"I'm impressed, I'm impressed
When that gorilla beats his chest
I fall to bits
I confess"
"I'm Impressed" from The Else by They Might Be Giants
"How?" Max asked. She stared at her chest, tapping her rib in disbelief. "It's only been a week. How is it fine?" It went entirely against her sense, but her light taps and prods didn't hurt in the slightest. It was hard to remember exactly how long it had been back then, but her rib hadn't healed this quickly before she'd come here. Of course, that could've been the many other injuries her body had to fix.
"I guess there could still be some fractures?" Ithos asked. He sat on 'her' bed while his hindpaws kicked the air. 'His' bed sat on the opposite side of the room, pristine and made like the day they'd decided to make this place their lodging. They needed to do what they could to make sure Fara didn't know they'd escaped, so Ho-oh brought them to some abandoned cabin in the mountains of Uproar Forest.
Even before her rib healed enough that he could hold her through the night, Ithos made sure she felt him next to her. She didn't even have to ask. He already knew about her nightmares, so it was easy to guess what would make them worse.
Ithos started bobbing his head to the same beat he kicked his legs at, a smile spreading wide across his face. Max looked back at him with a growing smile of her own. "But, hey," Ithos said. "I'm just glad I finally get to do this," he lunged over and ripped her up and into his arms, "again!"
"Kaaapi ka," Max giggled. She eagerly reciprocated the hug herself, and he started to squeeze her tighter. Very quickly, she felt the ache in her chest returning and squeaked, "S-stop! Too hard!"
"Sorry!" Ithos said. He let her go completely, but Max still held on. She didn't care if he hurt her a little, so long as they got to hold each other. Her tail wrapped around his back, and he put his arms around her again. This time, he stuck to much gentler squeezes. She kind of wished he could just squeeze her into a jelly-chu without it hurting, but alas.
While they rested in each other's arms, Ithos nestled his muzzle right next to her ear, whispering, "How are you holding up?"
Max flicked her ear down and moved her head so his muzzle rested on top of it again, and her face rested in his chest. She didn't want to talk about that. Of course, she never wanted to, so he always bothered her about it. Why did being open and honest about your feelings have to be important in a relationship?
Ithos let her pout, waiting patiently with his question already in the air. If it was anyone else, she might've been able to wait until the question was too long ago to respond. Ithos, unfortunately, knew better.
"I don't know," Max muffled into his chest. She pulled her head up to rest on his shoulder, wriggling up a tad to sit higher on his thighs. "I just didn't expect it to be so sudden." She shook her head, remembering that fateful flight by night after they escaped. Fara had wasted no time mobilizing now that she thought she had her biggest threats under lock and key. Max nuzzled into his scales.
That night hadn't brought any horror she'd expected. If it was last time, she would've known to head straight for the Tree of Life, but this was different. Even now, after having confirmed and reconfirmed again and again, her head shook in disbelief.
"I don't know, just," Max mumbled. Ithos smoothed the fur of her back while she struggled to get the word out. "War?" It felt ridiculous to say. Fighting Eleos (though it didn't have that name, yet) had been perilous, sure, but in a sort of cartoony way. A group of rag tag kids teaming up to take on the devil was stressful, but in the 'good will prevail' kind of way.
What would a war even look like in this world?
"Well, she did always hate the Rescue Society," Ithos mumbled. He squeezed Max tighter and pressed his cheek against hers. The pressure pushed some stray sparks out that only seemed to tickle him.
Max squeezed him again to let go and turn around in his hold. She started reaching for the bedside table, tail extending the opposite direction to counterbalance, but her paw didn't even brush the table. Ithos chuckled and tugged her back into his arms to lean over and snatch up the piece of paper she wanted with a proud grin. Max rolled her eyes and snatched it out of his paws before he could be annoying about it.
"What does any of that even mean?" Ithos asked. Max scanned the 'continent wide warning' again, like she had hundreds of times before, without pulling much of an answer. He dragged his paw along the page until he found a passage to point at with his claw. It was an odd poem situated smack dab in the middle of what looked like a natural disaster notice.
Beware the weak of body,
Beware the weak of mind,
For they spread their malady,
Trick you to fall behind;
Beware the weak of heart,
Beware the weak of will,
For evil they impart,
And in their scheming, kill.
Destroy this sick, corrupting force
That seeks to sin with no remorse;
Destroy the dark within yourself
Or be devoured by The Else;
Destroy the love you feel for those
Who, in their love, cause you to sin;
Destroy to live, for if you can't,
Degenerates will crush an ant.
Ithos scanned it over again, but Max didn't let herself. Reading it once had made her sick and engraved it into her mind. She recognized its rhetoric, even if it baffled Ithos. "None of it makes sense," he mumbled. "How does being weak make you a threat?"
"That's the point," Max said. Her paws trembled thinking back to her first conversation with Fara. She glanced back to her tail, glad now more than ever that she'd landed with a different configuration this time. Even if it wasn't as true to herself, it was safer. "She's not going to stop by purging Rescue Teams." To say it, 'purging,' left tar on her lips. Her claws dug into the paper until she shoved it into Ithos' paws.
