Night has fallen, and with the night comes revolution. Here our young heroes will meet up to take down an ever-growing threat. This cannot be left alone. If it goes unquestioned then the darkness will continue to spread, and all chance of a happy ending will crumble to ash. No, the line must be drawn here, this far, no farther!

KedharS: It's nice to see the Phantom take an L for once. Too much seems to be going exactly the way he planned.

Guest: Yep. It's a nice satisfying chapter after he got away with so much shit in Orre.

Hyphenman: That's some very interesting thinking. The Renegade System will be explained in detail, but it should all make sense. As for the so-called "mega stone", well, we'll have to see.

Guest 2: Yeah, Dakota is slowly but surely getting more powerful. Both physically as she masters her powers, and emotionally as she comes to terms with what happened to her.

Venoms Cross 2: Yep, I wanted to make for a really tense scene between these two, since it's their first confrontation we've seen.

Arbiter8991: Nah it's fine if someone catches her she'll just teleport away, no biggie. Then she'll do some investigative reporting on this mysterious "teleporting girl" haunting the campus and make the big bucks. It's like Peter Parker getting photos of Spider Man.

Pokemon Academy: Beginning of Beginnings

Chapter 1252

"Now then. Let me explain the reason I've brought you all here."

Olivia sat at the head of a large table in the fanciest restaurant on campus, a nice Kalosian place with food that made Blake feel right at home. Around the table sat Blake, Cynthia, Sango, Marion, Serefina, and Ruka, the members of the "Reunite Blake and Ayame" alliance. Ruka was more interested in devouring rolls than in discussing her role in the alliance, though. Silver hung over Sango's head.

"Frankly put, seeing my best friend in this state feels wrong," Olivia stated. "Just forgetting about Blake like that? Unacceptable. But if we're going to get you two back together," she glanced at Blake as she said this, "then we'll need to think very carefully about how we're going to accomplish that, wouldn't you agree?"

"Um…" Sango raised her hand.

Olivia scowled. "I already told you, only two things from the menu. Do I look like I'm made of money? This stuff is expensive you know!"

Sango turned red and awkwardly lowered her hand, burying her face in the menu. She couldn't help it, everything looked so good!"

"I'm surprised that they have a restaurant like this on the island, personally," Serefina said, eyes bulging at the prices on some of these dishes.

"I know, right?" Cynthia said, shaking her head. "I can't imagine that there are many students here who can afford eating here, and forget about foot traffic. It's not exactly a lucrative business venture if you ask me."

"I may have pulled a few strings," Olivia said, smiling proudly. "After all, someone of my standing must dine on food that suits my palate."

Cynthia rolled her eyes.

"There's hardly any fish dishes!" Marion grumbled. "Couldn't we have gone to a sushi place or something?"

Olivia's eye twitched.

"I invited you here," she said through gritted teeth, "as a courtesy to Sango. Who I invited as a courtesy to Blake. But if you're not interested in participating in this discussion, then you can leave."

"Right-o!" Marion hopped out of her seat with a smile, slinging her fishing pole over her shoulder. "See ya later Sango! We can go catch a bite tomorrow! On our fishing lines, of course! And good luck with the whole amnesia thing!" With a salute and a wink, she skipped out of the restaurant, leaving everyone thoroughly confused.

"…Why did she even come here?" Blake asked, pinching the bridge of his nose.

Not even Sango could answer that.

"Well, it doesn't matter," Olivia sighed. "Moving on, as I was saying-"

"Why the heck do they serve wine here?" Cynthia asked, flipping to the last page on her menu. "This is a school!"

Which was predictably followed with…

"Hey Olivia, can we get some wine?!"

"Absolutely out of the question!" Serefina snapped, smacking Cynthia's hand with her own menu. "You are a student here, and you are 16 years old! I will not have any underage drinking on my watch, little missy!"

Cynthia rubbed her hand and pouted.

"Very good, thank you Serefina," Olivia smirked. "Of course, the drinking age in Kalos is 18, so if you don't mind, I'll be-"

"O-ho, you think so?" Serefina narrowed her eyes. "We're not IN Kalos, you realize! And on this campus, drinking is confined to those that are 21 years of age or older!"

Olivia scowled.

"…Why do they even let people drink on school grounds in the first place?" Sango asked. She and Blake shared a quizzical look and a shrug.

"Ahem!" Olivia cleared her throat, desperate to change the subject and get them back on focus. "Now as I was saying, we need to discuss the issue of Ayame's memory loss, and how we'll get her and Blake back together."

