Dark 5.8: Call to Adventure
Kekoa
June 11, 2020
You lie in bed and read The Rallying Cry, the semi-official newsletter of Team Skull. This week's edition is mostly about a new strike at the power plant on Blush Mountain. Management and some scabs are keeping it running, for now, but there might be power disruptions. How will the Haole survive? Clearly no one could have ever lived on these islands without electricity. You give it five days before management gives up and caves. Better than trying to run the place themselves. Better than putting in a real day's work for the first time in their lives.
An apartment complex burned to the ground after they evicted their tenants to turn it into luxury housing. Skull won't say they did it. Just that it happened and it was a good thing and maybe it should happen more often.
Then Cuicatl comes up. Sort of. They've never said her name directly but it's the third story she's shown up in, after the tyrantrum deal and the (brief) arrest of Gen's shitty father. More news about Kukui's ninetales has come out and it's really not looking good for him. League founder and regional professor fucks up so badly that his ace steals multiple pokémon, runs away, and then curses an island challenger. Pictures of a damaged hotel room, a crying child whose vulpix was stolen, and a 911 call about a potentially murderous ninetales on the loose make you hate the man more than you did before. He admits in the call that the ninetales had been getting more unstable. Point is, it looks like he had plenty of warnings, ignored them all, and almost got Cuicatl and her starter killed. You hope this destroys his career so badly you never have to hear anything about him ever again. The Rallying Cry goes through Kukui's statements on how the old traditions were bad and needed replaced before asking if he really understood the traditions at all after failing to handle one of the sacred pokémon of your people.
The newsletter concludes with a post from some real estate billionaire warning that Alola is now bad for business and people like him might stay away. Good. That's the point. Fuck right off.
You drop the phone onto your lap without turning it off. Plumeria is doing great work. Stealing back your heritage, pissing off the haole, literally threatening their power. If she had anything to do with that. You're guessing Skull didn't. They're just glad it's happening.
It's been two weeks since Cuicatl had her shitty anniversary. About a week since Lyra came back. Three days since Cuicatl came back cursed to die alone. You overheard Genesis being adamant about prophecies being fucky (not her word) and not worth listening to. She could die in bed alone at age 92 with her partner in the bathroom.
You could practically hear the blush when Genesis talked about Cuciatl's partner after, like, seventy years. They're insufferably lovey with each other for two people who seem to have no idea what they're doing. And they probably don't. Gen had the shitty family to end all shitty families and Cuicatl has apparently been sitting on a mountain of self-loathing you thought was just, like, normal teenage self-loathing. The kind that you and pretty much everyone you know has. And you assume that all the cheery people also have it and are just really good at lying to the world about it.
Anyway, uh, good for them. They deserve some good shit to happen to them for once. Kind of weird Shirona is still letting them share a bed but you're pretty sure neither of them knows how sex works. Not that you give a shit. Is fucking without the risk of anyone getting pregnant really that bad? You're mostly just surprised Shirona's cool with it.
That… isn't what's important. What's important is that you missed some very important things about your friend that were obvious in hindsight. Not eating much could've just been because she was small. But she was active and you know how much you have to eat after a day on the trail. And you should have been supporting her more than you were. Somehow. You don't know how. Maybe you did, once, back in the in the Paniola days with your little friend group. But those were long ago and life has taught you many, many more lessons since then about the importance of never expecting anyone to stay, to be kind, to care.
You told Dr. Livens that you don't know how to help Cuicatl and Genesis except by hitting their problems and the systems that enabled them. That hasn't changed. And you're starting to get the impression that there will never be a good time to leave. A time where there hasn't been a crisis in a while and everyone is stable and happy and you can slide out of their lives like so many people have slid out of yours.
This is going to suck. For them. For you. But you have to do it.
It's the only way you know how to help.
There are just a few more things you have to take care of before you leave.