"I hate this," she whimpered, burying her head in her paws. Ithos set the notice back down at her bedside table and tugged her back around so she could lean into him again. She let her face rest against his scales so she could wrap her arms around him.
"It won't work, c'mon," Ithos whispered. "She can't just get people to hate each other overnight."
"Maybe not," Max said, barely any air under her voice. "But plenty of people already hate each other, and fear is easy to spread." Her eyes started wandering back to the note, so Ithos gently turned her head to rest on his shoulder again.
"Still, why is she getting rid of Rescue Teams?" Ithos asked.
"Think about the missions she forbid Expedition Teams from taking," Max said. She desperately wished he had a frame of reference for this, but why would he? This wasn't anything the pokémon world had probably seen before, which made it all the more dangerous. "Helping people is always secondary, but it was always enough for Rescue Teams."
"Well, yeah, but it spread them really thin," Ithos said. "I mean, we had to basically build that house ourselves." Max nodded, mouth twisting in thought. She couldn't help wondering if Fara had her paw in that, too.
"It was still a support network," Max sighed. "People needed it." She started squeezing her paws in frustration, not realizing where her claws stabbed until Ithos started hissing. "Sorry." Ithos let out a breath of relief, patting her to let her know it was fine. Her mind couldn't leave from the call to action, though. The once exclusive Expedition Society now let anyone audition.
In Neb's time, that wouldn't be a big deal, but food wasn't free, here. Shelter wasn't, either, and both had gotten noticeably more thin while Fara prepared her legion.
A deep, guttural moan of agony came from the other room.
"Heck," Ithos whispered.
"Shit," Max whispered. She rolled her eyes and let go of Ithos to flop back down on her bed. Once she hit the sheets, she winced in pain, hissing all the air she could in and out of her lungs while clutching her side. "K-kaka KAAAchu," she whimpered, barely keeping one eye open in her wince to watch Ithos' reaction. "M-my rib! When you squeezed me, I-I think you might've re-inju-"
Ithos shoved her off the bed, grumbling, "You're just mad it's your turn." She yelped, but landed perfectly fine.
"Kachu," Max swore. She reeled her head back to take in a deep sigh, lowering it as she exhaled. Among the three of them, somehow, Ash had come out of it all the worst—and he didn't even get petrified. At least, he seemed to think he had it the worst.
"Don't worry, my little spark," Ithos hummed. He hopped off the bed to plant a cheek on her forehead. "I'll make sure you have a lovely breakfast once you're done."
"You never let me cook," Max grumbled. Crossing her arms, she pouted off to the side. Keeping him out of sight, however, didn't stop her feeling him staring down at her.
"No, I let you cook," Ithos said. "Once."
"It's been a long time!" Max said, burrowing into her crossed arms a bit before throwing them up in indignation. "Besides, why should I?! What's the point! Berries, apples, nuts—they're fine! You don't need to cook them, anyway! It's pointless! I hate food!"
"I'm not sure you think that, my husky little bolt," Ithos chuckled, pinching at some plush chub at her side. His claws didn't get far before a short, sharp shock shot right through him. Max swiped at him with her paw, but only caught air, and he was at the door before she had a chance to try to use her tail. "Love you, babe, bye!"
A huge bolt of electricity smashed into the mirror hanging on the back of the door right as he slammed it shut. "YOU!" Max shouted at him. His laughter echoed through the door, too loud for a bit of wood to stop. Luckily for Max, the wood was enough to keep her chuckles to herself.
"He's lucky I'm me," Max mumbled to herself. She rolled her eyes with a shake of her head. "Any other girlfriend would've killed him already." Ithos was the only one who knew her past 'configuration', and she'd talked about it all with him before. She'd started to notice a pattern that he only seemed to tease her about aspects she happened to like about her appearance.
Max wiggled the last bits of sleep out of her head and looked at the mirror. Luckily, her little shock had glanced harmlessly off the glass, so she let her eyes wander to her own reflection. She really didn't look much different at all, though it was sometimes hard to remember her old reflection exactly.
After all, she didn't exactly like looking at it before. Now, though, she just adored doing it. Sure, it seemed a bit vain, but after so many years of hellish dysphoria, she'd earned some vanity.
Her paws traced their way down her side, feeling the subtle and soft topology. Her waist transitioned near seamlessly into her hips, now, which she'd barely managed to notice was different until that incident with the Lotus. Her biggest concern, thankfully, was significantly more subtle than it would've been as a human. Her mammaries were nice and mouse-sized, much to her relief, barely noticeable unless she felt for them.
Inevitably, she found her eyes drifting between her tail and her… 'configuration' elsewhere. It was odd, the two most obviously gendered places in her old body still felt out of place in this one. She might've had fun experimenting with the new plumbing, but she'd never really stopped feeling the sense of loss.
