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step twelve
Sometimes Hopes Are Put On Hold
Sobek trudged up stair after stair.
Sobek was small.
Sobek was small so he stuck to the inside parts of the steps where the steps were smaller and each step had less of a rise between the steps but that meant there were more steps for him.
So many more steps.
Sobek trudged up stair after stair after stair after Sobek was small.
Sobek was small, which put him eyelevel to the stairs' middling railing that he clung to; the upper one far out of his reach and the bottommost too low to pull himself along with. So, he gripped the middling railing, the railing had the little grey light-orbs inset in the wood. Cold, tiny, unflickering flames set inside little cloudy glass orbs that lit the stairwell in a sterile, flat light.
The entire stairwell was lit exactly the same. Sobek didn't have a shadow. The stone was all the same shade of off-white grey. There was no depth, the stone was too smooth. There were just the painted lines on the steps and the corners in the walls and stone, hovering lines of orange in a blur of grey. Everything looked the same. Summit one flight of stairs, turn, and there was the same flight of stairs. Summit another, turn, and there it was again! And it was all that off-white grey.
And it went up and down. The whole way, it went up and down. It was all he could see. The grey went up and down the whole way.
Sobek trudged up stair after stair after stair after stair after stair after stair that's all there was.
The grey.
The grey was the walls. The grey was the floor. The grey was the air.
It was burnt into the air. The off-white grey. The nothing. The null. And it flowed. It flowed and spiraled down and past him and down and down the stairwell until it was pulled through the metal grates and into the void of the vents behind them. Metal grates. Big as Sobek. Bigger than Sobek. Patterned as trees. The grey flowed. The grey pulled him. It pulled him into the trees and the abyss beyond them.
Were they always trees? Weren't they mountains when Sobek had started? All he can remember are trees. Iron-wrought trees with gaps between the leaves that were just big enough for maybe a claw to fit through. Maybe just his arm. Maybe just his head. Maybe just his feet. Maybe just his screams.
Maybe nothing.
Maybe just nothing at all. Maybe just the grey.
Maybe just the walls and the grey as they flowed up and down and past him. Pushing against him with the bland nothingness of the air as it rushed into the pure utter nothingness of the abyss of the grate after it flowed down after stair after stair after stair after stair after a Charizard crowded by him in his rush downward. The pack on his back rustling spines on Sobek's head and a wingtip bounced harmlessly off Sobek's shoulder. The Charizard glanced back in half-apology only to narrow his eyes and turn away to bound again down the grey infinite.
The ceiling above was merely the underside of the next flight of stairs, and that next flight of stairs above was just only a few feet, a few torbs, above the Charizard's head, and a few torbs above that would be Sobek again.
And more torbs above that would be Sobek again.
And more torbs above that would be Sobek again.
And more torbs above that would be Sobek again.
And more torbs above that would be Sobek rubbed his eyes and shifted the pack on his back.
But if he looked down, Sobek was sure he'd see himself looking down, being sure that he'd see himself looking down, being Sobek shook his head and pulled himself along.
The ceiling above was too low for how wide the stairs were. It was lowering with every Pokémon that passed him—that Blaziken earlier was even stooping slightly—she sheepishly asked for directions, she had gotten lost and ended up in the wrong stairwell. He had none to give.
Wrong stairwell. Sobek had taken the wrong stairwell. Trudging up stair after stair with larger Pokémon crowding the steps; large Pokémon only made even larger by the lowering celling, crowding his section of the stairwell, bowling him over as he rounded the landing, pushing him closer to the wall and the vent, the same vent he saw every single floor, the same nothingness that permeated the air and pulled at it.
The same nothingness that pulled at him.
Pulled him down, down, down, down down downdowndowndown
stair after stair
after after stair after stair stair
after stair after
stair after a Machoke bolted down the stairwell beside him. The white streak of her cloak trailed after her and caught his snout.
He spun. The blinding white dazzled him. He couldn't see. He teetered on the steps.
The abyss beckoned.
From behind crashed green instead.
"Ack! Sorrysorrysorry!" the Grovyle grabbed Sobek by the shoulders and pulled him out of the air onto his feet. She laughed nervously and awkwardly backstepped a stair or two down to be at his eye level. "You, uh, I just—I just didn't see you there! Was, uh," she glanced down the stairwell, "Was just distracted with—with the nurse there. Nearly bowled me over too!"
"No. Sure. Yeah." Sobek turned and continued up the stairs.
"H-hey. Are you okay? You're as white as a sheet. A blue one. White as a blue sheet—blue as a blue—nevermind! Listen. You look like death. Are you feeling okay? Do you need any help? Should I get one of the—"
"Yeah. No. I'm fine." Sobek continued up the stairs.
He continued up the stairs.
He continued up the stairs.
He continued up the stairs.
Sobek then paused for a moment, if for just only a moment, Sobek paused.
He continued up the stairs.
The Grovyle laughed nervously again. "Um. O-okay then. But, um, maybe take a moment to rest on the next landing, you know? Just, take things one at a time? Err—and don't be so hard on yourself…! Okay? Can you… please do that? Tr… just try that? Can you, please? You look absolutely horrible."
"Sure. Sure, thanks, sure."
Sobek continued up the stairs. It was only another dozen or two until the next landing and the time passed with him focusing simply on the topmost stair. Just that one singular top line of orange.
He made it.
He reached the landing, he steered clear of the vent, and then he slumped against the grey wall.
A rest. Sobek took a rest. Yeah. Not a bad idea, taking a rest. Sobek took a rest. He took a rest.
If things weren't going his way, he should just calm down and stop freaking out. He was going to take things one at a time. One step at a time. One stair at a time. Sobek took a rest, and soon he would be better.
He sunk his head into his hands, rubbing his eyes only to groan at how they stung.
Sobek then mumbled to himself, "Calm down. Calm down. Downdowndowndown. Stop freaking out, start making sense of this." He held in a deep breath but let it out coughing. He nodded to himself. "There has to be a reason for all this. It can't as bad as this. It can't be. Not as bad. In… out... in… out… It's just the Square. You can handle the Square, Sobek. It's still the Square. It's still the—it's just different. Just… different. Just-just one foot in front of the other, like always. You can do that.
"I can do that."
Just one thing at a time.
He looked up to see the floor number. Five.
He had started on floor four.
