Chapter 41

Resolution

Crossing the desert was a slog. There was no easier or better way to put it. Wartortle and Quil climbed up sand dunes. Then, they went down the other side. Up, then down. Up and down, up and down. All day. For two full days.

Wartortle got sand lodged in the crevices of his shell's interior that he didn't even know existed. The lovely aqua-blue fur of his tail and ears were thoroughly dirtied before noon of the first day. The sand of the dunes was not nearly hot or abrasive enough to give his Pokémon feet burns or blisters, but neither was trudging through the sand comfortable.

"Not half as exciting as the orange desert we came from," Quil said. "The warmth and sun feel nice though. I'd choose this over Heartless Heights and Snowcap Crags. How about you?"

"I'd take the mountains. However, I welcome the hardship. This journey is part of my atonement. I'm due back a little suffering, if Victini was being honest."

He'd shared with Quil his thoughts on the possibility of Victini lying about what had happened to bring him and Wartortle to Preserve Alpha. Quil, who had no way of knowing what had occurred that night, trusted Wartortle's judgment of what was truth and what was falsehood. "I already told you I thought he was lying or exaggerating," Quil had said. "I know my opinion doesn't mean much here because I barely even know what humans are, but I doubt you made a bet like that with Victini."

Now, he said with a soft chuckle, "You and your atonement. Any other 'mon would think that saving Blindhollow was enough. Actually, no. They wouldn't be worrying about atoning at all."

"We've established, in my time as a Pokémon, that I am in fact different from other Pokémon." Wartortle's tone was as dry as the dunes.

"Less and less, though!" Quil said. "If you could take a look at the Squirtle that tried to fight that Zigzagoon, I think you'd laugh or cringe. Either one."

Wartortle nodded in hesitant agreement. That was a topic he'd come to terms with weeks ago. He was what he was: a one-of-a-kind hybrid. Well, two-of-a-kind, he knew now. He wondered what Victini thought of the duality they shared. Wartortle did not give any further reply, and Quil let the matter drop.

The coast veered southward as they traveled the desert. Now if the two traveled directly east, they would soon hit the winding coastline. They took a more southward course to keep going approximately parallel to the ocean on their left. The change in direction made perfect sense, as Iyrodenin was supposedly near the island's northernmost point. The pair would be traveling due southeast before the journey was over.

Battles were rare. Despite the resilience and resourcefulness of Pokémon in general, few had wound up adapted to true desert life it seemed. Toward dusk, Quil and Wartortle crested one dune to find a group of Pokémon climbing toward them from the other side. One Sandile, two Krokorok, and a Krookodile in the lead. Wartortle figured they lived a nomadic lifestyle, due to the barren nature of the desert. The Sandile and one of the Krokorok immediately dug into the slope of the dune, vanishing from sight. Their motions reminded Wartortle of the way Bein used to dig the hidey-hole each night. The Krookodile in the lead hissed as it tore up the hill toward Quil, leaving a wake of scattering sand. The other Krokorok stayed behind, burying its hands and feet in the sandy slope.

Wartortle ran to the right along the sand dune's crest to get away from Quil as usual while his partner prepared to call down an inferno upon the approaching Krookodile. The dune began trembling violently while he watched the Krookodile's ascent and Quil's impending Ember. Wartortle endured the shaking until he lost his footing and tumbled down the opposition's side of the dune. He caught a look at the Krokorok who had partly immersed its limbs. It heaved its body up and down rapidly, sending powerful vibrations directionally upward along the dune toward him. A section of the dune, the section he had been walking on, appeared to blur as the grains of sand jumped up and down from the tremors. A contained earthquake.

Wartortle reoriented himself even as he tumbled. With deft placement of one hand, he swung himself onto his shell-back. The hemispherical surface allowed him to stabilize his tumble into a steady slide down the sand dune.

Just like the snowy mountainsides of Snowcap Crags, he thought as he leaned to the right to escape the shaking sector of the dune. Except back then, I was fleeing from the enemy.

