Extra special shout-outs on this chapter go to the sweet full art Ogerpon card I collected recently.
Yes, I'm collecting Pokemon cards now. Yes, I'm actually playing the TCG at a local venue.
And yes, I do regret how much money I'm already pouring into that new hobby.
August
Enigmas of Paldea - File #13
Iron Fission: Clean Energy With Disastrous Consequences?!
Industry whistleblowers allege that the Macro Cosmos Corporation is developing new sources of unlimited energy that would put disgraced President Rose's experiments with Galar Particles to shame. One leaked prototype resembles a mechanical creature called Iron Fission that appears in the mysterious Violet Book. Internal projections that safety oversight committees don't want you to see suggest Iron Fission's small chassis contains such huge power, it's capable of leveling cities and raining down nuclear fallout thicker than the soot showers of Hoenn's Route 113.
A crisp, wet crunch drives a shiver into Florian's hair.
He tears away from "Occulture," a magazine spread across the kitchen table beneath hunched shoulders. Florian eases the blanched color of his knuckles where they rest around glossy paper. A blurred approximation of Arven chews a sandwich to mush on the edge of his periphery.
"Yeah." Florian warbles. He clears his throat, which only amplifies his hoarseness. "That's a lot."
Arven grinds a sliver of tomato skin into his left molar, the rest of the bite waiting patiently in his cheek like Greedent's with a mouthful of berries.
The chef swallows. It's an arduous display; each muscle in his thick neck becomes visible in sequence, as though Arven is manually forcing them to cooperate.
"Yeah."
They stare past one another.
Arven's gaze falters. Leaning against the laboratory's kitchen counter, his right hand sinks onto the paper plate in his left. The over-stacked Kalosian roll loses a few ingredients and a dribble of condiments to its Suicune-patterned diamonds and ribbons.
Florian follows suit, arching his back concave so he can properly roll his head toward the ceiling. Uncovered chocolate hair falls loose over his houndstooth uniform sweater, smooth but unkempt.
Soon thereafter, rhythmic chanting cuts through the silence:
"Pon! Pon! Ohg- Ohg- Oger-pon!"
Both boys are drawn to the clubhouse living room. There, Ogerpon circles the couch with her cudgel swinging to-and-fro. Her marching band of one, Miraidon's snout lingers near the ground as it trots along. The canine lizard pants in a metallic whirr, its titanium claws clack against concrete.
Mabosstiff lies by his food bowl nonplussed, following Florian's Pokemon with droopy eyes.
Arven smiles.
His muscles are invigorated just enough to bring that sandwich back to his lips. He clears the bang from his right eye to keep hair away from his food. Though he only manages a small chunk, it crunches all the more satisfyingly.
"How could we have missed this thing?" Florian mutters.
Arven grinds to a halt, mid-chew.
"Whewl, if itsh anything like thosh ohthersh…" Arven pauses to force down another bite. "Y'know, Iron Leaves and Crown." He sets the sandwich down, and then pops his pinky into his mouth to savor balsamic vinaigrette. "They prohhly weren there to begin wih, lihl buddy."
Florian's face contorts. He retreats from the table and crosses his arms.
"Weren't there to begin with?"
Their eyes meet, but this is sure to be a different kind of battle. Arven frees his wet digit with a distinct "pop."
"Yeah?" He scoffs, and then flourishes his free hand along the ball of his wrist. "There weren't any Terrakions-with-servos the first time we went into Area Zero."
Florian raises one hand to cushion his cheek.
"I remember seeing Iron Crown, Arven."
"You're definitely mistaken, little buddy." Arven sets his plate on the counter. "There was Treads, Bundle, Jugulis, Hands, Moth, Valiant, and… Uh…" He snaps his fingers a few times. "Thorns? Plus that sandwich-stealing freak back there, if it counts."