Sobek sobbed.
The Minun scowled.
"Gaaahhk!" Sobek leapt to his feet only to trip onto his tail. The Minun just shook her head and grabbed his wrist. She pulled back to his feet and towards the stairwell he just climbed. "What. No. I just—no!" He flailed, but Minnie stoically dragged him towards the stairs. "Minnie—zzzzz-gahhhahaha-ow. I don't have any names to try on you—look! It took me this long to get up those stairs—where are you going?!"
The Minun pointed down.
"PPfffffffyyeeahhhhhmmmmmm."
She stopped two paces short of the first step and turned back to the Totodile. While her eyes were perpetually unenthused before, they now had a very anxious sheen to them. She held out her free hand low, then slowly raised it above her head until she shuddered and coughed sickly.
"Dav-vey? Sev-vey? Pshh!" She waved above them dismissively. She pointed to herself, to Sobek, then defiantly down. She huffed.
Sobek slowly nodded. "It would be my luck that the time I got up there I would have to turn back around."
The Minun pointed at him in agreement and let go of his arm. She reached up under her hat and pulled out two small oran berries. She tossed one to Sobek.
Sobek frowned slightly. "I think I'm—that's a lie, and we both know it. I'm barely good enough that I can save this for a few minutes from now. I… I just needed a short rest. I guess." He shook his head to clear it. "A rest, yeah, a rest, that's, huh, just what I needed. Thanks though." He held it out for Minnie to take but she waved him off with a mouth full of berry. "…I take it you're going to be joining me from now on in avoiding elevators?"
Minnie choked and pulled at the brim of her hat, shuddering underneath.
"Now if we can just convince the amnesiac, I'm going to name us Team No-levator." He headed toward the inner side of the stairs, where the rise to each step was smaller compared to the ones on the outer side. Those were up to his jaw. But… that just meant that there were many more smaller steps. Six small steps for every big step. One hundred and twenty steps. …that made one hundred and twenty steps.
Five floors, two flights per floor, six hundred steps.
"Oh, Palkia help us—maybe we should risk that deathtrap after all!" He paused, head held straighter in thought. "So. The water-type and electric-type of this team have issues with heights, right? Or at least great heights." It took a moment for Minnie to allow herself to nod. Sobek bit into his berry as the empty void beckoned for him again. "…maybe the ground-type beat us down there after all."
David's head panged and he found himself stumbling back from the railing of the Windfall's Sixth Floor Medical Pavilion.
He blinked harshly and shook the vertigo away. Then laughed hollowly in disbelief on his way back to the lower handrail of the iron railing.
And there before of him stretched the Commoner's Square.
Except, well, the Square wasn't a small neighborhood or a village or even shaped like a square for that matter.
It was a civilization.
A civilization nestled against the southern cliff of some kind of peninsula, but shielded from the rest of it by tall, magnificent walls of sunset stone. He could only see anything over the western wall, where the forest rolled away to the horizon with grassy plains dotting the way. The north was just a brilliant blue of ocean and sky, and the east the same as well, save some stone towers of a structure a good distance beyond the wall.
There was a lot of air traffic over there too. Lot of birds, at least one Dragonite—big shape with tiny wings can only mean Dragonite.
But that wall.
It was the long side of an oval split in half, lined with brilliant sunset orange stone that arced from the cliff's edge in the east to the cliff's edge in the west; the Windfall Rock Spire, and by extension the Windfall Hospital and David, at the very center of it.
And between David and that brilliant, brilliant wall were miles and miles—maybe three or four far and what had to be eight or nine across? Or maybe he was overestimating because he was so small? Or would that underestimating then? Either way, there were rows and rows of circles of red roofs, blue roofs, yellow roofs, clay roofs, slate roofs, and even some of glinting metal. Their heights started low then went up and down and then up again from the height of the buildings and the rolling of the hills underneath.
And dead ahead of him, death north, was an avenue that stretched straight from the gates of the hospital, through the central park and straight on, splitting in two at a huge rock spire to form two separate main gates at the wall—wait, that spire, that… that's a Zapdos. The entire upper part is carved into a Zapdos, its beak to the sky and its wings half-unfurled. The entire thing was carved, decorated even, but from so far away David could only see that beak, wings, and the spiky plumes of a Zapdos. Even from so many miles away, the silhouette was striking.
There were other spires scattered around the city, their peaks just above the roofline—oh! The buildings were built to match the heights of the nearby spires! Or… or the ones in the western half of town do. The buildings on the eastern side seemed much, much older—there was an entire wedge of the city to the east of him that was low-lying and just a mess of streets, very much unlike the organized half-circle grid of the entire town west of it.
And then there was this neighborhood to the northeast of him, almost halfway to the wall. It was set in a valley, much lower compared to everything around it. It was… the entire neighborhood looked circular by how the streets carved gaps in the buildings. Circular, focused around a gigantic spire in the middle. Like the Zapdos one to the north, it was carved and if he squinted—is that Rayquaza.
Is that a gigantic Rayquaza carved into the side of the spire? That… that totally is a Rayquaza carved in the side of the spire. It is the spire. It's—it has to be larger than Rayquaza actually is, it has to be. The carving spiraled up the entire thing; tail at the base, head just below where David stood—that's like five stories high! But its base was set in a valley—that's more than five stories high!
Rayquaza's mouth was open, carrying a small hollow building to the sky. Marble pillars held up a silver roof edged with cobalt blue metals and with what looked like statues adorning the corners. Like a crystal-like cylinder with sharp metal horns—that's Dialga's head. Those are sculptures of Diaga's head. They even had a glinting gemmed chestplate in the center of them instead of the face. And there was a bell-shaped object within the Dialga shri—that's not bell-shaped, that's an actual bell, that is a bell adorned with Dialga's colors and gems shining brilliantly in the afternoon sun.
It's a belfry, a bell tower. It's a rock spire carved into a tower, with Rayquaza coiling up the sides, and, at its peak, Rayquaza held to the sky in its maw a belfry designed after Dialga. And the neighborhood around it, he could barely see it, but by how the sun reflected off the blue clay roofs….
It almost seemed like it was bowl-shaped. He could only see bits and parts the neighborhood, but the farther ones were taller the inward ones, and he could make out several streaks of Dialga's silver painted in straight lines, radiating out from the spire to the edge of the—it's a sundial, isn't it?
