards with the motion, like a pendulum, Kane had to grab onto the sink again to regain his balance.
He knew hardly anything about… pokémon evolution. Before Rina's disappearance, he had been like any child, reading up on everything pokémon-related, as befit a young trainer-to-be. But after Elder Fuji's acceptance, he had no time for pokémon research or training. His days were filled reading up on all things religious, querying the Elder whenever the opportunity called for it.
Kane didn't even know what yamask was. What had his partner turned into? Was it still even his yamask?
Even as he thought the question, he knew it stupid. Of course it was his pokémon. Ghost pokémon were notoriously shy creatures. If a strange, wild yamask-thing had been about his room, it would have eaten him long before now.
Kane shuddered. He had heard tales of pokémon devouring humans. How could he not, with Lavender as his hometown? Even the concept had crossed his mind when Rina... died.
Muttering a rapid prayer, Kane forced himself out of the bathroom – yamask floating out of the way, hands still held out in reassurance – and sat heavily down on the bed. His earlier notion of awakening from a deep sleep seemed impossible. Kane felt utterly drained.
As he sat there, mulling over what to do, something dark flashed in his peripheral vision.
Kane jumped and looked about him wildly. His room was empty, save for him and yamask. Dreary morning light bathed the room in a faded pink-yellow hue. His belongings lay at the foot of his bed, neatly arranged.
He was suddenly aware that he was still dripping wet. Kane got to his feet hastily, tugging off the sopping garments. Yamask watched as he went back into the bathroom and started running the bath, shaking out his robe and hanging it over the bare shower curtain rail.
As Kane submerged himself in the lukewarm water, his eyes travelled to yamask, who was drifting silently in the doorway of the bathroom, its red gaze staring resolutely ahead. He wondered if yamask was praying. Kane ducked his head underwater, rubbing his hands over his bald scalp. He held his breath for as long as he could, deaf and blind in this warm universe.
When he broke the surface, Kane couldn't stop the thought that flashed across his mind: And so, mew was born anew.
The foyer of the motel was dusty, the carpet an odd sludge-coloured rag that might have once been red, an unashamedly early-21st century style to the wallpaper and light fixtures. The counter was manned by a middle-aged man with a ponytail. He was flicking through a magazine, not watching the television playing behind him.
Kane approached the counter, his rucksack slung over one shoulder, and yamask hovering at the other. Kane had thought they might have some trouble getting out of the room – yamask was now three times as big as it had been previously – though his pokémon had merely dissolved through the door. He was also hesitant to bring up the state of the bathroom. Kane had attempted to tidy it up after his bath, sweeping the bits of broken glass up and screwing the tap knobs back on. As a result, the bathroom was somewhat clean, although the fluorescent tube was blown and the mirror was completely broken. He'd lit a candle afterwards and prayed for a good fifteen minutes to cleanse himself. Kane kept seeing something dark flash in the corners of his eyes.
"Good morning," he greeted politely. The man glanced up and grunted, turning a page in his magazine. As Kane put the key of his room down on the counter, the logo of the Kanto news station played across the television screen.
A man and a woman sat behind a desk, grinning at the camera.
Good morning, Kanto, and welcome to Sunrise. It's currently seven o'clock in the morning. The temperature we're looking at today will be about seventeen degrees Celsius, with some cloud cover and windy periods. There's a chance of rain later on in the day.
Down the bottom of the screen, the same words were repeated in English. Most people in Japan spoke English as well as they spoke Japanese. Back at the end of the Third War, every sign or television show or book was translated into the main languages of Europe, as well; Japan had had to accommodate a huge influx of refugees following the War, and the country had swelled in population. The government had attempted to keep each language alive, although one by one they'd fallen by the wayside. Some pockets of society spoke the old languages in the ghettos – Saffron, for example, had a small Spanish colony – though English and Japanese were expected of everyone.
Now, onto our news stories this morning from across Japan. Mossdeep city today will be celebrating the eighty-sixth year anniversary of the successful endeavours of the Hoenn Space Project. The Mossdeep city gym leaders, twins Tate and Liza Sidera, third of their name, have announced the launch of their new shuttle, Enterprise. The shuttle will expect to launch at eleven o'clock tonight, on its way to complete the final preparations for the colonisation of the moon.
A string of attacks on pokémon gyms in Sinnoh has prompted officials to authorise a temporary ban on pokémon battling in the northernmost region. The shock announcement came late last night, when a 'group of youths' exploded four wheezing in Eterna city gym using fire pokémon, devastating infrastructure and causing a small landslide to cover the western side of the city. We'll bring you more information as it develops –
"You gonna get goin', kid?"
Kane tore his gaze from the television to stare at the man behind the counter. His brow was furrowed and he gave Kane a pointed glance towards the door.
Apologising hurriedly in Japanese, for that was what the man spoke, Kane stepped away and started towards the entrance.
