"The world has turned and left me here
Just where I was Before you appeared
And in your place, an empty space
Has filled the void behind my face"
—"The World Has Turned and Left Me Here" from Weezer (Blue Album) by Weezer
This was the day.
"Their stuff'll have plenty of room, at least," Goon said. Max nodded along with the sentiment, too distracted to notice Goon's concerned frown. Just thinking about this confrontation had Max on edge. She didn't know what the worst case scenario even would be, but she already felt it confronting her.
"Max?" Goon asked.
"Ka?" Max half-shouted. For someone with supernatural awareness of her surroundings, she sure forgot she wasn't alone often. "Or, what?" Now that she'd looked up, she could see his frown.
"Nothing," Goon said. "You just looked out of it." He suddenly looked away from her, hiding his eyes. They didn't hide for long, though. He traced the perimeter of her house with increased concern. The notes, right. He must not have noticed them earlier because of his drastically different vantage point. She was so used to using them, she'd forgotten how odd it must look.
"Permanence," Max said. This time, it was Goon who jerked out of deep thought. Max scampered over to the North wall to find note one. She raised her paw to tap it, already starting to walk the perimeter.
"Dungeons are always shifting." As early as the second note, the ink had smudged almost beyond recognition. "Having a consistent anchor helps ground me." Her claw sunk into the fourth note and missed the fifth. Each note had a random number of pockmarks. "After waking up, it's weird that the world isn't constantly changing." The more she tried to focus on the numbers, the more her eyes drifted to the inconsistencies between every note.
One was a bit charred from her electricity.
"Sure, if that helps," Goon said. Another above her hay had an edge half-burned away, from when they urgently learned she needed to be the one against the wall. "It just looks really lonely."
"L-lonely?" Max stuttered. She was right on top of her hay. How many nightmares had she woken up from last night alone? "What makes me—why do you think I'm lonely?" She shivered in the warm house as a chill independent of temperature came. Dark and empty, the only person she could rely on gone. She huddled against the wall on instinct.
Goon's paw rested on her shoulder. She flinched at the touch before quickly relaxing into the bit of warmth it offered. "You there?" Goon asked. His paw left her too soon.
"Y-yeah," she said, choking back her whimper. "Yeah, sorry." She shook her head and looked back at the note on the wall. Countless marks and imperfections on the paper, and the ink itself was hardly uniform to begin with. She never had the neatest script, and it only got more inconsistent when she went from hands to paws. Add that she'd scribbled all of these in a rush, and they were basically ink blots showing her what she expected to see. "It's almost time. We should probably get going."
They'd all be gone, soon.
"You remain, turned away
Turning further every day"
"What do you mean 'it's better than falling'?" Goon asked.
"What do you think?" Max asked. She glanced up at him, tilting her head to the side with a smirk. "Usually, I'll just have to flop back and sit for a second." Still tired from the whole stupid ordeal, she'd had to lay down for a minute on the way to Cori's house.
"Usually?" Goon asked. He was starting to look a bit worried, now. "You have to sit for a second every time you get up?"
"Well, not every time," Max mumbled. Sparks bounced from her cheeks. It was a bit hard to keep her nerve with Goon staring at her like she'd lost her mind for such a prolonged amount of time. "Y'know, when you stand up to fast." She hoped that'd clear it up for him. It happened because her body was more suited to quadrupedal walking than bipedal (she thought, at least), so Goon should've been the same.
"Max," Goon said. He dropped down into a squat less than a foot away to stare down at her. Max stepped back when he tried to grab her shoulder for emphasis, but he didn't mention it. "What the hell are you talking about?" Max stared back at him. They were talking about getting up. This was established.
"Standing up?" Max said. If Goon was making a point about this, she didn't get it. Either he was making it poorly, or she was still too rattled from the impromptu Dungeon dive.
Goon narrowed his eyes at her in growing confusion and disbelief. He squeezed the bridge of his snout with his claws for a second while trying to think before looking down at her again. "Okay, Max," he said, shaking his head. "What happens when you stand up too fast?"
"Well, y'know," Max mumbled, wincing before Goon corrected her. Apparently, he didn't know. Maybe zangeese were just better suited to standing upright than pikachu. She had to give it some thought, so she sat back (just like Neb taught her to from all fours). She'd never thought she'd have to explain such a normal part of life to someone. Goon must've been really oblivious not to know about this.
"I just get dizzy, I guess?" Max said. It wasn't a great explanation. "Woozy?" She shrugged.
"Dizzy," Goon echoed. Max nodded to confirm, but he didn't look any more aware of what the hell she was talking about. "Like you just spun around?"
"No," Max said. This was a bit odd. How did he not get this? "I just can't see for a few seconds." She shrugged while Goon continued to stare at her. "Seeing stars, sometimes I fall." Her paw went to scratch at the back of her head.
"Max, you're describing fainting," Goon said.
Max slapped her paw to her face. Of course. How'd she not think of that earlier? "Yeah," she chuckled, rolling her eyes. "It's almost like that, sure, but I don't usually go unconscious."
"Usually?!" Goon asked. Max flinched back, so Goon took a forceful breath in to calm himself down. "Okay." He stood up, holding his shaking head in his paw. "And this happens all the time for you?" Max nodded. Maybe it was just a pikachu thing, then. "Okay." Goon shook his head again, staring at the ground. "You get so dizzy you can faint from standing up normally?"
"Well, it's worse when I'm tired," Max mumbled. "Or sick." Or low on blood, as she was recently. In fact, she wasn't sure if she'd gotten all that blood back yet.
