June 18th, First Year

"Every available ranger and scout! To the center! I repeat, every available ranger and scout! To the center!"

Rain poured into the hollow, ripping at the canopies and towing away thick mud and uprooted plants. Water thundered beneath the thick wooden bridges of the Diamond Clan Settlement, tearing at the mud-stained posts buried deep in the ground. Massive soot-black clouds eddied overhead, burying the mountains in their fog as they reached lower and lower into the mirelands.

"Where's my son?" came a distorted cry, nearly obscured by the wind. "My son- he's missing! Please, somebody help!"

Jaku immediately ripped herself out of her hut, wincing as the cold downpour tore at her exposed face and arms. A summer monsoon? She raced along the wooden docks keeping the village out of the massive flash flood, her boots skittering on the planks as she turned one way and then another. She would talk with Ingo later; her clan would have to come first.

Seemed it was only bad news that awaited her once she arrived at the village center. Something had happened up in the mountains and a child had gone missing in the village. Adaman and his deputy, Keiji, had said nothing else as they sorted through the influx of scared villagers and worried scouts; rather, they had sent Jaku along on her way to track down the missing child with a wish of caution and good luck.

Waves of sludgy, black water thundered down the slopes and swept with them trees, rocks, and even stray pokémon. Jaku did not look at the mangled, drowned corpses caught in the turbulent waves as she followed the torrent south, keeping well away from the churning rivers and especially from the bogs. Thick mud squelched under her boots. She was apprehensive. Just how did a kid manage to go missing, completely unnoticed in this weather? This late at night with this much floodwater? This kid, whoever they are- they're probably dead. Nobody can swim in a flash flood with zero visibility.

Ghost broke free of its pokéball, twining its tail around her wrist to guide her as it led the way over the wet terrain, its nose to the ground. With a hum, the golden fur along its tail tip began to glow, electricity jumping from its thin fur as it lit up the surrounding mangrove trees. With a slight pull, Jaku followed as Ghost stalked toward a dip in the sopping wet clay.

A vice-like grip clamped down onto her shoulder. "Not so fast!"

"Huh?" Jaku immediately bristled as she turned to face the man before ripping his hands off of her shoulder. "You! Of all people!" She swore loudly, Ghost immediately putting its wiry body in front of her. "Get lost!"

Akanti looked unimpressed, holding up a placating hand as a familiar Lickilicky approached at his side. "You're supposed to have a partner, you know," he drawled, putting his hands on his hips. He took a step further, pausing when Ghost snarled at him, electricity sparking at its fangs. "We can partner up-"

"I'd sooner get caught in the flood!" Jaku hissed. "Why don't you make yourself useful for once and stop stalking me, asshole! Why the fuck are you following me?"

"Where the hell is your partner, genius?"

Jaku snorted but her face remained impassive and cold. "I don't need one. I may have to hold my tongue around other people, but I haven't forgotten what you tried to pull during my trial. You may have talked Adaman into letting you off easy, but you're still a disgusting pig and I don't want you anywhere near me. I thought Keiji would've made that very easy to understand. Go back to camp and find some other woman to put your filthy hands on." She turned and began following Ghost west, scowling when Akanti's heavy footsteps trailed after her.

"Wait! It was just a prank!" the man called, his voice edged with annoyance. "I'm sorry! I was just messing around-"

"Oh, so do you strangle and nearly beat the shit out of every new ranger-to-be that you work with?" she challenged him, turning around to regard the creature across from her with ire. "But no. I suppose you were just 'messing around', am I right? What's next? Are you gonna 'playfully stab' the next to-be in the river?" she taunted. "Gonna toss the next rookie in a gorge for funsies? Oh, but you seem to think rape is just hilarious in general. That's the type of guy you are- "

"Listen to me," Akanti growled, coming nose-to-nose with the ranger before him.

"Don't you dare interrupt me!" Jaku hissed back, jabbing a finger into Akanti's chest. "You don't get to stalk me and then belittle my apprehension about the shit that you put me through and then try to bypass it with some half-assed apology! You're a horrible person to even think that this is funny! To think that viciously assaulting a person and threatening to rape them would be anywhere near on the same level as being played off as a joke- you are a pig! And as a matter of fact- " Jaku growled, plucking a pokéball from her waist- "there aren't any rules saying I can't ask for more protection." She flicked open the release mechanism and out came Lilith.