She'd even considered trying out different tail sleeves again, just for fun, but that didn't feel safe anymore. She shook her head out of that thought before she could even look at the letter again. Turning around, she lamented one last thing about her anatomy.
It was a lot harder to look right behind her as a pikachu. As a result, she'd never gotten the chance to get a good look at her own ass. The best she got was feeling its topology when Ithos got more adventurous (which certainly made her optimistic of its size), but that was no replacement. She got promising previews by looking at it from the side, and that had to do for the time being because Ash was whining again.
"Idiot," Max grumbled. She glanced herself over one last time on her way over to the door and tugged it open to head over to Ash's door on the opposite wall. She started to knock four times, but the third nearly hit an eager Ash in the face.
"ITH-" Ash started to scream before visibly deflating, "oh." He let out another forlorn sigh and traipsed away to languish on his bed some more.
"Good morning, Ash, nice to see you," Max chuckled. She followed in after him with a shake of her head and started to talk before deciding it'd be better to shut the door first. By the time she'd gotten back, Ash lay defeated upon his sheets once again. "Ash, come on. He won't even fuck me yet." It took some effort to keep the growl out of her voice for that one. "Why do you keep trying?"
"I neeeed it," Ash whined. "It's not like you," he flicked a disgusted paw at her and rolled over, "can give me what I want." Thankfully, he didn't get to see her flinch at the sore he'd unwittingly glanced over.
"Ohhh, bless your heart," Max cooed in sativa sweetened sympathy. She hopped on his bed to run her paw down the love-sick cyndaquil's back. After that awakening in the bar, he'd become quite prolific in his own right. He even had some kind of boyfriend (Max was pretty sure Ash was just one of many playmates) that he'd had to leave behind without a word. Ithos and Max really felt for his loss.
At first. Losing an emotional support like that could devastate anyone, but Ash's problem seemed to be exclusively with his new lack of release that he, for some reason, made Ithos' problem as well. Max kinda thought the little bi-disaster was cute, but obviously had to downplay that to support Ithos.
"Come on," Max said, hauling him out of the sheets by his shoulders. Ash gave some token resistance, but he and she both knew it was pointless. She'd spent the most time out of all of them honing her physical strength. Since he was being so cooperative, she tugged him up to rest his head on her shoulder. "You'll get back to him, all right?" Ash forced out an exaggerated groan loud enough to start testing Max's patience.
"You don't get it," Ash grumbled. "You'll never understand how hard guys have it." Not about to let him know how wrong he was, Max rolled her eyes and played dumb. "It's a need, Max, a NEED, for us!"
"Kapi," Max hissed, putting a paw to her ear with a wince. She was starting to regret letting him lean on her. Misery was no excuse to yell that close to her ear. It was like he'd never even thought of taking care of this issue himself. "What happened to, y'know." She looked him in the eyes and sprinkled invisible salt on her groin. "Self-regulation?"
"Not the same," Ash said. Unfortunately, he had a point.
"No," Max grumbled with a breathless head shake of appreciation. "No it is not." Contrary to Ash's assumption, he had no idea how good he really had it. Self-care was significantly more tedious for her, and it took her a long while to figure it out. She shook her head out of those frustrations and turned to see Ash squinting at her (more than usual).
"You jack off?" Ash said.
"What?" Max spat, flinching away from him in confusion. She twisted her mouth in bafflement, shaking her head while she took a breath to focus on her speech. "Yes, obviously?"
"Why?" Ash asked. Max slapped her paw to her face. For spending so much of his energy for so long pursuing them, Ash knew absolutely nothing about girls. His eyes started wandering to the floor while he processed the very simple information. "How? Like, what do you even use?"
"Out of bed!" Max said. She grabbed him by the shoulders and chucked him to the floor before hopping down herself. "Not. Talking about this with you, buddy." She was very, very happy to be open with her friends about her sexuality, but she hadn't even had breakfast yet. Also, she didn't want to explain how to masturbate with a vagina to Ash. She went to open the door, yanking Ash along on her way.
Opening the door, she saw a very red Ithos holding a spatula with a vice grip.
"H-hey, Max," Ithos stuttered. Max slapped a paw to her face, shaking her head. Was it simply impossible for a guy to be normal about this? She could see the air distorting around him while he burned in embarrassment. "S-someone's at the door for you."
"All right," Max grumbled. She glanced at the spatula and shoved Ash closer to him. "Beat him with that, will you?" Ithos sputtered out failed attempts of responses while she walked away, rubbing her eyes. This was not her morning, but at least it probably wouldn't get any worse from there. The last surprise would be whoever was at the door, surely.
Then, the first cramp hit. Because of course it did. It was a little twinge, barely noticeable, but with the deafening clarion call of what was to come—especially since she left her ibuprofen at their dorms. She put a paw to her belly and tried to wear a brave face as she opened the front door.
Grovyle pounced down to yank her up into a hug, forcing several embarrassing squeaks out of her along the way. "Oh, there's my little anomaly!" he cooed as if talking to a toddler.
