Cynthia, my human, you are braver than I thought. Some might call it foolhardy. I spoke with the doctor last night in my dream and she told me of her plan, and that you had rejected it.

"She said it won't work," she said, sitting on the stump of an old oak and watching the half-fledged rufflet chicks jostling and chirping on the crag above us.. "Not unless we show some evidence." She twisted her mouth up on one side, then released it in a puff of snowy smoke. "I can manufacture some, I think. Safely, of course, I don't want to put either of you in any danger. But I wanted you to know before we commit, because if we go through with this, you're going to have to be completely on board. If this goes wrong, none of us are getting out of it. You're stuck here, Cynthia's sent home, I probably face charges."

I listened carefully, eyes on the sky and the braviary riding it down toward the crag. This was Dai's memory, and one I'd lived a thousand times before; there was a comfort in the familiar line the braviary described as she swooped, the rhythm of her claws pulling in and her eyes glowing as she levitated the stantler corpse from her talons to the hungry chicks below.

What was left of Dai was still breathless at the sight, even now. I held onto their wonder like a talisman, keeping myself calm enough to consider the doctor's plan on its own merits, and then I sighed and turned to her.

"Cynthia has agreed?"

"Cynthia suggested it, like I said." She seemed unhappy about it, and I could understand why. It seemed the kind of bold endeavour that claims reckless young hearts and stakes them out to wither in the sun. "I told her to think about it, but I really think she'll do anything for you."

As you would, I'm sure. I didn't want this, Cynthia; my unstemmable immortality leaves me careless of myself, but you are young and breakable and cannot simply wait for your enemies to fall victim to old age. The idea of your young hands grasping a risk like this seemed like the highest folly. But of course if you'd do anything for me, you are my human; and if you are my human, I must be your partner; and if I am your partner, you must know that I in turn would do anything for you.

"Ach," I sighed, rubbing Dai's hand over my eyes. "Then I agree, doctor."

"Sure?" she asked. And deep within me, I felt my parents whisper in the unison they'd never shared in life:

Yes.|Yes.|Yes.

"Yes," I said aloud, voice borne high on the wave of their affirmation. "What do you need me to do?"

The doctor's eyes glowed with the cold, grim light of a luxray's glare in the dark.

"Not much," she said. "I'll handle most of the legwork. But if you can do one thing for me, it'll make this go much smoother …"

Jodi, love, this has been a bloody stressful week. But as you know, God is a fickle little shit, and saying something like that is basically just inviting him to come up with something even more stressful to throw at you. I was having breakfast this morning, or rather I guess I was having four cups of coffee and half a pastry while I read the international papers, when Rowan burst into the hotel dining-room in a state of disarray.

"Dr Spearing!" he called, hurrying over. "You'd better come quickly. The hospital called."

Some sentences go in so fast and urgent they bypass my conscious mind. I was on my feet in a moment, inside my jacket in another, and halfway across the room in a third.

"What is it?" I asked, falling into step beside him. "Cynthia?"

"Yes." He stuffed an arm down a sleeve and shook out his raincoat around him. "She didn't wake up this morning, and they can't rouse her."

I don't think he could ever really sound scared; his voice just didn't work that way. But he didn't sound his usual confident self, and I knew right away that somewhere underneath that bulletproof self-regard some deep concern was gnawing on his heart.

"Is it the infection?" I asked. It was the most important question. Darkness reaching the brain sounds bad, but isn't; an infection breaching the blood-brain barrier is much worse news.

"They don't know." He kept his gaze ahead, somehow, though I could feel the impulse to turn to the nearest doctor burning behind his eyes. "I, ah … know that if it were to reach the brain …"

"You can't worry about that," I said. "Besides, the infection was under control. I'd say it's more likely to be darkness pressing on the brain. If the clot broke up and part of it slipped deeper in, it could account for what we're seeing."

"I must confess, that doesn't sound much better." We turned left at the main hall into the lobby, past a guy in the waiting area showing his corphish pictures of deep-sea crustaceans in National Geographic. "Is it treatable?"

"Yes. But let's see what it is first."

"Hm. Of course."

He didn't sound reassured. I stopped him there at the door, hand on his shoulder, intense green stare dead into his eyes.

"Hey," I said. "Rowan. She's in hospital. Best place for her right now. And you had the presence of mind to bring in an expert in ghost-types to work with her. Give me a chance to diagnose her before you start panicking."

"I know, I know." There was a trace of irritation to his voice, but at himself, not me; he struck me as the kind of guy who wasn't used to feeling this way. "I'm concerned for her, that's all. And …"

I cocked my head, a few stray coils of hair flicking off and dissipating like stale cigarette smoke.

"And?"

"No, it's nothing."

"Doesn't sound like it."

"Dr Spearing, we don't have time for this―"

"Is it related to Cynthia's health?"

"No. And the taxi's waiting."

Which, well – much as I hate to admit it, I do know when to pick my battles, and this seemed like a moment to back off. There was a kid in the hospital, after all. And you know it's no boast to say I was more qualified than anyone in the Pastoria Central Hospital to handle this particular situation.