"Max," Goon said. His voice was suddenly a lot softer. It sounded empathetic, even. "You need to go to the hospital if you're fainting for no reason." Max was a second away from objecting that standing was the reason, but luckily, she saw reason. He still chuckled, though. "Or, y'know, get a cane."
"C-can—wait, what?" Max asked. She glared up at him for a second before guiltily looking away. She could still remember that stupid crutch Codi and Ithos used to make her use. She wasn't going anywhere near that. "You mean—pikachu can't use canes, can we?"
Goon closed his eyes and brought his claws to the bridge of his nose. His paw concealed half a smirk. "Yeah," he said, shaking his head. "I'll never get how you think." He gave a light chuckle; Max bit her cheek. Eleos used to say the same thing. At least she didn't need to worry about embarrassment sparking off her cheeks. "Uh, Max?" Goon shocked her out of herself. "Are you o-"
"Here," Max blurted. She steadied herself with a breath and looked away from Goon, one paw clutching her scarf. She needed to put it out of her mind. For now, just for now, she had more important matters to attend. "I'm fine. Just thought I remembered something."
Another breath pulled her sorrow in, only for it to grow on the exhale. The tightness in her throat, emptiness in the air around her all grew in a wave. While the emotion grew more intense, though, it felt satisfying to fill. It clicked right in place, right where it belonged—right where she belonged—and pulled itself back in to grow on the way out again. A sob shook in her throat while a smile started to spread her lips.
"Max?" Goon asked, tapping at the back of her head.
Max shook halfway out of her trance, mumbling, "Huh?" When she heard herself, she broke the rest of the way free. She ripped her paw from her scarf to see th in remains of those tendrils evaporating into dull purple smoke again. They must have dug into her scarf with her paw, holes mending themselves where she held it. "What the hell is this?" she whimpered.
"Oh great, you're confused, too," Goon grumbled. Her awareness shot over to him, instantly letting her feel exactly how he stood. He'd drawn his left hindpaw back, muscles of that leg tensed and ready while a light pulse accompanied the claws on that same side. He was ready to attack.
"G-Goon?" Max stammered as she stumbled back. He towered over her, several times her height, but she didn't feel afraid. She felt helpless.
"Whoah, all right," Goon said. He tossed his forepaws into the air and let his legs return to a neutral position. "Sorry. You spooked me a bit." He'd relaxed, but Max still cowered under him. It took her a few seconds to recover, start dragging herself back out of that head-space, not hearing him ask, "You still do that smile thing?" As the feelings of helplessness and sorrow left her, she felt empty and drained, just like in the Dungeon.
"Hey, c'mon," Goon whispered. He'd bent down to shake her shoulder without her notice. Dazed eyes looked up at him, zoning in and out as they struggled to focus. "You're all right." Despite the claim, he seemed hardly convinced, his comforting smile too thin to hide concern.
Max groaned as she tried to shake the daze out of her head. "What happened?" she asked, as if Goon had any better chance at understanding. Pulling a paw away, she tried to catch another glimpse of those tendrils. They'd all evaporated.
"I'd hoped you could tell me," Goon mumbled. He offered her a paw to help her up (wait, when had she fallen?), but she shook her head. The offered paw dropped to his knee, his other staying at her shoulder to lightly knead it. "Your voice." Max flinched. He'd already made the connection. "It sounded like-"
"Eleos, I-"
"Dark…," Goon went on, shock setting in as he spoke, "Matter." His expression quickly flattened out of its confusion. He took in a sharp breath as he dropped down from his kneel to sitting. Only then did Max realize how odd it must've looked to sit in the middle of a dirt path of a neighborhood. It was a passing thought, though, a distraction.
"You…," Goon trailed off, eyes distant. "Impossible." His eyes never widened, staying precisely half-narrowed. "I can't believe it." The closest to bafflement he expressed visually came in a few blinks. As his gaze shifted to Max, it quickly shifted to the sky as he shook his head.
"L-look," Max rushed out. It's not like either of them even knew where Eleos was, but she still felt a need to defend it. "I know that it loo-"
"Dating it?" Goon blanched, finally looking down at her again, his brow thoroughly furrowed with a smirk below. "Max, come on. I knew you'd fuck anything, but really?" He brought his paw up to obscure his chuckles. "Oh, spit off a salazzle, you—," laughter started breaking him down to useless giggles, forcing him to fight tooth and claw to say, "a charmander, too!" He fell back, paws holding his shaking belly.
Max stared at him, mouth agape, in utter confusion. She could've been insulted, probably should've been. Instead, his reaction had her baffled. The devil supposedly destined to destroy Earth lived, and that didn't bother Goon at all. No, he only cared that she had— was dating it.
The last wave of laughter rolled out of Goon, and he pulled himself back up to sitting. "What, not gonna kill me?" he asked, though he seemed to understand when he saw her expression. "Not the reaction you expected?"
Max blinked a few times. The question took a second to process. "No," she muttered. "Not really." It took some concerted effort, but she managed to catch up. Eventually. Honestly, if Goon could so easily accept that it was alive, it seemed odd that he didn't believe it capable of romance. "I kind of expected more surprise that," she glanced around and saw no prying ears or eyes, "Eleos was, y'know."
"I'm really just surprised you were the one that let it live," Goon said, reclining back to lean on his arms. "Although, I guess you made it pretty obvious in hindsight." Max tilted her head, and he already looked primed to explain. "Ithos always regretted killing it."
"He what?" Max asked.