"CHU!" Max shouted in pain. He'd smacked his paw right on the bad part of her rib that Ithos agitated earlier. All the other jostles upset the rest of her, too, pulling out a long, low groan of suffering while that minor suggestion of a cramp suddenly decided to wring her like a towel. "Rib!" Max seethed. "Broken rib!"
"What?" Grovyle asked. He pulled her away in confusion that burst into concern once he saw her pained grimace. "Oh, sorry!" He plopped her down with equal parts speed and grace, then held a bottle out for her. Max snatched the bottle out of his paw without a single question and downed the first ibuprofen dry. "Didn't expect the rib."
"There's been a lot of unexpected events lately," Max grumbled. She walked over to the set of steps and plopped down on the first. Grovyle followed shortly behind and sat on the second step, leaning against the opposite banister with his right arm resting on his knee.
"I'm sure," Grovyle said. He gave her a sympathetic nod that only made her blood boil further. "Terrifying enough learning this history. Don't know how I'd handle living it."
"Right, that, too," Max said. This was history? At least Fara's little stunt was supposed to happen, though that didn't really feel like comfort. Grovyle tilted his head at her words in a silent question. She tried to hold her frustrations back, but couldn't help feeling like he should be able to guess what was bothering her. "Getting petrified again."
"Getting what?" Grovyle asked. One brow lifted in concern. "You went to the Voidlands?"
"Yep," Max grumbled. Resting her elbow against the banister to her right, she held her cheek up with her paw. Purely from his reaction, she could tell that wasn't supposed to happen. It made sense, considering he hadn't known about her rib, either.
"That's how this happened," Max said. She carefully tapped her chest with her free paw, then deflated in her own hold. "Guess you're off the hook for not telling me about that, then."
"I'm sorry, Max," Grovyle said. Max looked through the gaps in the banister to avoid seeing him. He sounded genuine, but she just couldn't accept the apology. The autumn cold had already dulled all but the evergreens to orange. "There's only so much that I can do for you. Even if I'd known that would happen, I couldn't have told you."
"I know!" Max snapped. She flicked her head to look at him with rage in her eyes and sent sparks of anger flying across the stairs between them. Remembering that letter made her paw curl into a fist. "Time can't change, I get it!"
Grovyle didn't even have the decency to recoil at her anger. He sat there with a sympathetic frown while she hissed at him. "All I get to know is something's wrong," she glanced to the door and lowered her voice even further, "and he fails this time." Her tail flicked off some excess charge behind her while she forced herself to look forward.
She'd known that was supposed to happen from the beginning, but she'd never realized the weight it carried before. She couldn't imagine what was going to happen if Fara got her way. It terrified her.
The naked trees with fallen leaves began to blur in front of her as tears overwhelmed her eyes. She hugged her tail to her chest while staring ahead. Of everyone, she probably had a better idea than anyone there of where this would lead, but it still wasn't remotely enough. Ithos and Ash were terrified of what war would mean, and so was she, but she knew that wasn't the real horror to come.
A cold wind swept dust up with a whirlwind of dead leaves to tumble along the path. Some remains fell along the way, forgotten by the gust before they hit the ground. Others joined along the way to fall just the same.
The wind mercilessly sucked them up and cast them away, not a single speck meeting its impossible standard. It whisked them away to beat and batter them into a new shape only to abandon them in a place they'd never known. It had no identity of its own, no color, no goal, nothing but an unstoppable force in search of an immovable object to slam all its victims into.
"She doesn't win," Grovyle said. Max barely listened, barely wanted to hear him. He hoisted himself up and scooted over to her. "Fara." Max glared up at him, waiting for him to get to the point already. He moved to put a paw on her shoulder, but quickly registered that wouldn't end well and instead looked ahead with her.
"Ithos will fail, but Fara won't win," he said.
"Is this a riddle or something?" Max growled. She let go of her tail to lean her back against the banister. Despite her frustrations, she knew he was already telling her more than he probably should. "Why would you even risk telling me more?"
"Simple. I'm a liar," Grovyle said with a smirk. "You're of interest to me for more than being a simple anomaly."
"What?" Max asked, squinting up at him. 'Of interest to me' was an awful pickup line. She rolled her eyes and shook her head. "Grovyle, I have a boyfriend."
"And I have a husband," Grovyle chuckled. He went to pat her shoulder again, now that she was too distracted with the little embarrassment to shock him (though, a few sparks did graze him as they bounced down her cheeks). "So sorry. I'm always quite the disappointment to the ladies, I'm afraid."
"I was just rejecting you," Max chuckled.
"Good, we're on the same page, then," Grovyle said with a smirk. After looking down in whatever victory he'd just imagined, he turned to look at the windswept path again. "It's hard making friends in this line of work, you know." Right as it'd begun to scratch down her back, his paw pulled away to rest at his side. Max found her instincts tugging her towards him for more and forced herself to sit still halfway there.