The great big canine towered over Akanti like a behemoth, the pokémon's sharp fangs glinting in the flashes of forking lightning. Steam poured from the beast's fur coat and with one warning snarl, it snapped at the man forcing him to take a few steps back. The two large pokémon formed a wall of unyielding muscle before Jaku, their coats bristling.

"Stay away from me," Jaku warned the man one last time. "Next time, I won't give you a warning." And when Ghost nodded its head and narrowed its eyes, Jaku ran a calming hand through the pokémon's mane. "Neither will my pokémon. Find somebody else. I'm going in alone as I'm allowed to do."

Jaku followed Ghost further down the slope, making sure that Akanti wasn't still tailing her as she inspected the dark woods for any signs of a child. She saw nothing. She had soon come to a stop at a flooded river, Lilith scooping her up onto its back as a stray wave ricocheted off the bank and completely ripped a tree out of the mud. She shivered at the sucking sounds the roots made.

"Get back over here!" Akanti called. His eyes darted upstream before he took a few cautious steps back.

Jaku rolled her eyes, retreating to the opposite side of the treeline as a new wave of debris slammed into the river and thundered over the hill, taking more and more trees with it. She grimaced as the man drew closer to her position, Ghost and Lilith once again sending the man back a few paces. "You don't seem to listen, do you? Stop following me like a lost dog!"

"Will you stop arguing with me? I'm trying to help you!" Akanti retorted back.

"I don't want your help!"

"I don't care!" Seemingly at his wit's end, Akanti attempted to reach for her only for Lilith to toss the man back a few paces with a swipe of its massive paw. "This is ridiculous!" Akanti seethed, his dark eyes locked on Lilith's dagger-like claws. He then locked eyes with Jaku. "You will listen to me-"

"Go fuck yourself!" Jaku tossed over her shoulder as she continued her march, determined not to pay the trailing pig any mind.

"You little, conniving-!" Akanti scrambled to follow, his breaths coming as pants as he followed at a respectable distance. "In case you've forgotten-" he yelled over the sound of the pouring rain, his voice hoarse with discomfort- "you work in a clan! You may think you're something special because you've got pokémon doing your bidding-"

"Excuse me?" Jaku halted, whirling around to push past her pokémon. She stomped over toward the much taller man, grabbing a fistful of his shirt as Akanti did the same to her. "Says the man that can't listen and doesn't respect personal boundaries- "

"You're acting like a child!" Akanti sneered. "Just because you think you're some gift from Almighty Sinnoh doesn't mean you can disregard Adaman's orders and behave like some bastard kid- "

"And I suppose you must be some child of god since you apparently have a track record of assaulting people for fun!" she spat back at him. "Adaman told me to go looking! He didn't say jack shit about a partner!"

"Basic! Common! Sense!" Akanti yelled back. "We're in a monsoon! Are you trying to get lost, you daft, idiotic, woman?!"

Jaku reared back a clenched fist and swung at the man, a vicious sense of satisfaction boiling in her gut when the blow connected with his left temple and forced the man back a few steps. Her face felt warm. Her clenched hands ached. She felt… good. Great, even.

Akanti recoiled from the punch, his eyebrows knitted with frustration and confusion as he stared back at her. He then sneered. "...Fine." He wiped a splatter of mud off of his tunic, wobbling slightly as he readjusted his stance. "...Fine. I earned that." The sneer vanished from his face. He instead stared impassively down at Jaku, crossing his arms, his gaze unblinking. He then turned away. "...I'm sorry."

"I've already heard that," Jaku growled. "I don't care how many times you try to apologize. I won't forgive you."

"Do I have to beg?" Akanti's voice had changed and so too had his demeanor. He had uncrossed his arms and let them hang at his sides, his eyes not quite looking at her. His voice had quieted, barely audible over the cascading downpour. "I am sorry," he finally muttered. "You're right. I got too into the role I wanted to play during your trial and… and I guess I didn't realize that I was scaring you." He ran a hand through his frazzled, mud-streaked hair, grimacing. "You were putting up a good fight- I just- I-"

"Do you think what you did was funny?" Jaku snapped back, forcing Akanti to look at her. "If you were in my place- against somebody who you couldn't overpower or outrun- do you think it would be funny if they were the ones wrapping their hands around your throat? Potentially strangling you? Do you think it would be funny if you were in my shoes and some other, bigger guy held you down in the mud and joked about sodomizing you with the hilt of your dagger? Would that still be funny?"