The Krokorok ended its shaking upon seeing Wartortle had escaped the affected area. Before it could properly center itself to dodge, Wartortle had leaned to the left to send himself careening toward the wild Pokémon. At the last moment, he lowered his raised tail such that it stuck into the dune like a needle. All of his speed became rotation around that pivot point due to his tail's leverage. Wartortle's shell struck the Krokorok with what he imagined to be the force behind a Blastoise's Tackle.

The hapless Krokorok cried out as it was launched off the dune into empty space. By then, Quil's Ember had been used to great effect. Wartortle had watched the flashes of light from the corner of his eye. The Krookodile slid down a different part of the dune, smoking. Quil still stood at the crest, though the portion of dune just below him was sand no longer. It had been melted to become some yellow, translucent material with a sheen to it.

Before Wartortle could marvel at the melted sand any longer, the ground beneath him erupted. Tan-colored jaws popped out, landing a good bite on him. He grimaced at the pressure while gathering water into his throat. When the Sandile released him, Wartortle pelted him with a Water Gun. At the dune crest, he spotted another puff of sand and flurry of motion, then an explosion of blackest smoke. Quil's boosted Smokescreen.

Wartortle could sustain his technique no longer. He clamped his jaws shut. The Sandile was finished. It lay on the moist sand, its shaded eyes as glassy as the melted sand further up the dune.

Water beats Ground, I know that much.

Then the smoke spilled over them both, turning day into night. Wartortle coughed a couple of times as he grew accustomed to the heavier air laden with particles. Like a series of lightning bolts within a thundercloud, a distant part of the smoke lit up with what could only be Quil's Ember. Wartortle made his way toward it.

After a minute, when the smoke had begun to thin out, Quil approached him with no trouble. "The others?" he asked.

"The Krokorok at the base of the dune will probably keep fighting."

Together they headed down the slope as the smoke finally dissipated. The Krokorok that Wartortle had launched was indeed climbing up to continue fighting.

"Surrender, I'm a Flame!" Quil said, as if the fire spouting from his body was a poor indicator of his Type.

"I can still fight!" the Krokorok returned with a hiss.

After another Ember, it certainly could not still fight. When Wartortle stood up again after diving behind Quil for cover, he could see that the phenomenon of melted sand had repeated itself. Fascinating. If a lightning bolt struck one of these dunes, perhaps a similar effect would occur.

Quil drew circles in the sand with the claws of one hind leg. "I would have offered a surrender earlier, but it was four versus two. And I'm not sure they could have heard me when they were underground."

Wartortle visually confirmed that the four Pokémon would not be bothering them anymore. "I wouldn't worry about it, they fought well. Digging underground is a hard technique to counter! Oh, did you see the way that first Krokorok hit me with a targeted earthquake? Amazing."

Quil shook his head. "I was busy preventing my face from being bitten."

The two showed their respects to the unconscious or drained Pokémon as they continued through the desert. The interesting topography and flow of the battle kept them immersed in excited conversation for the next hour. Despite both taking hits, they decided not to stop and rest. At the current rate, another battle any time soon was highly unlikely. It was back to the slog.

Later on, Quil spotted a particularly large dune coming up. He suggested they climb to the top for the view at the same time that Wartortle suggested they circumvent the inconvenience. Wartortle gave in to Quil's enthusiasm. After a climb that took five minutes of patient effort on the shifting sands, the pair was granted sight of the desert and beyond. To the south was desert, with a very distant promise of mountains on the horizon, or gargantuan trees packed close together. Or they were clouds? It was difficult to tell.

To the west, the different style of desert from which they'd come was barely visible. Not one but two slivers of gray smoke rose into the sky. Fires, they agreed. It was bound to happen sooner or later with the entire Type having been boosted. Any careless Fire-type could set into motion an uncontrollable blaze with the firepower they were packing nowadays.

The nature of the eastern lands, and thus their destination, was not easy to decipher. The fact that miles of sand dunes lay between them and the new terrain did not make identification any easier. It was rough, a little mountainous, and looked colorless at distance. Wartortle wagered it was a desolate wasteland, like a bumpier and sand-less version of the region they currently traveled. Quil guessed it was grassy like his homeland of Steady Steppe. He said it looked similar.