"Yeah, I mean, you know Ithos, or," Goon said but suddenly tensed a bit and looked away. "Right, sorry. Do you remember his personality at all?"
Max struggled to think up a good answer for a moment, though her tail started flicking in frustration. She thought Ithos had agreed to visit Goon and tell him everything. Evidently, that hadn't happened. She could always force the issue by telling him—though now wasn't the time. "Pretty well," she said, quickly adding, "surprisingly." Especially considering where most of her memories of Ithos came from.
Goon nodded, taking her intense thought to be careful remembrance. "Well, not that surprising," he mumbled before going on. "He brought it up a few times. You were always kinda cruel about it when he did, though." Goon shrugged while Max winced. "I guess you were just so eager to say it was dead to cover your own ass, though. That right?"
Max shrugged while trying to rub the exhaustion out of her paws. "It makes sense, but I don't know," she said. "Don't remember any of those conversations."
Goon grimaced with a nod. He still often seemed surprised at what she couldn't remember. After the nod, though, his eyes remained on her. He was looking past her. Max shrank a little, afraid it was the same horror he'd felt before, but she saw innocent curiosity when she stole a glance his way. He seemed to realize what he was doing, because he lightly stretched and stopped staring.
"Here, let's go," he said, starting to push himself up. Max followed his example before he could offer to help. Thanks to the exhaustion in her forepaws, she opted to stay upright. As they started off, Goon said, "Y'know, it's kinda funny."
Max glared up at him, ready for some other rib or tease. He rolled his eyes and brought his forepaws up behind his head. "You were willing to give Eleos a second chance after everything it did," he said, giving her a subtle wink at Eleos' name. "Why did you think we wouldn't do the same for you?"
"Please," Max said, rolling her eyes. "You know I was well past my second chance. What was I on, my tenth?" Some chill wriggled in the back of her throat, an echo of that helplessness she felt, but it quickly left. She looked down at her paw to make sure the tendrils hadn't returned. If only the one person who might know what was going on hadn't abandoned her.
A squeak of a yell ripped out of her throat when Goon snatched her up by the nape to cradle in his arms. "Well, I'm glad you came back," he said. Before she had a chance to resist, he had his claws under her chin. She tried to clench her teeth and resist, but the simple scratches relaxed her face into a smile bit by bit until he started milking more embarrassing squeaks out. "You need to relax, though. We're almost there."
Max nodded along as best she could, though it better served the purpose of presenting new spots under her chin to scratch. The misunderstanding didn't bother her much. She hated this treatment with a passion before and after it happened, but during, she was too blissed out to mind.
Too soon, Goon tugged her out of his hold and set her back on the ground. It made Max mewl in protest which near instantly snapped her out of it. "Goon!" she barked under her breath. "Seriously, stop that!"
"That's really not cool, Goon," Cori said. Max's ear flicked to acknowledge their presence, but Goon took most of her attention. At least they'd made it the rest of the way. The rest on the way helped, too, but she still kept her glare on him until he averted his gaze.
"All right, sorry," Goon said, scratching at the back of his neck. Max relaxed a bit, letting her glare drop, and Cori came to hug her side as she did. They had her right arm on lock down, so she reciprocated with her left as best she could. She clapped at their shoulder to squeeze them back, then they released her.
"You all right?" Cori whispered. She was still a bit frustrated, but she nodded. They had more important worries, anyway. With another pat to her back, Cori seemed to get that. "Well, should we get started, then?" Wordlessly, they shared glances and nods. Max had drilled the plan into everyone enough that they didn't need another refresher (and it helped that it was a simple plan).
Cori led the way into their house, a pretty humble dwelling. It was just them, their brother, and their father, so it didn't need to be huge, though every space had to accommodate a seven and a half foot feraligatr. Even Goon barely came halfway up the door. Max might as well have been, well.
A mouse.
They went through the living room, into a kitchen, and into a comparatively cramped hallway behind. Max couldn't help keeping constant watch all around them. Her ears stood on end while her tail tried to flick excess energy away. It accumulated static instead. Some part of their surroundings didn't sit right with her. Even though she didn't have a point of reference, the place somehow felt off.
Cori led them into an already open door on the right, but she paused before following. Cori's door was open, but a door opposite it remained closed. It was innocuous, most people closed the door when they left the room. Yet, it worked as another part of the place that had her fur standing on end.
She shook herself out of it and darted into the room—water was on the right. She leapt away from it with a yelp, even though it was a gradual shore. The scare earned her credulous looks from Cori and Goon who might've laughed if they didn't already have boxes in their arms. "Sorry," she said. She wondered if the unease had come from the water, but that didn't feel right. "Just on edge."
Cori and Goon accepted the apology by basically ignoring it to carry out the boxes they already had. Max snatched up the nearest box and followed. Passing the door again made her rush right up to them, even brushing Goon's tail with her box.
The size of the halls and doorways gave them plenty of room. The only concern, then, was actually carrying them out. Max had to worry about that fatigue in her paws, but they seemed to have recovered already. That could've just been the box, though, since it didn't feel like it weighed all too much.
They regrouped outside to drop their boxes next to each other before heading back in. As they turned, though, Cori raised a brow at the one Max carried. "Oh," they said. "Do you need a break?"
Max, already halfway through the door, turned to ask, "What?" Cori nodded to the box. "No, I'm all right."
"You sure?" Cori asked. They glanced at the box again, reexamining it to be sure. "That box is pretty heavy. It's all right if you're tired."