Akanti met her gaze, Jaku surprised to find regret clear as day glinting back at her. "...No. No, I don't think it'd be funny at all. And… I… I never thought it was funny. I just-" Akanti grabbed at his long hair, his face scrunching up. "I didn't think you were taking what I was saying literally. I was wrong-" Akanti admitted, putting up his hands. "I was incredibly wrong. I didn't come out here to antagonize you, I promise."

"Then what did you come out here for?"

Akanti once again broke eye contact. "Adaman sent me out here to help look for the missing boy, too. Keiji realized that he sent you out alone- he mentioned it to me and… well… yeah. I understand that you hate me- I get it. But you really shouldn't be out here alone. Adaman would have my ass if I told him that I left you be and then we found you dead in a ditch somewhere."

Jaku impatiently tapped one boot in the wet clay. "Also not funny," she growled. I have better things to do than listening to your half-assed apology. You're still getting nothing from me.

Akanti's eyes narrowed. "I…see. I apologize for scaring you during your trial and threatening to…"

Jaku glowered at the man. "Say it," she growled.

"You know what I'm getting at," Akanti argued back, fidgeting with his hands.

"Oh, so now 'rape' is a bad word?" Jaku scoffed, turning on her heel. "Yeah, this isn't a sincere apology, is it? What was I expecting-"

"It is!" Akanti yelled. "I'm apologizing! Fine! I'm sorry I threatened to rape you! I didn't think it was funny at the time- it just popped into my head and I went with it!" When Jaku said nothing, Akanti continued albeit on a far quieter note. "I'm sorry I picked on you during our patrols and I'm sorry for just being a dickhead to you in general. I'll stop. I'll even step down from patrols if we get paired up." He stepped closer and when he was neither stopped by Lilith or Ghost, he reached out and gently grasped at her shoulder, his touch light as if threatening to pull away at any moment. "I'm sorry for making you uncomfortable," Akanti murmured. "It was never my intention to do that. Again, I just thought you knew that I was always joking."

"Did I ever laugh?" Jaku shot back. She snatched her shoulder out of Akanti's grip. "I won't forgive you," she grumbled. "You want to follow after me? Fine. We may be clanmates but we'll never be friends." She took a step away. "Keep your distance and mind your hands. My Pokémon are a lot less lax about protection than I am as I've already stated."

"...I understand. I'll stay behind you."

Jaku didn't know how to feel anything optimistic about Akanti. She hated him; still hated him despite his lackluster apology. Just the fact that the man had been talking about her to Warden Ingo before her arrival- that he had somehow broken into her house- had made her feel nauseous and incredibly vulnerable. On one hand, just the way he had acted toward her during her trial made her never want to step foot near the deranged lunatic again, even if it had just been a joke.

Akanti was many things when it came to him following her around and mocking her whenever he had the chance to. In her opinion, he was selfish, impulsive, aggressive, and if she were being honest, a bit of a masochist. She had had nightmares of him strangling her with that crazed grin from during her trial. That had been after the celebration, and she was thankful that Talaos had apparently told him off for his behavior the morning after. It didn't stop her from barricading her doors at night.

Apparently, Akanti wasn't all that well liked within the clan. Can't imagine why. Pokémon wielders were reportedly rare, but they certainly weren't looked up to by any means. Jaku had heard that Akanti had apparently done something so vile and vicious the first time he had aligned himself with a pokémon that he had gotten his mother killed and that he had driven his brother, Warden Iscan, away with his actions; another reason for Jaku to dump him whenever she had the chance.

Unfortunately, due to their similarity in having pokémon, Jaku was often given tasks that involved being near or working with Akanti on any given day and the man seemed to adore irritating her at his earliest convenience. Poking fun at her choice in pokémon, pranking her by stealing her items, or sometimes scaring her by appearing before her without warning in the night. She had tried to appeal to the deputy to 'please stop pairing me up with that insufferable jackass'. Her pleas had fallen on deaf ears. But now that she knew the truth behind his actions, she could only grimace. Childish behavior. Gods, spare me.

