Aftershock
Chapter 10: Old Acquaintances
It was soon after that tainting, that true shattering of my self, baptizing me entirely into the damnation I had chosen, that I realized it time to be renamed.
In a shadowed, forested corner of the world, roaming as we did so often in the dark and the silence, I and Lepena neared a depression of a black cave to see it lit with crimson light. Meditating upon their lot in the deepest niche was a most familiar grown Quilava and Kadabra.
We considered each other for the slightest of a moment, before turning to the cave-mouth to contemplate our surroundings.
Strategizing our roaming, my last sane Pokèmon and I had developed a policy of chasing the winter cold to wherever it would lead, and synchronizing ourselves to a near nocturnal biological clock. Thus, at any given point, sufficient cold would exceptionlessly surround us as we marched, and the dim twilight of night-accustomed eyes shade us in our waking hours. This particular winter presently shied away from prospects of snow, but a fine stream of mist emerged from our breaths (and from Angin's flames), and invisible patches of frosted ground would unexpectedly crunch underfoot as we trusted our footing to them. Above us, the stars were cold, distinct points of razor light, but even this was light, and I felt then the oxymoronic craving I had begun to regard all radiance with: I hated it, shying away from its outright, uninhibited glory; but inside I lusted after its wholesome influences as a desert-marooned beggar after water. Ah, but I was already unsuited to its overwhelming presence.
The Razor Leaf of canopy above which shielded us from the wrath of the starry night was frozen, yielding not an inch to the wishes of nearby breezes. Even so, the weather was entertainingly cold and bleak. I and my Mightyena moved into the dimlit cave, sparkling faintly with the effect of orange fire; Ytarrik and Angin stood face-to-face, a bonfire between them.
I realized a crisscross of telepathic links set up between this motley reunion, courtesy of Ytarrik.
[It's been a while, I began.
[Indeed, replied Angin, [it must be at least sixteen years now.
[Not for me, it isn't, Ytarrik growled faintly. [I wasn't hoping to see you again for at least a few decades.
[Now, that's a little unfair, Angin attempted to interfere.
[No, no, I don't think so, replied the Kadabra. [I declared my allegiance to Amaren Kelanis, beginning trainer, not you.
[But why? said I. [Why all this enmity; you were doing so well with the morally blinded rampage of thoughtless destruction for a long time.
[No, I wasn't, he spoke, his mental voice rising imperceptibly. [I thought I could accompany you, but this life isn't mine. It's a human's life, not a Kadabra's.
I half-ignored this. [If all my lies are falsehood, and I really am a sinking ship, you undeniably are the foolhardy captain who chained himself to the mast. My speech was growing dangerously loud as well, but I hid this under the guise of a fit of cold mirth.
He blinked his (almost) lidless eyes. I didn't chain myself.
The tall, black-jacketed man laughed. A hollow laugh, devoid of both the warmth of laughter and the malice of a cackle. [Don't be quite so heartless. If I'd known, all that time ago, what was to happen to Ruki and me, I wouldn't have brought any Pokèmon along for my descent into hell.
[I certainly didn't throw myself at your Pokèball, all that long ago in the burning forest.
[I was trying to save your blessed little skin from combusting.
[Considering the alternative, I'm not sure I accept your intentions.
[But that's the whole point; [Iit wasn't my fault[/I.
Ah, this was precious! Exactly as the traditional disorganized arguments between groups in those coming-of-age tales. Except there was no grand cause to unite at the last moment for the sake of. Merely a spiral to our deaths!
Ytarrik seemed filled with retort, but he calmed himself. [It wasn't either of our faults. Blame it to chance, as so many fools do worldwide.
We stared at each other for a long while, and then turned to our side. Lepena and Angin were watching us blankly, entirely excluded from the conversation.
[Ytarrik narrated the story of your life suitably, Angin began, and continued when no objection was forthcoming. [So I suppose it's my story that no one's heard of yet.
[Of course, Angin, I urged her for narration, as Lepena slinked into his customary corner.
[What else can a trainer's Pokèmon do, after she leaves? I trained, of course. They say wild Pokèmon are no match for trained, but I met up with some fierce competition even here. You just have to look. Of course, I make my way to the Cinnabar Gym every now and then; there are good arrangements for wild Pokèmon, as long as they're coherent enough to understand.