"She's stronger than she looks," Goon said. When he glanced to her confused expression, he added, "Or knows, probably." Max tried to ask for clarification, but he waved them on before she could. Sure, her vision spotted a bit after she put it down, but that was normal. "C'mon, let's get this done."
Cori followed his lead, and Max reluctantly did the same. Admittedly, she didn't mind the diversion since it let her avoid that uneasy feeling she got in the house. It even felt worse this time, though it could've been that she expected it this time. That was the easy explanation, at least. Once they made it into the kitchen this time, though, she got the real answer.
The door opposite Cori's sat open with a croconaw leaning on its frame. Max froze, right paw shooting out to stop Cori. They looked confused for an instant until their brother registered. "I thought you said the house would be empty," Max said.
"I was sleeping," their brother answered for them. He stood up with his arms crossed, revealing he was a bit shorter than Goon. "They must've missed it, locked up in their room like always." Cori flinched away, their snout dropping. Max grit her teeth. "Who the hell are you?"
"Their friends," Max said, barely keeping from growling. "They're leaving. We're helping." Their brother jerked his head back and looked to Cori for confirmation. Cori was too busy examining the floorboards to notice. Max pat them on the back, just to remind them she was there. It was small, but effective. They managed to pull their eyes off the ground and look at their brother.
"I'm moving, Jax," Cori said.
"Really?" Jax asked. Max kept her arm on them, but Cori still shrank away from their brother. "Without telling us? Without any warning?" His voice started to rise, and he took a step forward. Goon matched it to stay between him and Cori, getting a sneer from Jax. "What, you brought some muscle to protect you?"
"I'm just here to help carry stuff," Goon said, but he didn't stand down. "Whether or not I do more is up to you." Jax' sneer deepened while Goon's expression remained unchanged.
"That a threat?" Jax asked. "Get out, or I'll have you arrested for trespassing."
"Hard to trespass when you were invited in," Max said.
"You think that dumbass has the right to invite you in?" Jax shouted; Max started preparing a charge in her cheeks. "This house isn't in their name! It's in mine! Now get!" He took another step forward to point out the open door behind them. "Out!"
"Don't insult them again," Max said with an opportune arc of electricity crackling out of her cheek for emphasis. She wanted to use the electricity for more than emphasis already—she knew she could knock this croc of shit out with one shock—but her little argument with Cori in Makuhita's Dojo held her back. As much as she hated it, she needed to stay civil.
For now.
"Or what?" Jax asked. He narrowed his eyes to slits staring down at her. "Gonna become my lunch?"
"Not a great idea," Max said through a snarl. "Trying hasn't gone well for anyone yet." She wanted to add that her own personal vendettas had never come into play for previous would be predators, but she bit her tongue. Civil. She'd keep it civil.
"I'm not gonna stand here and let you threaten me in my own house," Jax said, voice starting to rise again. "Now g-"
"Dude, really?" Max interrupted. She wanted to make fun of him for whining about a threat after he just said he'd eat her, but he'd already started saying something else (and that probably wouldn't have helped, anyway). "Is this really how you want this to go?"
Whatever Jax was about to yell got caught in his throat at that question. "What?" he growled.
"Look," Max said through grit teeth. She just wanted to choose violence. If only she didn't have self-control. "What's your goal? What do you want from this?" She looked up and watched his anger give way to uncertainty. "They're moving. You're not stopping that from happening. Do you really want this to be your last conversation with them?" Her voice trembled at the last part while she tried not to think of her own experience with goodbyes.
Jax didn't move at first. No one did, aside from Goon giving her a quick side-eye, but that didn't detract from the feeling of being frozen in time. It had to be mere seconds, but she felt every single one tick by her. She had precious milliseconds to reconsider what she'd said, even though it was too late to take it back.
Finally, the slightest bit of movement came from Jax's bottom jaw quaking in increasing anger. Evidently, she didn't say the right things. She didn't know what to expect, but she prepared for retaliation. After everything, she hated that her prediction was validating before her eyes. She'd wanted to believe in the best like Cori. Now, she worried they'd lose a bit of that optimism.
"Fine," Jax spat. Max blinked. "Make it quick." With his final message delivered, he went back into his room, door slamming behind him. It was so the opposite of what she'd expected that it took Max a moment to realize what happened.
She'd deescalated the situation.
Almost twice her height, Cori didn't hesitate to throw themself onto her in a suffocating hug. "Thank you," they whispered. It was clearly an attempt at a scream, but they were hugging her too hard for that. She started gasping for air, and they hopped off her. "How did you do that? I've never seen anyone talk him down."
"Luck, I guess?" Max said. She looked sheepishly down as she tried to think it through, though, and came up with a better answer (just not one she liked). "And, well, I guess I'm used to dealing with people when they're mad at me." It was a simple answer, one that she should've been used to. Somehow, though, it left a knife deep in her chest that every breath probed. Was her throat getting tighter?
"Try to get less used to that, all right?" Goon said with a chuckle; Max felt an unnatural throb in her heart. Before she could reply, he waved them forward. "C'mon. Let's get this done." He started heading for Cori's room again. Max started to do the same when a scaled paw tugged her back.
"Max?" Cori asked. They looked her over carefully, yet without a clear goal. Max kept careful watch on her breath without knowing why. She started to look back in her own investigation. Something seemed wrong in the way they looked at her, but she couldn't figure out what. It just looked wrong. They couldn't seem to find what they were looking for, but they weren't satisfied with that. "Are you all right?"