June 12, 2020
You aren't sure what the right way to say goodbye to someone is. It's not something you've done often. Usually, you'd just come home from school and find out you're moving to another home right now. Maybe the old Kekoa, the one who lived in Paniola with his family and friends, knew. You don't anymore.
When you confronted Cuicatl about VStar it went… disastrously. You're pretty sure she was threatening you. Well, threatening anyone who ended up in her way. Including you. If you did that. She at least had the decency to say she hoped you didn't.
Sometimes you forget she was raised by dragons. And sometimes it's all you can think about.
She left for the desert this morning without saying a word. Took Shirona, Lyra and her girlfriend with her.
You don't want that fight to be what she remembers you by. During her shitty anniversary she also said that she never said goodbye to her brother. Seemed to be tearing her up even a year later. You get that. You didn't get to say goodbye, either. You spent your one-year anniversary huddled up in the corner of an unfamiliar bedroom, avoiding your unfamiliar 'parents,' and wondering if things could possibly get any worse… and what you would do if they did.
You haven't thought about that in a long time.
You wonder if Cuicatl has.
Just another thing you should have known and didn't. Maybe she really is better off without you.
Point is, you can't just leave without a note or anything. Telling where you're going also means that Shirona hopefully won't tear Alola apart looking for you if she goes full mama bear.
You open up your VStar phone, open the voice notes app, and think. How do you want to go about this? Like, what did she mean to you at the end?
Fuck it, you've never been much of a thinker. Let's wing it.
"Hey, Cuicatl. Um. Shit, I don't know how much Galarian you can actually understand but there really wasn't another way to do this." Off to a great start. You take a deep breath and consider deleting it and starting over. No. You got across what you needed to. Keep pressing on.
"I'm leaving. It's not your fault. I've been planning this for a while." Kind of? At least a month. "You saw what Gen's dad could get away with. Guess what? That kind of thing happens every damn day in Alola and no one gives a shit. Well, okay, not quite that bad. Okay, sometimes that bad. The cops can mow down any kanaka they want and get off with desk duty for a week. And it needs to stop. Someone has to make these fuckers pay. The Gage family, the cops, the capitalists, the settlers—all of them. They need to burn. And."
You take another breath and try to focus. You're getting a little off topic. "You have your family to get back. I get it. You won't come with me. You might try to stop me. That's why you're getting the message like this. I'm sorry. Wish there was another way. You deserve better. You shouldn't have some capitalist fuckers stringing you along. You should've had this kind of home from the start. We all should have. And the kids will once Alola's in the right hands. We take care of our own."
Alright. That's out of the way. Now… now onto the sappy shit.
"Thanks for putting up with me the last eight months. For saving my ass from pangoro, braviary, and my own shitty food. I don't think I could've gotten this far without you. It's been nice. Mostly. I mean, we fight. But you've been looking out for me and I've tried to look out for you, even if I kind of did a crap job of it. You're the best friend I've had since Paniola. The only person I've had on the trail the whole time. I wish I didn't have to do this."
Wait. You leave the tape running. What you were describing. Deep friendship and closing ranks, no romance (you've just… never seen her like that), bickering.
Are you kind of siblings, now? Does she see you that way? Do you see her like that?
You're definitely closer to her than your actual brother. Maybe than you were to him before all of this. She even pushed you to reconnect with him.
What does that even mean given how her last brother ended? Will she be insulted? Sad? Do you really want to drop that now, right as you're leaving her?
"I…" You sigh. Fuck. No good way of doing this. "I hope you're happy. Or at least less sad. And I want to meet again when Alola is free. Or whenever you turn on Chris Foster. Whichever comes first."
Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. Can you end it there? She's going to hate you. This might not even be better than just going without a word.
"Don't follow me unless you want to join the cause. I'll miss you. Hope you don't hate me too much."
How do you end this? It's been a long ass time since you told anyone you loved them, and she might take I the wrong way. 'Bye' is wait too simple.
"I really did like our time together. And, uh. I'm sad it had to end. But it had to. Not your fault. Uh. Goodbye?"
