Zoe took a savage blow to the chin. Luke wanted to switch in another Pokémon—Shane, Pauline, any of them but Zoe. She wasn't supposed to still be out there. But no matter how many times he pressed the switch on her ball, it wouldn't recall her. A Headbutt sent her flying backwards a hundred feet, but not out of bounds, even though she'd only been five feet away from the edge. If he couldn't switch her out, he wanted to forfeit. He opened his mouth, but his lungs were shut tight, and his vocal cords were gone.

The lights went out in the Gym, but the battle didn't stop. The opponent sent out three more Bug-types, each of them something between an Ariados and a Beedrill, and they all jabbed their fangs into Zoe. Leech Life. Luke couldn't call for any attacks, but Zoe tried using Psychic anyway. The walls warped, and the playing surface fell for miles. But the bugs held on.

Luke heard his own voice in his head, but only in his head:

Fall over. We can't win. Just fall over.

He wanted to move his hands to signal "time out," "give up," anything, but his arms were locked to his side.

Stop.

Zoe moaned in pain. She fell her to her knees, but not all the way down. Instead of going quiet, she continued to moan, so the fight wasn't over.

Stop. Stop. Stop. Stop. Stop. Stop. Stop.

"Wendy can't stand quitters," said Aaron.

Chapter 7

Dreamaches

October 6th, 1993

Luke awoke gasping for air. It pitch-black above. He worried he might have gone blind, but then he remembered where he was. No stars ever poked through the leaves in Ilex Forest.

It was years since Luke last had a bad dream. He must not have been fully awake yet, since it didn't occur to him right away why he wasn't supposed to have—or remember having—bad dreams at all. All he could think about was training for the Gym Challenge, which he had to reassure himself they weren't doing anymore.

They. He and Zoe.

Zoe and bad dreams.

Luke bolted upright and all but kicked his sleeping bag away from him, hoping against hope it wasn't what he thought. He groped for his flashlight, found the switch on the second try, then finally saw Zoe.

"Oh, fuck."

Zoe was lying in the fetal position. Next to her head was a translucent, shadowy puddle of what Luke recognized as "dream-sick."

"I'm so sorry, girl."

He had dropped his end of the bargain: She hypnotized him and ate his dreams so he could actually sleep, while he maintained his emotional stability such that her dream-diet remained healthy. If her body was rejecting nightmares—vomiting them back into his head as well as onto the ground—it meant he had been feeding her too many of them for weeks.

Before she could go back in her Poké Ball for the night, she needed her medicine. Luke dug through his pack for the deep, seldom-opened compartment where he kept the plastic bag. It was distressingly light when he found it. Taking it out, he counted only two sheets of four pills. He cursed himself for forgetting to obtain more when those older packs expired.

Slowly, he turned Zoe onto her back, then helped her sit up. She made an obstinate but weak noise in her throat and kept her eyes closed. He held the pill to her mouth.

"You got to take one, Zoe. Open."

She showed no interest in listening. It took a minute of persuasion with his fingers and with what he called "thinking louder" to get her to open up just a crack. Even then, he needed his hands to make sure she swallowed.

"Good girl. You'll feel better."

He set her down again before returning her to the ball. Then, he put his head in hands, rubbed his eyes, and groaned. The stock might not last until he could get more. The silver lining was that since they were in Ilex, he could scrape together a supply of an emergency substitute tomorrow, if he remembered how.

In the meantime, he was left to his own devices to get some sleep. He knew it would be impossible for at least two hours in his current condition. His watch, to his dismay, read 2:00 AM. He was going to be as good as a zombie come daylight.

With his options limited to lying awake or finding a distraction, he opted for the latter. Before he thought twice about it, he had pulled out Wendy's letter from Olivine a few weeks ago and was re-reading it by flashlight.