"Fine," I said, letting go of his shoulder. "Let's go. You can tell me about it on the way."

"Hm."

He didn't, as it happened. But I guess I wasn't expecting him to, either. And as you might guess, love, I had half an idea what it might be already.

Cynthia, I confess, this plan tested me. I am patient by inclination, but nothing in my long existence had ever prepared me for dread; I sat and waited and felt the dark thoughts boil inside me like toxins seething inside an overquil's gut. What were you doing out there, beyond those walls? Sleeping, perhaps. You're mortal; you need rest if you are to stay in the fight. (Enough, Gaeric. Go to bed; tomorrow comes early.Six hours of slaughter is enough to break any man.|Get back inside. The enemy are as tired as you; this fight will keep till tomorrow.) Or perhaps you were dying of some complication from the wound I'd inflicted on you. Or you'd already begun your plan, and failed, and seen the last hope in your quiver glance harmlessly off the enemy's shield.

A few short days ago, this agony of ignorance would be unimaginable, even with my parent-selves' memories to lean on. Yet now it seems as natural a part of the world as the celestial waltz of the stars across the heavens. And frankly, Cynthia, I was very glad indeed to see the door beyond the glass open, even though it disgorged nobody more exciting than Nathaniel.

"Good morning," he said. The strange little ghost that attended him darted close to peer through the glass, then pulled back sharply, like a stray spark twisting and diving above a fire. "I, um, hope I haven't disturbed you."

"How might you disturb me?"

He gave me the helpless look of a child asked a question whose answer far outstrips the capacity of their young mind.

"I suppose I don't know," he said. "It just seems rather early to call on someone. But then, you don't sleep through the night. So."

"So?"

He sighed in a way that gave me the strong impression that my reasonable answer was neither expected nor correct.

"Never mind," he told me. "I came to let you know what's happened. And I suppose to apologise for keeping the news about Miss Mandeville from you. Tacoma was right to tell you. We just didn't know how you'd react until she did."

It seemed a slender excuse on which to hang the choice to let me worry if you were dying for several long days alone. But I had determined already that this sort of argument wouldn't serve me, and besides, I didn't want to be distracted from Nathaniel's message might be. Something had happened. Alone here, disconnected from the world, it was too easy to fear what that might be.

"Now you know," I said, practically. "What is it you came to tell me? Is Cynthia all right?"

"Yes, as far as I know. The last update I received was last night, but she was on the mend then and I don't believe that's likely to change. No, Solomon, it's about Tacoma. And – well – that unpleasant scene that played out here toward the end of her visit."

You were well; that was enough. I already knew that the doctor was to be sent away, and that if he had any sense at all Nathaniel must suspect I'd worked it out, if not that she had told me herself. Or that she had told me this was my chance to place some pressure on his conscience.

"You are going to tell me that your Champion has forbidden you to let her see me," I said, permitting my disc to spread its sawteeth wide across the air. "Is that right?"

"Well." Nathaniel made a weak, boneless gesture. More fit for a spirit than a man. "Um, yes, actually. She won't be coming back. I suspect she'll stay here in Sinnoh for a few days – she doesn't seem the type to admit defeat – but her consultation work is over." He shook his head. "It's rather a mess. But I don't intend to let this be the end of our work here. There are plenty of other scientists here in Sinnoh who I'm sure would be interested in speaking to you; I think we've a lot to learn from each other."

I thought it through for a moment. The doctor would have had a perfect response ready as soon as he finished speaking, I was sure; so would a few of my parent-selves. But I am not sure I'll ever know the footwork well enough to trade solid blows in the cut and thrust of conversation.

"Before," I said, "you did not tell me anything."

Nathaniel's discomfort bled through the glass in piquant streams that danced across my palate.

"No," he admitted.

"Yet you do now."

"Yes."

His nerve failed him, I could taste it. I had no objections. My patience had outlasted Hisui; it would outlast this stripling, too.

"Well," he said, scratching diffidently at the side of his nose. "I suppose … I suppose sitting in on that interview you did with Tacoma – and considering our own conversations, it – oh, bloody hell." He sighed again. "What I'm trying to say is, I didn't believe you, about being different to other spiritomb. And now, I have to admit, I'm finding that position harder to maintain. So I thought I might try … this."

"This?"

"Communication. I do think we should continue our work. Not with Tacoma, unfortunately, but we have specialists of our own, academics, researchers, who I'm sure would be very interested in speaking with you. And – well – it might help pass the time."

Guilt, then. I understood that, after these long days spent polishing the knowledge of your ruined eye into a fine gem deep inside my stone. He wanted to be told I forgave him. I am sure you do not need me to tell you, Cynthia, how little I liked the savour of this weakness.

"I can't thank you," I said, and felt the collapse of some desperate scaffold of feeling within him. "Not if you mean to say you just now see me as the doctor does."

Nathaniel swallowed. His little ghost drew close to his collar, a vivid starburst against the false night of his coat.