"I've got some nice friends to go back to, but it's always odd," Grovyle said. "I've always been away for longer than they think. There's years of my life they'll never know about. Either it's too much to tell, or because those years were spent erasing themselves."
He glanced down to see if Max was following and seemed pleasantly surprised to see she was. "Good girl," he said, administering a thorough head pat. She should've been offended, but her instincts wouldn't let her complain, and he started talking before he stopped. "It makes relationships a lot more complicated." He smirked down at her while she recovered from the petting. "You'll see."
"I'm just trying not to think about it," Max said. She started leaning against his side without thinking about it, and he brought his paw down to rest on her shoulder. Never knowing what might happen to him, she never let herself worry about where Ithos would end up.
There was, of course, the despair to worry about, but that wasn't her main concern. The real problem was her own relationship to the inevitable. If she let herself think about it, she'd start believing she could defeat it. Perhaps it was a natural consequence of saving the world once, or maybe that trait had been what they needed to defeat Dark Matter. She was more than willing to believe in the impossible.
Transitioning only emboldened that feeling.
"What if I did?" Max asked. They'd had this conversation enough that she didn't need to clarify. In fact, as he pat her shoulder, she already knew what Grovyle would say next.
"You can't," Grovyle said.
"I know, I know," Max said, rolling her eyes. "But what if I did?" She tilted her head back to look up at him. Some knowledge gleamed behind his eyes like it always did, only strengthening her rebellious need to prove him wrong. "You said there were ripples, didn't you? What if, somehow, we did it? What would happen?"
"Well, if you did," Grovyle said. He took a deep breath, patting her shoulder as he exhaled. "I suppose I'd have my work cut out for me."
Max rolled her eyes, intercepting his paw with her tail and flicking it away. It was too much to expect a meaningful answer from him. Unfortunately, she could never stop herself from hoping. That was the hard part. She'd love to just give up, give in to despair, roll over and die, but she couldn't. Her heart would beat whether she wanted it or not and hope whether it helped or hurt her.
That made it all the harder to wonder how much longer she had with Ithos.
Her little resistance lost its luster, and she leaned back into Grovyle's side. "Was it a mistake to fall in love?" she asked.
"Probably," Grovyle said—she really hated his snark, sometimes. Max forced herself to wait for his incoming point before shocking him. "It always is, if you do it right." He smiled down at her with an infuriating, knowing grin and lightly scritched the top of her head. "For you, though." He shrugged and coyly looked away. "I've a feeling you won't regret it, in the end."
Max perked up at that. It could mean a million different things from learning to live with grief to living with Ithos happily ever after. Given how cagey Grovyle was with information, though, it did let her know one thing: their relationship was basically a certainty.
The reassurance wasn't much, but it was enough. It started to feel a bit easier to believe she'd find herself somewhere nice in the end of this all. Maybe that would only make it hurt more, but that frustratingly tenacious hope stuck with her still. At least she'd be able to leave Ithos on good terms. She'd already lost him once. It might hurt more to lose him this time, but she'd be glad to love him to the end.
"How were the Voidlands, by the way?" Grovyle asked. He hopped over the last three steps and started stretching in front of their little cabin. He kept an expectant gaze on her as he did while Max choked back her bewilderment (like always).
"Great, honestly," Max lied through a thick layer of sarcasm. "Worst nightmare coming true again right before my very eyes? Couldn't imagine anything better." She rolled her eyes to glare at Grovyle and found him looking at her chest. When she looked down, she saw her paw digging its claws into her scarf. She awkwardly let it go, looking down and away while she smoothed it out.
"Well, I'd assumed that much," Grovyle said. He didn't even acknowledge her little attempt at playing brave, responding instead to an approximation of a more honest answer. Max wasn't sure if it was courteous or scathing. "I hope you can find some peace with it, but I've other things I'd like to know."
"It's pretty much what you'd expect," Max said. Soon after she said that, she remembered that he hadn't expected it to happen at all while she fought her paw trying to squeeze the scarf again. She couldn't quite take it off the scarf, but she managed to stop digging holes into it.
"I'm not a monster, Max," Grovyle said. He paused his stretching to kneel in front of her. Thanks to the stairs, it was actually enough for him to reach her eye level. It was purely symbolic, though, since she refused to let herself meet his eyes. "If this is too much for you to recount, I don't need you to force yourself." Even looking away, she could feel him staring at her.
"Thanks," Max sighed. Without the added pressure, she actually managed to think back a bit. As far as getting trapped in the embodiment of negativity went, though, it really was uneventful. She almost said as much when the most bizarre encounter came to mind.
"Oh yeah, Jirachi," she said. Grovyle watched with interest as he pulled his arm behind his head by the elbow with its twin. Max partially mirrored the motion, scratching the back of her head. "When I found him, he…," she could still hear his weeps echoing off the cave walls, "really didn't like that I was here." She glanced up to gauge Grovyle's reaction, but he had yet to give one, so she went on.