Another aberration. Max shivered just a bit, probably not even enough to notice. Her own words rang in her head with a new chorus on top. She only managed to whimper out a whisper, "W-what?" but it was just enough to snap her out of herself again.
Max yanked her paw away to see no tendrils, but the smoke of their remains. Whatever feeling was building within, she shoved it deeper and felt an almost physical absence. A lightness joined her soul that made it heavier. The exhaustion of an empty stomach, phantom sensation of a limb lost wriggled in the back of her throat, but she pushed it down. It didn't matter. Cori needed her.
"Excuse me," she said, forcibly clearing her throat. "Sorry." She coughed into her elbow and looked up with a smile. "Congestion or something. Just zoned out, that's all."
Cori stared at her with narrowed eyes. Remarkably similar to how Goon usually looked at her. Was it because they'd been spending so much time together, or did she just have that effect on people? Whichever it was, Cori suddenly snapped out of it, shaking their head. They looked around as if surprised to find themself there, but seemed to recalibrate after a second.
"You two having fun?" Goon asked right as Cori opened their mouth to speak. He walked barely around them, brushing Max with the side of his leg. "Don't mind me. Just carrying everything."
"Sorry!" Cori said as they rushed into their own room.
"Hey, no," Max called after them. After a quick glare at Goon, she hurried to follow behind. "Don't apologize to him. He doesn't deserve it." As she turned the corner, she made sure to give the water on the right a wide berth just in case. Rather than argue the point, Cori tossed her a box. She yelped and leapt away rather than catch it, and it hit the ground with a thick thud.
"What the hell?" Max snapped at them.
"What?" Cori asked, peeking around the box. Hiding it didn't help them, though. Max could sense their hidden smile even without her awareness. "It's just bedding."
Max rolled her eyes—wait. "Bedding?" she asked. If there was a bed in the room, she hadn't seen it. She looked around to find a bed for the bedding, but came up empty. "Where?" The answer to her own question came when she looked across the water.
The gradual shore dropped, then rose to a little alcove with some grate in the ground, then a bed. Their bed. Cori had a bed.
"Why do I sleep on hay?" Max grumbled, hoisting the box up. She started to head out with the box in her arms, and Cori did the same close behind.
"I just figured you preferred it," Cori said. "Lots of pokémon do!" So, they had a perfect excuse to never suggest something better for her. How convenient. "I thought it was a mammal thing." Too convenient for Max to really believe them. She wasn't just bitter because she'd been sleeping on hay for so long to blend in with the locals for absolutely no reason because locals absolutely slept in beds.
"Sure," Max said. It was better to be the bigger person. She could hold Cori accountable for the crime she imagined they committed some other time. After all, they had a lot more to move. She didn't really know how much more, but she knew it was a lot. "How much more is there?" She made it through the front door and plopped her box down.
"Not much," Cori said, plopping their box down right behind. "Just two more boxes and…." They paused, ostensibly to think, but it was a bit theatric. The way they tapped their chin, it seemed a bit too dramatic. "Oh, right. My bed."
Definitely on purpose.
"The one on the island?" Goon asked. Max froze. Across the water. "Well, that's three things. One for each of us." Max tried to stay calm and keep her paws from clenching so tight they cramped, and Goon chuckled when he noticed. "Don't worry. You'll take one of the boxes."
Max let out the held breath and said, "Thank you." It should've probably been a given to everyone involved she didn't have to ford the tiny pool. She hadn't really thought it through before the fear hit her, though. Even now, though, with the reassurance, she felt a light chill. It started at the back of her neck and slithered down her spine until a paw intercepted the sensation.
"Don't worry, all right?" Cori whispered. They tugged her into half a hug that helped the rest of the shiver evaporate. Her breath stabilized before she noticed it had quickened. "Besides, it's only about a third of a meter deep in the middle."
Max neglected to share the objection in her throat (that she was barely taller than that) and tried to force a smile. "Thanks," she said. She took in a deep breath and shook herself out of her worry. Unfortunately, that pulled her out of the hug, too. That couldn't hold her back, though. She'd been far too emotional this whole time. Cori needed the attention that she was stealing with every little thing.
"And sorry," she said, still trying to shake herself out of it. It wasn't really working, but she was trying, and that's what mattered. "I don't know what's up with me."
Cori eyed her curiously for a moment, shared a glance with Goon, then looked back at her. "Max," they said, ever so gently. It took them a moment to finish the thought, trying to find the right words. "Didn't… didn't you almost die earlier today?" Max barely kept from slapping her paw to her face.
"It wasn't that bad," Goon said, scratching nervously at the back of his neck. Was he embarrassed? If he was, it didn't last before a bit of assurance came to straighten up his posture. "Still, that probably rattled you."
"Right, obviously," Max half chuckled. It was right there the whole time, but she'd never considered it. The whole ordeal barely registered as an event. It fit so comfortably in the past that she'd forgotten exactly how recently that past had been. Her memory of it was pretty hazy.
She'd blacked out, after all.
"You're right, thanks," she said, keeping her eyes on the grass. She took a deep breath to let it out slow as she looked up with a nervous smile. "I should probably take it easy." The boxes surrounding them gnawed at the edge of her vision. "Well, later." She turned to scratch at the back of her neck. "We still need to get that stuff out of there." The three nodded and started their last trip inside.
"Max?" Cori asked, walking up beside her.
"'Sup?" Max replied. She bit her cheek to keep her smile while Cori looked her up and down.
"What's wrong?" Cori asked.