"Okay," he said. "I suppose I can't really fault you for that."

This was one of those knotty utterances that I couldn't unpick quickly enough for a response. But it strikes me now, in the recollection, that perhaps my silence was as good an answer as any I could have spoken.

Jodi, sweetheart, you were there in court with me that day. You walked in next to me, hand in hand, even though we were only kids and the whole room was watching – eyes heaped high as the ceiling, staring down from the gallery at the freaks the prosecution had dredged up for its star witnesses. I said, maybe you should go first, I don't know if I can do this. And you said, Tacoma, spooky, we already did the hard part. Now all we have to do is tell the truth.

You weren't lying, but you were wrong. Still, you got me in there. And this morning I touched the memory like a crucifix, and so you got me in there again, past the eyes, past the disbelief, and right through the curtains around Cynthia's bed.

Obviously I didn't get much further than that. Sophia and Bain jumped up from their seats at her bedside like they'd seen a ghost, which in fairness I guess they had, and the doctor they were talking to dropped her sentence halfway through and couldn't seem to find the point of it again.

"Let me," said Rowan, stepping out ahead of me. "Ahem – dobri ráne, çe na Rowan …"

One nice thing about being dead: the shock means people stand around and listen. I let Rowan get on with the talking and shouldered past the surprise to get to what actually mattered.

It wasn't an easy thing to see. Cynthia's always guarding her face, playing the grown-up, but in her sleep all the wariness had left her. She looked so young, her slim face diminished further still by the spreading cloud of her hair and the bruise-dark socket ringing her eye. And I know I've said it before, but Jodi, it really never gets any easier. No matter how long it's been since it was you lying in that bed.

"Excuse me," said the doctor – in Kantan, to my surprise. I know you sometimes miss the odd word, but as someone who went to uni over the border, I can say with confidence that it's more or less mutually intelligible with Johtoni. "I'm trying to tell the professor, you can't―"

"She's cold," I said, taking my hand from Cynthia's forehead. "Too cold. And I can feel the shadow moving in there." I fixed her with a look that shot the words clean out of her mouth. "This isn't the infection. Did you decrease her dosage?"

"What?" The doctor's face folded along rarely-used lines of confusion. She was thirtyish, short, with sensible earrings and a bleached ponytail showing red at the roots; there was no one concrete thing, but taken altogether each aspect of her appearance coalesced into a stalwart, trustworthy air that I'd seen in many other women on many other wards. "No, of course not. The shadow hadn't broken up yet―"

"Well, it has now. And it's moving with intent." I ran a thumb along the edge of my jaw. "Weirdest thing. You'd expect to see it quietening down as it breaks apart. But, well. We are talking about a spiritomb. That's ghost/dark. Double shadow, makes things weird." I opened my palm and summoned a few coiling threads of darkness to play across it, like baby dragons testing their wings. "We have a gift for that kind of thing."

No interruptions now: I had her attention, and everyone else's too. All of them, standing and staring at me like I was sinner and saviour at once.

"Spiritomb," repeated the doctor. "Who are you, exactly?"

"Dr Tacoma Spearing, Royal Westside Hospital in Goldenrod. Rowan will confirm, as will the hospital if you want to waste time calling them up. I'm a ghost-type with twenty-five years of experience in ghost-type medicine, so believe me when I say I've seen my share of shadow injuries." I indicated Cynthia. "You can run tests if you like, but you don't have any as sensitive as a real ghost's powers. That shadow's broken up, and it still has traces of the hostile intent that formed it, so it's trying to get deeper."

The doctor frowned. Not aggressively, but thoughtfully. On either side, Bain and Sophia were silent, hanging on our every word as avidly as if they understood.

"If it went deeper, it'd reach the brain," she said, sounding out the thought. "Which is faintly psychic-type."

"Correct. The dark-type energy negates the psionic energy of human thoughts, erasing most of Cynthia's conscious mind. Which is survivable, in theory – the brain just bounces back once the darkness is removed – but a type negation reaction―"

"―is strongly exothermic," she finished. "There's no way that would be survivable."

"No. It wouldn't." Layman's terms? Sure, love: the heat of the two types reacting would cook the brain inside the skull. It's as gruesome as it sounds. "Which is why we need to remove it. Or, failing that, render it inert so the drugs can clear it out."

"There's no precedent for that kind of surgery."

"It's not a surgical intervention." I raised my hand again, darkness climbing the rungs of my spread fingers. "I'd explain the physics of it, but truthfully I don't have a clue."

I'll say this much for tutorials at Saffron: they taught me how to argue my point. My words went through that room like a wild tauros through a metro station, an unstoppable force ripping through too small a space, and when I looked at the four faces before me, I didn't see anyone who looked like they were about to speak against me.

A moment passed. Then another. Then, of all people, Sophia raised a hand.

"Excuse me," she said, in accented Galish. "You can, ah … help?"

"Yes," I said. "I can."