It's a sundial! The entire neighborhood is a gigantic sundial! David couldn't see the shadow from where he stood; it was hidden by roofs and the spire. It was afternoon. That's all he knew, and well, what he could see of the sundial didn't disagree with him.
…didn't he hear a bell a little bit after he got off the elevator? He heard two, the second very faint—there's a second one of these sundial/bell tower neighborhoods?! Where is it?!
It wasn't around the one he could see. He traced a river to the neighborhoods behind it, but just found layers and layers of buildings and the only arc these ones had had was the one the entire Square carried around the Windfall. But the buildings there were mostly low-lying, covered in greenery, and built around or over the river. Beyond that, David just couldn't make out any more. The buildings just west of the belltower were too tall, the distance too long, and his viewpoint too low for him to make out anything else behind them.
It certainly wasn't in the eastern areas—there was that Ekans-in-a-frying pan of a neighborhood, occupying a large chunk of the westernmost quarter of the city, running from the main boulevard just outside the park ring to a bizarre bit of wall that sat just more than halfway towards the actual border wall of the city.
It wasn't even the same orange stone of the outer wall. It was more yellow and it looked much… much older—like some remnant of an older protective wall that was just maintained. And even though it's not the only odd chunk of wall around—there's a few scattered in the park right next to the Windfall's base, this one seemed… charred over. Scorched even. There was a second wall beyond it, this one covered in soot and ash and between the two were very large dormant chimneys. There was an avenue that ran between the bell tower neighborhood and the old part of town; it went right by the weird sectioned off part of town and out a third gate at the proper wall.
David could just make out a gate on the inner, scorched wall, like there was this part of town segmented off from the rest and all its walls were covered in ash. So… fire prevention? The old town did look… really flammable. Most of its buildings were wooden and, well, old. Very old.
David couldn't see over the second wall, but the area around the gate of the ashen-place was a big market that went straight up to the actual city gate. The streets were crooked and the tents dingy from ash, but the entire place was a kaleidoscope of moving Pokémon.
Suddenly, that thin bit of the outer orange wall that jutted inward to separate the dingy marketplace from the clean, proper river-side neighborhood made a bit more sense.
The northbound avenue was flanked by small parks and somewhere behind the Zapdos spire was the source of the river. Maybe it came from outside the wall.
But the wall.
That. Wall.
That gigantic, beautiful, huge wall. It was far taller than the outermost ring of buildings and while some of the inward ones blocked his view of it, that striking orange went one-hundred eighty degrees around David, from the edge of the cliff to the east to the edge of the cliff in the west. It wasn't a perfect arc; it bowed in and out to use some of the spires of the peninsula as guard towers. Each of the three gates David could see were bordered with sizeable watchtowers and capped with bright tan and orange flags. David could just make out another pair over the ash-walls to the east, so four city gates?
But this brilliant orange stone! Where did they get it! It… it…!
It would totally make a great archway for the door to his home.
A beautiful stone frame of this orange, laid in a mosaic of angles and ever-so-wavering hues with a big, flat rock to stand on and an amazingly trapezoidal keystone with his name carved in big, bold runes to say, yes, this is his house. This is a place he put his blood and sweat into to make it a home, a place he's proud of to bear his name.
And! He was a Cubone. He wasn't that big. He'd only need like five or so pieces too! Leftmost, rightmost, two for the arch, and the keystone in the middle! Six for a floorpiece.
Or… wait. He's due to evolve in a few years or so. That's a growth spurt that will make a tiny door kinda cumbersome. Then again. David, Private Eye (Don't Trust Any Other Guy!), needs to actually take in clients through that door. Clients that are prooobably at least five times as tall as he is.
That's… maybe seven per side, assuming each stone was as tall as he was—could he even carry that stone by himself? Even a single piece that's bigger than he is? Even if he could, could he elevate it properly and maneuver it into an archway? Secure it?
On second thought, David, Pancake Detective (Be Sure Your Breakfast Ain't Defective!) seems like he'd have a very unfulfilling career path.
He'd... he'd also need a way to transport the stones from, err, wherever he would get them. That would mean a cart. A handcart might work—no, wait. Would tiny little David have enough leverage to pull a cart that could carry even three of those David-sized rocks?
He'd have to get a pack-Pokémon then. That… that wouldn't be impossible. There are like three dozen Tauros pulling carts down there and David Private Investigators will need some sort of cart to travel around in sooner or later. A Tauros would be overkill though for his team of three. Maybe he could hire someone to cart the rocks ohh.
Oh.
Hiring would require money.
Money is something he doesn't have much of.
Well… it's doubtful that he could get all the stone he needed all right away—or even if he did, he'd have no idea what to do with it! So maybe only one bit for the keystone in the arch but that would still be pretty nice! Why have a house that's all this muted brown color when there's this brilliant orange rock… um… somewhere?
Ah.
Stone comes from somewhere. Somewhere like a quarry. Quarry will probably sell the stone.
For money.
Money is something he doesn't have much of.
David huffed. Maybe he could at get some paint. Orange paint. Paint the keystone, maybe outline his windows. Fake it until he could make it. That seemed like a good way to go. Maybe.
Paint has to be fairly cheap, or at least cheap enough to swallow after funds were set aside for food and supplies and—that's food and supplies for all three of them, and that house needs more repair if three Pokémon were going to make it their home.
…maybe some orange dirt that he could like make into clay? He needed clay anyway, to fix his house.
The house with holes in the roof that he really, really take care of before it rains. The last thing he needed was for those holes to get large enough for the entire thing toooooooo—it better not collapse on him. If the entire thing falls down, he's sunk.
He felt confident that he could fix the house.
He had no confidence in building a house.
Food, supplies, actual home repair materials. That's… a money sink and a half.
He scowled at himself and hung his head.
David was suddenly reminded that he was actually six floors up. And each of those floors was many, many, many times his own height.
His stomach did a backflip and he took three shuddering steps back.
Heights—why was he fine looking outwards but not directly down? Maybe it reminded him that the Pavilion he was on was a essentially gigantic balcony and there was empty air some ways below his—David hummed in discomfort and hugged his arms tightly. His entire back was twitching and he was fighting to gain control of his tail again before it cost him his balance.
He shook his shoulders and forced his feet in lock-step back to the railing.