The two rangers came up to a part of the river where the sweeping flood water had gouged out a massive flood channel. Akanti wordlessly motioned for his Lickilicky to step forward, the portly pokémon stomping its flat feet into the ground, forcing the wet clay to arch up and out into a steep bridge of sorts. They crossed, Jaku calling the need for the two to pick up the pace; the sky darkened overhead. If they stayed out any longer, the storm would only worsen and they would risk the gambit of getting lost as well. Ghost and Lilith moved the two rangers onto their backs and set off at a gallop, leaving the foaming river behind.

As they rode on, Jaku began to feel incredibly nauseous. She sunk her fingers deeper into Ghost's scruff, her hands shaking. Her legs began to tingle, and her limbs weighed her down as though they were made from stone. She opened her mouth to call for a hasty stop, pain piercing through her abdomen when her body wouldn't obey her commands. Fuzz began to build in her peripheral vision. The nausea roiled in her gut. She lost her grip on her pokémon, feeling her body fall to the side.

"..."

"...IO…?"

"S….. NOT…. W…"

"UNDERGROUND, MY CHAMPION. WHAT YOU SEEK LIES BENEATH YOUR FEET."

The cloud of agony and nausea cleared and a burst of white-hot pain lanced along the back of her head and through her jaw. Jaku gave a stifled groan of pain as she clutched at her temples, noticing that she was now lying up against a rock wall and covered with mud and torn leaves. Her body ached. Her head throbbed. She could taste the familiar tang of blood in her mouth. She tried to move, pausing when a pair of rough hands steadied her.

"Good, you're finally awake." Akanti reappeared much closer than he ought to have been, his scowl much deeper than before as he gave her a quick once-over. He looked none too different, but his hands were smeared with blood. "How do you feel?"

"Like I got hit by a car," Jaku croaked. "What the hell happened?"

"You fainted," Akanti grumbled. "Your dog clued me in when you nearly fell off your damn mount." And then, Akanti sighed deeply and pinched the bridge of his nose. "You- ugh- I think something hit you- flying debris, maybe?"

Jaku laughed. The voice. She knew the voice that had spoken to her. "More like, someone picked a bad time to show up," she chuckled slowly. At Akanti's questioning stare, she could only shrug. "Future business with Almighty Sinnoh."

Akanti blinked. "You mean to tell me that Almighty Sinnoh talked to you? In your head? Telepathy?"

"They tend to do that," Jaku grumbled. "At least, I recognized the sound of its voice from last time."

"Does Adaman know about this? About Almighty Sinnoh talking to you?"

"No. I haven't gotten around to doing it yet but I'm sure I'll get it to either today or tomorrow." At Avanti's incredulous gaze, Jaku scowled and began to make her way to her feet. "I'm fine. Let's keep moving."

"Are you sure? You're bleeding from somewhere on your scalp."

"I've suffered worse. C'mon. Time's ticking."

Akanti snorted. "You sound like Adaman." He let go of her shoulder, his dark eyes scanning the edge of what looked to be a cave mouth, wincing as a shower of gravel fell upon him. "Rain's worsening. Technically, we're uphill and I can't think of anything worse than going downhill."

"No, you're right. I'm not going downhill. There's nothing but flood water down there." Jaku shook off the mud from her tunic, still feeling dizzy from her brief episode of dissociation. She took a step forward toward Akanti, stilling as her surroundings finally became clearer.

The two stood in a narrow but tall cave, layers upon layers of dusty rock closing them in around and behind them. Soft sand sagged underfoot. Outside the cave, similar rocky ledges closed them in, rainwater coalescing in dirty puddles. Jaku froze as she sighted scraggly, pale trees growing from out of the cracks in the rock walls. No. No way. There's no way we're in one of those things.

"Akanti. How long was I out for?"

Akanti turned and stared at her as though she had said something odd. "Maybe five minutes- tops. Why?"

Jaku edged past him, setting one quivering hand on the lip of the cave mouth. It was rough, just as she had expected it to be. She took a step forward, clenching her hands when her foot met solid ground. She took another step. No mud. The bog and the surrounding woods were gone, replaced entirely with the same endless canyon scape that she had seen during her trial with Lord Wyrdeer.

