March 13th, First Year

Akari rubbed the sleep from her eyes and shivered. Snow swirled quietly around her tent as a dense chill set into her small frame the moment she abandoned her cot. Ahead of her that day was yet another attempt to complete a regular old survey; the returning scouts were still waiting on the commander's orders before they could go back home.

Dark clouds wreathed overhead blocking any shred of sunlight from coming through. Their little campsite near the Floaro Gardens overlooked the frozen riverbank where nothing but snow stirred. Akari pulled on her warmer gear and fixed the straps to her snowshoes, pulling her headwrap over her ears. Winter had to be waning soon. She would just have to hold out a little longer. Gods, I miss the warmth of spring!

One of the tents tucked away under a fir tree stirred and out came Yuki, his golden hair sticking up in every direction. His jaws parted in a silent yawn. Then, his eyes widened as they landed on her, one of his eyebrows raising. "Isn't it too early to be up right now?"

"It should already be past sunhigh," Akari murmured. "Besides, I have stuff to do."

"You mean those requests that the professor sent your way?" Yuki had finally managed to get out of his tent, bringing along a bundle of tinder and a kettle as he began to make his breakfast. "So what? You're now the errand-boy of Jubilife?" he teased.

"Sort of. If it means the villagers will stop being rude to me-"

"Unlikely," Yuki sniffed. "Trust me when I say that they're always looking for something to gossip about. Doing their dirty work will just make them lean on you harder."

Akari withered a little. "Really?"

At her despondent look, Yuki hastily backtracked and clapped a covered hand on her shoulder. "I meant that you shouldn't let them bring you down!" he cheered nervously. "You've already got Rei and I! And the professor too! Just ignore the villagers! They're just jealous that we get to go anywhere we want with our pokémon!"

Once Rei and the other Galaxy scouts had woken, their small camp bustled as they rushed to finish packing up. Mister Volo would be impressed that I can carry so much weight on my back, Akari mused. She was looking forward to seeing him again once their mission was over. Hopefully, she would see him back at Jubilife Village.

They set into the gardens shortly thereafter, Rei on her left and Yuki on her right. They were heading south toward the edge of the Floaro Gardens. Once there, they would split into two groups. Akari, Rei, and Yuki would be cutting north through the gardens toward Aspiration Hill. The older scouts would follow the riverbank back to camp as they had been tasked to do a survey of Deertrack Heights from afar.

As the trio departed from the rest of their squad and trudged upward, Akari could've sworn that the ground was rumbling underfoot. It came in waves, rattling the pebbles and causing the trees to sway ever so slightly. As another vibration rocked through the earth, Akari paused. "...Does anybody else feel that?"

"Feel what?" Rei muttered, his eyes focused on the pale gray body of a Starly. He crouched low and lobbed a pokéball at the small bird. The clearing around them lit up with the bright sparks before the ball sank back into the snow. "What are you talking about over there?"

"That weird shaking feeling. In the ground, I mean." Akari had continued to walk, stopping every time she felt even the most miniscule movement of the earth below.

"No….? Not at all." Yuki gave her a side glance. "Are you sure you're okay? You know, Hideyoshi did say that you were allowed to stay back at camp until it's time for us to-"

"No!" Akari suddenly shouted. She then flinched, realizing that her sudden surge of volume had caused Rei to trip over a hidden foxhole. "No. Uh- I meant, no. I want to pull my weight too."

"…Okay? A little quieter next time Akari," Yuki retorted with a little snark. "We're not trying to attract attention out here with just the three of us. C'mon. Let's keep going."

The further they ventured into the Floaro Gardens, the more it was that Akari noticed the worsening air and earth vibrations. Tremors shook at the ground beneath her feet, causing the hairs along her arms to stand straight up. Tree branches rattled on the trunks, sending down waves of needles and long-withered leaves. The skies, once peaceful, had echoed with a horrendous cacophony of buzzing in low and high pitches. Some were so high that they made Akari's eyes sting and water in their sockets. She could even feel the vibrations in her teeth. Even Yuki and Rei had noticed it then, their eyes darting around in an attempt to find the source. Akari had managed to catch a venturing Wurmple for Beauregard and with Rei's Starly, she safely tucked the pokéballs into her satchel.