September 17th, 1993

Dear Luke,

Thank you, thank you, thank you for the picture. I love it so much. I'm writing in a little more of a hurry than usual, but even if I had time, I don't think I could properly write down everything I feel about it. I don't remember if I told you once that I think that's one of the prettiest valleys in Johto or if you just guessed I would like it, but I actually think that would be even better because that means we're seeing the same thing there, if that makes sense. Maybe it doesn't, I don't know. Anyway, I love it, and thank you.

Nadine just told me I don't have to hurry that much on her account. She says hi, by the way, which I suppose needs some explanation, ha. If you can believe it, we ran into each other right after I got your last letter a few hours ago. We're catching up on a lot of stuff: She's doing amazing at school back home, for one. Quincy (her Sentret, if you forgot the name) finally evolved and is very soft, fuzzy, and adorable. Maybe we should get you together so you can take his portrait, ha ha.

Okay. I'm actually going to slow down and write with my brain more now.

Among the things Nadine and I talked about, there was something I wanted to run by you. She told me the reason she quit back then was because she felt a lot of pressure to measure up to where Aaron and I were at with our teams. This really caught me by surprise, and I imagine it might surprise you too, if you remember just how sharp she was about reading battles. I mean, I'd be lying if I said I thought her team was quite as good as mine or Aaron's, especially Aaron's, but I never thought she was "behind," and we were all just getting started. I don't think I could have guessed in a million years she was dealing with that kind of self-expectation.

Or I guess what worries me more is that maybe it wasn't just self-expectation, and that I was doing something to make her think she had to get better right away or quit. I wish I hadn't missed whatever the signs were, and really feel like I should have seen them. If all she needed was a little encouragement, just someone telling her she was closer than she thought, or even just a "There's no hurry, you got this," she should have heard that from me. Maybe because I never felt any stress about how I was doing with training, I didn't think about how she might be looking at it.

All that said, the biggest relief in the world to me is that whether or not things should have gone better, they're going great for her now. She is so clearly in her element at school. I can't overstate this: My footsteps are lighter just knowing she's doing this well. At the risk of putting it too bluntly, it's like when you first wrote back to me in July. Knowing you were okay, getting you back again even a little bit was so important to me. And now it's happened with Nadine, and right after I got your picture, too. This is seriously one of the best days of my life.

I'm going home with Nadine for at least a while. Long enough to meet some of her school friends. After that, I'm overdue for doing some work at and around the National Park, so probably there next.

Yours truly,
Wendy


Luke put the letter down. If it had consisted of only the first two and last two paragraphs, he would probably re-read it every single day. Even with the middle two paragraphs, though, the thing was an overwhelming comfort to him. He loved it. What he hated was how it was also making Zoe sick.

If he was honest with himself, he could have seen this coming when he changed his mind about continuing this correspondence with Wendy. There was no thinking about her without also thinking about Aaron and the fight, and no thinking about that without inviting nightmares. He suddenly found himself wishing he'd never met her. If this letter was medicine, he figured it was worse than the disease.

He clapped a hand to his forehead. That was the dumbest thing he could possibly think right now. It was one thing to curse Aaron, curse Pokémon battling, curse his own bad luck, bad decisions, immaturity… but not Wendy. Not when he owed her so much on Zoe's behalf.


September 30th, 1989

Luke was at his wit's end. His head hurt, his eyes were burning, and the doctor still wouldn't tell him if Zoe, lying limp on the examining table, was going to be okay. The man just kept pulling Zoe's eyes open and shining a light in them. Then he listened to her chest with his stethoscope again, even though anyone with eyes could tell something was wrong by how it was blue.

"Doctor, pleeeease… Is she going to get better?"

The doctor took the stethoscope out of his ears. His face showed nothing. "Luke, the first thing you should know is that while her condition is serious, it isn't life-threatening, and the effects shouldn't be permanent."

Luke's lower lip trembled. He'd never thought "life-threatening" was a possibility.