Her teeth dug a bit more into her cheek. It didn't stop her smile faltering, though. She looked away to hide the fact, tail flicking behind her in frustration. Of all the times for someone to ask her to open up, she wished more people would wait for a better opportunity.
"Can we talk about this later?" she grumbled, nodding into the house. "We're kind of in the middle of something."
"R-right, sorry," Cori mumbled. They pulled their paw back from her and went inside with their head down.
Max took a breath to conceal a grumble as she caught up, saying, "Wait." When she came up beside them, they didn't look at her. She managed to put on a thin smile anyway. "Look, I appreciate you caring. Now's just not a good time, all right?"
"Sorry," Cori mumbled. They still didn't look at her, so it didn't matter that her smile faltered.
Max let them take a bit of a lead in front of her. Considering the situation, they were probably unbelievably stressed. It wasn't finished yet, either. They still had their father to tell. It looked like their stuff would be nice and portable by the time he got there just like Max planned. That way, whether or not he approved didn't matter. It's a lot harder to talk someone out of what they already did.
Turning into the doorway, Max smacked into a wall of sopping wet fur that quickly barked, "Watch it!" She stumbled away and saw it was Goon holding something over his head. "Can you move? This thing's kinda heavy."
"Sorry," Max mumbled, stepping aside. While he passed, she tried to shake off the bit of water that had squelched onto her. It didn't get a lot off, but not a lot transferred in the first place, either. Still, it left her too damp for her liking. Outside was chilly—hopefully Goon would be all right.
The coast clear, she stepped into the room for the last time. Cori stood in the middle of it, taking it in. They looked around a bit, but it wasn't to see. There was new air in the empty room, air that hadn't been there since they moved. The space they'd filled with what mattered to them reverted to its previous state. Hollows speckled the room, holes freshly unfilled. Few of their belongings even left marks on the walls or the floors.
If places have souls, moments like these are where they shine through. Rooms are built empty, always to be filled. An empty room is an open wound. It is inevitably filled with something else, be it new flesh or infection. Moments like these, though, memories of what once was there flush away empty air.
Max stepped over as loudly as she could manage without killing the moment. A few thuds on her way made sure she didn't scare Cori when she put an arm across their back. They still startled a bit, but they didn't jump.
She didn't look at them when they looked at her. She scanned the room like they had, paying her respects to the wound she'd tugged at with her scalpel. It didn't take long for Cori to follow her following their lead, looking around their own empty room with her. As they did, she rubbed at their opposite shoulder. She tried to leave the moment there, but the silence grew too much, and she asked, "How you holding up?"
Cori narrowed their eyes at her. "Didn't I just ask you that?" they asked. Their attention quickly went back to the empty room, though.
"Your moment, not mine," Max explained, saying nothing. "We're supposed to be here for you. If you're here for me, the whole thing breaks down." The last two boxes sat opposed to each other on the far left corner of the room, and a keyboard stuck out of the one on the left. "Oh, you play?"
"Sometimes," Cori said. Nothing she said had any real comforting parts intrinsic to what she said, but it didn't need to. They weren't alone. As long as she reminded them of that, she was doing her job. "I'm not really any good, though."
"Sure you are," Max said.
Cori pulled away, rolling their eyes. "You've never even heard me play," they said.
"No, I haven't," Max conceded. She freed them from her arm, but stayed right next to them. "But I've seen you do things you say you're no good at." She looked at them with a smile that they nervously looked away from. "Of all my students, you're learning to fight the fastest."
"I'm your only student," Cori grumbled with heavy disdain. Very heavy. Forced. A gleam of victory seeded in Max's eyes. She started to grin. Right at the corners of their mouth, she could feel the war there. "It doesn't count." With every single word, they had to put all their effort into keeping the ends of their lips down.
"Cori, don't move," Max said. She urgently moved in front of them while keeping intense eye contact. "I saw something." Grabbing their snout in both paws, she pulled it down and to the side to examine its length. "Oh my God." She took a sharp breath in. One paw went to her mouth, the other to her heart as she took a few dramatic steps back. "I saw it."
"What?" Cori asked. Their paws went to feel their face and found exactly what they always did. "Saw what?"
Max dropped her act when a grin broke through it. "That smile you're hiding."
Cori froze in place. Their mouth hung half open in disbelief and anger. The anger didn't last long, though. That fight Max noticed seconds ago at the corners of their lips now had her tipping the scales. They tried to grit their teeth to keep it away, but once the laugh broke out, it was over. "I hate you," they laughed.
"Love you, too," Max said. "Whelp. Let's get this going." She pulled her paws behind her head to stretch as she turned and went over to the remaining boxes. The keyboard's box had her interest, so she grabbed it and left the other for Cori. It was a bit unwieldy thanks to being unbalanced, but it wasn't too heavy for her. She'd figured boxes bigger than her would give her more trouble, but pokémon were weird like that.
Goon greeted them outside in the grass, sat leaning against a stack of two boxes, his chin resting on a paw. His fur still glistened and matted from his little dip. The bed itself sat behind the boxes to hold them in place. At least the water didn't seem to make him too cold.
"That's the easy part over with," Max grunted as she dropped the box in front of her. Goon had mentioned something about muscle atrophy working differently. She hadn't paid attention to it, but as she flopped to the grass to catch her breath, she was glad it did. Whatever her past self had done, she appreciated… him?
She still wasn't sure how to refer to that little shit.
Regardless, Max didn't have time to waste on figuring that out now. "All right, Cori," she called, hopping up from her seat. The little jostles didn't pull her scarf out of place, but she adjusted it anyway. "Last chance to bounce before he's back." Their brother might have not been too bad, but that didn't guarantee anything about their father. It had to be Cori's decision, though.