She nodded, once, with a conviction that took me by surprise. Shouldn't have done. Everything she did was because she loved her granddaughter, just like everything your arsehole granddad did was because he loved your mum. But we see so many more damaged kids than we do their damaged guardians, and it's too easy to forget.

"Help," she repeated, clasping my hand. "Please."

"I will," I said, squeezing gently. "I have surgical training; I can manipulate the shadow without hurting her." I swept my eyes across them all, one by one. Made them feel it: Sophia, Bain, Rowan, the doctor. "But I can't do it alone."

I could see the doubt in the doctor's eyes. A consultant was going to have to get involved; some credentials were going to need to get checked. But damn it, I could see the fear too, sure as if I had your gift, and for the first time since I'd entered the hospital I dared to let myself hope.

Cynthia, young relict of old Hisui, I cannot tell the time during the day so easily as at night. And so I found myself wondering: what was the delay? I should surely have heard from the doctor by then; she'd told me to expect word early in the morning. But Nathaniel had come and gone, and the concrete fortress had measured out the hours in electrical hums and whirrs, and still I had no more to show for it than a stone full of glittering fears.

(Any word from Platea? No. None yet.|Almighty Sinnoh, the first and last to be, if you have mercy in your soul then please, spare some for my son.|No more to be done now but wait. If it worked, the fever will be gone in the morning.)

It was novel, I admit. We had never known hesitation, still less fear; we tore through men and monsters like the colonists through Hisui, barely tasting each kill before we moved on to the next. The closest I'd come before then was the panic when your torch slashed open my abyss. But this is the price of the gift you gave me. If I am to be your pokémon, if you are to be my human, then I must take up a measure of the frailty my parents left behind in life.

So I waited. And I feared. And then, after what seemed two weeks of tumbling our short time together through my disc, Nathaniel came back.

It did not seem an auspicious meeting. He had little enough colour in him at the best of times – a life on this cold and sunless island will sap the warmth from the healthiest man – but the pallor he wore now left me in no doubt that something had changed for the worse.

As did his silence. He came in alone, nodding to someone beyond the door, and stood there for a moment, swaying on the balls of his feet as if tossed on the wind of some powerful thought. I couldn't tell if this was part of the doctor's plan, if I might jeopardise it by interfering, so I simply watched.

"Hello again," he said, after a measurable amount of time had slipped through the neck of the hourglass.

"Hello," I replied. This much I knew how to respond to, or I thought I did; I expected him to reply, but he just sighed and sat down in the chair by the window. He stayed there, chin leaning on his steepled hands, until something in him rebelled at the loss of time and he straightened up again.

"There's been a development," he said.

(I'm sorry, said Jayat, many centuries ago. I did all I could for him.)

"Cynthia," I said, leaning in as close as my stone allowed. "Is she all right? What happened?"

"She isn't, no." Nathaniel took a deep breath. "The clot of shadow in her head has broken up and, as I understand it, begun to press on her brain."

(God-a-mercy! cried Godfrey, as the stained rock slipped from his shaking hand. I fear I've killed thee, lad.)

"The doctor assured me she was recovering well."

"And the doctor has now informed Rowan that her life is in immediate danger." He ran a nervous tongue over his lips, like the snake in the old Pearl legend that had to taste the air before it dared to breathe. "Apparently it's treatable. If we act fast."

(Aye, well, said Dai, folding their arms. The gods will do as they will. But you and I, love, we can make a little of our own luck at least.)

"Then I know she will," I said, perhaps too quickly. "She will save her. She shares my power; she can unstitch the shadows I sewed." I paused. Nathaniel did not confirm it. "She is doing this, isn't she? She must be."

"She would be. Will be. But, um … apparently it's quite a sensitive job. She needs to be sure she's attuned to the specific darkness in there, or else she runs the risk of damaging Cynthia's brain. Which … well, it's rather awkward, because, um, it means that …"

(Get away! snapped Vethi. Don't you have eyes to see that head wound? She doesn't move from this spot until I say so.)

"She needs me," I said. "Yes, I understand. One of us was a healer; I remember some of it. The inside of the head is fragile."

"Indeed it is." Nathaniel sighed again. "But, well, it's … not that simple. We can't just take you into the city. The damage you could cause―"

"What damage? I need to help Cynthia, as she helped me. I won't jeopardise that by killing some other unimportant human."

"Well, yes, but―"

"Would you let her die?"

"Of course not!" he cried, starting up out of his seat. "Damn it all, Solomon, I'm not a monster, I don't want to see a teenage girl die of a treatable head injury!"

I forced my disc to slow, the lights within it to dim their flickering. There was nothing to be gained by antagonising him, and everything to be lost.

"Then what stands in your way?" I asked. "This is your fortress. You are master here. It is your command that will save her."

Nathaniel's mouth worked silently for a moment, then gave out in a soft, boneless noise.

"We both know what," he muttered, turning away. "The bloody Champion, what else?"

Of course. Achille, the so-called Champion of Sinnoh. A title fit for a warrior-priest of old Hisui, cheapened by some colonial braggart. And so large in Nathaniel's mind that all morality seemed to have slid away.