"What it comes down to," said the doctor, "is that there's a lot we still don't understand about how a Drowzee's stomach works, such as how dream-eating manifests semi-physical matter for digestion. We know that too many bad dreams upset the stomach, and that in rare cases, they can provoke something like an allergic reaction, as is happening with your Zoe. But we don't know enough about it for the machines to be of any help. And since the condition is so uncommon and only medium-priority, we don't keep the medicine in stock either. Its shelf-life is too short."

Luke was in disbelief. Nobody ever told him there would be anything the Pokémon Center couldn't make better. But what gnawed at him was how the doctor could call this "medium-priority" when Zoe was in this much pain and could barely move. He almost bit the man's head off for how calm his stupid doctor-voice was when this was serious, but he reined himself in. "Then where can I get some? She needs it!"

"I know she needs it. I'm writing the name of the medicine on this piece of paper. When you give it to the nurse at the front desk, she will order some in, and tell you when we expect to have it. Until then, if you'd prefer not to leave her here, keep her in her Poké Ball so she can rest."

Five minutes later, the nurse put down the phone. Luke's knuckles went white from his grip on the edge of the counter.

The nurse said, "It will be four to six weeks."

An eternity. Luke fell to his knees, then broke down completely. His friends had to lead him out of the building.


Fifteen minutes later, Luke sat hunched over on a bench in Goldenrod Municipal Park, staring at the dirt. Aaron was there too, saying some words Luke didn't care to listen to, but couldn't stop hearing. Wendy was off somewhere else. Said she needed to call home.

"So, if Zoe's gonna be out of commission for a while," said Aaron, "I think we ought to focus most on Shane. He's been falling behind lately. This ain't a bad chance to get him caught up, if it makes you feel better."

Shut up, Luke wanted to say but didn't, since with some people it only invited more talking.

Aaron continued. "First thing Shane needs work on is defense, especially against Water and Grass. He can take a pounding, but the way he loses his drive when you hit him with a weakness is a real liability."

Luke put his head in his hands. Why couldn't Aaron leave it alone for one day? Or even one minute? This was torture.

"After that, I say it's time to teach Pauline a new move. She's good and strong, but you're not taking advantage of that. Brave Bird might be a reach, but maybe Hurricane…"

"They need a break." Luke couldn't keep it in. He regretted it immediately.

Aaron's rebuttal, though inevitable, wasn't quite immediate. "…You know, last I checked, Wendy and I got four Badges, and you've still got three."

So what? Luke stopped himself from saying. Who cares?

"Like, am I missing something? Did your team get good enough to earn a vacation while I wasn't looking?"

This was too much. Luke's self-control slipped again. "They're tired. Zoe's sick. They'll get sick, too. They need it."

Aaron rolled his eyes. "They're not gonna get sick like Zoe. That's just cause you're having some bad dreams, right?"

"I need it." It should have gone without saying. He was a wreck. Maybe he was a wreck because of the dreams, maybe the dreams were because he was a wreck—it didn't matter. He hadn't slept more than two hours a night in a week, he was killing Zoe, it was all his own fault, and this jerk wanted him to push even harder. He wanted to tell Aaron where he could stick it.

"Okay," said Aaron.

Luke hadn't expected that.

"Maybe you should go home for a few weeks, then. Or months. Whatever. We'll see if we run into you again, down the road."

Luke stiffened. He should have expected this, but Aaron caught him utterly flat-footed. The thought of going it alone again? After more than a year with Wendy and Aaron?

…No, "with Wendy." Forget Aaron. Luke was too mad at him right now.

"Course," said Aaron, "Wendy'll take it hard. You saw how she was when Nadine threw in the towel."

If Luke could have gotten stiffer, he did.

"If you don't want to deal with that, you can try to pick up the pace again, but I think the worst thing you can do is keep dragging behind like this. You know Wendy—she's all about that hundred-and-ten percent. She won't show it, but it's getting on her nerves. I'd either catch up fast or quit while it's easy. Your call."