Finally, tonight in Rustboro, Devon Corporation is rolling out the red carpet for their annual gala. The social event of the season, elites from all over Japan are expected to attend at the behest of Devon Corporation's acting head, Mable Stone…
Kane stepped out into the street, the muffled voices from the television dissolving in the cacophony of the main road. Early-morning commuters mechanically sped down the street, just as they had on the first morning Kane had arrived; eyes down, backs straight. Saffron was no longer the hub of business that it used to be, but habits die hard, Kane supposed.
He turned left and walked down the street, trying not to bump into anyone or get in their way. He needn't have bothered. One glance at the massive ghost pokémon floating along behind him was enough to make people veer to one side, as if he were a rock in a raging river. Kane felt uneasy. Many eyes stared a little too long at yamask – he wasn't sure whether it was because Saffron was a primarily psychic-type city, or because yamask was from Unova. Elder Fuji had given him yamask as a gift, following his acceptance into the faith. It had never bothered Kane before that he owned such a rare pokémon, but clearly, here in Saffron, it meant everything.
Although he was a little confused – people hadn't acted this way yesterday, when yamask was still… yamask – Kane didn't want to take any chances. He already knew he was a target, with his old-fashioned clothing and distinct look about him. Turning his head to one side, Kane murmured a request to his pokémon.
A block later, when Kane went to cross the street, he could no longer see his ghost pokémon. Relieved, he continued through the city, yamask following behind him, invisible.
Kane travelled for about half an hour, getting lost only once, until he finally came across his destination. The narrow building was in a street just off the main shopping district, and at the entrance of the street, people hurried along, shopping bags swinging and high heels clicking. No one glanced into this street, not when there were more important things at hand.
The building was far more run down that Kane expected. A faded sign over the double doors proclaimed that this was the Ho-se of Div-ne W-rs-ip.
The foyer, an eight-sided room, was colder than outside, where the autumnal sunlight barely touched the pavement and the breeze rattled his bones. On the far wall sixteen thin banners were hung, each painted with the kanji name of the pokémon it represented. Underneath each banner was a small donation box and a collection of low candles. Some had gone out, the air foggy with smoke.
Above the main banners, five additional kanji scrolls were hung. These all had a small watercolour image: regigigas, arceus, rayquaza, giratina, and… mew.
Kane made a beeline for the six banners of the dogs and birds, above which was the image of mew. He relit any of the dead candles and made a donation in each box, before praying quietly for a moment. Afterwards, he made a donation to each of the other boxes beneath the remaining deities.
Although he had never been here before, Kane knew the layout as well as he did his own home. These houses of worship never differed across any region. There was always the main foyer, which was like an entrance room, meant to symbolise purgatory. Four open doorways sprouted off from the main room, above each doorway a kanji symbol dictating which room beyond belonged to which deified group and their corresponding region.
Kane took the rightmost doorway ('Kanto and The Six') and went down a dark passage, remembering that this symbolised the journey from purgatory to his chosen heaven. The room beyond was cramped, though it served its purpose.
The ribs of the high ceiling were bare, yet carved into the six pillars of the room were statues of the three dogs on one side, the birds on the other. At the end, below a glassless hexagonal window, was a carving of mew.
Kane had been in places of worship greater than this: he'd been in buildings that were massive and constructed from sandstone, with beautiful stained-glass windows and glass sculptures of the deities. He'd been in places where congregations gathered for a mass service worshipping their gods. Kane had heard of groups in Hoenn where people drowned themselves, or buried others alive, or burned people on stakes far out at sea in rituals meant to bring them closer to purification.
His gods were not like that.
Kane knelt on the cold ground before the statue of mew, looking into its hollowly carved eyes.
When he was like this – empty, lost, yearning for fulfilment – the mew was always his guide. Prayer brought him ultimate peace, unrivalled by anything in the world. Kane didn't know what he would have done, had he not found his faith. The rest of the world seemed so small and unimportant next to the purity of mew.
Some people didn't worship only mew, however. Some thought mewtwo to be the twin of mew; this idea derived from Elder Fuji and South America, naturally. Kane didn't quite know what he thought. If mewtwo was the twin of mew, then reasonably all life had to be derived from mew. Mew was the father and mother of the world. But mewtwo's origins were only loosely based on mew's DNA. The rest of it was created by humans, and eventually destroyed by humans, a few years after the Third War. Mewtwo was created to be invincible, yet it perished. Mew was everlasting, immortal, perfection itself.
Kane realised his face was wet. He wiped away his tears and stood, humbled and cleansed by being in this house of worship and safety.
He knew he could stay the night here, if he wanted. He need only seek out the Elder in charge.
Kane turned, ready to pay his respects to the other deities of this house, when he noticed someone else was in the room.
The person near the doorway was male. His head was shaved, much like Kane's own, though his robe was not grey, but a pale brown. The fabric was lighter, as well, as if it was made for hotter temperatures. The man was possibly a little older than Kane. His face was thin, his eyes slightly wrinkled. The dominate feature of his face was his nose, which protruded like a braviary beak.
"Mew protect and bless you," Kane greeted.