"So you would let her die to appease a man like that," I said, curling my mouth into a jagged grimace. "I know you are the product of a shattered people, Nathaniel, but I cannot respect a man who acts this way."

"Nor can I." He closed his eyes. "But … no. Nor can I."

I gave him a moment to continue, but you did not have many to spare, and I have learned my lesson about waiting to act.

"So send me," I said. "I'll come back after if I must. But if you keep me here, Nathaniel, and if she dies, I will dedicate the rest of my existence to evening the score."

He exhaled, opened his eyes, raised his head. Each movement his, but all together so like Vethi's son that she half woke inside me.

"Creators help me," he said. "But I'm not sure you'd be wrong."

It sounded like a decision. And I watched, hungry-eyed and restless, as the rest of it came tumbling from his mouth.

"If you need to make preparations, do," he said. "I'll have Operations prep the truck."

Jodi, I gotta be honest with you, there were a good forty minutes there when I didn't think Nat would go for it. And it was all right, mostly, because I was busy talking to doctors and consultants, getting sign-off, proving I was a real physician and not some ghoul trying to crack open Cynthia's brain for my own sinister reasons, but you can't crush a thought like that entirely. It comes back, like weeds through pavement, mould through fresh paint.

Then Rowan said he'd called, of course. So we moved Cynthia to a private room, somewhere we could get a spiritomb without causing a panic, and then all anyone could do was wait. Bain and Sophia in there with her, making some kind of peace. Me and Rowan outside, nursing paper cups of vending machine coffee and not quite talking about what might happen.

"Probably an hour to go," he said, checking his watch. "Do you think that will be all right?"

"It'll have to be," I replied.

"I suppose so."

We sat and sipped and waited, two different forms of stoic masculinity playing out in parallel. Rowan's watch ticking. My hair swirling. The thought running through my mind that if I tried hard enough, I might be able to believe that this was going to work out.

"Back at the hotel," said Rowan, "you asked why I hesitated."

I looked up from the black depths of my coffee.

"Yeah?"

"Well." He cleared his throat. "I'm afraid I didn't know how to say it without sounding like I'd missed the gravity of the situation. But … well. Yesterday, Cynthia asked if I could call in one of my press contacts to see her."

I knew that much, of course; it was part of our plan. You know the drill, love – a savage monster, a child in hospital, a thousand tabloid hacks drooling at the thought of tomorrow's headlines. Cynthia wanted to reclaim the narrative. Rowan knew some journalists. Seemed like an obvious match-up.

"This person's coming today?" I asked. "To hear Cynthia talk about how Solomon's not dangerous at all?"

"Only to see … this."

"You can't call them?"

"I tried, but he never picked up. He must have already left."

"Ah."

I thought about it for a bit. Then about the fact that Rowan must have been thinking about it already, all morning.

"You know," I said, "he might get here and see Solomon save her life."

"I suppose he might, yes."

He didn't sound convinced. Which was fair, I guess, because I'm not sure I sounded all that convinced either.

That was about all the conversation we got in. He finished his coffee, I got halfway through mine, and then all at once eight guys came marching down the corridor with body armour and League poké balls.

"Tacoma," said Nat, appearing from between them all like a dove from a hat. His camouflage was pretty much perfect; tuck a short goth between a few black-clad spec ops guys and he just disappears. "I hope we're not too late?"

I glanced through the door at Cynthia, lying there in a pool of blonde hair and beatific silence. The only person around who didn't look worried.

"No," I said. "Just about in time. Where's Solomon?"

He held out a master ball.

"Right. Bring 'em in, then. Not you," I added, holding up a hand to the rest of the goon squad. "That room is too small and this operation's too delicate for this. Anyone who isn't a healthcare professional or Solomon is barred."

"Look," said Nat. "You have to know that Solomon can't be unsupervised―"

"Just you, then. You've got the master ball, right? In the unlikely event that they try to do anything, you can recall ''em."

Nat wavered, but I'd won the moment he arrived and we all knew it.

"All right," he said, signalling to his team. "Lead the way."

"Good luck," said Rowan. "Sophia, Bain?"

The conversation had already drawn them to the door; he didn't need to say any more for them to know.

"Thank you," said Sophia. She looked over at Cynthia, said a few words in Sinnish, and led Bain out by the hand. "This can save him?"

Obviously I wanted to say something, but there's a time and a place, you know.

"It's our best chance," I said. "I'll do everything I can."

She nodded. And then it was just me and Nat and the medics, gathered around Cynthia's bedside like the mourners round my coffin way back when.

I won't lie, I felt the pressure. But it wasn't about me, it was never about me, and I was damned if I was going to let Cynthia down by choking now.

"There's one person missing," I said, sticking to my doctor voice so that I'd sound calm. "Nat?"

He drew in a deep breath.

"Bloody hell," he muttered. "I must be insane, but …"

A click, a flash, and Solomon ballooned up out of his hands like a wind-blown umbrella.

"Cynthia!" they cried, with a raw concern that hurt a bit to hear. "Are we in time, doctor?"