Lastly, both turned to the north. At that moment, a sinuous creature emerged from the ocean a mile away, arcing high into the air. Its gaping maw was probably bigger than Wartortle's whole body. Fins and frills adorned its head and spine. A blue tail fin made a tremendous splash as the Pokémon plunged back into the deep. Gyarados.

"What was that?" Quil asked, long after the waves had settled.

"Gyarados. Rare. Where I come from, seeing them can mean good or bad luck depending on who you ask. You'll definitely have some kind of luck."

"You're sure it wasn't Kyogre?"

Wartortle laughed, then apologized. "According to human mythology, Kyogre looks like a Wailord. Not at all long and thin like a Gyarados."

A slight gust reached them high atop the tallest sand dune. Wartortle fancied he could taste salt on the breeze. Quil said, "There's a whole other world under the ocean. A million regions to explore. All different kinds of Pokémon and moves."

Wartortle hummed in agreement.

Eventually, they descended from the dune and moved on. The only other exciting incident of the two-day desert trek was a battle with another Fire-type. It was a cumbersome Pokémon walking on four cloven hooves. Its coat of hair was pink with a pattern of three blue rings on each of its sides. The dull eyes sitting on top of a wide muzzle contrasted in attitude with the twin miniature volcanoes emerging from its back. Wartortle thought for a moment, then dragged the name Camerupt from the pits of his long-term memory.

The fight was over quicker than the battle with the Sandile line of Pokémon despite the Camerupt's boosted typing. As Quil's blazing white missiles reached it, the Camerupt's tiny volcanoes ejected a combined geyser of molten lava. Being a boosted technique, the thick geyser reached an astonishing height before fountaining outward in all directions. The sun shone red through the thin blanket of lava as it covered the sky in a thirty or forty foot radius. It descended to the sands far too quickly for Wartortle or even Quil to escape. He had the sudden inspiration to use his water to poke a hole in the approaching lava, but too late.

The Camerupt's groan was swallowed by the explosions and firestorm around its body from Quil's ember. Wartortle and Quil both yelped as the lava splashed down. He brushed at the lava that coated him to hasten the process of its oozing off of him. The intense heat against his shell and skin was not easy to bear but neither was it painful, by virtue of his Water typing. Nevertheless, the lava had come from a boosted Fire-type technique. Wartortle's legs gave out by the time he'd brushed off most of the lava. The drain on his energy was too great.

His body had fallen at such an angle that he could see both Quil and the Camerupt as his chin rested on the sand. Both were down.

The fight's already over. The winner? Nobody. Mutually assured destruction. Wartortle rested his eyelids as the crinkling sound of hardening lava came from the ground all around him.

An hour later, long after the Camerupt had risen to show its respect and taken off, Wartortle found he was not recovering his strength like Quil was. The world was blurry and distant as he stumbled along beside his friend. His right arm was the problem, he realized. The limb felt tender to the touch, and the skin of its upper half had a nasty purple color that he hadn't noticed. He imagined he could feel his body trying and failing to repair the lingering damage dealt by the lava. His arm was a black hole steadily sucking up all the energy reserves his body produced.

"That's a Burn, I would think," Quil speculated. "I've never had one; I don't think I can get Burns. But that's what they say it looks and feels like. Dark color, it feels tender, a weakness that won't go away."

"All conditions pass with time, right?" Wartortle mumbled. "How long?"

"I wish I knew. Maybe five hours? Ten hours? I have no idea how to make it go away faster, since it's a Burn. Sorry Wartortle, but we'll just have to take it really slow until you heal."

Wartortle clenched the fingers of his left hand into a weak fist. Surely there was something he could do. When he'd been Poisoned by the Venomoth, the nausea and fragility he'd felt had made him yearn for a Pecha Berry. Now they carried a pack of supplies. Maybe he could find an item of use.

Quil stopped moving as Wartortle rummaged about in their pack. Nothing he brushed his claws against appeared useful in healing Burns. He'd been short-sighted; he'd neither researched nor packed for such a condition even though he'd predicted that Fire-types would be boosted. It made sense that Burns were associated with Fire-type techniques.