"He wouldn't say much about it," she shrugged, starting to re-wrap her scarf again. "Just that it was his fault, and he was sorry."
"Oh dear," Grovyle said. He rested a paw on his hip while sneering at the horizon. "Definitely not a good sign. Don't like that." He shook his head. "Don't like that at all." Max tilted her head and raised an ear. "And he wouldn't tell you what he'd done, either." He took a deep breath in and whistled.
"Not really helping," Max said. She returned her head to neutral while worry weighed down her ears and tail. There was a reason she'd tried not to think of that encounter much.
"Apologies," Grovyle said. "On the bright side, I believe we've found a good contender for what's caused all these ripples." He crossed his arms with one paw coming up to scratch his chin in thought. "Jirachi's certainly strong enough, after all. Even among legendaries, few others could meddle with time." Max wished she'd brought a pillow to rest her head while he rambles on.
"Oh well," Grovyle said with a shrug. Max's ears flicked up at that. He didn't usually stop himself so soon, and he seemed to register her confusion with a smirk. "More I'd love to say. Unfortunately, we're just about out of time." Max opened her mouth to ask what he meant right as the front door opened behind her.
"Hey, Max," Ithos called. "Oh, you're still here?"
"Not much longer, worry not," Grovyle said. He waved his paw and started to head out. "Ciao."
"Hey, wait! You sure?" Ithos asked. Grovyle paused to look back, slightly taken aback. "I just finished breakfast. Are you hungry?" Ithos let the door fall behind him while he went over to help Max up. The assistance was revealed to be a clever ruse, though, when he pulled her into a hug, planting a kiss on her nose before looking back at Grovyle with a smile.
"Touching," Grovyle chuckled, shaking his head. "Inviting a stranger in for breakfast?"
"Well, you're not really a stranger, are you?" Ithos asked, smile entirely unaffected by the skepticism. He glanced down at Max, then nuzzled her cheek as he went on. "You know Max, right?"
"I suppose I do," Grovyle said. Max turned to wrap her arms around Ithos and saw Grovyle watching them with a smile. "I do have to go, though. Apologies." He nodded to Ithos and turned to head out. "Don't forget to bring in the bottle, Max."
"Bottle?" Ithos asked.
"Right," Max said. She scanned the porch and scampered over to the ibuprofen. Ithos lagged behind, catching up to her with a curious eye on the bottle.
"Is that the same Grovyle?" Ithos mumbled. "He always brings that stuff to you. How'd he even find us?" Then, he suddenly looked to Max and winced. "Oh, you're having your thing, aren't you?"
"My thing?" Max asked with a chuckle. A light stab of her internal organs answered his question for her when she put a paw to her stomach with a wince.
"Here, I got you!" Ithos said. He snatched the bottle up in his paw and crouched under her left arm to hold her up. "C'mon, let's go."
"Oh my God, Ithos," Max chuckled. She wriggled out of his hold and shook her head. He didn't remotely get what she was dealing with, but that never stopped him from trying to help. "It's just cramping, not a broken—kaaaaa chu." A fresh cramp came to interrupt her, nearly making her double over despite the earlier ibuprofen.
When Ithos snatched her up again, she didn't resist. She nuzzled her cheek against his scales in thanks while her insides proceeded to blend themselves. The pain wouldn't have stopped her from walking, but assistance wasn't too bad. It gave her an excuse to hang off Ithos, and too much help was never a bad thing. Besides, she knew Ithos. No one could ever stop him from trying to help.
"I admit I'm impressed
When the torpedo in the vest
Barks his orders I'm impressed"
Ash, Ithos and Max walked alongside the road by night, erring closer to the woods than the path. A night of the new moon, only stars lit the sky. It was profoundly dark, but Ithos' tail gave them enough light. It was a bit of a risk to get spotted, but he'd gotten good at hiding it when needed.
All three kept vigilant watch around them as they went, Max using her awareness just in case. It was almost more trouble than it was worth, though. She could feel every little twitching twig around them while also having to deal with a constant hum of instincts behind her every move. At least she was familiar enough with Ash and Ithos that her instincts didn't consider them a threat.
Ash tapped his chest twice before pointing to a half-fallen tree on the opposite side of the path. He looked back at them and splayed the same paw to the sky at them. Ithos nodded, tugging a notebook out of his bag's front pocket.
After reading it over and a few more glances to the half-fallen tree, Ithos nodded and looked to Max. Her ears fell for a second, but it's not as if they had much of a choice. Even if it put more of a strain in favor of her instincts, they needed to know. She closed her eyes and focused on the area around them to find it was a surprisingly windy night.
The wind wasn't enough to register through her fur, but every blade of grass, loose leaf or twig rustled around them. Max winced against the sensory overload but tried to keep a hold of herself. Ithos started to reach out to give her a supportive paw, luckily catching himself before worsening her problems.
Of all the ways Ithos helped, this issue more than any other made her miss Cori. They'd always sit with her exactly like she needed. Somehow, they knew just what to do. Ithos tried his best, but sometimes his attempts to help did the opposite.