"I think we should start the journey back to the encampment," Akari declared nervously. She glanced at the darkening skies above. "I think there's gonna be another snow storm soon and I don't want our trip back to get delayed."

"More like, you can't wait until we can get back to a nice warm hearth and dry bedding," Yuki teased. "I'm with you there!" The older boy turned, his face red from the cold as his eyes landed on Rei's back. "Oi! Rei! Hurry up over there or I'm fining you a million cenz!"

Surprisingly, Rei didn't stir. The boy didn't so much as flinch. He was crouched low in the snow, hurriedly writing something in his notepad as he stared at a half-frozen stream a few paces away.

Yuki paused and then followed Rei's lead, ducking low as Akari tailed him to come up behind Rei. "What's the matter?" Yuki hissed.

"Look. Over there," Rei whispered cautiously.

Akari recoiled from the sight before her, inhibiting the urge to gag as she edged in closer to the two boys for protection. So this is where the loud buzzing is coming from! In a large clearing bordered by empty, snow-covered hills were numerous dead and alive pokémon, so many that Akari couldn't even begin to count them all. "Bug-type pokémon," she thought aloud.

The bugs crawled over fallen logs and flitted about aimlessly, coagulating in dense dark swarms as they jerked, seized, and wheeled in the sky, forming erratic swarms as though performing some dance inspired by the wake of madness. The buzzing the group had heard had been the hundreds and thousands of chitters of mandibles and the distinctive flap of wings as the multitudes of bug-type pokémon infested the little clearing. Beautiflies, Cascoons, Dustox, Heracross, Kricketune, Paras, Parasect, and countless others gathered and tore at each other as if in a hypnotized trance. The branches of the fir trees had been stripped bare even past the bark. Many of them lay dead or seizing, their tiny legs and wings torn apart violently as their brethren set upon them to devour them. Some had laid eggs only to have them trampled, turned to mush and crushed into pulpy messes and stains against whittled tree trunks and clattering rocks. The larvae that had seemingly survived were no better. Almost translucent, the larvae were being ripped from their clinging positions on the trees to be devoured, torn in half, or mauled to death in the snowy hills.

One of the maddened bugs, a sickly-looking Heracross with half of its exoskeleton missing, reared up and flapped its wings, flying directly into a toppled over tree. The sheer noise of its hind wings was so raucous that the trio was forced to retreat away from the blood-soaked clearing, their hands over their ears. Rei scribbled furiously in his notes as he led them back toward the river heading north. Under his breath, Akari could hear him remark that it was highly unusual for winter, especially for bug-type pokémon who usually didn't emerge until the middle of spring, to act in such a manner.

"What in the name of Sinnoh was that?" Yuki exclaimed as soon as they were far enough. "Hey, Rei! Did you write all that down? The professor is gonna go nuts when he hears out about that!"

"Yeah," the boy gasped. " I got it. Let's go home. Please." He had a look to him as if he had seen something more disturbing than what the other two had, but Rei said nothing more and took up the head of the group, his scarf fluttering in the breeze as he trudged onward.

"Is there anything else that you need to get done?" Yuki asked Akari in a quieter tone.

"I need to catch a Shinx for Toshi. He wants to know what their ears look like."

"Well, I can always just show him mine. And it'll get us out of here faster. I don't know about you, but I don't fancy figuring out what's causing that swarm of bug pokémon in the hills."

They ascended further up into the hills until the river was far beneath them, Akari calling for a break as they started a small fire underneath a large fallen spruce. As Akari had predicted, a new snowstorm had begun to build and soon they were huddling behind the treeline for warmth.