You end the recording and sigh. Good enough. You flip to your settings, turn off your password and autolock, and walk into the girls' room. The bed is made. Whole place is pretty clean, actually. There are a few pokémon beds on the floor. Only one is occupied. Pixie stirs from her nap when you walk up to her. Weird to see her minus an ear. You've seen her walking up and down the stairs recently. But from what you've heard it sounds like she's never battling again.
"Hey, girl. Just need to plug something in."
She doesn't move to bite you as you plug in the phone on Cuicatl's side of the bed, still unlocked and on the voice notes app. Hopefully Genesis can point it out to her.
"Take good care of her, Pix. She needs it."
The fox just blinks at you. She probably doesn't know what's happening. Good.
You grab your things, walk out the front door, and head to the abandoned gas station at the corner of 3rd and Koa. No one stops you on the way out. No one calls the cops on you as you walk across the small coastal town. New Undella was supposed to be a beach resort to the east of Tapu Village. They scrapped the plans when Tapu Bulu wrecked the village. Now there are only three mansions blocking the view of the ocean. Turns out Shirona is one of the only people crazy enough to still live there. Could her team take the Tapu in a fight? Do either of them really want to find out?
Now New Undella's just another coastal town without real money. There's a grocery store that looks like it's on the verge of falling apart, a gas station, a trailer park, and a few homes that haven't been painted in decades. The only things that look like they aren't half-dead are Shirona's little mansion and the Pokémon Center for travelers into the desert.
Plumeria grew up here. You wonder if she saw Shirona's home against the rot of the town and set out to fix things.
The gas station is in an abandoned part of the old resort. Some of the buildings are half-built. Others are missing windows. One has a roof seems to have burned.
You check the time on your remaining phone. 10:54. Still six minutes until the pickup time Plumeria texted you. It's going to look suspicious if anyone sees you just hanging out here. You pull out Anuenue's pokéball and hold it at the ready. For what feels like a half hour you glare off into the empty road waiting for someone to challenge you.
"Waiting for someone?" a voice asks from behind.
You whirl around to see… no one you know. A teenage boy probably a little older than you wearing torn jean shorts and a black tank top. No balaclava. He's also pretty muscular. And way taller than you. Cis boys. If you had Jabari's genetics and a normal puberty you would've been a lot taller. You aren't sure if that's comforting or depressing. You puff up a little all the same.
"You're my ride?" you ask.
"Yup." He doesn't say anything else. Just stares at you in silence. An abra pokes its head out from behind him. Oh. That's how he snuck up on you. Would've been embarrassing if you let someone that size just slip past. "Being followed?"
"No. Just paranoid." You're pretty sure Shirona took all of her pokémon but the roserade and milotic. Doubt either could've kept up with you without being seen. "We teleporting?"
"Wouldn't be a secret base if we were always walking in and out the front door, would it?"
Huh. You'd never thought about that. Just assumed they were hiding out somewhere in Tapu Village and relying on no one bothering to stake it out. This makes a lot more sense.
"You got everything?"
"Yes." Your ID and Skull phone, some personal items, toiletries, your pokéball and supplies, three changes of clothes, hormones.
Wait, fuck, how are you going to keep getting hormones? Can Skull just rob a pharmacy? Claim its about drug prices or something? You can't be the only trans kid in Skull. Surely Plumeria has a system, right?
"Before we go, we need to get you a codename."
"Codename?"
"Yeah. Boss prefers we don't use our own. Means that even if someone snitches there's not much they can tell. Same reason we have multiple safe houses."
That makes some sense. You just aren't happy to give up your name after struggling so much for it. What do you even want to be known as, anyway? Incineroar's kind of aspirational. Golem are tough and fuck things up without even meaning to. Then there's—"
"Jigglypuff?"
"What?"
"Your code name is Jigglypuff. Puff for short."
"No." You aren't doing that. "I was thinking—"
"Jigglypuff. You don't get to pick your own codename."