Max clenched her teeth tighter and tried to focus. For all the rustling and rattling, she didn't detect more than the skittering of bugs as far as life went. She took a breath and looked up with a nod.
"Is that some weird human technique?" Ash asked. Ithos slapped his paw to his face while Max shook her head. She might've laughed if she weren't still surrounded by the endless input of their surroundings. It would take her some time before she fully recovered, but it was already enough that she could start heading over to the rendezvous point.
"Not," Max said, glancing at Ithos to confirm she was speaking English, "exactly." Ithos narrowed his eyes at her for even entertaining the notion, making Max even more eager to go on. She flopped down near the tree and took a moment's rest first, though.
"Quite the opposite, in fact," she hummed. What she wouldn't give for an iPod. Not what she would've expected to want, but the sheer lack of music around her had to be the most torturous part of living in this world. "It's some weird thing with my instincts." While they all got comfy, she kept an ear up to listen. Even without her awareness, being a pikachu gave her the best hearing of the three.
Having ears tends to have that effect.
To her dismay, that was enough to quell Ash's curiosity. They were all tired, though, so it made sense. She just wished they could keep talking while they waited. As long as they kept quiet, she'd be able to hear anyone as they approached.
When Ithos tugged a map out of his bag, she leapt over to see what he was doing. Any stimulation was better than none. Ithos flinched, then chuckled a bit, shaking his head.
"Just reviewing this route," Ithos said. He pointed a claw to trace it in the air with his typical consternation. The orders came from far above them, but that didn't stop him from hating the oddest parts of them. "It doesn't make any sense."
"That's kinda the point, honey," Max said. She pointed to the coastline and followed one of the many paths originating in a port in a few circles that looped into about every other path. "It's modular and confusing. Lets us change plans on a fly as needed. Otherwise, they'll be able to block us off."
"I get that, but it's not like we're leading other Teams," Ithos said. "Just—look!" He jabbed his claw towards the paths diving into and through the mountains. "It goes through a mountain range, and half of these could get taken up by the Dungeon in that area!" His head shook while he looked over the map he had to have memorized by now. "What about the kids? Hatchlings, how are they supposed to do that?"
"Maybe they won't have to," Max offered weakly. In truth, she didn't have a good answer for him, but she knew the routing had its reasoning. "We can adjust the routes for who's taking them." Not that the reasoning helped keep her stomach from turning.
Ithos looked up at her and saw a similar conflict in her eyes. Neither of them liked this arrangement, but they didn't have any choice, and the Rescue Society still didn't completely trust them yet.
"How many?" Ithos asked. "How many families have had to uproot their lives because of this?" Max winced away. She might have more experience uprooting her life than most, but that didn't ever make it easy. She still got emotional thinking about that little card game with Neb. Ithos let out a loud sigh and started folding the map up. "I wish we could just end this."
Max's ear flicked up at a sound. After a few seconds, she heard the same faint whistle coming from the East. She gave Ithos an apologetic smile and tugged her own whistle out of the front of her bag. They could finish the conversation later.
She echoed the whistle back and waited. After a few seconds, she heard a long tone, a short, then three more long tones. She'd forgotten what they were supposed to mean, but she knew how to answer it since it almost sounded like a tune. A short long long, short long, short long short could kind of be considered a cadence when she was particularly close to losing it.
Which she was.
Finally, she heard a seconds long whistle back. They were on their way over. She let out a sigh and dropped the whistle back into the front of her bag. "Get ready," she said to Ithos.
Ash seemed to voice some kind of objection. When Max looked, though, it was obviously just him snoring. She started sparking her cheeks to give him a very efficient wake up call when Ithos firmly, but gently, pulled her back by the shoulder. Max rolled her eyes and crossed her arms while he forcibly shook Ash awake. Before Ash could yelp in surprise, Ithos covered his muzzle.
The panic lasted just long enough for Ash to wake up before he realized it was just Ithos. When Ithos let go, Ash scrambled up and started rubbing the sleep out of his eyes. Ithos had his priorities in order, knowing it's more important to stay quiet than to express his frustration.
Max still didn't like it, though. Regardless, she swallowed her annoyance with a yawn and started listening for whoever was to come. Maybe they were far enough away that she could get some shuteye herself.
A branch rustled above them. Max hid her frustration as she looked up to see a purple bat with pincers staring down at them. Soon after, the ground below the gligar rumbled until a marshtomp popped out. Having them both pop up so close, Max could feel her heart racing. She didn't even know gligar was a ground type, but her instincts did.
"Anyone trailing you?" Marshtomp asked. He walked carefully over to Max while Gligar watched from above. Max could feel Gligar's eyes on her and started second guessing every move. "Pikachu?"
"No," Ithos said. He put an arm around her, lightly jostling her out of her terror. "We kept watch. What about you?"
