Something was...off...in the Realm of Dreams. Past Morai could feel it. She completed her meditation, took up her staff, and headed towards the Outlands once again. It had become her job to keep the Land of Nightmares under control, which often forced her to go toe to toe with the creatures that inhabited it. Nightmare Morai lived above them all. A wispy and sometimes intangible form, she was the representation of nightmares that often threatened Morai's sleep.
As Past Morai descended into the nightmarish terrain with a solemn look on her face, she couldn't help but wonder how long she'd keep this up. Was it her duty to fight this imbalance between dreams and nightmares forever alongside trying to balance Morai's very soul? Her body, though it was made up of dreams and psychic power, had grown weary. As the trainer traveled further into the land, she realized that its cruel ruler was nowhere to be found.
"She would've come out to fight by now," Past Morai told her pink Espurr companion as it came to rest on her head. It didn't take much longer to come upon the nightmarish scene lying within the nightmare land.
"A...hole..." Morai said with curiosity. "Like shattered glass. Like the very reality has been...broken."
The urgency of the situation suddenly hit her with terrifying force.
"She's gone!" she yelled, immediately putting Espurr in one of the satchels hanging from her belt as she leapt through the supposed tear in the fabric of Morai's mind and soul. They were consumed by darkness as Morai began to realize that her actions might have been too hasty and reactive. Until they hit the ground, that is.
"All of that work," the familiar voice of nightmares said, "for absolutely nothing at all."
The recognizable figure was looming over someone else, who was sat on the floor against a wall.
"I just need more time!" the figure pleaded. "I can still fix it! Fix you!"
I know them, Past Morai thought. I haven't seen them with my own eyes, but...somewhere in our shared memory...
"More time? You can't resurrect people from the dead, doctor," Nightmare Morai said. "You can't undo what she's—what I've done. Not only did you fail to save my soul, but you managed to lose so many others' in the process. Now the damage is done. I'm doomed to remain the way I am and the world is all the worse for it. The cruel, unforgiving and chaotic world filled with people hiding behind their masks of righteousness, doomed to give into their selfish and evil desires. Not only did you fail to change the world, you failed to save one single person. You have blood on your hands, doctor."
"The formula!" the doctor said, frantically grabbing a syringe from off the counter above, "I think I've got it right this time! If I could just—"
Morai—or the nightmare that had taken her appearance—clawed the man's outstretched hand and sent the syringe flying to its doom, the blue liquid spreading over the cold laboratory floor.
"Don't you get it, you fool? I never wanted to change!" Morai said, grabbing him by the collar of his white coat, her sharp teeth inches away from his face. "That's what you wanted! You and that entire team trying to accomplish the impossible, putting me through hell just because they wanted their old Champion back, and you wanted a lab rat you wouldn't go to prison for testing experimental drugs on!"
"Morai, I'm s—"
"And look where it got you! You're the last to live! It seems so unfair that fate would spare you out of everyone, but perhaps it's a just punishment. You've witnessed the bloody consequences of your failure first hand, and now you have to watch as the one whose soul was placed so carefully in your hands—"
Past Morai couldn't wait any longer. She attacked with a flying knee to get her opponent away from the doctor and sent her crashing to the ground. The two exchanged a few blows before the fragment of nightmare made her way to the other side of the room.
"I've done all I wanted here," she said as she faded away like sand blowing in the wind.
Past Morai turned to see the doctor, who had risen to his feet, looking at her in awe.
"You're..."
"Morai," she said.
"Yes, but...you're the other Morai. The one in her head? What about the others?"
"I wasn't always in her head," Morai sighed, sheathing her staff back onto her back. "I used to be The Mask Maker, out there in the real world. Until I took that serum. Light and Shadow Morai are gone. I don't know where they went or if they'll return."
"But you're here!" the doctor said. "In my dream—er, nightmare, really. How am I supposed to know you're actually apart of her psyche instead of something my own brain dreamed up? Wasn't that Morai that just left?"
"It wasn't Morai...not really. Just an intangible part of her psyche that happens to take that form. You ask a lot of questions, doctor," Past Morai chuckled.
"Sorry," he said, "It's just that Morai is a puzzle I've been trying to solve ever since we met. Before that, even."
"I don't mind," the dream trainer replied, sitting down and leaning against the wall with a tired sigh. "Ever since I basically died and went to the Realm of Dreams, she's the only human contact I've had and...well, you know how Morai is. I was supposed to help her, but I'm afraid her—our—soul has been scarred by that serum. I haven't accomplished very much."
"Nonsense! Have you seen her lately? There hasn't been a full attack in nearly two weeks!"