As he checked the last pouch, the one with the speckled blue berry, his mind was already elsewhere. Yet a recent memory came back to him with the image. Quil as a Cyndaquil balancing one of the berries on his snout. That had been on his very first day as a Squirtle. Almost his very first hour. Forgetting those moments would be impossible. Nostalgia warmed his heart. Those had been simpler times, when they hadn't known about any boosts or cruel Pokémon. He had been an amnesic Squirtle trying to find his way. Quil had been unwilling to even produce fire, and here he was summoning blinding infernos with ease!

Associated with the memory was the taste of the berry as he'd bitten into it. Very bitter. His tongue retracted deeper into his mouth with the remembered taste. Then, as he'd been distracted by Quil's balancing act, he'd felt a chilling sensation sweeping along his skin. In the sunny and warm hills by Karprest, he should not have been feeling cold anywhere. Could it have been...

Wartortle snatched the berry and closed the pouch. The hook of his upper lip broke into the berry and he pushed it into his mouth. He hurriedly swallowed the first squirt of bitter juices. Raising his arm, he watched for any changes. It felt like a cold wind had picked up, brushing along his face, his arms, his legs, but Quil's fur did not shake like it normally would. There was no wind. The purple splotch on Wartortle's arm faded to blue and vanished before his eyes.

"It's gone!" Quil exclaimed, poking at Wartortle's arm. "Those must be Rawst Berries! I never knew."

Wartortle nodded, still feeling weak as he worked on the remainder of the berry in his mouth. His arm felt good as new. In minutes he knew he'd be raring to go as usual. The incident was amusing, really. Knowledge from his first snack as a Pokémon had ended up helping him all this time later.

Early in the morning of the third day in the sandy desert, the dunes had leveled out. The sand they trod became coarser with scattered small rocks. The hue desaturated as it transitioned into very pale brown soil. Like a fallen branch long dead, the color was nearly gray. Scattered mountains stood alone or in small clusters to the east and the south. Their size was fairly small, on par with the lesser peaks near Iyrodenin. Wartortle felt a sense of isolation as he viewed the land ahead. It was not a warm, jolly place. It was a land of austerity, where no one would help you if you failed to thrive on your own. The dull colors and lonely peaks were getting to him, he decided.

The pair took a route that stayed at sea level as often as possible after nonstop ups and downs in the desert. As a result, mountains loomed over them more often than not. Wartortle felt small, always at the bottom of canyons or surrounded by vast emptiness. He imagined the mountains as ancient beings that scrutinized him as he passed through their territory. Too little. Not determined enough. Overconfident. Much too feeble to seek Articuno, to ambush Victini.

The battles they experienced only enhanced his sense of personal inadequacy. Most foes were typed as Steel, Fighting, or the mighty Dragon. Had Quil not been boosted, there was absolutely no way the pair would have been able to cross through the desolate region. Wartortle witnessed more than a few scowls or expressions of surprise when hostile Pokémon first observed them. One of their foes finally voiced the reason for the reaction; they were not yet a Blastoise and Typhlosion, yet they had managed to get that far. As they crossed the region, not a single unevolved Pokémon could be spotted. Even Pokémon with no resistance to Fire were often able to endure an Ember by Quil. The techniques the wild Pokémon unleashed in return were wickedly potent. Wartortle and Quil suffered as many victories as they did defeats. The miles they could travel each day took a sharp downturn.

At one point, against a wild Dragonite, a question that had long remained unanswered in Wartortle's mind was finally resolved. Its opening gambit was a rapid approach for a physical strike. The antenna on its forehead straightened out behind it as it swooped toward Quil. The claws on the end of its right arm curled inward, like it was forming a fist. Then the fist exploded into flame. White fire, fading to orange and red, blazed with tremendous energy. Wartortle knew a boosted technique when he saw one. The Dragonite knocked Quil out with that single fiery punch. A flash of immense heat and light from the punch slammed against Wartortle like a physical blow, but he stood there dumbly. He'd been wrenched from his battling mindset by what he'd witnessed. The Dragonite rushed him next with the same punch. An easy win for the Dragonite.

"The Pokémon aren't what have been boosted," Wartortle said to Quil about half an hour later, as they took a roundabout route. He hadn't felt such excitement in days. "The techniques are! We could never tell because it's rare for a Pokémon to be able to use an Electric technique when they don't have Electric typing. Same for Ice and Fire."