Heights.
David didn't think he was afraid of heights. He could look straight out to the ocean horizon and be perfectly fine. He can look across the city and see the teeny tiny dots of Pokémon going about their daily lives, Pokémon he'd be craning his neck up to see. He can look down on them just fine.
Falling.
It occurred to David that he didn't like the prospect of falling to his death. The railing was clearly built to prevent that; it had several handrails at varying heights for different sized Pokémon and even though he was leaning on the shortest of them—without even using the step for it! He wasn't that small! …he took some sort of pride in that…. There was also a mesh grid of iron from his chest to his feet to prevent any accidents.
His talons clacked against the stone pavestones, but the clacking felt hollow to him, like he was a push away from his feet slipping out from underneath him. Maybe the pavestones were fake, not really stone b-but some sort of plaster? Or-or they were only a covering for whatever laid underneath? But they were still stone! It was… it was smoothed by foot traffic but it still was gritty! It still had a lot of grip!
He wasn't going to slip. He shouldn't slip. There was no reason for him to slip.
He felt like he was going to slip.
David gripped the iron handrail and, despite knowing he could be upside down and not lose it, put a hand on his helmet. He stuck his head out slightly past the railing.
David looked directly down.
David saw the Third Floor Medical Pavilion. The garden part of the Pavilion to be precise.
The Third Floor Pavilion was almost an exact copy of the one David was on, just much, much larger and curiously had no roof. Up here, the medical garden's trees were just barely thick enough to lose the sense of the city beyond. Down there, a small forest ringed around the Windfall Spire. Up a small ramp from the garden was its therapy area, one much larger than the one David passed through. It had a larger fire pit for the fire-types to lounge in, a small pond rather than a small pool for water-types. A beach instead of a literal sandbox for David. There were probably even more across the entire ring.
The Third Floor Pavilion also was able to extend out atop the roof of the first two floors of the Windfall Hospital to provide a large sitting area, complete with a raised square, its corners in each of the compass directions. A stage?
There were several Pokémon setting up instruments along the northern corner and a Servine was counting out steps across the area. A stage. David's Pavilion had less of a stage and more of a long and deep step between the therapy area and the viewing platform.
The Servine glanced skywards, then double-taked. Her movements froze in a rigid shock for one long moment before she melted back into her routine with a shake of her head.
The only thing the upper pavilion seemed to have that the lower didn't was, indeed, a roof. Unlike the Servine, he couldn't look up towards the rest of the spire. Bizarre.
A deep voice called out to her—the Floatzel that was positioning the players and directing the construction of the short curved wall behind them on the northern corner. The Servine shouted a word over her shoulder. She glanced between the corners and took two steps east. She tapped her heel, pointing to the spot. The distance made the words unintelligible, David could barely hear the Floatzel and only because of how surprisingly deep his voice was. But even then it was a strain.
The Floatzel put down the instrument he held against the far side of the stage and walked over. David could only make out a curved swirl of the instrument's wooden neck, so perhaps a strange violin or a harp? The Floatzel was facing away from him when he was holding it, but he did hold it vertically. David would guess some sort of harp, but the Floatzel held a violin's bow. He pointed with it to the spot the Servine was standing.
Beyond the orchestra's sound wall was a fence, which then began the proper roof of the Windfall Hospital that stretched out quite a ways away from the spire's base with its rectangular and domed skylights scattered around. If David remembered the tourist advice from the far-too-chipper Kirlia acolyte (or whatever they called the nurses here), he said it was a general clinic for the Square's populace, the single largest within the Duchy and the region. And perpetually expanding as well.
Surrounding the Windfall and the Hospital was the Windfall Planter, so said the Kirlia. A grand public park in the middle of this city. A host of domed roofs cropped up in between thick canopies and lakes and rivers and paths, the most formal looking ones keeping close to the Windfall on the western side while the rest were scattered across the landscape. The park mostly stretched east and west, not so much to the north. Which made sense, that main avenue from the twin northern gates led directly here, though the pavestones forked westward toward several of the domed buildings on its way to the west face of the Windfall Spire.
The huge main boulevard that ringed the garden was separated by long-but-squat buildings. It seemed all the other streets in the city were built in respect to this one huge street. Except save the older eastern parts of town. The eastern half of the boulevard was hidden from David by the row of buildings that lined the park's edge, but the western half had clearly suffered from a fire. The park had an entire swath of a forest missing, with the last of the burnt trees being felled—there went one right now!
But the buildings on the park's edge were also caught in the fire. An entire arc, from a street that formed a radial avenue directly west of David to a bit of remnant wall almost north of him had been taken down to the foundations. Reconstruction hadn't started yet.
But in the space beyond, in the boulevard itself…
But… but… no… really…?
…yes, really— every single space was filled with merchants. Even in such the narrow swath David could see, where the carts didn't roll, there were stalls upon stalls. Buildings with awnings that stretched out over the bricks. There was food—berries, vegetables, herbs, spices. There was meat—raw and fresh from the butcher or cooked, seared, roasted, fried from the… just how many of food stalls lined that street? They were everywhere, spattered in between every other sort of merchant in the world. The carpentry workshops that sat on the north-eastern part of the boulevard, and there was a grocery between them with the bright colors of berries set out in baskets. The black-, tin-, silver-, red—really any kind of smith there probably was took up the west-most part of the boulevard—David could very clearly see a line of Pokémon in front of a stall on a corner and between the masses he could just make out a huge, frenzied bonfire as it fed off of the fallen juices of roasted meat.
And then there was this strange part of the north-western boulevard where the cart traffic was the busiest, where the biggest of the plazas were, and the operations of the merchants seemed to extend into the neighborhood around them. There were no goods laid out, but carts full of crates and boxes came out of and into alleys all the same. And there was this Salamance—no mistaking it as anything else, this gigantic blob of blue and red in the middle of all the traffic as it flowed around it. Directing traffic and trade, maybe? A… tall, green, long tailed, winged—Flygon. A Flygon trailed above in the air after the Salamance with a gigantic book—so big that David could make out the Flygon shuffling its pages around. The book was big enough that he could probably live in it. That'd probably be cheaper than rebuilding a house.
Except the trick then would be finding a good fairytale to live in.