"Why. Jigglypuff?" you seethe.
"Cause you're small, cute, and seem on edge."
"I am not cute! And I'm still growing."
"Jigglypuff expand, too. It's perfect."
The boy has a shit-eating grin on his face and you really, really want to punch it off.
"You still in?" he asks.
You want to tell him to fuck off. That you'll find some other way. But you came here willing to sacrifice. This is a small thing, really. No. No it isn't. Fuck that. Even if you'll still do it.
"Fine." You don't stop glaring at him. "What's your nickname?"
"Machoke." He keeps an entirely straight face.
"I'm fucking jigglypuff and you get to be machoke?" It comes out as a screech. Not really proud of it. Terrible first impression. Still more angry than embarrassed.
"You're loud, too! What a good puff. And, yeah, admin privileges."
Fucker.
"Do you do this to everyone? Or is it just because I'm trans?"
He throws up his hands in mock surrender. "Woah, calm down. I didn't even know that."
Plumeria really hasn't told him shit. You wonder if that's part of the anti-snitching thing.
"You want to get going?" Machoke asks. "Don't want to draw too much attention."
"Sure, whatever," you spit out. Hardly the welcoming you were expecting. But. It's. Fine. You've put up with bullies before. You'll do it again for Alola.
"Excellent!" He claps you on the back and the world falls out beneath you twisting and twisting and twisting and crushing you down until
You're standing in a pretty boring entryway. The front door behind you is boarded off with plywood. Maybe to keep Team Skull out. The place is kind of messy with bags of pokémon food, clothes, and other junk haphazardly strewn around. The wallpaper probably used to be white and floral but now the flowers are barely visible and the walls are more brown than white. There's dust on the table that no one has bothered to clear off. A persian is sitting on an empty paper grocery bag. He glares at you for a moment before he goes back to licking his paw.
You could work with this.
There are people chatting up ahead. You give Machoke another evil look while you wait for the world to stop spinning. He just immediately walks forward, gesturing for you to follow. "Hey, guys," he calls out. "New boy just got here. We're calling him Jigglypuff."
You raise your shoulders and glare, trying not to think about how that kind of is jigglypuff-ish. You haven't even seen them yet and you've made a terrible first impression.
There are six people sitting on the couches. That makes eight with you and Machoke. Seems to be an even split of girls and boys. Not that you can know for sure with looks alone. None of them except the admin are in uniform. Just normal, worn clothes. The kind you would see at the orphanage when the donors weren't there.
And now you have to introduce yourself. Been a long time since you had to walk into a new home and do that.
"Hey. I'm… that." You can't help but shudder. One of the boys laughs. A few others smile. Is it bad that you hope they have shitty names, too? "Dropped out of the island challenge before my third grand trial. Here to break things for Alola."
That gets a few nods and even a muted cheer from the smallest probably boy. You don't think he's trans. He's wearing a tank top and you can't see any binder straps. Just got unlucky with height.
"What's your team?" a girl with thick glasses, a studded choker, and a series of scars on her left cheek and arm asks. She has by far the worst injuries but a few of the others have a scar or two.
"Toucannon, drifblim, miltank, carbink, charjabug, and rufflet." You put Leilani and Ihe last so maybe they don't notice it. They'll be strong. Just isn't useful now.
"Bird trainer, nice," an older girl with half-faded blue dye in her hair says. "Skarm and a murk myself."
An adult skarmory would be really useful. Bulletproof flier. A shield that can move around the field as needed. Your team… Mahina can work well as a sniper. Kapuna can tank hits. Moe can sneak up on people. Anueneu's just a brute. Goes from one of your strongest options to one of your weakest real fast. Weird thinking of their tactics from a new angle. Guess you'll have all of them at once, too. That could make Ihe's tailwinds useful.
"Like, an adult miltank?" a dark-skinned girl with short hair asks.
"Yeah, he's pretty big?"