Cori didn't answer her. She gave them time to think it over, but this was a bit different. She looked up and saw them staring off down the road. Their paws quaked, and she already knew who had their attention. "Or not," she mumbled under her breath.
Max didn't let herself watch the feraligatr approach. She'd held strong against her instincts for a croconaw, but she didn't want to take her chances with this one. Particularly considering she could hear its paws hitting the ground. No, not it. She fought her mind already trying to categorize him as a predator here to fulfill his son's empty threat.
Goon was already behind Cori. Max stood barely in front of them and to the side, not blocking their father but ready to. As he walked up, he didn't look once at either Goon or Max. It was almost comforting to the instincts jabbering in the back of her skull to be ignored by the owner of such sharp, vicious teeth.
He stopped less than a yard away, finally glancing at Max when she braced herself on instinct, but only for an instant. While he stood there, Cori's paws steadied. Max looked and their fear hadn't left their eyes, but they seemed more stable, certain. They were well experienced with him staring down at them like this. They looked more ready than Max for him to start.
It turns out, in more ways than one, they were. Their father started speaking, and she barely understood a few words. In an instant, she recognized the Spanish, but that barely helped her, and only worsened her confusion.
Externally, she kept herself stalwart and strong for Cori, so they could lean on her. Internally, she was completely befuddled. It wasn't that the world had multiple languages, not entirely at least (though how she'd missed that up to this point was embarrassing), but she could recognize them. She had a frame of reference for languages spoken millennia after her old life.
She'd always assumed understanding them came from the same thing that changed her species. She thought of it as English while assuming that it only sounded like that to her. As a matter of fact, though, it was English. Did they call it that? No England, no Spain, but they had English and Spanish (well, it sounded too familiar to be Castilian, but that was a bit pedant—could she really distinguish between dialects?).
Max finally pulled herself back out of her head. It was mostly a formality, though, since she still couldn't understand either of them. She did manage to hear Cori's tone, at least. They sounded… fine. Calm. As close as she was to them, she could feel their frantic heart, yet their expression was stone.
They were doing great; Max prepared for the worst.
This was the moment she'd feared. If it was going to go South, it was going to go South here. Along with their quaking heart, she could feel their father's seething rage. That info became redundant when he spoke, though.
He wasn't taking this well. Each sentence grew louder than the last, more aggressive. No matter how evenly Cori replied, they got the same ferocity in return. Their own inputs dwindled as their father started dominating the conversation, turning it from a discussion to a lecture. Max didn't need to know the language to recognize accusations when she heard them.
The rebukes grew short, snappy, and final. Whatever he was saying, he didn't have much more left. Conversation was ending, evolving into the next step. The worst case scenario. Max braced herself a second too late and their father lunged down for Cori and yanked them up.
He hugged them. Seething with enough anger that Max could hear his teeth grinding, he hugged his child to finish things off. She didn't have long to switch to a more relaxed posture, either, when he knelt to put them back down and turn to her.
Max tensed; he looked directly at her, as if sizing her up. She kept herself tall while he stared down at her like easy prey. Cori held their ground, and so could she. Whatever came, she'd see it through to the end. She promised to be there for Cori, and she'd fulfill that promise if it killed her. Their father extended a paw and left it there. It took her a beat too long to realize he was offering to shake.
Max held hers up, and he took it. His paw wrapped so completely around hers that it left no evidence of any limbs on the end of her wrist. He gripped it exactly firm enough to avoid hurting her and started talking. She didn't understand a word, but she kept her composure, played along. It was exactly as aggressive as he'd sounded with Cori.
Her message ended much faster, though. He shook her paw one last time, she nodded to agree to whatever, and he let go. After one last look down at Cori, he got up and went inside.
Cori breathed a sigh of relief. That was nice, at least, though Max was still reeling. It. It was over. It was over, and everything was fine. Nothing especially bad happened. The whole move hadn't gone exactly smooth, but compared to what she'd expected, it had.
Max put a paw to their shoulder for her benefit as much as it was for theirs. "So," she started to ask, "how'd things go? Are you all right?" Goon glanced down with a nod and moved to start loading the boxes into the cart.
"Yeah, I'm okay," Cori said. They took a deep breath, then looked up at her with a sheepish smile. "He was just mad there wasn't any warning."
"I talked for hours to your wallet photograph
And you just listened
You laughed, enchanted by my intellect
Or maybe you didn't"
"Nothing wrong?" Max shouted back. Since only Cori knew what their dad said, they started debriefing them about halfway to Max's house. "Really? He said he never treated you wrong?" Max wasn't on the same page as their dad. "No, no! Of course not. It's not like he's ever listened to you before. Why start now?"
Even though they were practically to her yard, she stopped for a breath. Yelling while tugging half the cart's weight wasn't exactly helpful for her stamina, and it was already pretty tiring. With Goon on the other side, she had to hold her paws up way over her head to do anything substantial. It gave them plenty time for conversation, though, and enforcing a slow pace probably ensured the safety of their things.
"I wish I'd stood up to him more," Cori mumbled. They'd held strong while he yelled at them, but every minute since had sucked the life out of their eyes. The facade had broken and left them lugging around a shell.
Max gave Goon no more than a glance of warning before dropping her half and heading over to Cori. She already had her arms around them when they noticed her. "You're okay," she said. "You're safe." They didn't move in her arms. To reciprocate the embrace, they went limp and started to quite literally lean on her. She didn't question it or complain, just repositioning her hindpaws for better leverage.