I had not seen her thoughts ever before, though this was a most unceremonious moment to do so. They possessed, unexpectedly, not the particular species of fire which had accompanied Ruki so long ago, but a more reserved form. Judiciously applied, but powerful in its own right. I noticed, for the first time, an alternate possibility to my own – Angin had mustered her strength towards repairing her loss, and while she yet carried unmistakable old wounds, she was conspiring adequately towards healing them. I considered this possibility for myself, but immediately dismissed it: if Ruki's death had only partially destroyed the old Cyndaquil, it had certainly killed off Amaren Kelanis entirely. This being inhabiting his body was an outsider: I couldn't have brought the old occupant back to life without the faintest trace of his existence. Not the greatest artist could spontaneously generate life from nothing, let alone Luphinid Silnaek.
[I know, the Quilava replied to my determinations; [how different are our paths.
[And I'm in the middle, remarked Ytarrik, [teetering on the divide. Of course, I would join Angin if I could, certainly.
And leave me? I thought inwardly.[You wouldn't be whole, then. Even Angin still isn't whole; she never will be what we once were.
[I guess so, she sighed.
[Don't deny it, Ytarrik, I hissed. [You're as much the monster's pet as a Kadabra, and much more. Chance still binds us together, you'll understand eventually.
At last, after long struggle and refusal, I relented in my efforts to seduce Ytarrik to my side. Matters turned to the affair of my name, and all three Pokèmon fell silent, thinking. At last:
[Remana, remarked Angin.
[Luphinid, Lepena growled with trademark hatred.
Ytarrik suggested last, waiting (as he had once done) for the court to silence sufficiently for an announcement of this grandeur. [Silnaek, he said.
[Luphinid Remana Silnaek, I determined.
And it was decided.
[//\/\/\/\/\//\\//\\//\/\/\/\/\/\/\\//\\//\\/\/\/\/\/\//
While most wild Pokèmon strove to few peaks of outward intelligence or development in the magnitude of the arrogance of humans, a fine network of nomadic groups or tiny villages stretched across the faces of the continents, each consisting solely of one particular species and somehow sharing its inherent characteristics with the countless others spread worldwide. Thus, each type of Pokèmon possessed its own intrinsic culture and language, and often also common traditions and customs, which were shared by the worldwide settlements of its more progressive members.
In the mythology of the Mightyena, Lepena's kin, a Luphinid is a preternatural creature like to a Mightyena in basic features, but unnatural and ungodly in its dark abilities. It makes a habit of terrorizing smaller, weaker groups of the species and its lower evolution, and thus is seen in a largely menacing light. Remana, in the tongue of Typhlosion and their family, is a somewhat contemptuous label for one who is unusually reserved and introverted, a trait not often praised in their fire-based society. Silnaek, on the other hand, is one of the few physical words spoken by the elite Kadabra and Alakazam to heighten their meditation; it is specifically used in attempts to transcend into the state of omniscience, a highly appreciated achievement in their circles. Ytarrik had told me of his vague endeavors towards all-knowing during his time, but I could (and would) not foresee what it had to do with me.
Deprived of the victory of persuading my starter to rejoin me, I was once more fired with the need for a productive task (in relative terms). It was a simple endeavour to turn back towards the nearest sign of civilization and dive into a record of righting documents, in search of another project; and this opportunity I took not to summon another wrong, so close after my first brush with death, but to study the secrets of anomalies – a crucial, if little-known, practice of righters, so often perceived as they were as mere hunters of the abominations.
The most common and obvious manifestation of a wrong is, unexpectedly, the phenomenon of ghosts. A ghost is born out of an incomplete death; not to such a level as mine, where the soul is primed slightly for death but instantly thrown back inside the still-living body, but to the point of the death of the physical manifestation, and an incomplete assimilation of the spirit. The body is decayed entirely, moving perfectly through the death stages, but a certain portion of the naked soul is forced to remain on the earth, be it a single memory of the original consciousness (which replays itself at regular intervals after the death), or an entire vagabond mind, possessing all faculties of the whole living except physical form. This is not to say, in fact, that the later form is unable to affect earthly matters; it may create illusions within the minds of others using inherent telepathy of a physical form which it prefers, and thus communicate using that body. A whole ghost, rarely as it is found, may even possess the bodies of others, ejecting the original occupant into the vagabond state.
The reason for my sudden interest in this subject was that, moving out of the shade of the forest I and Lepena had been tramping through, we encountered a low cliff immediately outside the forest boundaries, belonging to a shallow canyon with a road at its very bottom. If one jumped down into the main road, as we did without incident or injury, and moved east through the dirt path, one would soon encounter a small, steep valley with a minor settlement on its flat surface. Lavender Town. I withdrew the unobjecting Lepena, and walked through the scattered houses to the showpiece of the village.