"Hey, Rei. Yuki. Can I ask you two a question?" Akari edged out.

"Sure," Rei mumbled around a mouthful of a bean cake. "Shoot."

"Is surveying usually like this?" She glanced back at the Floaro Gardens. "Is it- you know- always dangerous like that? Running into random dangers?" Akari's hand twitched. "Stumbling upon corpses?"

Yuki took a drink from his waist flask. He was slow to respond, his eyes dulling briefly as he adjusted his messy hair. "...Honestly? Sometimes. Most of our time out here is just staring at pokémon from afar and making sketches of them. We don't usually get closer unless we have a few of the senior scouts with us. Sometimes, we have no other choice but to fight off the little critters. And sometimes, we come across things we wish we never had. That's just how it is being a scout."

Rei nodded. "It's tough work. Not everybody opts to become a scout because most who do gain lifelong injuries or die out in the field."

"So why do this then?" Akari questioned. "What do you two gain from this?"

Yuki gave her a grim smile. "Fame. If you live long enough and gain a high enough rank, you're guaranteed special benefits in the team here and in the other regional sectors." The teenager reclined back against the frozen log, his eyes wistful. "Guaranteed housing, cheap food, land to call my own- they're things that not even my dad has, and he's a merchant that gets a lot of business! I'd say it's worth the risk. There's so much unclaimed land here in Hisui. I figure, I do my job, get a high rank, get me some land- maybe here in the fieldlands or by a beach- and just live."

Beside him, Rei smiled. "I see you're taking the long route."

"The better route."

Akari glanced toward Rei. "What's your plan then?"

"Mine? Well, mine's a bit more divided. See, I'll eventually inherit the family business of woodsmithing and crafting- my dad learnt the trade and so did his father and his father before him; it runs in the family. Don't get me wrong- I love my family's trade!" Rei smiled at nothing in particular, crossing his arms over his knees. "Makes me feel useful. I'm far more confident working with wood than with pokémon, but I like the challenge of working with the latter. It's exciting being out here. That's so much that I don't know!"

Yuki snickered. "Professor Laventon is wearing on you. What? Do you have a backup plan on becoming a pokémon professor? You know they're scorned upon by literally every society?"

"They are?" Akari gasped. "Why? Wouldn't it be a good thing to get more research on pokémon?"

"Normally, you'd be right," Rei alluded, "but not everybody wants to deal with the subject of pokémon. Who would even want to remember that there are pokémon out there known to have been the once-departed souls of humans? It's a theory that Professor Laventon has on a particular species of pokémon- I forget which." Rei shook his head. "It's just- I'm sitting on a crossroads deciding what path I want to take. Do I take the family business and do what I know I'm good at or do I take the path of studying pokémon and potentially come across some groundbreaking information?"

"You should stick with woodworking," Yuki advised him. "If you make enough money, you can pursue that other goal of yours as a side hobby, kinda."

Akari's errant thoughts of Hisuian jobs and social statuses were quickly scattered to the wind as the sky above them turned to an eerie shade of gray. The wind picked up to drag branches and mounds of snow along and to her horror, the buzzing from earlier was getting louder and closer. The noise reverberated in her chest and knocked the air out of her lungs. "Guys?"

"This again?" Yuki groaned. "Rei! Akari! Grab onto me!" He held out his sleeves and the two wordlessly seized them. "We need to take cover!"

At his words, the dense snow cover had been blasted upward and the ground trembled and crumbled beneath their feet. The trees rocked back-and-forth before becoming uprooted and tossed aside like twigs. The sheer cold of winter vanished immediately and was replaced with a searing warmth as cold beams of light poked through the clouds. No, not clouds, Akari thought with a twinge of horror. What is this?

A large network of spindly, glowing cracks spun outwards overhead as the eerie light continued to seep through, the buzzing from before becoming warped and distorted. Akari was sweating through her clothes. She took a step back, confused when instead of snow, her shoes met soft dewy grass instead. Wind swirled like a tempest on the edge of the distortion but within, the breeze was calm. It would be the perfect weather for taking a walk in if not for the creature that had just emerged from thin air.