All around the two dragons there was this… this constant moving sea of carts of metal and wood and all sizes and shapes being pulled by Tauros and Rapidash and Camerupt and Rampardos and Bastiodon and all around them pedestrian Pokémon walked and they were just everywhere, almost every single space of the boulevard was filled with movement in an endless flow and ebb and—
David's stomach panged and he stepped back.
Just… just how. Many. Pokémon are here, live here? Tens of thousands? Hundreds of thousands?
…a million? More?!
David approached the railing again. His head throbbed as he looked out, so he looked down.
The Servine was alone counting steps again, but doing so in a slow dance. She wore a costume now, a silk gown of silver thread and sky-blue trim. It had loose golden threads sewn onto the bottom of the arms that trailed after her movements and had a small purple hooded cape tied around her shoulders, secured by a glinting golden brooch. She wove across the stage; each spin, twirl, and step started with the point of her snout to flow through to the tip of her tail. Her cape and the golden treads and sky-blue trim of her cloak blurred in the air around her and each hesitation on her part wasn't so much to stop as it was to shift their weight. Like the Servine wasn't moving to move herself, but to keep up with the motion of the rest of her costume. The cape never laid flat against her back, it was always this… almost like an aura flaring around her.
And when she did come to a complete standstill, she was still moving. Her tail slowly carried on, gently spinning her on the heel. And yet, down to the smallest golden thread on her gown, she was completely motionless. She just turned. Somehow, she just turned, agonizingly slow for an excessively long time.
But then her cape shifted, the threads rustled and she was carried into a new motion across the stage.
A million Pokémon within the walls of one town. No. That's way too many. That's impossible. The city is big, but not that big.
The Servine flowed backwards, her feet only moved to carry the ripples that passed through her. She spun, shed her movement to the wind, and at last came to a rest with a skyward shake of her head. Her aura settled into a cape again.
But… there's a lot of small Pokémon, like him, like Cubone. Just as there are a lot of large Pokémon. Maybe not a million but….
Her eyes met David's again but immediately broke away to look beyond him. Her shoulders sunk with each breath she took. Her eyes lowered back down to the floor while she counted out steps to the spot she had found before. Then, her head lifted, her shoulders rose, and her aura ignited. A breeze had caught her and she was again flowing across the stage.
There was laughter behind him. It held not so much humor as it did profound relief and joy.
David turned. "Seve."
"David." The Sneasel knelt to David's eye-level as the Cubone approached. He wore no hat this day, instead sporting several loops of gauze that kept the bandages behind the square of his jaw secure. The fur of his face and left arm had been cut short, but if it was to treat the wounds or to even out the mess caused by the claws that made them, David couldn't tell. Mostly likely it was both. His right arm was in a plaster cast and sling.
A gloved claw gripped David's shoulder. "From its silk wings, Fate returns the Skull-Helmed Absol to the living once more. It is very good to see you."
"Um?"
"Hah!" He clapped David's shoulder. David stumbled. "David! David, David, David…. Hmmm. I see you cannot comprehend the absurdity of events that happened upon us before you fell to nightmares. Perhaps that is for the best."
"Was they really that bad? The nightmares? …I just remember an odd dream."
Seve's grin twitched. "Kah. Kahah! The only nightmare worth fearing is the one still felt during the morning. Worry not, worry not." Seve's sling suddenly needed to be adjusted. He fumbled with the clasp for a moment before giving up. "Though the more pressing horrors of the moment are those forced upon you by that infernal tailor." With his good claw, he tugged at one of the loose ends of David's scarf. The amber material was folded and tied in such a way that the two ends stuck out far behind him in a sharp V-shape. "I am quite serious. What even is this?"
David ducked out of the Sneasel's grip. "What? What? Oh! Um. N-nothing? It's just how I tied it."
Seve's eyes flashed quizzical. "You are the one who tied it?"
"Yeah, it's just how I tied it, so?" David was fussing with the knot to fix it, hands moving in a frantic precision while he shrunk away. Seve frowned. "What? No really, stop looking at me like that. What?"
The Sneasel shook his head and stood. "It is nothing. Just a curious way of wearing a scarf. Distinct even." He waved his claw, dismissing his thoughts to replace them with a scowl. "Though I do wish Chall had spared you the wrath of the Lickitung tailor. Like he said he would. Like he promised he would."
He glanced to David to see him fidgeting with the tips of his collar that poked out from his ridiculous scarf. Seve half rolled his eyes before he caught himself. The Cubone tried and failed to suppress a nervous laugh. "Um. Seve. Sorry to say this. But, eheheh, um. I actually like this thing."
Seve snapped-to and recoiled four steps, leaning backwards with fangs bore and face twisted in revulsion.
"What!?" David laughed anxiously. "It has a nice texture! It-it-its durable but it doesn't get in the way. It's warm and wind-proof—which is good! Because, you know, it's so cold up here in this wind! Maybe I just like it because it's Charmeleon leather and I'm a Cubone. You know?" He tapped his helm and shifted his club. He cleared his throat. "Seve, so I like the jerkin. Is that such a big deal?"
Seve's nausea unwound into discomfort as he shook his head.
While Seve's tweed tunic (and glove) was mostly meant to keep him from scratching at his bandages, David's… jerkin (what was a jerkin anyway?) was clearly meant to be an actual coat for protection with multiple layers of actual leather. The color of the Charmeleon leather had been muted into a brown more red than David's own scales were. The pattern of the scales was exaggerated with a darker amber color over the shoulders and the very short sleeves. Four tiny metal buckles held it close and snug: one at the collar that David had loose, two across the chest, and one over the stomach. Across the small of his back two small iron loops held his club, the smaller having a cap for the club's point. David's back-spikes poked through slits along the spine.
His satchel sat just over the club, the strap reworked into an adjustable clasp and the bag itself sporting new seams and cuts to allow him to reach into it effortlessly. He wore the collar tall, the tips catching on the bottom of his skull from the wind.
And then there was that amber scarf of his with the two absurd plumes of fabric jutting out from the knot at the back.
Seve swallowed his words and chose others instead. "I can only imagine how Sobek is feeling about his."
"His is Priplup."
"Kah! And here I thought Totodiles didn't like the Piplips!"
"I thought it was Piplups didn't like Oshawotts."