Quil nodded along as they tromped through the rocky soil. "Remember Moltres' metaphor about the lake, rivers, and mountains? She never said the lake represents Flames. She said it was all 'mon that use Fire."

"Yes! The phenomenon makes more sense to me now. It clicks. Pokémon of boosted Types are absolutely no different except for when they use a technique associated with their element. They faint as quickly as always. Their defenses against opposing attacks are unchanged. Only the power of the techniques they use has changed at all." Wartortle let out a delighted laugh. "That's the scientist in me that's so excited. I finally see the complete picture. The mechanism of the boost is simple and elegant. I love it."

"You love it? You love the boosts?"

Wartortle nudged his friend off balance with his shell. "You know what I mean."

Quil regained his footing with a smile, but it vanished. He seemed to have noticed something in the sky while his head had been turned from the shove. Wartortle craned his head and spotted a tiny figure immeasurably high above them. He squinted. A Flying-type, gliding with wings outstretched. The profile of the Pokémon from below looked like a Fearow.

As one, Quil and Wartortle waved up at what was probably Row. The figure did not react. The pair jumped up and down, waving their limbs vigorously. This time, the figure appeared to flap its wings in response. Wartortle thought he could hear a wordless screech: acknowledgment. The Flying-type turned and flew in a southwesterly direction.

Quil hopped and spun in the air. "That had to be Row trying to find out where exactly we are. So it's almost time; this is going to be fantastic!"

Wartortle was equally elated. "Yes, but let's not lose time. We have to keep going toward the peninsula. Every day that passes by increases the chances that Victini sees through our ruse."

Quil agreed, sobering somewhat. Both of them now had a pep to their step though. While he had been reminded by Row of the heavy decision he'd made, he'd had plenty of time to think it over since their first meeting. He knew it to be the the correct choice. The mountains held their peace in Wartortle's mind as they pressed on.

The second day brought them flowers. Every now and then the pair passed through or near a patch of lively color amid the dead, gray-brown terrain. Quil remarked that life looked to be a struggle for them, and Wartortle agreed. These were short, hardy specimens with little diversity. One or two colors would be present, framed by forgettable shoots of grass or sometimes only moss. Wartortle leaned down to smell the first red flower they encountered. No scent wafted into his nose.

At one point the coastline dipped unusually close to the traveling pair's inland course. After walking by a small mountain, more of a hill, Wartortle could see that they were passing a bay a quarter mile away. Like the small inlet at Karprest, this body of water offered calm solace from the vast, rough waters beyond. By chance, his eyes fell upon a nearby wooden beam protruding out of the earth. It would have been easy to miss, since it had the same lifelessly pale color as the dead soil all around. When he went over to investigate he discovered other beams lying mostly buried in the ground.

"What's all this?" Quil asked, joining him. Wartortle had no answer. The wood of the beams was bleached of color through and through, as well as rotten. However their shape and length indicated they may have supported a structure at one time. Bein would know, were he present. Had these beams served as the framework of some hut or shack long ago? Wartortle surveyed the empty scenery between where he stood and the bay, trying to pick out other signs of Pokémon structures. Like a Detect Band for the remains of buildings had been tied around his forehead, Wartortle blinked and could suddenly see irregularities popping out on the ground.

Collapsed roofing here. Fallen door there. Black wooden paneling and large scratched-up rocks. Spars and struts arrayed in separate assemblages, like skeletons. All of it mostly buried in the ground. Almost certainly, he was looking at the ruins of a sizable Pokémon town. He pried up the buried portion of a door. It was lighter than it looked. After flipping it away with a foot, he saw ceramic shards beneath where the door had laid. Fragments of a vase, or bowl.

"I found...a hammer." Quil sounded baffled by the discovery. He clutched a black hammer between his forepaws and held it up for Wartortle to see.

"This was a town," he replied. "I'm sure of it. Maybe populated enough to be called a city. The ruins surround most of this bay."