While she adjusted, Goon hurried with the cart, taking it the rest of the way. He'd had far, far more emotional conversations than his usual quota today. For him, a bit of manual labor instead was a blessing.
"Cori?" Max grunted. She tried to push them up a bit, get them to look at her, but they were too slack. The cold had started to come in as the sun dropped in the sky. If she was starting to feel it, they definitely were. "Hey, let's get inside, all right?" Cori whimpered a bit. They needed a bit more time. "Okay, fair." She wasn't going to keep holding their weight, though, in need of a bit of rest herself.
"Hold tight," Max said. They gave a half whimper that turned into a yelp when she whipped them around to her side and fell to the ground ass first. Both of her arms still around them, she rested her head against their chest and looked ahead. The jolt got Cori to wrap their arms around her, holding tight with all their might.
"C-Cori," she wheezed. Instead of a break from holding their weight, she'd only lessened the load a bit while losing access to her lungs. They at least lightened their grip a bit when she wheezed. It was still tight, but she didn't mind. Her arms around them and theirs around her while they both looked ahead to the reddening sky felt so, so right.
She hadn't learned the true extent she'd needed touch like this until she'd left Neb and Mandy. It had barely been a few days, but it felt like a lifetime. The long, sleepless nights didn't help. Every moment had her restless. Here, though, she finally felt some peace. It was the first moment of true security she'd felt since Eleos left.
The world around them, so still and tranquil, didn't stop its movement for the moment. It continued turning, the sky kept reddening, and the sky above grew more and more gorgeous. The horizon hidden behind the trees blazed with yellow light of the shrouded sun, a subtle contour too bright to look at giving away its location. Above and around, the yellow crisped and caramelized into a burnt orange as the sky darkened the further it went from the sun.
Long after the sky faded to blue, a blazing red reflected off the bottoms of clouds without casting shadows above them. Large, billowing clouds grew the dark gray of ash as they grew taller. Thin wisps coated the rest of the sky in delicate strokes, ever shifting with the wind of the atmosphere. All the world sat below in a lively glow that waned with the sun.
The beautiful sight grew darker and darker. Sunsets were fast, but not this fast. It faded into darkness as the ache of exhaustion groaned in Max's muscles. Sleep felt too perfect for her to even consciously make the decision. A smile crept across her face as she gave one final, unwitting squeeze to Cori.
It wasn't meant to be, though. Her squeeze jolted Cori just enough that they jerked up and postponed her snooze. Had that been it, sleep likely still would've prevailed, but it wasn't, and they broke their silence.
"I'm a coward," Cori muttered. Max shook her head and squeezed them, not giving her lost rest another thought. She couldn't quite manage a verbal rebuttal yet, so the ball remained in Cori's court. "The second my brother insulted me, you shut him down. He's never listened to me like that at all."
"That's because he's a dick," Max said, only barely awake enough to talk. How truly drowsy she was became even more obvious with her next words. "I know how to handle those." Luckily for her, Cori was too emotional to acknowledge it, and she was too tired to notice. She shook her head to fend off the grogginess. Rubbing it out of her eyes required letting go of Cori, so it wasn't an option.
"You stood up to my dad for me, too," Cori said. Max tilted her head a bit to give them a questioning look. She hadn't really said anything to their dad. "You're smaller than me, but that didn't matter when he was there. I don't think I could've held together if you and Goon weren't there with me."
"That's all right," Max said, squeezing them tighter. "That's why we were there. You didn't have to face them alone." She nuzzled her cheek into their chest, loads of stray sparks bouncing out and into them without her notice. The micro-shocks made Cori jerk and seize a little, though Max misread why. She'd just shivered against the cold, herself, so that must've been their problem.
"Right, you're probably cold," she said. Her paw went to her left and grabbed the air where her bag would be. She didn't even have anything that would help, though. Before Cori could clear up the confusion, she started unraveling her scarf from her neck to sling it around theirs.
"B-wait, Max?" Cori sputtered. They tried to resist, but their paws didn't go up in time. "Don't you need that?"
"As long as you don't let me go, I'll be okay," Max said with a smirk. Just as planned, Cori tossed their arms back around her. With the scarf nice and secure, she leaned back into their hold (while keeping one end of the scarf in her paw). The beautiful sight had faded by then, but she didn't mind. Once again, she felt perfectly safe.
This peaceful moment didn't last as long, though. A restless worry wiggled in Cori's grasp. "Still," they mumbled. Their left paw pet and scratched at Max's back while they tried to put their words together. "I just wish I could be more like you two."
"Nah," Max mumbled. Those scratches and scritches had her barely hanging on the edge of consciousness. She shook her head both to dismiss what they said and to pull herself back to consciousness. She needed to follow up that rebuttal pretty quick, because Cori was glaring at her (for good reason). Even half-awake, the answer came quick.
"I need you. Without you, I'm…." Words started failing her as Cori's ministrations joined forces with drowsiness. She had to finish, though. This day—she needed to be there for Cori. Cori needed her comfort. That's why she was there!
Of course, had she been less drowsy, she might've noticed the growing smile on Cori's lips. Perhaps they knew what they were doing and getting exactly what they needed, but Max wouldn't know. Not tonight, at least. "The one… piiii chaa-ch-the, it's… you're who…. chaaaaaaaa." She trailed off into incoherent mumbles, but Cori got the message.
Begin Part Three:
Indigo Meadow