"He?" one of the boys snorts. Big guy. More around the waist than the arms. Hard to pin down his race at a glance. Tanned haole? Light kanaka? South Asian? Something else? "You know miltank are—"
"Freemartin," you interrupt him. "Intersex. He identifies as male." You raise yourself up a little bit on your toes and glare down at him. When you're in a new place you establish that no one fucks with you and gets away with it. Machoke already took that away but you can try to salvage things a little.
He throws up his hands. "Jeez. Alright. I get it."
You glare at him a second longer before turning back to the dark-skinned girl. She huffs and crosses her arms. "You know how hard it is to smuggle bales of hay into this place? You can't just go outside and let him graze without drawing suspicion. And the drifblim? Are they going to have to wander? Because we can't—?
"Easy, Hatterene," Machoke interrupts. "We can deal with that after introductions are over."
Hatterene, huh? You don't know much about them. Still a hell of a lot more dignified than jigglypuff.
Machoke turns towards you. "She was trying to hide herself behind a cap like it wasn't sus as hell. Then she just kept worrying about everything. Hatterene."
Oh. It isn't just you.
"Over a year ago," Hatterene huffs. "You promised I could pick a different name."
"And then no one was able to keep it straight, 'rene."
"Gumshoos can."
Machoke laughs and walks over to the one obviously haole guy in the room to clap him on the back. "Yeah, yeah, we love our token straight." He glances back at you. "Wait, are you?"
"Yes, but I'm trans. It's different."
You grew up thinking you were a lesbian. Even if you aren't gay anymore you don't really want to move past that part. It's… ugh. This would be so much easier if you were bi.
The girl with scarring snickers. You can see that she's missing a few teeth.
"Join the club. I'm Golbat, by the way."
Oof. Is that a joke about her glasses or her teeth?
(And is it terrible that you'll remember the shitty nicknames for her and Gumshoos better because they kinda fit? Is that the real point?)
The bird keeper is Simisear, 'cause her murkrow shit on the floor while she was introducing herself and the monkey's hair apparently looks like the poop emoji. You wouldn't know. Never seen one.
The fat boy who laughed at a male miltank is cranidos 'cause he kept charging in instead of using his head.
The last girl, an Asian who only whispered her name and said nothing else, was named loudred. You can guess where that came from. She apparently has a houndoom, scyther, and froslass. Scary team. She'd probably get along with Cuicatl.
You ignore the pang in your heart at the thought. No. You aren't going to think about the maybe-sister you betrayed to get here.
Even with the nicknames you probably aren't going to remember more than three of their names for at least a week. You've always been bad with them. One time when you were in Heahea for a whole year at the same school you realized on the final you didn't know the name of the math teacher after however many months.
After the introductions are done the team gets lost in their own banter while you awkwardly stand around. The bird keeper, Simi… pour?, eventually calls you out to put your stuff away in the bedroom upstairs and on the left before helping her make dinner. The bedroom is full. Very full. Possessions pour out of the bunks and are tossed randomly around the floor with only a small footpath between the door and the beds. Way messier than you would like. Would it be rude to clean it up later? Would they like it? There are two twin bunks and only the bottom of one is empty. Of people, anyway. There's still a bunch of stuff on it. You shove it off and put your backpack down on it.
This is home, then. It seems like they've been here for a while and they expect to be here a while more. You stare at the mess and take a deep breath. You aren't sure what you were expecting. A mission right off the bat? Things to be… cooler? Turns out there are codenames and small cells and all of that but it just makes things lamer, somehow. An underground city full of grunts, or an occupied mansion, or… something more than a middle-class home left to rot, filled with teens with ridiculous nicknames and no organizational skills.
You don't regret your choices. At all. You were just expecting something more.