"This town sure had Krow's luck, whatever happened to it." Quil wandered away to explore more of the collapsed and buried buildings as Wartortle dug through the dirt of an exceptionally large plot. Large rocks where the walls would have been, some of them bearing white scratches and gouges. A stone table, cracked in half. Some kind of figurine or doll made of rotten, shriveled plant stems tied together. It resembled a Sealeo or Dewgong. As Wartortle lifted it closer to his face, key knots broke off, causing it to fall apart.

If there were young Pokémon here, there must have been families here. They would have chosen to settle here and nowhere else. He moved onto the next ruin. Why had this place been destroyed and abandoned? What would have done this? Or who?

Wartortle was well aware that he and Quil were wasting time. Nothing in some old ruins of a town would give them an advantage over the trials ahead. His curiosity had been roused however, and it was not easily laid back to rest.

"Oh look over here!" came Quil's voice from afar. "I think I found the main road."

Wartortle joined him in examining a winding road devoid of any sign of ruins. He could picture it going all the way to the water's edge, branching into side roads along the way that could take you anywhere in town. The corner of some pale wood poking out of the rocky soil caught his attention. When he shifted it, the soil for about ten feet in one direction shook. With a great heave, he rotated the structure out of the ground. It was a faded wooden signboard. A big one. He brushed the dirt off the side that had U-script painted on its surface.

Quil offered to hold the sign upright on the ground while Wartortle stepped back to decipher the characters. He could read them, albeit very haltingly.

"Let's see, it says...Welcome...to...Port..."

He froze, checking the contours of every Unown shape once again. His reading had been correct.

"Welcome to Port...what?" Quil asked, letting the sign flop back to the ground.

"Port Rein," Wartortle said, a chill running down his spine. "This was Port Rein."

"Port Rein," Quil repeated. "The place from that Charizard's story. The town where he grew up." His eyes grew wide. "The town he said he destroyed!"

Wartortle turned his gaze to the southwest, toward where he guessed Blindhollow was. "I never believed his story was true, but his account matches up. He said Port Rein was in some harsh and desolate mountain country northeast of his prison cell. He said that after his rampage, all that was left was ruins. I think his exact words were 'smoldering ashes and worthless debris'."

"Can you imagine how powerful he was?" Quil said with awe. "He leveled the town and defeated everyone in it all by himself."

Wartortle imagined the scene: a Charizard out of his mind, batting aside his fellow Pokémon and breaking everything in sight. "You heard the story. That Charizard made perfecting himself his life's work. Nothing else mattered to him. I don't think we should be surprised that someone that obsessive developed an odd psychiatric disorder. This tragedy right here is the result of a single-minded obsession with power."

"I hope the Resistance hasn't had to deal with any boosted 'mon that destructive. They'd have to be even crazier than Raizula."

Something about that sentiment set Wartortle's gears turning. An important realization was on the tip of his tongue. What was it?

"Maybe we should get moving," Quil suggested, unintentionally derailing Wartortle's thoughts. "This happened a long time ago; there's nothing we can do to help. We solved the mystery but nothing here will help us reverse the boosts." He took a few steps away from Port Rein and waited to see if Wartortle agreed.

Wartortle's ears twitched in response to his surge of annoyance at losing the realization on the edge of his awareness. Then he smirked at the fact that his ears had twitched, before following Quil.

The hour was too late to make significant headway after leaving the inconspicuous ruins. Before they slept for the night, Wartortle noted their first clear view of their destination. The peninsula was indeed mountainous as Moltres had said, though he could see no 'fortress of ice' at the tip. The peninsula was not a long one; it extended somewhere between ten and twenty miles away from the island. The mountains were taller and more intimidating than the ones near Port Rein, but Wartortle wagered they could travel the length of the peninsula without too much trouble. That last leg of the journey would take around a day, with another day required to reach the peninsula.

"We're almost there," Quil said, peering up over the edge of the pit they'd dug next to a patch of violet flowers. "I'm supposed to be nervous, aren't I? I'm busy being excited to see another Legendary. We're going to do things that no 'mon has ever done before. We're going to fix everything."

"I hope so," Wartortle said wistfully. "That's the plan."