"Yes, but she's not doing well internally," Morai answered. "She's a ticking time bomb, waiting to go off. She's trying very hard to fight what she's become, but deep down she still wants it and is barely getting on without it. She's tried to attack me several times."
"...I see...Well this really does seem quite hopeless, doesn't it?" the man sighed, sitting down beside her."
"She's trying, and I suppose that's what matters. In our garden there's a way to tell the balance of her soul. Before, the 'good' side was completely dead, but it seems to be slowly coming back to life despite her struggle."
"Excuse me for saying it, but you seem quite worn out and battered. Is it hard work, living in someone else's mind?"
"I keep nightmares at bay and care for the garden in my counterparts' place," Past Morai answered. "It often involves fights with the entity you just saw, which are Morai's nightmares personified."
"It looks exactly like her."
"Well, Morai is a bit of a nightmare to deal with, isn't she?"
The doctor laughed.
"Would you like some tea?" he offered. "You seem like you could use it. I could bandage your wounds as well."
Past Morai was apprehensive. The only chances to breathe she had granted herself lately were when she was revisiting memories of her old friend. Otherwise, she was always on guard, working tirelessly and hoping that it would one day be good enough for Light and Shadow Morai's return.
"...Alright," she said.
As the man prepared the tea, he couldn't help but glance at the Morai that existed before the one he knew several times.
"So you...you were out in the real world," he awkwardly asked. "Living and breathing and being The Mask Maker. Then you...died?"
"You could say that," Past Morai answered, groaning as a wave of pain hit her while she shifted her posture. "I was trying to fix what I had broken. I guess Shadow Morai took hold of me for a time and led me to make that deal with Giovanni in the first place. I was disgusted with myself for the crimes I committed, yet something deep down longed to keep going. Becoming The Mask Maker was my way of trying to achieve balance. Someone else was doing those terrible things. Not me."
The trainer hobbled over to the counter where her tea had been served. The real Morai had sat there not long ago in the real world. She took the cup in her battered hands and shakily took a sip. Warmth filled her previously cold and tired body.
"When Team Rocket orchestrated those attacks, I knew it was a set up. They wanted to change me. I knew that, but I also knew that if I didn't do what they wanted, I would be the reason the Battle Subway fell. I had already caused damage and hurt people, and I wanted to atone. I knew that I would never be the same...but I did it anyway."
The trainer gripped her cup a little tighter as she stared down into the liquid. The warm porcelain was perhaps the most real thing she had felt in a long time. Memories of her old friends played like a movie through her mind. Every time she moved to a new region and met its people, banding together to save Kalos, Hoenn, Unova, Galar, and Alola from destruction. Trying and failing and trying again to beat the Battle Subway. The pancake breakfasts with her Alolan friends. Overlooking the vast sea of lights and buildings from Prism Tower in Kalos. Hunting for a shiny Poochyena on Hoenn's Route 101. Meeting Bede before she became The Mask Maker and him not recognizing her afterwards. Memories that the one who now carried her namesake had all but forgotten. Memories that it was her job to hold.
"Are you alright?" the doctor asked. Morai hadn't even realized she had been crying until a teardrop fell from her face into her tea. She put her arms forward to be cleaned and bandaged.
"Ingo and Emmet are very grateful for your sacrifice. They miss you greatly, and often talk of the old memories you have together. Colress, too. I...imagine it's been very difficult, being locked away all alone in this world before you even got the chance to bid farewell to your life out there. After reading your last letter and meeting you now, I can tell you've handled it tremendously. I'm glad we crossed paths, which is a completely different discussion. I mean, how is that even possible? So many things to discuss!...But not right now."
"I should get going," Past Morai said, rising from her chair after the last bandage had been secured. "I shouldn't leave my Realm of Dreams alone for too long. Thank you, doctor. Please take care of Morai where you can and I'll try to do the same."
"I will. And I, on behalf of entire regions, owe my thanks to you. My home region of Galar could've been destroyed had it not been for you. Rose was...idiotic, to say the least."
"I used to place the blame on people like him so easily, but it wasn't until I was placed in this predicament that I became more understanding. I had been blind to the world, in a way, but a friend opened my eyes."
The doctor watched Morai leave. He still wasn't sure that she was the Morai that Morai referenced in the waking world. Nevertheless, the implication that his and Morai's dreams had somehow crossed paths was enough to wake him up.
"There was so much I should've asked and tested!" he said. "Maybe Morai wasn't imagining things after all! She really does have advanced dreams given power by her psychic abilities! If that's the case, then it wouldn't be a stretch to surmise that she could...directly influence the dreams of others!"