"May The Six grant you strength and wisdom," the man replied. He walked over to Kane and stood looking up at the statue of mew. Up close, he was even uglier, though Kane felt he had a certain aura of calm about him. Kane wondered if the man had reached purification.
Kane made his way to the door, though as he was about to vanish into the darkness of the hallway, the man spoke suddenly.
He turned to look back at the stranger. "My apologies," Kane said, "but I did not catch -"
"Are you on your journey?" the man asked, but before Kane could answer he said: "I am sorry; it was presumptuous of me to…"
"Not at all." Kane went back to stand beside the man, his eyes drawn irresistibly to look at mew one more time. "Yes, I am on my journey. I left my hometown only yesterday."
At the man's querying look, Kane explained, "I am from Lavender town."
"Lavender," the man mused, one hand coming up to toy subconsciously with the necklace he wore. Kane hadn't noticed it before: it was a six-sided silver star, with a round crystal in the middle. When the weak candlelight caught it, the crystal gleamed all colours of the rainbow. "A strange town, many would agree. Where are you headed?"
Kane didn't mind all the questions. The man was a fellow brother; he had nothing to hide from his kin. "Celadon, I am hoping," he answered, "and then Vermillion from there. I am travelling around Kanto, then by the year's end, I will be home again."
As Kane spoke, the man listened attentively. He reminded Kane of a politician, or a journalist, noting every word uttered and filing them away. "You are a brother of my faith, I see," he commented, glancing at the statue of mew and, briefly, at Kane's still-red eyes.
"Yes." A little embarrassed, Kane quickly brushed the sleeve of his robe over his face. The man smiled. "You are devout; this is good. There are too few young people in the faith, these days."
Kane didn't know what to say to that. They stood there for a heartbeat, both looking up at mew.
"I will leave you to your prayers," Kane said, moving back down the aisle towards the doorway. "Goodbye."
"Here."
The man had laid a gentle hand on Kane's arm. He was holding out another necklace, a replica of the one he wore around his neck. Kane smiled politely, but did not take it. "It is very kind of you," he said, "but I have no need for something like that. I do not believe in many worldly possessions."
"Think of it as a gift," the man insisted softly, pressing the cool necklace into Kane's hand. "I too believe that one should own little, but it has brought me clarity in times of strife. It may be only a trinket… Please, a gift."
Kane blinked, but uncurled his fist to look at the necklace, the light sliding off the silver. It was beautiful. "What does it mean? The shape of it," he clarified.
"See here." The man stepped closer to Kane, a slender finger indicating each point as he spoke. "The points of the star represent The Six. In the middle, there is the crystal, which is mew. Mew is the centre of the universe. All beings revolve around its grace."
"And where do we, humans, fit into it?" Kane found himself quite enamoured with the necklace; the symbolism was pious and meaningful. He was fine with candles and incense, but this necklace seemed to serve as a touchstone: a reminder of one's faith, even when candles and incense were not at hand. It was like a prayer, there at all times.
The man took the necklace gently from Kane's hand and turned it over. On the back, the outline of a small circle had been carved into the silver, parallel to the crystal on the other side. "The circle represents us. We are shadows of mew, its devoted servants and children. Mew guides our steps, knows our path, and lights our way. It is with us always, forever, until the end of time."
A/N If you're confused about the whole religion thing, I'm sorry. I got a bit confused myself and couldn't really make up my mind and then I had to sit down and really figure things out and make them like TOTES LEGIT. I'll explain what I have in my mind briefly.
Basically, each region has a trio of legendary pokemon/gods, right? Kanto has 'The Six', which are the three birds and dogs, and they are ordered around by mew, who is ultimately divine. In Johto, you have lugia and ho-oh, and they also have 'The Six' - Johto and Kanto are so close to one another, their religions kind of melt into one another, with only minor local differences. Hoenn has the three golems and groudon and kyogre, and they former are ruled over by regigigas and the latter by rayquaza. Sinnoh has the three lake guardians, dialga, and palkia, and all of them are bossed around by arceus, with giratina as kind of a shadowy overlord. Giratina, though, is a new addition to Sinnoh religion, as when Europe fell, Japan took in like a lot of refugees, and for Sinnoh, that meant a lot of middle-eastern people. I'm a bit hazy about this, but I'm drawing a parallel between giratina and the old Egyptians gods like Horus, Anubis, etc. Hey, it looks Egyptian-y to me.
Unova is a totally different bag, but as Kane explained, their religion is divided between the 'old' (South American/Native American almost) and the 'new' (i.e. the muskateer pokemon, which remind me of the Spanish inquisition and the slave trade and stuff like that). When it comes to the mew/South America connection, I'm just white-washing over that and gonna say that YOU'RE GOING TO HAVE TO FIND OUT i.e. I'm not entirely sure yet and I'll get back to you.
I sure hope you're enjoying everything so far. (: I'm very addicted to writing this, I must say. I have exams in two days, I kid you not, but I've been updating this instead.