"So it's real, then? The memory loss?" Serefina asked. She knew that Ayame had been acting strange this morning, but the thought that she could have forgotten all about her boyfriend… that was just heartbreaking.

"It's real," Olivia nodded. "Trust me, I tried every test I can think of. Her memories as a whole are intact, she still remembers this past year and all the stuff we did together, even you two, Cynthia and Sango. It's just… Blake isn't a part of those memories anymore. I know that sounds hard to believe, but it's what happened."

"It… is a little difficult to wrap my head around," Serefina admitted. "But… this past month has opened my eyes to a lot of possibilities that I would have dismissed as ridiculous before now, so I guess I'll believe you."

"It's weird though, why did she just forget Blake?" Cynthia mused. "That seems really specific. How did this happen, anyway?"

Olivia frowned. This was the part she'd been dreading. She wanted to work with Blake (and his friends couldn't hurt) because he was the key to all this- if Ayame was going to regain her memories, it would be next to impossible without Blake's direct involvement.

The only problem was her promise to Alcea. She swore that she wouldn't tell Blake about Samarra or his other sister or anything specific about what had gone down in Agate Village. Not to mention what would happen if the school found out she'd been leaking that info. She might have been able to weather the ensuing storm thanks to her existing contracts, but if she was going to break out into the big time a scandal like this could be damaging.

She had to play this very carefully.

"It's complicated," Olivia said. "I wasn't there when it happened, but apparently it was a psychic thing, that's what I heard."

Sango raised her eyebrow. "A psychic thing?"

"Yup. A Psychic type pokemon wiped her memories. Whoosh." She made a slashing motion with her hand to emphasize it.

"Wait, but the Orre Region doesn't have any pokemon native to it," Serefina said, confused. "So it was a trainer?"

"Uhhhh…" Caught in a really bad lie, Olivia did what she always did when things didn't go as she planned.

"Dunno. Guess so. It's not important though. Moving on!"

…She avoided the problem entirely.

It was clear to the whole table that Olivia was hiding something. However phenomenal of an actress she might have been, it was clear improv was not her forte. But no one thought to press her further on the details. Everyone knew that a schemer like the Empress wouldn't lie for no reason; if she was trying to help Ayame but was still trying to keep this secret, there had to be an explanation, and trying to pry the truth out of her would just be a waste of everybody's time.

Ruka, who did not have that sort of intuition about human beings, quickly signed "SHE'S LYING!" at Sango with frantic eyes.

"What? What's with the hand thing?" Olivia asked, glancing at the Zorua. Ruka hissed back at her in response.

"She's, um… upset. Because we're out of rolls," Sango said, trying to spin a tale of her own. It was just as obvious a lie as the one Olivia told, but it worked for Sango because Olivia, frankly, did not really care enough to probe deeper.

The thoughts of other people still rarely came under her consideration.

"…Well, that's a problem easily solved," Olivia said, picking up the bell on the table and ringing it, summoning the waitress immediately to ask for more rolls.

Everyone at the table save a confused Ruka suppressed their giggles. She really was acting completely predictably, wasn't she?

"…Back to the matter at hand. I wanted to tell you all something important about Ayame's condition, something I didn't even tell Alcea," Olivia said, scanning the table. "And yes, she's involved with this as well."

"She's the one who told me about Ayame's condition," Blake reminded everyone.

"Yes. Well, she couldn't make it tonight, but I plan on informing her about what we've discussed here, so we can formulate a plan to-"

Cynthia gasped, her jaw dropping. Her eyes widened in realization. It was such a distracting expression that it actually caused Olivia to stop talking, which was a miracle in and of itself.

"…What? What is it?" Olivia frowned. She was getting very tired of all these interruptions.

"You and Alcea are together, aren't you?!" Cynthia cried, practically leaping out of her chair.

Now it was Olivia's turn to be shocked, though not as shocked as the rest of the table. Four heads swiveled to look at a ghostly pale Olivia, completely caught off-guard at Cynthia having figured it out so easily.

Again, for as good of an actress as the Empress might have been, getting caught off-guard like this made all those skills fly out the window. She couldn't even formulate a response.

"No way! Seriously? But I thought you two hated each other!" Sango gasped.

"Th-That's… no, I never… I just…" Olivia was babbling like a schoolgirl with a crush! What was the MATTER with her?! She was Olivia Himeko, famous model and rising star in the acting world, future Top Coordinator, and every bit of dignity and class had completely left her as she was faced with the accusations of first-years.