In that moment, a thought came to Luke for the first time: Why wasn't he mad at her, too? It wasn't just Aaron who never said it was time for a break. Even if Wendy wasn't all-training-all-the-time like Aaron, she never wanted to take it easy. It always had to be something else if not training or battling. And whose idea was that stupid Badge-pact to begin with?

"…Maybe I will," said Luke.

"Which?" said Aaron, in the same voice as if he'd been asking whether Luke meant diet or regular, chocolate or vanilla, heads or tails.

Luke dug his fingers into his temples. He was this close to saying it. This close to saying he was through.

"Luke!"

Wendy came running over. She sat too close to him on the bench and shoved a piece of paper under his face.

"My mom talked to her friend at the Pharmacy." If she was trying to be reassuring, there was too much urgency in her voice, but she spoke too fast for it to matter. "She said there's an herb that grows in Ilex Forest that can help if we're careful. I've got what to do with it written on here and I'm going to the library now to copy a picture of it from a book. I'll be back real soon, then we'll go right away. Okay?"

She left the paper in his hands and was off running before he could blink.

Whatever thoughts had been in Luke's head about whether to leave or whom to be mad at were gone. Everything was about Zoe now. He read and re-read Wendy's scrawled instructions. Even if they couldn't reach the forest until the day after tomorrow, he wanted the procedure committed to memory.

"Ilex it is, then," said Aaron. He didn't speak again after that.


It was impossible to tell when the sun set in Ilex Forest—it was hard enough to tell when it was noon on a clear day—but what mattered was that Luke had to strain his eyes to see protruding roots before they tripped him. He spotted a bush which he knew wasn't the right kind, but he checked the picture again anyway. Still wrong. None of the plants they'd seen all day had the round, jagged leaves they were looking for.

He checked the picture again for another bush, again knowing he didn't need to check, then realized it wasn't even another bush but the same one. He was checking plants twice when he didn't need to check them once. His eyes stung so bad. Before he could check the bush a third time, he put the paper away. It took all his concentration to start walking again. Three steps later, he tripped.

Now his hands and knees stung too. He didn't want to move. He knew he had to because Zoe still hurt worse, but moving his arms was like moving cement. He moaned.

"Luke?"

Wendy's voice.

"Luke!"

Someone pulled him to his feet, but took his pack off and set him down with his back to a tree right afterward. Luke couldn't quite see who, but whoever it was had long hair. Wendy, maybe.

"Wow, is he dead?"

"Luke, are you okay?"

He closed his eyes, and somehow the sight of nothing was brighter. It hurt, so he opened them again. He took deep breaths. Eventually, his eyes semi-focused on whoever was in front of him.

"…Fine," he said. At least, he was pretty sure he said it.

Someone put a cool hand to his forehead.

"He needs to sleep, somehow." Girl's voice. She was talking to someone else. "We gotta camp here."

"Not much space."

"It's Ilex. The nearest clearing could be a mile away. It's not going to rain, so we don't need the tent."

"Whatever you say."

"You start on dinner. I'm going to lay out his sleeping bag. I think he needs more padding under it."

Luke didn't know why she kept checking on him, assuming it was Wendy. He wasn't sick—Zoe was.

The rest of the evening was a blur. He was lying in a sleeping bag for much of it, not sleeping, and for a while he was sitting up with a hot bowl of rice in his hands, trying to eat some at someone's insistence. There were gaps in his memory. One or two of those gaps might have been sleep. He wasn't sure. It didn't feel like it.

Eventually, as it always happened, Luke's head cleared up. Nothing hurt less—if anything, everything hurt more—but at least he could think again. He could tell himself they were going to find the right plant tomorrow, that they couldn't possibly have such bad luck two days in a row. It wasn't true, but he could at least tell himself.

He sat up. This was no time to lie down. They needed to get looking again. He staggered to his feet. The only problem was how it was pitch-black out. No matter. He could wait. He took a few steps, felt for a tree trunk, and sat at its base. It would be morning soon enough.