The Pokèmon Tower, a memorial to dead spirits, was an antique weathered affair of ancient spires and stone sentinels, having been left untouched by renovation projects for over five centuries. It was indeed a mark of the preserving forces of the numerous ghosts it harboured that the building was still stable and safe for human entry, if any were bold enough to attempt so. As I walked across its walled courtyard over the single, cobblestone path, the cracked and scattered stones underfoot shifted ever so slightly, as though acknowledging their soundless lacks of welcome to my presence. Rows of gravestones I passed, monoliths commemorating the withering of the husks of life underfoot; and the pupilless eyes of the stone Pokèmon guardians hunched over each tomb stared accusingly at my intrusion, their proud expanses belying the intended strength of their limbs. As I put each tombstone behind me, a sunless, musty wind would hiss through the stone carvings, whispering into my sensitive ears tales of blood, betrayal, sordid trickery, and cold-blooded murder.
At last, I arrived at the granite double-doors, which opened at my nearing by themselves, creaking eerily, though their hinges were oiled stone. I gazed into the darkness inside – to meet a gruesome set of blood-red eyes, leering shockingly into me.
I fixed my eyes onto the phantom face and glared back with such malice that the unfortunate Haunter appointed to this illusion turned tail and fled, back into the confines of the twilight tower.
I entered the guardless foyer to meet a collection of still more graves, more ornately carved and plated with the dusty marble of the floors. A single spiral staircase stabbed through the center of the room into every storey of the tower, and as I watched and waited the colourless figure of a small child could be seen descending down this structure, trailing (besides her long dressing-gown) the purple fireballs of cowering Ghost-types which surrounded her as moths to a sustaining fire.
The Ghost-type was no result of incomplete death; it was a perfectly natural phenomenon, an evolution of certain Pokèmon to mimic the tendencies of hostile spirits. Thus, large collections of such types would usually be found headed by a true, complete ghost, from which the Pokèmon learnt the secrets of their type and fulfilled their mortal needs. At this point, it seemed this tiny child-ghost was the head of this settlement.
As she approached, her figure seemed occasionally to flicker and skip forward seconds in time, like to an old film reel. Within seconds, therefore, despite her leisurely pace, we were face to face, scrutinizing each others' eyes. The fine-carved skin was as the ivory of early childhood, but the large, sad eyes betrayed her age to my experienced gaze; the cascading stream of once-golden hair was pale silver under the desaturation of lifelessness. This ghost was no less than a century old, its experience and knowledge uncounted.
She cocked her head slightly to the side. "Kindred spirit."
The two kindred wraiths walked back through the courtyard, into the Lavender main. The moon was up in full tonight, its light casting faint shadows on the grassy ground, but I suffered the moonlight to warm me in its subtle manner. All around us, doors were locked and windows boarded (their houses' occupants all inside), saucer eyes of the humans gaping through the cracks – all but for one old man with a young Cubone hiding behind his legs, standing outside his door and watching us with distinct understanding.
"Does it not bother you," I began, "that your true age is hidden by the size of your form?"
"Does it not bother you," she questioned in reply, "that not your physical appearance, let alone anything else, has not escaped the ravages of time?"
"But you're not harbouring any hidden youth within yourself, are you? Your form is only an illusion; it doesn't make you younger."
"I may be endeavouring towards a cause I will never reach, but you are not acknowledging it at all. Lies aside, your position is the same as mine. Perhaps you should cease denying, as I, that you wish for youth at all."
But I do wish for it! I wanted to shout. I wish it with all my heart!
"All those years," I managed. "Your wisdom, your memory of every minute crack in the stonework of the Tower, it must be monumental."
"Yes, but what of it? It would be a cruel jest to consider passing on my knowledge. My age would come with the packet, of course."
"But surely you must have the power to move mountains! How could you ignore that?"
"As easily as you ignore your own abilities. At least, I presume so?"
"I… I'm not entirely certain…"
I raged inside. The things I was saying! This was not the aged, withered ghost at my core; I was veiling my true thoughts, and I could not learn how to unveil them for this fellow of mine to see. Did I wish for the withering which slowly overcame me, the dark vapours clouding my body? I had been barring myself against their influence, but a quick brush with the maleficent emotions would effectively harden my heart against them, teaching me their true darkness.
I allowed the Mightyena blood to enter my mind in an imperceptible trickle – and slipped. Before I could react, a torrent of vicious thought and emotion was sweeping away my judgment, filling me with the intoxication of bloodlust, and I knew no more: merely the eyebrows of the ghost beside me, rising in vague surprise.