Thunder rumbled overhead. Jaku glanced upward, her heart dropping into her gut when she sighted a familiar crack in the sky. Light poured in through the edges, a spiral wind stirring at the canopies as a familiar static began to pull at the loose fabric of Jaku's tunic. Everything was brighter. Clearer. Sharper. The earth was cracked and dusty as if there had been a drought instead.

Jake's eyes then caught on a new item almost immediately. There was a small shoe on the edge of a rocky ledge. "Underground," Jaku heard herself speak, her voice coming out garbled and wrong. "They're underground."

"Underground? What are you talking about?" Akanti turned to scowl at her when he caught up. He then frowned, his eyes going wide as he silently approached closer. "Hey. What's that glowing thing around your neck?"

"What?"

Akanti, far too close for comfort, had snatched up the pendant around Jaku's neck, staring at the glowing red engravings. The reddish light glowed sharply on his dark skin, his long fingernails catching in the grooves as he studied the small circular item. He turned it this way and that in his palm before eventually dragging his eyes away from it to stare her down directly. "Where did you find this… thing?" he asked.

"By the lake," Jaku retorted, reaching to snatch it back. "And keep your hands to yourself! Don't make me remind you another time." She stiffened, exhaling as a new headache started to throb at the back of her head. "I think this kid- whoever they are- I think they may be underground. Maybe a sinkhole of some kind?"

"Now you're just making things up."

"No, look. There's a shoe over there. On that outcrop of rocks."

Akanti snorted. "Did you fuck up your head on that fall of yours? We're in the middle of a swamp. There are no clumps of boulders just hanging around."

At that, Jaku exhaled deeply, pinching the bridge of her nose between her fingers. "Right, right. Distortion gimmicks. Visual hallucinations. Love 'em. Just great," she growled. "Okay, Akanti. If we're gonna work as a team than now would probably be a good time to mention that distortions make me experience visual distortions. All I see are canyons. You probably still see the swamp. Just look where I'm pointing, will you?"

"You know what? I'm not even gonna ask. Fine." Akanti followed where she pointed and then immediately pulled her over to the middle of the time distortion, bending down to inspect the abandoned shoe. "Okay. This is a good lead but there aren't any tracks anywhere around here," he muttered. "Do you see any broken branches around? Any bits of exposed sod?"

"No. Not a thing and I wouldn't be able to anyhow." Jaku carefully observed the crack in the earth underneath where the shoe was found and immediately recoiled. Her headache had grown to an unbearable pain and she found herself unknowingly pulling Akanti away from the abandoned object.

With a resounding crack, the earth lurched under her feet and the distortion seemed to grow bigger. The strange object around Jaku's neck glowed until the reddish glow was all she could see. Then came silence. As her headache worsened, the reddish glow softened only to be replaced with the sight of huge, snow-capped mountains and walls upon walls of cracked cobblestone. Jaku took a step back, her heel colliding with something squishy. When she turned, she froze, her eyes widening.

Before her was herself. Her own recognizable body, unconscious. It was covered in bits of stone and dust, a light dusting of snow and frost covering its face and body. A fierce wind tore at her surroundings, showering the lifeless body with walls of snow and hail. Jaku kneeled down into the freezing snow in a motion of morbid curiosity to check and see whether this doppelganger was really and truly dead. And when she uncovered her own face and pulled back the eyelids, she grimaced. Her own dull, lifeless eyes stared back at her, her nose, lips, and ears a horrible shade of gray.

"THIS IS YOUR FUTURE." The voice then took up all the space in Jake's head, forcing her up and away from the corpse. "THIS IS YOUR ONLY ENDING HERE. YOUR RESOLUTION WILL HAVE NO EFFECT ON THIS OUTCOME, MY CHAMPION."

The frozen body disappeared only to be replaced with the visage of a massive, winding stone temple atop a snow-covered mountain. Lighting flashed in forks as the temple wavered and trembled in the malevolent winds. The voice began to speak into her head once more.

"YOU WILL BRING FORTH THE TIME GEARS TO THE TEMPLE OF THE DIVINE. MORE WILL COME TO YOU AS YOU DO MY BIDDING."