A flashlight lit the ground at his feet. Even though it wasn't shining in his eyes, it stung, so he covered his face. It went out. Then he heard approaching footsteps. They stopped right next to him.

"Hey," said Wendy. Her voice was little more than a whisper. "Do you think you should lie down?"

"No." His head and mouth were working a little better, now.

"You don't think it'll help?"

"Doesn't matter. Soon as it's bright enough, we should go."

She sat down beside him. Her arm brushed his in the process, so he shifted. "It's still hours away. Even if you don't fall asleep, you need rest."

He didn't say anything.

"Was it always like this? Before you had Zoe?"

He wished she'd go away, but he tried to remember the answer. It felt like a lifetime ago since he lived at home. "…No. We had routines. Had a bed, too."

"What were the routines?"

It was clear what she was trying to do. "I don't need sleep. Zoe needs medicine. I shouldn't sleep after that either, cause—"

He faltered.

"She's in her Poké Ball," said Wendy. "You getting sleep now won't hurt her. It doesn't have to after, either. When she's better, she can use Hypnosis at bedtime, and then I can put her back in so she can't use Dream Eater. We'll make it work."

"That's not fair," said Luke. "It's not a trade, then. That wasn't the deal. This is how she eats. Human dreams are best—the book said so."

"Then we need to get you sleeping again."

Luke leaned forward and rubbed his eyes. She was talking in circles. Or, no, he was. Was he? He was so tired. "It's the dreams. I can't just make them better."

He'd seen them every night he'd managed to fall asleep since Zoe threw up the first time. Zoe getting kicked around by bigger Pokémon, Shane stumbling exhausted through a training session, Pauline falling out of the sky and landing on her head. Over and over and over.

Aaron was right. He had to go home. He couldn't do a hundred and ten percent. The stupid jerk was right.

He had to tell her. She would hate him for it, but he had to tell her. It wouldn't be like it was with Nadine. She hadn't known him since they were little, so she could just get mad and tell him good riddance. It wouldn't be as bad. And he had to leave.

There was a hand on his back. "What's your favorite thing in the world to think about?" asked Wendy.

He lost whatever train of thought he'd been on. "Why?"

"Remember when you told me that nothing's just your own problem?"

He didn't.

"When you feel bad, I feel bad. You're my friend, so this is about me, too. You said so yourself once. So, if you won't lie down, tell me about something nice so I'll feel better."

It didn't make sense, but maybe if he played along, it'd get her to go away.

"…New Year's, three years… four years ago. We went to Ecruteak to visit my aunt and uncle."

"Uh-huh. Did you go to a shrine?"

"Yeah." He tried to remember what it looked like. Soon he could picture it. "There was a gold statue of Ho-Oh under the gate. He had snow on his beak. Looked like he might sneeze."

She rubbed his back. Up and down, slowly and gently. He felt his shoulders sag.

"Did you take a picture?"

"Yeah…" He remembered it was in color, but he didn't remember developing it, which meant… "I got a disposable camera that Christmas. …I used it up before lunchtime, but I wanted it for Ecruteak, so my dad gave me another one."

"Did you help decorate the tree?" Her voice was quieter now.

"Uh-huh…" His head was dropping, so he sat up straighter. "…uh…" He felt limp and unsteady. The hand on his back kept moving. His eyes closed on their own, which seemed to help. "…my mom puts the lights up, but it's …my job to untangle them…"

He opened the box from the attic. His favorite "…decorations…" were right under the mess of lights at the "…top of the box…" so he asked if he could put them up first. Dad said no, since it's easier to put the lights on a bare tree. So, he carefully set them aside, the "…Magikarp scales…" from up north.

As he worked on the knots in the string of lights, he seemed to lose his balance. It didn't keep him from the task at hand, though, since his head came to rest on somebody's shoulder.