Golbat ends up throwing spices on and baking a block of meat that's way too cubic to be natural. Most lab meat at least pretends like it could be real. Skull must be going with the discount stuff. Weird they couldn't just rob something better. Not that it really makes a different. You're left cutting vegetables for the salad while she works. That was your job on the trail, too. Cuicatl would have you cut them up at the Pokémon Centers so you didn't have to bother with a knife and board in the middle of nowhere. And she couldn't really be trusted with the knife, even if she insisted she could. The little nicks all over her hands showed that much. There were even a few smaller ones across her arms and legs if you stared. Probably just from tripping or something. Or maybe her dad. You'll probably never know now.
No. Don't dwell on it. You're moving forward.
"There a way to get hormones here?"
"Yeah. Ask 'rene. She takes care of supplies."
"Got it."
Golbat's voice is kind of deep but you didn't automatically flag her. Probably should have from the choker but you don't like to judge. She's about your height, maybe half an inch taller. Probably got on hormones kind of early.
"What's your story?" you ask.
"You're the rookie. Shouldn't you go first?"
"Uh."
She rolls her eyes and walks away to get out forks and knives to put on the table. The dining table's just a few folding tables pushed together. The kitchen's clean, though. Apparently, it's the only place they bother to tidy up.
"Lemme guess: got stuck on Nanu, decided to join up while you were here?"
"I didn't even fight him."
"Acerola, then? I saw you have a bunch of normal-types."
"She retired."
That gets her to pause and turn around. "Huh, did she?"
"Yeah."
She blinks in surprise. "Huh. Good for her. Always seemed like a nice kid. Tried to mother everyone at Aether even though she was only twelve or something."
The knife almost slips in your hands. "You were at Aether?"
"Only for a month or two. 'bout three years ago. They wouldn't let me on hormones and were being kind of shitty about, well," she sweeps a hand over her hair. "Skull had just taken over Po Town so I ran away and joined 'em."
Three years ago. That would have been when Guzma was still there. Before Plumeria's changes. Before most people left.
"You've been here the whole time?"
"Mmhmm." She's setting the silverware down pretty neatly, knives and forks parallel to each other and facing straight away from the table's edge. You were half expecting her to just throw them on the table and see where they landed. "Everything got a lot quieter when Guzma left and we lost our funding. Cops got a whole lot bolder against us, too. Lots of us still didn't have a place to go. Like. Were we supposed to just go back to the government, beg for foster care, and then. What? Get a shitty job or three and put it all behind us? Fuck that. Big Sis went around, found those that didn't want to move on, and started setting up safe houses. Found ways to get what we needed. Got all political once we'd built back enough. Kind of like having a mission. Old Skull was just a bunch of us fucking around all day."
She walks back and glances through the glass into the oven. Then she blinks and glares at you. "Hey! You tricked me into answering. You were supposed to give your story."
You still have questions you want to ask her. How she got her scars, what pokémon she has, why she doesn't seem super invested in the cause itself. Doesn't seem like you're getting away with it. Fine. You'll try to do this as monotone as you can. No need to get emotional and look weak. Just keep making cuts between short sentences. Like it's nothing.
"Parents died. Brother fucked off to join the military." Cut. "Bounced between foster homes between ending up at Aether." Slice. "Left on the island challenge to try and knock Selene off her mountain." Cut. Cut. Cut. "Figured that wouldn't change anything, came here to help Alola."
A hand rests on your shoulder. "Sorry about your parents. It… you're not the only one here like that. Rest of us don't have parents worth talking about."
You put everything into keeping your face level. Damn it. Should've put off cutting the onions. "Sorry about yours," you grumble.
"'s okay. Just got to stick together," she says. Then she goes back to pouring glasses of water to put at the table. Kind of thought they'd be drinking soda or beer or something. Golbat must catch you looking. "Machoke and Hatterene's orders. Water's cheaper, healthier, and easier to get."
Huh.
There's conversation throughout dinner. Everyone but you and loudred pitches in, talking about recent missions and team dynamics and inside jokes and a million other things you can't quite comment on. They aren't going out of their way to include you. That's fine. Better than fine. It always feels really awkward when people try to force you in like you've always been there.
Teleportation sucks a little bit less when you're prepared for it.