"Osha—? Wotter, ah. Hm. Hmm." The Sneasel waved his hand in dismissal and walked away from the railing to one of the many empty benches that sat across the pavilion. He fell into it, sinking his head into his good hand. "Well then. I must ask simply because I had repeatedly told him not to monologue: How many… 'thoughts' did Chall voice to you? Please, do not tell me all four."
Seve merely sunk deeper into his hand with a low groan. He didn't see David literally bite his tongue for an instant.
"Um…. Yes." Seve scowled at nothing. David spoke to seem as if correcting himself, "Well. Five, actually, but he revised one and counted it as, errrrr, quadthought—" THUNK
Seve shook the pain from his wrist. "Abby Doctors. Useless! The lot of them! You are not a puzzle for them to solve! The only one to solve your mind is yourself—but they never see that. And every single time, I tell them! I tell them constantly, yet I am but a mirror for them to reflect their thoughts while ignoring the image!" The bench rattled again. Seve swallowed with some difficulty and held up his uninjured hand. It shook in front of him. He tucked it under the sling. "…please, excuse me. I drown in sorrow as of late and when I surface, it seems I only flail in rage. I apologize."
"I-it's fine, Seve." David swallowed as the color returned to his face. He cleared his throat. "I'm—I should be the one apologizing…."
Seve silenced him with a shake of his head. "Of all Pokémon, you have nothing to apologize for, David. O Absol in the skull helm… kah. Kahahahaaa….
"O ye who walks these bleeding threads of fate, may I ask thee for aug'ry? Pluck my soul, listen to it sing. I beg of thee, tell me what dost my song dictate? I cannot afford a treas'ry, for all I have is but a tawdry. All I am, is but a tawdry!" He laughed again. "Ah, worry not. It's… it's from…. You would not know."
He laughed an awkward, saddened laugh that shed the last bits of irritation from his face. But he still looked through David with absent eyes. "So you have amnesia, David." He shook his head. "Chall has said enough on the subject, of that I have no doubt. It does not matter; it will be months until we hear word back from the Abby's High Dominion—gah! Such disgusting words!" He recollected himself with a roll of his shoulders. "Until then, I suppose that makes you the most reliable Abby Doctor the Gilded Lands has ever seen."
High Dominion. Seve was right, just the name made David's scales crawl. His helm wasn't helping.
David lifted the back of his skull to scratch his ear. "Seve, I'm not sure what I am, but I really don't think I'm a doctor. Chall mentioned pacifism somewhere and I, um, kinda hurt things. Quite badly, actually."
Or, kinda kill things. Doctors don't do that. At least they don't—that Elekid wasn't intentional! But, well, it certainly wasn't unintentional either….
"Indeed." Seve gestured to him with a nod. "I highly doubt you're a Squire as Chall thinks." His frown turned incredulous for a moment, "Or a rit—it matters not, ignore these words, they are meaningless. There are greater things to be concerned about. The most noble team I have ever known is once more only a Nidoran whose soul Death wants no part of. That is..."
Seve slowly looked up. The bench creaked as he leaned back and watched the clouds through the solid roof.
Then, just before the silence fully set in, "Why, indeed, are we up here? I am not partial to heights and you are in great need of proper stone beneath your feet."
"Uh, one of the nurses told us you wanted to meet us up here, Seve."
The Sneasel nodded in chide at himself. "It was a selfish, short-sighted request at the time, true. Though that does remind me, I did meet our Minun friend on my way here. She was headed towards the stairs down."
"She took one look of the view here and immediately went back, squawking all the way."
"That sounds very much like her. So where is Sobek then?"
"Avoiding the elevator. Hopefully the Minun runs into him on her way down—she wants a different name, by the way, and I have no idea what else to call her."
"Kahhah, Sobek and I are very much aware," he rubbed his knee. "Very much aware. Such a strange team you've assembled, David. A world-walking Totodile, that old loon of a Minun, and you, an Absol in all but form. Truly, it is a team that almost makes me believe in miracles."
"Can I ask something? How do you know that Minun anyway?"
"Ah. Well. I, very much like you, was... requested to visit the Thunderwave Cave, and—" Seve blinked and he straightened in epiphany. "As Hemura burns—perhaps the Minun is the Absol—another time, another time, I will think of this another time. So much of it has already gone by us already that some grow impatient.
"Such as a Lombre who currently sits down below in an all-too-familiar cart. That is my brother, Dimas. Far too quiet he is, but he will see you to a small part of town I more than welcome you to call home. Or, a home-away-from-home, as I do. It is the very least I can do for my newfound friends, and should I ever be able to do more, I will."
David was silent for a moment. His head was angled down slightly so his helm hid his frown. His back crawled and he still didn't know why. "I… thanks. Seve. Thank you." The Sneasel nodded, eyes closing in some form of relief. But his grin faded and he stayed silent.
A violin played a single sharp note. Seve seethed silent mumblings at himself.
The performers.
That was a indeed a violin the Floatzel had, though strangely shaped so that it rested fully down the length of his arm rather than just sitting on the shoulder and hand. He stood atop the stage, conversing with the Servine as he tuned the instrument. The Servine glanced upwards again. She double-taked, her eyes lingering for a long moment before again turning to the Floatzel.
The Floatzel drew his bow across the strings and a lone, powerful note played. He played it long, uncomfortably so, before taking and blurring it between pitches, breaking it apart into a staircase of triplets, marching up the scale and down again until it hit a sour note that finally broke Seve from his thoughts. The violin fell silent, and Seve sunk his head into his good hand, scowling long and tired.
There was this flaw in the iron railing. A scratch or something in the coating or the in metal itself. David's claws made small little scrapes along the edge. Flecks slowly flitted down and away in the wind but David was busy looking through the horizon until the sharp frays he had cut pricked his palm.
Below the violin was silent and behind Seve's breaths were troubled and ragged.
David pulled at the small filament he had cut in the railing.
Seve coughed heavily. "Excuse… please excuse me." He huffed. "Please, excuse me, a turmoil does indeed rage inside my mind, but I do not yield to it. I must not yield to it! No matter the number of claws that it rakes upon my soul.