A Luxray. A utterly massive Luxray. A Luxray that was so large that the closer it got, the more she was dwarfed in its shadow. It didn't seem at all fazed by the distortion, its eyes glowing a bloody red as it approached, jaws dripping with saliva. Rei yelled something from behind her as a bolt of lightning rocketed forth and struck the large beast squarely in the face.

"Out of the way!" Yuki yelled. He stood tersely as though afraid to move, his Shinx quivering with its tail between its legs as it whimpered before its trainer. Rei was no better, his hand moving skillfully over his notepad as his Pikachu sparked defiance.

"Let's get out of here!" Akari yelled back. She carefully turned to gain more distance between herself and the beast, electricity crackling before her as she stood shoulder-to-shoulder with Rei and Yuki. "How can we get out of here?"

"Not possible! If we try to run, it'll catch us! Rei! Pikachu and Shinx won't be able to fight it off!" Yuki froze and stared down the large predator before them as it cocked its head, eyes narrowing with faint curiosity. "I'm about to do something stupid so you guys just hurry up and get moving!"

"What're you talking about?" Rei hissed back. "We're not that far from the encampment! If we just stay calm and keep our eyes on the beast, we might be able to get away!"

"Idiot!" Yuki snarled. "It's a giant cat! You think it'd care if we stare at it while we flee? I'm attacking while I still can. You guys run! Run back to camp!"

Akari stiffened. "Yuki, wait!" Her plea had fallen on deaf ears.

With a roar, Yuki charged forward, his long legs stumbling over the pebbles in the grass as his Shinx ran behind him blindly. The little creature stopped short and withered, ears flattened against its skull; Yuki hadn't seemed to notice. The world froze and time clattered to a halt. One moment, Yuki was getting ready to attack the Luxray and the next, he was on the ground, held in place by a massive jet-black paw. Akari and Rei recoiled, stumbling backwards as Yuki's agonized scream pierced through the distortion and rattled in their rib cages, echoing on the river ice. Bone snapped and flesh tore. The Luxray had pinned Yuki to the ground and had completely broken the boy's legs, rolling him over as though he were an errant pebble it had found lodged in its paw.

Yuki struggled despite it, clawing at the Luxray's feet and belly. He reached upward and clawed at the feline's eyes and throat. For his desperation, he was rewarded with a new pain. For his clattering instincts, he'd been rewarded by teeth in his legs, a loud snap ringing through the clearing as Yuki was unceremoniously lifted and shook like the world's most eerie chew toy. He continued screaming. Continued hollering. Continued fighting.

Akari started to move before her eyes caught on something behind the beast. Something tall and thin, a golden aura sparkling about it despite the carnage taking place only paces ahead of her. The large white figure cloaked in the light of the distortion stood motionlessly behind the Luxray, its red eyes focused on her. Voices- thousands of them- whispered to her as the strength left her body. She was completely unaware of the fact that the Luxray had since dropped Yuki, its large shadow settling over her next.

The white figure, enshrouded in piercing light and countless stars, whispered to her. It whispered for her to relax. To let things come. To put her faith in it to save her. To save Rei. Where is Rei? The question left her mind the moment it had entered and as Akari's eyes rolled into the back of her head, she felt only a light pressure as the Luxray seized her with its teeth. Only the smallest of pressures was she was thrown bodily into the ground. Only heard what sounded like a whisper as Rei came sprinting back, her hearing cutting short thereafter.

When Akari next awoke, she came to in a warm cot swaddled in bandages. The warm pink-and-white plastered walls of the recovery wing in Jubilife Village appeared to her. Akari blinked. How did I get here? What happened? Where's Rei and Yuki? When she attempted to think further on her position, she grew tired, giving in to the need for sleep.