Key words: a little.
You're still left dry heaving on the floor while Hatterene walks forward without a care in the world.
"I'll give you a tour when you get up," she calls back.
You grimace and pull yourself up to your feet. Turns out you're in an old barn. The red paint on the walls has faded but everything else has been kept up well. "I have one or two bales of hay on hand. Hope Big Sis comes through with more or we're going to have some tough discussions."
"I brought some cash," you mutter. "I can cover some of it."
"You'd better."
She sends out her own pokémon, a chansey and a drowzee, and gets to work organizing a shelf of food. She comes back with the small bag of leftovers she brought and a watmel berry she apparently just had lying around. She throws the lab pidove and the watmel berry on the ground in front of you. "For your rufflet and toucannon. Hay bales are in the stall behind you. Sleeper, the abra, can translate. I'll be with my own team."
You'd never expected the group healer to be so rude. Not that you're much better.
Moment of truth. You send out your pokémon. Moe lazily spins around to take in her surroundings. Then she drifts over towards Hatterene before you call her back for the team meeting. Mahina glances around before stabbing the watmel berry until it shatters to pieces. Then she starts scooping out the inside. Anuenue just goes straight for the hay. Only Ihe seems confused as he glances around before chattering at you in a lower tone than usual. Kapuna and Leilani don't really react at all. The abra, well, not quite translates. Gets some of the feelings across. Uncertainty. Fear. Loss-friendship?
Oh. He's probably wondering where he is. Where Coco is. They were always… close.
"Tell you in a minute. Need to talk with everyone."
Ihe's mom offered him to Cuicatl first. Will he still respect you without her present? Will she really want to go back to Cuicatl? You could respect that, although the handoff would be more than a little awkward.
She's probably come back from the desert by now. Listened to your note.
Hopefully she understands where you're coming from.
Mahina and Ihe finish their food. Anueneu's still going and could be for a while. You'll just let him chime in if he has anything to say.
"So, uh, you might notice we're somewhere new."
You can hear Hatterene's snicker from the other side of the barn.
"I left the others to go off on my own."
Mahina and Leilani don't react at all. Moe… it's hard to tell with her. She doesn't say anything but you think she floats a little lower to the ground. Ihe screeches and spreads his wings. You don't need the translation of shock-betrayal-loss-anger to get the meaning.
"You'll see them again. Just might be a while."
He beats his wings and hisses. Anger-anticipation-grudge-disbelief. Roughly, 'you'd better not be lying.'
"There will still be fights ahead. Just… different ones. Fighting together rather than one at a time."
Anueneu grunts. Acceptance-eagerness. He's in. Ihe just shuffles his wings back into place and glares. No response from Moe or Mahina. Or Leilani, but, again wasn't really expecting one. Kapuna is unnaturally still. They're usually at least bobbing up and down a little.
"Moe, Mahina, your thoughts?"
Moe groans. Dust sweeps off the floor and flutters in the air before falling back into place. Anticipation-hunger. "You can feed inside our base. And, uh, I'll try to read more or watch tv or something to keep you fed. Just please ask me before you go wandering okay?"
She twirls again and the winds whistle. Annoyance-willingness. On board for now, might end up leaving. You can work with that.
Mahina clacks her bill a few times and chirps. Indifference-anticipation. 'We'll see.' You think.
Now you turn to Kapuna. "What about you? I know you wanted to stay to the end of the island challenge, but this is even more different, right?"
By the end of the hour you've had to explain gangs, government, revolution, invasion, kings, and betrayal to a rock. They happily absorb it all, seemingly more excited with every word. This is new. They'll have so many stories to share with their carbink friends when they get back. Stories about the bizarre, illogical world of humans, yes, but still stories.
Leilani says that she doesn't care as long as she doesn't have to fight until she evolves.
Ihe might abandon you. You can deal with that. Not the worst case where they all want to leave. You're hoping none of them do.
If only because you don't want to face Cuicatl again until all this is over.