A myriad of mages and memories poured through her head, forcing her to her knees. A pen on a table. Two broken claws in her hands. Her own hands are covered with cactus needles. A cave covered floor to ceiling in ice crystals. Burning debris. A pokémon standing atop a canyon ledge smiling at her. A bunch of metallic items in a bag. Broken glasses. Barren mountains under a blue sky. Pictures out on display. A paper attached to a wooden pole. Uneaten cake.

Jaku woke up with a burning sensation in her throat, her mouth dry and her eyes itchy. She coughed, flinching when a spasm of pain along her chest forced her over into a hunch. When the pain finally faded, Jaku took in her surroundings. It was beyond dim wherever she was, an unreadable darkness spanning out just before her on the tumble of rocks she laid on. Heavy rain poured into the large opening above her.

The sound of Akanti's groan echoed not too far off, Jaku only being able to see his muddied, bleeding arm sticking out from a pile of rubble at the base of the pile. She struggled to free herself of her own debris, sliding down the pile to land near where Akanti's voice stemmed from.

"Akanti? It's Jaku. Are you okay?" She laid one palm flat against the ranger's wrist and forced her hand down to where it connected with Akanti's shoulder. "Can you move your arm for me?" When Akanti did as she asked, Jaku reached forward and grasped his shoulder, Akanti in turn, struggling forward, the pile of rubble collapsing inward as he struggled out of his pit.

"I've got it," Akanti gasped, pushing out at a wall of small debris as he flopped out of the pile. "Nearly died, but here we are." With one last push from Akanti and one last pull from Jaku, the two rangers stumbled back and tumbled down the pile of rubble, grumbling as they got to their feet.

Akanti scuffed one boot against the floor, his beady eyes moving to glare at the pendant around Jaku's neck. "I don't suppose you opened up this hole, did you? I knew it. That object around your neck has some kind of power. It glowed right before this sinkhole opened up."

"Hey, don't look at me," Jaku grumbled. "I don't control this thing. Almighty Sinnoh just shows up wherever it feels like it."

"Fine. I think we should look around a bit. If that missing shoe is anything to go off of, perhaps the kid might be down here. Not entirely sure how a kid could've managed to get down here- you think they fell through at a different spot?"

Jaku nodded. "No idea. I don't think the kid phased through the ground considering that the shoe was sitting on undisturbed land before we kind of fell in here. But who knows?" Jaku snorted, clapping her hands together. "I know nothing about distortions. All we can do is look around."

"You take the left side and I take the right side?"

"Deal."

It had only taken a handful of moments. Similar piles of rubble had been lined up along the cavern floor, the parts of which were visibly spotted with blood. A strange smell lingered in the air. To Jaku, it was indescribable. Neither good nor bad. Just… odd. She unearthed a separate pile of rubble, pausing when unstacked cairn had toppled over to reveal a small, unmoving body. Jaku could only sighed and look away, remembering all too clearly the vision of her own corpse that Almighty Sinnoh had shown her.

"Akanti… I found them. I found the kid."

"Where? Who is…" Akanti peeled around the corner, his voice petering out as he came up alongside Jaku and kneeled low, exhaling. "Oh."

The missing kid in question had been Hassun, that curious boy that had pelted Jaku with questions when she had first arrived at the Diamond Settlement. The small boy lay twisted and broken on the floor of the exposed cave, one of his shoes missing. He had been crushed to death in his own fall into the sinkhole, his face frozen in an expression of surprise and panic.

"We need to get him back to the surface," Akanti began, gently sweeping off the remaining debris. "Get him back to the settlement. Give him a proper burial."

"Well, I don't have any flying-types and neither do you." Jaku stared at the small hole in the ceiling where they had fallen through. "It's too steep to climb out as well. Any idea whether this cave slopes downward or not? You're the senior one here."

"Downwards. Let's hope this cave doesn't start flooding because it's our only way out." Akanti scooped up Hassun's corpse, grimacing, before plodding forward into the cave, the dead boy's head lolling on the ranger's shoulder. He didn't give Jaku a passing glance as the ranger sped up to match his pace, not wanting to stare at the corpse's twisted face for too long.