"I think so. Nat explain what I need from you?"

"My shadow." They lifted their eyes from Cynthia's face to mine, like twin supernovas burning in the depths of a nebula. "It is at your disposal, doctor. I've never shared it before, but I think I know how."

"It's simple. You'll feel me reach out; all you have to do is let me."

"I see." Their mouth glowed brighter for a moment. "It shouldn't be a problem."

"I'm counting on it." I turned to the medics, all of whom were in the middle of recovering from the large step back they'd taken when Solomon appeared. "When I start, we're going to know in seconds whether this has worked. If it hasn't, we may need to attempt resuscitation immediately. Jenna, I don't speak Sinnish, so I'm designating you the leader on that. Are you and your team prepared?"

"Yes, doctor."

"Good. Thank you." If I still had a heart, it would've been pounding half out of my chest; as it was, I swear the fog was wheezing on its way out of my keystone. One chance. One chance, and everything to lose. "Nat, put Solomon down by the bed and let's, uh … do this."

I wish I hadn't hesitated. But everyone else here was at least twice as afraid as I was, so I sucked it up and stretched out my hands. One toward Solomon. One wrapped gently around Cynthia's forehead.

"Okay, Solomon," I said, concentrating hard. "Reaching out now."

"I feel it," they said, the lie concealed completely by their dead, cracked-earth voice, and while the whole room held its breath I pushed my mind down into Cynthia's head and undid the Hypnosis I'd placed on her last night.

Wake up now, I said, in my clumsy ghost-to-brain telepathy. And if you ever ask me to do this again, the answer is a strong bloody no.

Her eyelids fluttered; I pulled back with a theatrical gasp of fake effort; and then, at last, Cynthia opened her eyes.

"Tacoma?" she mumbled. "Is that …?"

"Yeah." I couldn't keep the smile from my face; it probably helped sell the grift, but to be honest I was just glad the stressful part was over. You know I love to fuck with people, but this con had really rubbed up against my sense of medical ethics. "You made it, kid."

"Cynthia!"

Her eyes flew all the way open at once, tried to focus on a point beyond my shoulder.

"Solomon?"

"Here," they said, straining at their keystone like a dog on a leash. "Doctor, give me―"

"Way ahead of you."

I picked them up and placed them in her waiting arms. And if I had any doubts that this wouldn't work, none of them survived the strength and conviction of Cynthia's embrace.

"You will think me a fool," said Solomon, mist splashing against her shoulder. "I knew you only a short while, and yet I missed you as my parent-selves missed their children."

"It's not foolish at all," said Cynthia, folding her arms tight around them. "I missed you too."

I glanced at Nat, staring at the two of them with the glassy-eyed expression of a man whose worldview is currently taking a pretty major beating.

"Pretty wild, isn't it?" I asked. "You might be fifteen, they might be several hundred, almost nothing in common, but when you find your partner pokémon, it just … works."

He massaged his temples with the thumb and forefinger of one hand.

"Arceus above," he sighed. "Unfortunately, I don't think there's any way I can argue with that."

Cynthia, my friend, you are young and you are reckless. I would have taken the doctor's original plan, if I were you: to simply lie, to feign agony and use the doctor's medical expertise to smooth over the rest. But that's not you, is it? You tread boldly – rescuing ghosts who tried to kill you, manufacturing evidence, seizing every opportunity the moment you spot it. It's risky. Desperate. And after so long dead and buried, I must admit, it is utterly exciting.

"I can't read this," said the doctor, handing you a sheaf of the thinnest paper I had ever seen, "but from the photos, it looks like you made the front page. Rowan's guy came good, I guess."

It had been but one night, and yet in it whole seasons of change had turned. Nathaniel had found his spine and given the order to leave me here, albeit with guards in the hall, and your grandparents had seemed far too relieved and afraid to prosecute their quarrel with you in my presence. One night, one dawn, and now here came the doctor, slipping in before even your family returned.

"It's about how Solomon saved me," you said, squinting at it with your one eye. "It says … sorry, it hurts to read at the moment."

I could not read the modern alphabet either, but the picture was startlingly crisp, as bright and finely detailed as if I could lean toward it and fall back into the scene: you and me here in your room, laughter on your lips and your fingers on my stone. The writer who'd come to see us had taken it so quickly, and with such a small camera, that I confess I hadn't believed it would amount to much at all.

"Don't worry about it," said the doctor. "Rowan gave me the gist. I'm sure he'll do the same for you, I just wanted to swing by before everyone else got here. Point is, things are looking up. Despite you being almost as reckless as my wife was when she was a teenager."

"Almost?" you asked, as if offended that you hadn't matched her.

The doctor grinned.

"Don't feel bad, no one outdoes her. What I'm trying to say, Cynthia, is that next time you're in a tight spot, maybe look for a slightly less risky way forward than asking someone to embed a shard of darkness in your skull so the League will believe you're experiencing a medical emergency."

You blushed slightly.

"We didn't end up doing that anyway," you said, a touch of childishness in your voice.