"THAT'S NOT WHAT WE'RE TALKING ABOUT RIGHT NOW!" She exclaimed, slapping her hand on the table so hard she nearly knocked off the candles. She panted, trying to catch her breath, and quickly straightened up to reclaim some sense of dignity and decorum.

Inwardly, the other humans present smirked. They'd be having some fun with this later, but for now, the Empress was right. Ayame came first.

"Now, as I was saying, this is very important information," Olivia cleared her throat. "It's about bringing back Aya's memories."

The table fell silent.

"Wait… you can do that?" Cynthia asked.

"Why didn't you start with that, then?!" Sango exclaimed.

"I was trying to get there, but you all kept interrupting me!" Olivia scowled, her eye twitching in frustration. "Now, as I was saying, I think it's possible that we can get Aya's memories back. Shake them loose from where they're all piled up in her head, in a sense. But I don't think it's going to be easy."

"About that…" Blake said quietly. "You said you think it's possible. Does that mean you did it before? What happened?"

Of everyone here, he was obviously the most interested in this revelation. After all, Ayame's missing memories were memories of him.

Olivia let out a tired sigh.

"When she first woke up in the hospital, I gave her back her stuffed Wooloo. You know, the one you gave her? Which she gave that ridiculously cringy name?" Olivia reminded him. Blake sulked at that while Cynthia and Sango snickered.

"So what happened?" Serefina asked. "Did she remember Blake giving it to her?"

Olivia paused for a moment before shaking her head. "If only it were that simple," she replied. "She didn't remember it directly. But the way she held that thing… she knew it was precious to her, even if she couldn't say why."

"It's state-dependent learning," Blake said quietly. Everyone turned to him for clarification. He cleared his throat. "It's… a thing with memory loss and trauma. When people experience trauma in their childhoods, they have a tendency to block it out. But by putting them back in that mental state, there's a chance that those memories will return. It's like when you get really drunk, and you can't remember what you did the night before. But if you get drunk again, there's a chance those memories will come back."

Everyone was staring at him, and he felt his face heating up. "I-I mean… I just read about it, that's all! I haven't like… gotten that drunk or anything…"

No one thought he had. Everyone there knew exactly why Blake would have read up on repressed traumatic memories.

"So what you're saying is that putting Ayame into a similar mental state to when she was around Blake, that might help her regain her memories, then?" Serefina clarified.

"It's possible," Blake nodded. "That's, uh… that's kind of why I did all that stuff on the dock earlier," he admitted, scratching his head and turning red.

Cynthia smirked, reaching out and kissing an imaginary hand. That just made Blake more embarrassed. Sango kicked her under the table.

"Well, I mean… when Aya and I first met… I kind of flirted with her like that," Blake said. "I mean, it was just to get under her skin back then, but… it worked. So I thought if I was flirty again, but even moreso, then maybe it would win her over but also get her to remember when we first met, you know? It was just a theory, I mean…"

"Ooh, I'll say it got her thinking about some stuff," Olivia smirked. "Way to go, lover boy."

"But it didn't seem like she remembered," Blake said. "So maybe it's not that reliable after all."

"…Don't be too sure," Sango mumbled. She was staring down at the napkin in her lap. Everyone looked at her expectantly. She raised her head slowly.

"I mean… look, I lost my mom when I was little, right? And I don't… I don't really have a lot of memories of her. They all kind of blur in my head. But… when I'm with Elizabeth, my dad's fiancé, I don't know… those memories keep coming back to me, more vividly than I ever could have imagined. It's like I'm right back there with my mom, you know? So I guess… maybe Blake and Olivia are onto something…" She admitted.

Silence fell around the table as everyone processed the meaning of Sango's words, including Sango herself.

She gasped.

"W-W-W-Wait! Wait, wait, wait! I-I'm not saying that I'm thinking about Elizabeth like a mother or anything!" Sango hastily tried to clarify. "It's just, I mean… I was just saying that it's possible to bring back lost memories! That's it!"

Everyone felt all warm and fuzzy. Sango's increasingly specific denials weren't helping matters.

Olivia cleared her throat to get everyone back on task.

"Ahem. Yes, well, as cute as that might have been, we return to the reason why I called you here. I don't think it's enough to just have Blake go and plant a smooch on Aya, not in her current mental state. It might not bring anything back, she might just punch his lights out," Olivia stated.