Marshtomp raised a brow at Max while he answered, "No. Gligar watched from above, and I never felt any rumblings from the soil." He watched Ithos and Ash carefully, and Max could still feel Gligar watching her without even looking. With Ithos helping her stay calm, it was a lot easier to get mad at the Rescue Society. They always sent type advantages to meet them. "How's the trail look?"
"Here," Ithos said. Reaching into his bag, he pulled out a notebook and gave it to Marshtomp. Marshtomp took it, but only after giving it a close look, and he snatched it out of Ithos' paw when he did. Ithos hissed at the impact and shook his paw while Marshtomp looked at him expectantly. "What?"
"What'd you find?" Marshtomp asked. Without looking, he tucked the notebook into his bag. "Appreciate the notes, those are for later." Max bit her cheek and almost started to tell Marshtomp how stupid that sounded when Ithos squeezed her shoulder.
"Not much, luckily," Ithos said. Max leaned back to watch Gligar watch her with a bored expression. Gligar didn't so much as blink in response, just keeping silent watch over them. "Route C goes a bit close to Longfield. We managed to miss the Dungeon, but it was close." Marshtomp nodded along, but clearly didn't care how close it came to a Dungeon. "Besides that, we didn't run into anyone."
Marshtomp nodded along. He gave Ithos a few more moments to continue before looking up to Gligar. "That right?" he asked. Ithos squeezed Max's shoulder tighter, this time in response to his own anger.
"About the same as what ours said," Gligar said. Max's tail flicked sparks behind her while Gligar kept careful watch. "It's not exactly thorough, but they're probably not lying." This had all been a test. A complete waste of time redoing what their teams had already done.
"Of course we're not!" Max hissed. The bit of dread burning in her stomach wasn't enough to dull her blazing fury. In an instant, Marshtomp hopped into a fighting stance. Max rolled her eyes and went on without even acknowledging how ready he was to attack her. "We've been trying to help for weeks! We already proved ourselves, what gives?!"
"Max, we're just being thorough," Marshtomp said. Max clenched her fist.
"What happened to 'Pikachu', huh?" Max asked. Marshtomp winced, realizing his own slip. "You know us! This is all just another test!" Her cheeks flashed in anger, and she let them. It's not as if they posed a threat to ground types. "What happened to Rescuing people?"
"I'm just following orders!" Marshtomp whispered through clenched teeth. He put one flipper finger over his lips to remind her to be quiet. If it weren't for Ithos grabbing her by the shoulder again, that might've been the last straw for her. Luckily, he tugged her back and kept things almost some kind of civil. She let him take the lead and realized her awareness had started reaching out in her anger.
"We're exhausted," Ithos said with a sigh. He rubbed some of the tiredness out of his eyes while tugging out another chesto to toss down his gullet. "We want to stop Fara just as much as you. Why do we have to keep wasting our time on this?"
"All right, look," Gligar said, hopping down a few branches. "You're basically trusted, okay? We just can't afford any of this getting out." All the grass rattling around them pounded into Max's head. "Nobody's on extractions yet, anyway, not until we've cleared every route, got it?" At the very edge, the air shifted in an odd way.
Max snapped her paw and threw a paw up. Once everyone looked, she tapped her ear twice and pointed behind Marshtomp. She hadn't heard it, but it got the point across.
She closed her eyes to feel for whatever it was. The noise of the surroundings made it hard to get a clear image, but she could tell they were coming closer. Just the one, it seemed like, but it wasn't making any noise. As much as she wanted some kind of answer, her awareness wasn't getting her anywhere.
She started to focus on her breath and tried pulling it in. Hopefully, she wouldn't need to do that while fighting. A metal clang resounded in the direction she'd felt them.
The air to her left inverted with a little pop as a gardevoir teleported in, standard issue tags hanging from the collar on his neck. "Freeze!" he shouted, flashing his Expedition badge to them. "State your business."
"Aw, do we have to?" Max whined. Ithos elbowed her while she rolled her eyes. "What if I don't wanna?"
Gardevoir snapped and a focused arrow of psychic energy appeared in his hand. Now that he was looking at her, though, he squinted for a second, quickly looking at her tail. "Max?" he asked. Right, because that mutation wasn't supposed to exist for another few thousand years, was it? One of the many perks of being one of a kind. She didn't recognize the Gardevoir, but he didn't seem happy to see her.
"Did you say Max?" a familiar voice called from behind Marshtomp. Gardevoir kept his eyes locked on Max while the other member of his team approached. Marshtomp hopped around and shot a jet of water in the direction of the voice.
With a flash of light, the water flung back accompanied by a swirling ball of darkness that nailed Marshtomp in the gut. A blazing arc sliced through the air towards him while he stumbled back. Max leapt over and shoved him out of the way, then swiped the attack out of the air with an iron tail. As the attacker approached, it got a lot easier to remember where she'd heard the voice before.
"Ah, greetings, old friend," Parry said, the shine of his sharpened edge enough to illuminate the air around him. He looked Max over with thought before readying his shield to match her stance. "We all thought you would have succumb by now."