Florian glances over. Ogerpon is now standing on Ol' Reliable, pretending to throw her ivy-wrapped club into the glow of Turo's research screens. She giggles watching Miraidon fall all over itself when flip-turning to chase invisible prizes.
The trainer taps his black-and-red Zapaldea sneaker.
"If that were true, how could Perrin have gotten me those photos at Blueberry Academy?"
An indignant breath meets Florian's raised eyebrow as Arven opens his mouth to respond. But words fail. He leans back and clutches the rim of the countertop at either side of his violet trousers.
"Well, I…" Arven scans ocean outside the nearby window, and starts scratching his nose with a raised thumb. "…don't have a very good answer for that."
He stops Florian's rebuttal by jutting his hand into a silencing finger.
"But I do have some theories."
Florian offers Arven the floor with a shrugging gesture. He silently pivots on rubber heels as Arven grabs his plate before he storms across the metal, and then hops a step down into the living room space.
Miraidon perks up as soon as Arven's yellow-laced hiking boots touch the concrete. It pounces into a whining heel along the trainer's leg.
Ogerpon waves at Miraidon with an upset cry.
"Yeah, yeah. Chill, you selfish brute." Arven holds his sandwich above Miraidon's head. The trained Pokemon sits back on its hind legs, segmented gray tongue lulled free. "Thought I'd be stress eating, but looks like I'm more stress nauseous."
Before Arven can drop its treat, Ogerpon clears the gap from Ol' Reliable's armrest to the Legendary Pokemon, as if trying to keep her leafy shawl away from lava. Miraidon bows under the sudden weight of Ogerpon's tabi-like feet. She deftly snatches the sandwich between her nubby arm flaps.
"Pon!" Her starry eyes sparkle as she appreciates the craftsmanship, pupils wide within that tangerine face. Ogerpon plops down onto Miraidon's saddle. "Gir-pon!"
Miraidon's joints hiss as it rises into an upright quadruped.
"Agias?"
The Dragon-type's head curls back to try and reach Arven's sandwich. Ogerpon holds it just outside the range of its metallic maw, and further teases the poor Pokemon by digging her vampiric fangs into soft bread with a happy whimper.
Miraidon chases its own tail trying to get within reach of the snack. Ogerpon rides along, spinning like a clover-mint Alcremie cake on a lazy susan.
Meanwhile, Arven brushes his hands clean before sliding Professor Turo's personal copy of the Violet Book (a gift from Florian) off its shelf.
"Apparently Heath's team started with an outsized number of observations about Iron Treads." Arven traipses back to the kitchen, slow to focus on flipping pages. "I've been reading dad's notes in the margins. He thought maybe those early explorers had less to discover down there."
Florian leans his hip and arm against the kitchen table, scrunching up the pages of "Occulture."
"What did he say?"
"Well, he had a damn-near photographic memory for research. Said one day he found the book grew from 156 pages to 158. The only section he didn't remember reading—"
Arven holds up the Violet Book, emanating a tang of weathered paper and cigarette smoke. Florian finds a sketch with an angular bean betwixt a blazing sun.
Florian blinks. Then, in unison:
"Iron Moth?"
"—Iron Moth."
Arven stirs the book back.
"Which just so happens to be the last page before the robotic Swords of Justice." He flips a few more pages. "And now, this."
When he shows Florian the book again, the "fantastical creature" sketch is roughly conical — akin to a nuclear cooling tower. One big eye appears in the center of the tower, its iris pulled in multiple directions. From the top basin comes a ball of smoke with two sharp wisps cast down the length of its body.
Florian squints and leans in to get a better look. It's hard to imagine this render corresponding to a Pokemon rather than a piece of architecture. Even the bizarre solar system depicted for Terapagos' Stellar Form was easier to parse.
He jumps when Arven shuts the book with an emphatic motion.
"The book is 166 pages now." Arven folds it into his armpit.