"…Yeah, no, I wasn't going to do that either," Blake scowled, irritated that Olivia thought he was the kind of guy who would just kiss Ayame against her will. "So what's your actual plan, then?"

"Well, the first part of the plan is pretty simple. Blake just does what he said he was going to do today, seduce Aya," Olivia said it like it was the easiest thing in the world. And Blake had to admit… she had a point.

"The second part is a little trickier, though," Olivia frowned. "So here's what I'm thinking…"

They discussed their plan long into the night. The food came and went, and hours later everyone was barely able to stay awake. The first-years all had jetlag, and Serefina had to get up early in the morning to take care of the pokemon. So they all parted ways.

Most of them, anyway.

"Hey, Seri!" Cynthia chased after Serefina with Ruka in her arms (the little Zorua had stayed up way past her bedtime and was now napping in her regular form).

Serefina paused, taking a deep breath and exhaling. She was alone with Cynthia right now. And while Serefina was a sweet and mothering person, and didn't have it in her to hate many people, there were still those who she didn't do well with.

She turned to Cynthia with as warm a smile as she could manage given the stress of evening's discussion. But she paused when she saw the sincere gleam in Cynthia's eyes.

"Can I ask you for a huge favor?" Cynthia awkwardly shifted Ruka's position so she could clasp her hands together in prayer.

Serefina's first instinct was to be suspicious.

"…What sort of favor?" She almost growled, fairly certain she wanted nothing to do with this. Since Dakota's transformation, Cynthia had shot up to the position of "most annoying redhead" in Serefina's life.

"I want you to let me work with you!" Cynthia said. "Just for a few days!"

Cynthia's eyes were filled with sincerity. No matter where she looked, Serefina could see no traces of ulterior motives in that gaze.

…Still, she wasn't buying it.

"Nope."

"Why not?!"

"Because I said so. We have enough student volunteers. And last term, you half-assed your way through all your scheduled assignments, remember? Not to mention you blow off club all the time as well, do you even remember you're a member of the Pokemon Friends Club?"

"It'll be different now, I promise!" Cynthia begged.

Serefina leaned in curisouly. Cynthia was putting up more of a fight than she expected. Maybe there was more to it than she'd thought.

"…So what are you after, then?"

"Huh? What do you mean?" Cynthia asked, confused.

"Forgive me for saying this, but you don't strike me as the kind of person who would want to work diligently to take care of someone else's pokemon," Serefina said, crossing her arms underneath her sizeable chest. It was a ploy to see if Cynthia would lost focus and ogle the way she made her cleavage stick out.

To Serefina's surprise, Cynthia's eyes never left hers. She blinked at that.

"Look, I know I'm not the most responsible person at the school…"

Serefina raised her eyebrow in a taunting expression and Cynthia scowled.

"But I really, really want to work with the newborn pokemon!" She pleaded. "The nursery, please! Isn't that okay?"

She was being really adamant about this, and Serefina didn't know why. She was about to tell Cynthia where she could shove it, but what stopped her was when she remembered how diligent Cynthia had been at taking care of her Vulpix. The amount of care she'd given the newborn pokemon, the amount of 3 AM phonecalls ruining her sleep schedule because the smallest thing had gone wrong, they made for overwhelming supporting evidence that Serefina couldn't just refute out of hand.

Serefina sighed and nursed her temples, knowing that she was going to regret this. "Look… if you want special permission to work in the nursery, you're gonna need to fill out the proper forms. Plus, you're going to need to get endorsements from faculty and other students in the Caretaker Course. That doesn't mean me! Actual students with green armbands, you get it?"

"Yeah! Yeah, totally!" Cynthia nodded her head adamantly. "I'll do it, I'll definitely do it! Man, this is going to be so great! You're the best, Seri! Thank you!"

She moved to hug the brunette and Serefina flinched out of reflex, but then the other girl paused, catching herself, and dashed away with her pokemon in her hands.

Serefina sighed, not sure how this was going to go. She felt like she'd lost something tonight.

Well… there's no way that girl will actually get the endorsements, right? She tried to convince herself.

Excellent, it looks like the mission planning is going well! Olivia's goal of restoring Ayame's memories is well underway, and with all these forces aligned against her, does Ayame even have a chance of making it through this? What about Serefina? Will she be able to survive working with Cynthia? And why does Cynthia want to work in the nursery, anyway? We'll have to see!