Quil curled up beside Wartortle at the bottom of the pit. The air in this region grew quite cool at night thanks to the sea's proximity, so Wartortle was thankful for the heat of Quil's body and flames. For a while, Wartortle rested his chin on the ground outside of his shell. He peered up at the sky.

The stars were marvelous every night. He'd grown to appreciate the night sky as a Pokémon since there were no city lights to cause light pollution. Even the tiniest pinprick of twinkling light reached his eyes. The moon had risen in the afternoon as a waxing gibbous, nearly full. Now it glowed in the sky a few fists above the horizon. Tracking the movement of the celestial bodies was inevitable when one hiked through prosaic terrain all day.

Along with faint starlight, the blackness was colored by dim features that he'd never before seen as a human. What were they? Nebulae? Galaxies? Probably some phenomenon that only astronomers had the terminology to describe. His inability to understand what he was seeing didn't stop the night from being beautiful. In fact, the mystery enhanced the beauty.

"Hey. Wartortle."

"Mm?"

"Thanks again. For letting me come with you, and not being mad that I left Cavetown. And for...I don't know. For being you, I guess."

"Quil, you've never needed to thank me. I should thank you, for putting up with how different I am from other Pokémon. For being so positive when I've gotten you entangled in the dealings of humans and the affairs of Legendaries."

"It's been an adventure, that's for sure. We're going to do great once we find Articuno. We're going to make a difference. I know it. Let's do our best, as always."

"Sounds good to me. Good night, Quil."

"Good night, Wartortle."

The terrain grew rougher as Wartortle and Quil approached the peninsula. The mountains, larger. The dirt, rockier. Articuno had chosen an unpleasantly forbidding region to spend his or her days. Wartortle could come up with a few suspicions as to the Legendary's personality.

At noon, the pair had no choice but to scale one of the smaller mountains to continue southeastward. No route existed that would permit them to bypass all of the mountains. Even the beaches had been subsumed by cliffs and unnavigable rocky deposits. The two descended the far side of their mountain into a large canyon that gave them a fine view of the ocean blue at one end. The canyon ran straight from northeast to southwest for a few miles. Wartortle looked left and right as they crossed the canyon floor to the next mountain. As such, he saw them first.

Wartortle had taken guilty pleasure in preparing a clever remark to say to Quil for this occasion. It had been a fine way to pass some of their time hiking. Both of them knew this moment was coming, so Wartortle would not have been surprised if Quil had also been ready to say some appropriately dramatic words. Perhaps Quil's face would be arranged in a solemn expression as he unflinchingly faced a cold wind. That would be theatrical enough.

The first remark he'd prepared had been strong. A classic. 'The cavalry has arrived.' Unfortunately, the meaning would be lost on Quil. It was a callback to nearly ancient human history. Wartortle could explain the humor behind the remark using the time he'd ridden on Hayzin to the Blindhollow mission as a visual aid, but explaining any joke eliminated most of its value.

His second idea was 'About time.' However, that implied that they'd been waiting. The two had been on the move even after Row had noted their position two days before. Despite the humor behind the mock severe tone evoked by the phrase, 'About time' simply wasn't clever enough.

The third idea was a strong contender. 'Look who decided to join us.' That one absolutely nailed the casual air that 'About time' failed to convey. It also belittled the nature of their journey and the task at hand, adding to the humor. Ultimately though, Wartortle figured the first idea he'd had was the best one. It was dramatic. It had pizzazz. Humor was great, but a properly delivered 'The cavalry has arrived' would really cement the occasion in his memory, he thought. Even if it was a strictly human expression.

Wartortle looked down the length of the canyon to the Pokémon who approached. All thoughts of dropping a clever and dramatic line evaporated from his mind. This was not what he had expected. Not at all. He stared, trying to understand the sight before him. He decided he'd better try a head count. In Wartortle's silence, Quil ended up being the one to assign a phrase to the moment.

"Wow. Just look at all of them!"

Wartortle could only sigh even as he smiled. How had he expected Quil to react in any other way? An earnest, passionate line like that was so Quil.

Hayzin, in the lead, sent a wordless whinny echoing down the canyon walls in greeting.

Behind him followed a throng of twenty-six Pokémon large and small.