"Okay…" Florian rocks his head back and forth. One can almost see the question marks drifting out of his ears. "If the book that we're using — the same one Turo gave me in Kitakami — didn't always have this many pages… Who put the rest of them in there?" The Champion throws his hands up. "And how could there be commentary on all those pages? For Pokemon that Perrin caught wind of before we did, despite never going to Area Zero?"
"All excellent questions, little buddy."
Arven leaves Florian to stew as he sets the Violet Book beside their issue of "Occulture." Rather than letting exasperation get the better of him, Florian watches Ogerpon finally share her sandwich with Miraidon.
He's pulled back; Arven rapidly taps his finger on the aged tome.
"Right here." He gestures Florian to nigh-incomprehensible text scratched into the margins of a page about Area Zero's odd creatures. "Dad took to calling any monster from the time machine a 'Paradox Pokemon.' Said the only way to describe his partners' lapses in memory was if, for example, Iron Moth didn't exist. And then it did. But in a way that it has always existed, actually."
Florian holds a hand to his head.
"Uhh…"
"Think about it like this. When Professor Saguaro gave us that lesson on raising brats, he said they have 'object permanence,' or whatever."
"I think he said that they don't have object permanence, actually?"
Arven shakes Florian's shoulders. "Whatever!"
"Okay! Okay." Florian grabs Arven's arms to stop him, and breathes in deep with his nose. "Right, whatever."
"The important thing is…" Arven covers his face with both hands. "When they can't see something, it doesn't exist." He opens his hands like window shutters, grinning underneath. "But once they can, how do you remember a time when it never existed?" His hands move to his hips. "Almost like memories creep in to backfill whatever wasn't there before. Sets the universe right."
"I think babies might have trouble remembering things either way..."
"Hey! Semantics!"
"Alright, alright."
Florian closes his eyes and nods.
"Yet you remember when the Paradox Pokemon didn't exist?" His lips scrunch, clearly unconvinced. "Even though the rest of us can't?"
"Maybe seeing dad's research growing up messed with my head? Or his notes gave word to something that I never knew how to describe?" Arven gives a wild shrug. "I have no idea, little buddy."
When Florian's eyes open, they're peering at the magazine and book.
"Well, let's say this 'Iron Fission' is some new Paradox Pokemon, and now it can blow up cities at any point in human history." He flashes a look at Arven. "Or whatever."
Arven tenses when Florian's Rotom Phone flies out from his pocket, wrapped snug in an Applin-themed case.
"We should call the Pokemon League."
Florian reaches to open his Contacts app. But Arven grabs his wrist.
He isn't sure whether to be more surprised at Arven's forcefulness, or his look of anguish.
"No way, Flor." Make that three-times the surprise — how often does Arven use his name? "If the Chairwoman catches wind we wanna head into Area Zero, we'll get tangled in red tape for weeks. Better we handle this ourselves."
Arven's pupils linger on the Violet Book. He swallows harder than it took to eat.
Florian frowns. He wrangles his arm free, and turns the tables by hooking that hand over Arven's knuckles.
"… We should at least get Nemona and Penny." Florian's suggestion is gentle, almost pleading. "We'll be a lot safer with the extra hands."
Arven mulls this over. The boys stare one another down. Ogerpon and Miraidon chitter away in the background, bathing in the blue light of a half-dozen screens.
"Agreed," Arven relents.
With a sigh, Florian flips his phone vertically, and then turns to leave.
"Alright! I'll message Pen, you get Nemona on the line. We can meet in the Zero Gate at… Fifteen-hundred?" He takes another glance at Arven over his shoulder. The husky chef looks relieved; he may as well be melting into the table. "Let me see if ma can pack snacks for the road. Might keep that down better than a caprese sandwich."
Arven flashes a vigorous thumbs-up as Miraidon carries Ogerpon to the door. She waves good-bye with both arms.
"Copy that, little buddy."
P.S. - Check out this story's publication on AO3 if you want to see the "Occulture" magazine spread rendered like an actual print publication!