With Jaku's Quilava providing a faint violet light and with Akanti taking the lead, the going was made a tad easier. The caves seemed to switch around everytime they stumbled into a new one. There were no tight squeezes or sudden drops, but Jaku kept noticing with increasing anxiety that parts of the cave walls and ceilings were starting to give out and collapse. The sound of floodwater cascading through the tunnels was all that they could hear over the quiet rumbling of Dusk's flames. Despite their tenacity to keep going, it wasn't long before Akanti came to a sudden stop. Jaku collided directly with his back and then found herself realizing why he had stopped.

They had been in that cave before. She recognized the long fang-like stalactites that hung from the ceiling, the only difference being that a huge part of the cave wall had collapsed.

"This doesn't make sense," Akanti grumbled, taking out a small map. "We fell near Gapejaw Bog. And if we're back in this cavern- which is right in the middle- then we should've come out near the Scarlet Bog."

"Only you would carry around a map of the cave systems," Jaku snorted. "Akanti, are there any marked caves on that map of yours?"

"None that directly connect to this cave system, no. Or at least, none that the Diamond Clan has discovered. So that leaves only two ways of getting out of here then. Wait by the sinkhole we fell through," Akanti recounted, though the crinkle of his nose told her that he wasn't exactly all too fond of the idea of waiting on a hope.

"Or, we make an exit," Jaku finished for him.

"Through where? We don't know if we're under a river or not. Especially during the flood topside" Akanti then sneered, his eyes glittering as he stared upward at the ceiling. "But it won't necessarily matter if we create a hole in the ceiling. Lichi knows Bulldoze so we can definitely collapse the ceiling, but we have no idea of just how much rock and stone is above us. It would be taking a massive risk."

"But Lilith knows Protect," Jaku offered. "We collapse the ceiling in and use Protect to keep us from getting swept away. From there, we can call upon your Lickilicky-"

"Lichi," Akanti interrupted her.

"'Lichi'," Jaku mocked the name. "Does Lichi know any other ground moves besides Bulldoze?"

"Apart from Screech? No."

"Screech isn't a ground-type move."

"You know exactly what I meant."

"Fight me."

Lilith appeared from her ball and began nosing Jaku's hand, leading her over to the cave wall. When the large pokémon was sure that Jaku was watching, it began using its long claws to pry through the wall, cutting through stone as though it were nothing.

"Dig! Lilith knows Dig!"

"Excellent! But let's not overstrain it too much. How about this? Neither of us know the way back to the other cave. Lichi collapses the ceiling using Bulldoze, Lilith uses Protect, and then we use the rubble from the cave-in to get as high as we can before your pokémon digs us out. Sounds like a plan?"

"Absolutely. Lilith, is that something you can do?" The dog pokémon gave a loud bark as an approval.

The two rangers found an upward sloping trail up the side of the cavern wall, Akanti taking up position just behind Jaku with their pokémon standing before them. The man readjusted his grip on the tiny body slung over his shoulder, clearing his throat to signal when he was ready. Jaku hummed back. With a nod, Akanti's Lickilicky began cracking apart the walls of the cave with its pudgy fists, tossing a boulder to strike the ceiling. A blood-curdling crack rippled through the quiet cave. Then came the foreboding warning of rushing water.

The ceiling collapsed in a wall of loose dirt, ripped-apart trees, and muddy water and to both of the rangers' relief, it flowed deeper into the cave and away from them. Lilith hoisted the two wielders and the corpse onto her back and worked her way up the pile of sludge and debris until they were halfway out of the hole.

Akanti exhaled sharply behind her, poking her in the shoulder. "Jaku. Look at that. There in the cave."

"Hmm?"

"We just barely missed it. Look at it."

Beyond the reach of the floodwaters and stalactites, a reddish mass hung back in the shadows, a pair of milky-white eyes focused on the two of them. Then came five pairs of bulging eyes. The creature scuttled forward, a mess of atrophied legs and eyes, the mushrooms atop its back covered with mold. Parasects. About a dozen of them all tangled together in a horrific mess as it struggled about in the maelstrom. More and more parasects emerged from the darkness, their harried cries echoing despite the ongoing storm as they were swept away.

Jaku grimaced and hurriedly turned her eyes away from the sinkhole, fixing her shaking hands into her pokémon's fur. "Lilith, let's put some haste in getting out of here."