"Please, permit me to tell you the truth, David, and O, how horrible it is. Glessite is not the first apprentice I have lost in my few years here at the Square. Nor her death the most tragic I have witnessed on this world." He took his head out of his hand and motioned to the sky. "But that does not deny the truth; the sun has bade her farewell. Tonight Hemura will set, and tomorrow Hemura will once more return to shine like our lives have never happened. But right now…? Right now, as I am, it is all… I can only do one single thing, David. And that pains me. It is all I can do to meekly ask Hemura for her blessings for when she shines upon dear Glessite again in her next life. Ah. Ahah." His hand fell to the armrest of the bench.
The filament snapped and fell through David's claws into the wind. "Oh. Oh. Um. I'm sorry."
"Though I do now just recall something about you Cubone." Seve didn't seem to hear him, he tapped his chin and continued, "Some old fable, about your helms, that wearing them allows you to put aside your fears and become what you need to be."
"I…." An old fable sounded much more appealing than crash helmets. "Err."
"A mask—a physical mask empowering, no, encouraging the soul to better themselves…! Or, perhaps, to grant disconnection from what they truly are…." Seve waved the thought away and stood. The fur below his eyes was damp. "Ah, I am sorry. Such a curiosity you are, David. A blank slate, defined only by its frame and the etchings on its reverse that none can see. It brings some introspection on one's own being."
Introspection.
David thumbed the nose of his skull and lifted it off. He lightly tossed it up to spin it facing him. It was his helm, still the Rilou skull he threw at the pooch the other day, just a bit more polished from when the nurses—acolytes, from when the acolytes had cleaned it. He frowned. Sobek was right, that was a really dumb move on his part, looking back. What was he thinking? "I get what you're saying, Seve, a mask is a mask. But I don't think I—" His ear was poked. He twitched it. "Um?"
Seve recoiled, his own feathered ear twitching. "I—I'm sorry. But... a-a Cubone without their helm is as almost as mythical as Volcana. Are... Are those...?" David's ears were again being poked and prodded.
"Vestigial organs in the form of a failed horned struct—" David flinched, smacking his forehead on his skull's. "Encyclopedia is still there—they're ears, Seve. Not—they're not really ears, but they're meant look like ears." He slammed the helm back into its proper place on his head. His ears twitched—he'd never really noticed how well they fit into the ear-bits of the Rilou skull.
"You look just like a young Kangaskhan. How bizarre!"
"Close evolutionary relative, ears are from before Cubone adopted the helm when they used Batesian mimicry to look like Kangaskhan joeys—okay! Okay! Okay! Stop, head! Stop it! Seve, apparently there's this big book of everything crammed into my head and it likes to ramble and I think it's been bookmarked to the Cubone entry!"
Seve laughed, loud and genuine. "A most bizarre Cubone! I must ask, why is this-this knowledge in your head to begin with? Is—oooh! Is this why you become lost in thought at the most inopportune times?! I tell you! I have been puzzled how you never noticed the Cyndaquil's smokescreen until… well." He awkwardly turned to the railing. "My deepest, most profound apologies once more."
David scowled and joined him at his lower rung, planting his chin on it and burying his head with his arms. A claw found the flaw, now a gouge in the smooth surface. "I don't know. Just… please don't set off the rest of the book report. It didn't make much sense the first time." His arms slid off his head and he let them fall limply to his sides. The waves on the horizon glimmered gently in the afternoon sun.
Seve said nothing.
"It-it's like whenever that... the encyclopedia, it just shoves what I'm thinking aside and spouts off everything and anything. It's—I mean, it helped with Nick back... back there, but I don't like it."
The Servine twirled below.
"I'm literally listening to myself talk or think or-or even move, Seve, but it's not me. It's not me, it's something else. Something else I have to shove it out of the way, get back control of my head— I... I have to fight it off—it's like there's another me and I have to fight it away to be me again! But that other me knows how to do the things I need to do, that I can't do as… as me."
There was a boat on the horizon. It wasn't there before. A tiny dot with the only clouds in the sky above it, slowly growing larger.
"I don't get it, is this how I'm supposed to be? I can't supposed to be slipping into... that. I have to be, well, just forgetting something? Right, hunter—?"
David choked and covered his mouth. It's not back, is it? It's not back—now is a very bad time for whatever feral instinct to pop back up.
Seve didn't notice? No, he's looking down.
This is…
This is going to happen every time he tries to talk about it, isn't it? It's like a headache, it's dormant until it's remembered again. Both that and the encyclopedia, two parts of him that just shove his thoughts aside—which instincts, Sobek said. Which instincts.
"N-nevermind," He scowled. "Just forget I said anything." He hung his head to find the Servine at the end of her routine, looking skyward again. She held the pose this time, though her body shook. She must be tiring out from the practice. She's gone through, what, eleven rounds by now?
But the Floatzel had taken note of the Servine and put it upon his violin. And the note was long and lonely, hanging in the air for an uncomfortable amount of time before he took it again to blur between pitches. He broke it apart into a staircase of triplets marching up and down the scale. Up and down and up and down and up to the hidden listeners and down, taking whatever thoughts that ailed them.
Seve's eyes closed as he smiled somberly at the sound. The Servine finally dipped into a bow and flowed offstage.
But the Floatzel stayed, weaving the sorrow into his violin, hanging on the long notes to then slur them together off-rhythm as he rallied the seated audience below, inviting them into the tale of tragedy he was to share.
Seve laughed at nothing. It might as well have been a sob.
"Little Skulled Absol, allow me to ask of you something quite selfish: Let me be. Please. Fret for this soul no longer; listen, for the violin already takes up the burden. Fate has hereby concluded its business with me. It shall not lead you again my way, if only till the morning. I... I would like to watch the actors." He looked fully down to David. The fur below his eyes glossy in his tears. "Glessite deeply looked forward to seeing them perform. As have I."
The lonely note sounded long once more, but this time it held steady. The Floatzel called out to the crowd below, but from this height his words were lost in the rich sounds of the violin.
"Yeah. Yeah, of course! It's a non…" David's attention was caught by a Grovyle with her hands over her face in some sort of frustration of embarrassment. She didn't see the Charizard sitting awkwardly halfway into rear aisle and her foot found his pack far heavier than herself. A Lucario pulled her out of the air and to his other side, waving an apology to the irritated Charizard. It settled for a huff of smoke in their faces before turning back to the stage.