"We were never going to," said the doctor flatly. "I'm a doctor. First, do no harm, et cetera. Still …" Her face softened. "If you hadn't asked, we wouldn't have come up with the Hypnosis plan. So. Hats off to you, kid. You were right. It worked. Achille's gonna kick off about it, but between the three of us I think we've convinced Nat to take a stand against him."

Freedom. Strange thing, for a prison to be free, and yet – here it was, close enough for its eyes to reflect the glow of my mouth. For a moment I felt terrified, and then my parents all sang out in chorus and I remembered that we had never really wanted anything else.

"A great achievement," I said. "You can be proud of that."

"It's only halfway done." You sank back against the pillows, suddenly exhausted. "There's my grandparents to deal with."

"You've got some breathing room," said the doctor. "They'll be too afraid of you to do much, Solomon. At least until they realise that you're not going to eat their souls."

I cocked my disc thoughtfully.

"Is that a possibility? I have never heard of such a thing."

"It isn't, but live people are bloody obsessed with ghosts eating their souls. Look, what I'm getting at is that is you've got time to work on them. Rowan's already had a go, so you're not starting cold. And I think you scared them pretty hard yesterday. That doesn't always change things, but …" The doctor shrugged. "The door is open. You might not ever be friends, but maybe you can coexist. At least until you're old enough that you don't have to engage with them if you don't want to."

"Yes." You had always looked pale – from your make-up, from the blood loss, from the rigours of the infection – but now your face was as white as a half-moon in the sunset cloud of your hair. "I hope you're right. I think … I think I might have to rest at home for a little while before I get back out on my journey."

Such painful knots the colonists have twisted the clans' minds into! In my parents' day, any family would have been honoured to bear one like you or Dai – those whom the gods returned to after the first shaping, to remould into a new and finer form. You are proof that divinity still leaves its fingerprints on this world.

I could not tell you this; when I tried to yoke the words to my tongue, they slipped the bit and galloped off out of the room. But you have many years left in you, Cynthia. I will learn to tell you before they all play out.

"I will be there," I said. "Morgan too. We will not be parted from you again."

"I don't doubt it," said the doctor. "Besides, I'm ninety per cent sure Rowan's going to gruffly and manfully offer you a place to stay in, uh, wherever the hell he's from. So if you wanna maintain a little distance, you have options."

Your mouth twitched into a small, incredulous smile.

"Is there anything you don't think of?"

"Don't know what you mean. I've never dropped hints so an emotionally stunted man would realise he needs to do the right thing."

Your smile ripened into a laugh. Small, perhaps. Weak, certainly. But it was a vintage I had not drunk from in a long time, and the taste of it was sweeter than all the pain you'd fed me on our ill-starred journey from my cave to your room.

"Seriously," you said. "Thank you, Tacoma. I … don't like to think what might have―"

"Then don't. You're too young to worry about the could-have-beens. Go do some living instead."

"Oh. I, um … I suppose. There is a lot I need to do."

"Right." The doctor snapped her fingers, green light flashing at the point of impact. "Rowan mentioned there are a bunch of gym leaders who have you on their lists of talent to watch. Have to say, having met you, I think he might be onto something when he said you're leader material yourself."

You looked at me, a little sly, a little wry. (Child, said Seyd, that look in your eye is nothing but trouble.) We'd discussed this last night, when we had at last been alone. You have ambitions, of course. And, having seen what's become of my world, I find that I do too.

"There's that," you said. "And if I end up having to get a gym trainer job to support myself in the meantime, I will. But we both have our sights set a little higher than that."

I felt my mouth twist into a grin of its own volition.

"Yes," I said, turning to the doctor. "This League, doctor. There is perhaps some worth to be salvaged from it, but not while Achille Rose stands at its helm."

The doctor's grin was a mirror held up to mine, bright and green and venomous.

"Well, now," she said. "I'll hold you to that. Let's say … six years from now, if you haven't unseated him, you owe me a drink."

"I have it worked out," you said, immediately. As you'd told me the night before. You are two years into your four-year plan to never have to return to the town you so hate; I think you could achieve it without me, but I can think of little more satisfying to help you bring some night back to this light-sick nation. "I should only need two. But I planned for three, just in case."

"Ha! Now that's a bet. Okay, three – least you'll be old enough to drink by then. Deal?"

She held out her hand, and you shook it without hesitation.

"I'll see you then," you said, not letting go. "That's a promise."

"Kid," said the doctor. "Solomon. If you wait three years to see me again, I'm gonna be offended. Visit my clinic sometime. You've got my details, just call or email."

Long decades of nothing, and now all this something, accelerating so quickly toward its conclusion. It was almost more than I could bear; my parents had seen many partings, but nothing they knew could prepare me to so quickly gain and lose the company of my own kind.

"It seems so soon to part, doctor," I said, pushing their whispers down inside my stone. This moment was mine; I didn't want to share it with their remnants. "We have barely begun."

"Oh, we'll finish." She stood, the indistinct mists of her body drifting in and out of her jacket. "But right now, you've got a Championship to win."