June 19th, First Year

The two rangers returned to camp past sunrise, realizing absently that they had both been deemed as missing due to warp in time thanks to the distortion. When they struggled into camp with Hassun's body stiff in Akanti's arms, Rez came forward, took the body and disappeared into the medical tent, a horrid wail echoing around the camp. Jaku bodily turned away, beckoned onward by Keiji who received them graciously and solemnly.

Adaman had said nothing to them despite his presence in the plaza consoling worried clanmates and adhering to taking personal counts. Keiji had sent them off to their respective huts with the orders to rest and then go straight to the medical tent once Rez was ready to attend to them. Neither had been injured too badly but neither had said anything to each other upon separating. Jaku was glad to be rid of the man.

She sat idle in her tent, listening to the rain dribble onto the tent's tarp. Dusk and Peanut were cuddled up by her sides under the fur blanket, soundly asleep as they usually were. Ingo had departed for the highlands hours before she had arrived according to a hastily-scrawled note that the warden had left atop the wooden table by her window. Seems like Emmet will have to find his own way to his supposed brother without my help.

She fiddled with the pendant, tracking the strange grooves in the stone with the edges of her nails before pausing. There was a back to it now. She flipped it over in her hands. Where the pendant was once symmetrical on both the front and back side was now a new stone backing painted a shiny black color, smooth like polished metal, free of chips or tears.

"LISTEN WELL, MY CHAMPION," came a booming voice, seeming to shake the tent and the floorboards around her. The same debilitating headache resumed its place within the pit of her skull, forcing Jaku onto her hands and knees. "TO ACCOMPLISH MY BIDDING, I MUST AFFORD TO YOU A SLIGHT BOON OF MY POWER. YOUR ACTIONS WILL HAVE NO EFFECT ON YOUR OUTCOME, BUT IT IS PRUDENT THAT YOU LEARN TO WIELD THIS POWER. YOU WILL NEED IT FOR THE CHALLENGES TO COME."

"...Challenges?" Jaku rasped. Amidst the headache, she gripped the hard edge of the pendant and stared upward at the tent ceiling. It was hard. To have a thing talking to her in her head. It wasn't a god, she was sure of that because gods didn't exist. This is probably just a dark or ghost-type pokémon playing with me-

"SILENCE YOUR THOUGHTS, MY CHAMPION. I AM A GOD- ONE OF MANY- AND YOU WILL LISTEN TO ME."

"And what if I don't want to?" Jaku gritted out through her teeth. "What are you going to do about it?"

"YOU CANNOT CHANGE MY WILL, CHAMPION OF MINE. YOU WILL LEARN TO USE MY BOON- WHETHER YOU TO DESIRE TO OR NOT. IT WILL SERVE YOU WELL IN THE TIMES TO COME. NOW. TURN THE DIAL BACK."

"Back?" Jaku echoed. Shaking from the strain, Jaku slipped her finger into a pit between the pendant and solid backing. "What? You want me to turn it back? The pendant? How?"

"WIND BACK TIME," the voice in her head responded curtly. "A LITERAL COMMAND. TURN THE DIAL BACKWARDS- TO HUMANS, TO YOUR RIGHT SIDE."

Jaku stilled and took a deep breath. I have to be hallucinating, right? Something is just fucking with me, right? She bit back her doubts about the task, carefully taking the pendant in her twitching fingers before winding the pendant back. A loud clicking began to chime in her ears as time began to move backwards.

Daylight faded, replaced with the sounds of the storm as what sounded like a horrible sloshing noise retreated back up the hill outside of her tent. Jaku raced outside, grabbing the doorframe of her hut as she stared, dumbfounded by what she saw. The clouds twisted and fixed themselves back into their terrifying forms above, wavering back over the horizon toward the sea where they had originated from. Her fellow clansmen whirled around her, retracing their steps as the sun began to poke back out from the clouds. Before she knew it, it was morning. That very same morning. She blinked. Something had just bumped into her.

"Oops! Sorry, Jaku!" called a shrill voice. "Hey, wait up! I need to tie my laces!"

Jaku watched with rapt horror as little Hassun whipped past her, his muddy face crinkled in a smile as he regrouped with the other children. She truly had gone back through time.