The Lucario visibly laughed at the Grovyle, one arm tightly around her shoulder and the other holding the back of his neck as he cackled to the sky. His eyes locked with David's for a moment and waved a humored to hello to a curious observer, holding his hand in the air at the end of the wave. David waved back with equal humor; someone in the crowd had actually spotted them. The Lucario grinned, then laughed again as he nodded halfways to the Grovyle in some attempt to get her attention.
"It's a nonissue, Seve. I understand. Just, uh, can I ask that you stop calling me an Absol? It's, eheh, it's making my scales crawl." He looked up; Seve had on his most genuine grin today by far. "…you're not going to stop calling me an Absol."
Seve cackled, only to choke. He settled for wheezing with his side clutched. He waved David off. "If… If the bleeding edge of Fate's blade you walked does not convince you, let me tell you this," He leaned down and whispered, "it aggravates Chall. David. It greatly aggravates Chall and every other Abby doctor in this place."
"Skull-Helmed Absol it is!" If only to amuse Seve. If only to amuse Seve….
A roar of applause—and a general roar of excitement—came from below. There were not actually that too many patients in the crowd, they wore orange robes. It was mostly white, grey, an occasional black, three reds, and a single brown robed figure. Doctors, nur—acolytes, and… is that Chall? That is Chall, watching from the far right of the stage with far too intense of a stare. …and there's his clipboard right in his pincers. This did not surprise David.
The Floatzel moved backwards towards the sound wall as his narration concluded, only for a Shinx to half-crash into him as the kitten blitzed up onto the stage. The Shinx tumbled in his clumsy tin armor, somersaulting twice before popping up with veiled ease in the exact center of the stage in such an exact way that in the overdramatic pose he struck, the visor on his helmet fell down over his face. And then it fell off completely to the ground in an ear-piercing clatter.
The Shinx glanced down to it once, twice, before quickly biting it and flicking it up in the air. It landed as it should and he feigned teetering to balance it before slamming a paw to secure it and lift it back up. He struck his pose again to a fanfare from the miniature orchestra behind him, grinning as wild as a child with a nefarious plot.
The audience finally laughed the awkward air away. David couldn't help but feel as if the joke was at their own expense.
The Shinx hopped out of his pose and skittered across the surface, his turns and jumps greatly exaggerated until he jumped back off the stage and into the crowd beyond. He snaked his way through the crowd, pausing to look at one, poke at another. There was one brief moment where he managed to distract one of the red-cloaked watchers to make off with the apple they were eating.
As the rest for the audience laughed, a ghostly hand phased out of the ground next to the victim and left two apples before departing with a pull of the victim's cloak. It took a moment for the cloak to comprehend what happened; it soon had joined in on the laughter, albeit of a different tone.
The Shinx looped his way back the stage, almost near where he hopped off. He double-taked at a patient in an oversized orange cloak and shouted in epiphany before there was a bright spark of lightning.
The Shinx jumped back onto the stage and heroically announced the success of his search—his voice was far louder than it should be. The orange cloaked figure slinked onto the stage after him before throwing up its hands. The cloak was tossed aside, and there stood the Servine from earlier in her costume, plus the addition of a necklace with a comically large gem. Her movements were slow, short and fluid; the look on her face morose and weary as the Shinx hopped all around and over her to greet the growing number of actors on the stage, declaring in the awkwardly paced rhymes of a child something about squires and protection and—wait, really?
It's a play.
Wow.
This is a play. A play with light music supporting the action and all. This was a play. The Servine's movements about the stage were concise, and her subtle expressions clashed with the over-exaggeration of the faces and movements of the other actors. And every single one of those other actors pranced in and out of her way. It was all she could to navigate the mess.
But up from above, it was clear that it was a slow dance for her. A constant shift of weight and momentum through a cacophony of chaotic motion, yet her own motion had a clear purpose and inertia to it that started at her nose and flowed down through to her tail, unending.
Unending, until a sudden armful of heavy robes and fabric was shoved into her arms. She stopped, but she didn't stop, instead spinning gently and slowly on her heel of her foot as the chaos swept around her. The other actors pranced and swirled in spiral of motion, oblivious, but she was still. Absolutely still down to the threads on the arms. She just spun, slowly, slowly, and the robes were suddenly taken from her and she immediately flowed across the stage, her cloak flapping with her movements like a purple aura.
If David were to hazard a guess, she was the main character of the play, the only one that made any sort of sense in the comically silly display of commerce below. She would glance offstage with muted reactions and her demeanor grew more and more nonplussed as her Shinx bodyguard happily pranced along in the chaos and song of preparing a fortress to defend some sort of shrine maiden from some sort of cataclysm ravaging the landscape?
Okay, well. The Servine is very clearly the shrine maiden, whatever that actually means, or perhaps an assistant to one? But what did that mean? Maybe her spiritual connection allows…
…oh.
Oh right.
Seve laughed. "They will be performing all over town, do not worry!" He leaned down slightly. "But, here and only from here can you stand such as this, above it all. And then, what is hidden to others becomes plain to us! Glessite and I have planned this for weeks! From here, we can see how they do all their magic tricks!" His laughter died down to a wistful smile. "Indeed, Glessite, things invisible to some are visible at another's viewpoint…. Kah. Ahh, well. I believe that, going by elevator, you will meet your friends at the Harmonia Walk—that is the third floor, David, the third floor that leads to the road on the wall. Dimas is waiting for you there."
"Okay. Okay, thank you, Seve."
Seve laughed in a sigh. "I still do not understand why you continuously thank me. I have done nothing. It is you who deserve my unending gratitude. …if I may…?"
David stepped away from the railing, nodding simply.
The Cubone walked back towards the stairs leading down to the garden and Seve stood on his own, singing along to the music where he could and humming all the rest.
"Now, Glessite, let us see what we can see, standing here, daring to be. Secrets unfurl beneath under our stare… or…"
The Sneasel took his eyes off the play. For a moment he looked to the horizon, then looked above him into and through the solid roof above.
"...or perhaps we should be standing there?"
/*
16 drafts, for those wondering. 16 drafts is what it took to get this the way I wanted to go.
And with those drafts, there's some stuff on my deviantArt I've put together for those curious:
(and as this site is just linking back to my profile when I stick them there, so we'll do it the really awkward way.)
For those who want some world building and a map of the whole Square:
fav & me / d9olp6j
For full story Title Card:
fav & me / dazp11v
Remove the spaces, Swap out '&' for '.'
Thanks for reading!
*/