And when I add this to my storehouse of memories, filed neatly away among my parents, this is the image I will return to: the doctor, standing, the hard electric light filtering through her mist and picking out the faint edges of a face long since smoothed out by death.

I miss her already. And that, Cynthia, says more of how you've changed me than anything else could.

[…]

Oh. You're awake. I didn't mean to disturb you. It's simply a habit of mine. Every night, while we were apart, I told you all that had happened to me that day. I thought perhaps I might do it in person tonight.

[…]

Because this brave new world takes great thought to navigate. And I couldn't think of anyone else who'd listen as you would.

[…]

I know. And I thank you for it; I will do the same for you. But it's late, and you're wounded. Rest. Rest, and let tomorrow make such shift as it may; our long dusk is only just falling, and I can tell even now that our midnight will be the deepest any ghost has ever dreamed of.

Jodi! I'm home! Ah, I love you too. Here's how much: I bought you this hideous glass psyduck from a gift shop in Pastoria.

[…]

Yeah, knew you'd like it. Okay, okay, gimme a second to sit down at least.

[…]

Oof, that's the stuff. Feels like I've been away forever. Nothing like your own sofa, is there?

[…]

If I'd known you were gonna get so addicted to the drama, I'd have given you fewer updates. Where did I get to before boarding? Right. I cut it a little fine leaving the hospital, like I said; I'd come in before visiting hours, trying to avoid bumping into any more of Cynthia's family, but I ran into Rowan in the lobby.

"Tacoma," he said, catching sight of me. "I thought I'd missed you."

"I was in a bit of a rush," I replied. "Flight's in a few hours. Nat's waiting out front with the car."

"That's what I came to talk to you about. So is …"

The doors opened on a red-faced man and an equally red-faced giant insect.

"… Achille." Rowan glanced at me. "My apologies. I was going to take you out the other exit."

"Got nothing to hide," I said, folding my arms as Achille approached. "And it'll be a cold day in hell when I give in to a man like him."

He drew level with us, eyes hard and bright with anger. There was already a healthy space around us – you know how people get around me – but when he and that scizor rocked up, everyone backed off even further. Either they knew who he was and didn't want any part of it, or they just didn't fancy hanging out with a man whose partner could pinch iron bars in half.

"Medijka Spearing," said Achille, his voice as cold and dark as the Lake of Rage in midwinter. I didn't catch what followed, obviously, but it didn't sound much more complimentary.

"Sorry, mate," I said, not blinking. "Guess I'm a bit of a bad tourist, 'cause I don't speak the language."

"I can translate," said Rowan. "Although, ah, I don't think I will, in that case. It was an extraordinarily impolite thing to say to someone who's just saved a young lady's life."

He said something to Achille that I found out later was the same sentiment in Sinnish; Achille swung around to face him, his scizor looming and clacking like it was about to get involved, but all credit to him, Rowan just twitched his moustaches and stepped aside.

"I've told him you have a plane to catch," he said. Never thought I'd come to appreciate his unbreakable sense of superiority, but there you go. Turns out it's quite nice when it's some other dickhead on the receiving end. "Shall we?"

"Yeah," I said, grinning in Achille's face and taking what you'd call slightly too much pleasure in seeing him flinch. "Let's. Before they get hospital security involved."

So we left―

[…]

No, he didn't try to stop us. He yelled a bit, though. I think I heard my name in there, but I didn't look back. Just walked out of the hospital into the light summer rain.

"God, it's almost bright," I muttered, squinting through the grey light. "Will it be okay? Cynthia's in there."

"Nat's gone in to join the guards on her door, in case they think of deferring to the Champion." He sounded almost approving, which to be honest is not an emotion I thought he was capable of expressing. "I'll drive you back myself. Though I'm still not sure how you talked him around."

I shrugged.

"He already knew he had to stand up for himself. Just needed someone to tell him."

"There may be something to that." He shook his head and struck out across the car park, heading for Nat's blue Polo. "It feels like the end of an era, in some ways; now that one League member has stood up to Achille, I imagine more will follow."

"Good. He's a bully and a blowhard. Can't believe everyone just put up with it all this time."

"I think several observers have held that sentiment for some years now." He stopped by the car. Turned to me, raindrops pattering on his coat. There was something kind of noble in his bearing then, like a sailor standing tall against the storm. But that admission stays strictly between us. "I admit, Tacoma – it wasn't the problem I asked you here to solve, but I'm rather glad you tackled it."

Caught me by surprise, I'll admit: all I could do was laugh.

"Well," I said. "'S kinda what I do."

[…]

Yeah. It is what I do. You know? To hell with playing it safe, to hell with the cops and the hospital directors. There's work to do, Jodi – real work, the kind we were trying to do when we first started out. And I for one am ready to get back out there and do it.

[…]

Hey, I wasn't gonna say it. But now that you have, yes, I agree. That does deserve a kiss.

[…]

Ha! Well yeah, that too. But I think I'll let you finish your cigarette first.