Interceptor's Wish

by Masterdude21

What started as a young man's search for his abducted mother spirals out of control. Soon, he is fighting a desperate war for survival against greater odds than a more generous God would have allowed. The enemy is everywhere and allies are far too few. With the entire region at stake, who can prevail when fate itself seems set against you? - Novelization of Pokemon Rejuvenation.

41. Librarian and Custodian

AN: today we are delving into the first two of the side quests that I really wanted to write. Apart from the story relevance, both are chances for me to add to the world building, flesh out some characters and provide an insight into the mental state of our heroes in general, and Will in particular.

I hope you enjoy!

~~~~~~~(0)~~~~~~~

Chapter 10– Stopped In Our Tracks

Librarian and Custodian

~~~~~~~(I)~~~~~~~

---

Xen Initiative Headquarters

"The Lounge"

Nastasia finally finished her preliminary checkups and took a few steps backwards to appreciate her handiwork. "So, how are you adjusting?" She asked.

"It's…a little weird?" Ren said hesitantly. "It feels like my head is lagging, but…"

"You'll get used to it," Nastasia replied with a shrug. "Probably." She looked the boy over again. She could barely see a difference. As always, the quality of her work stood head and shoulders above that of the rest.

What little was still left of the rest, that was.

To think that one young man could have laid waste to half of their top leadership. Utter madness.

The doors to their improvised lounge opened and Madelis came strolling in.

Nastasia levelled her colleague a perplexed stare. "Madelis…where have you been this entire time?" She asked.

Madelis came to a halt near one of the couches and leant against it with one hip. "Well, I said I was going on vacation, but…I really was just hiding from - "

In a terrifying display of stealth, Madame X was there. One second Nastasia had been looking at Madelis and the next, the Madame was looming in the doorway in full armor.

Alarmed, Nastasia took a step forwards and to the left, putting herself in front of the boy. "Ren, stay behind me," she commanded.

Madelis blinked. With aggravating slowness, she said, "Huh?" and turned around. When she did, everything about her froze. "M-Madame X," she sputtered.

"Do you even understand what you've cost us?" The Madame growled, her voice tense and, Nastasia thought, quivering with barely-restrained rage. "This team cannot succeed if unity isn't our biggest strength. We lost because of our lack of unity. Do you know who divided us?"

To her credit, Madelis stepped away from the crouch and presented herself to their leader. "It was me," she admitted with a quiet voice.

"Correct," Madame X said. "Because of your incompetence, the Shadow Pokemon project failed." With silent, measured steps, she strode into the lounge. Madelis flinched away a meter for every step the Madame took in her direction. "The mission at Valor Mountain has failed. Zetta has been reverted and captured by Crescent. And finally, Geara is…unable to function as a member of the Xen Initiative." She turned to stare down Madelis. "Such a waste."

With the Madame having turned her back towards her, Nastasia had front row seats to Madelis' sheer terror…and the confusion in her eyes when she heard that Geara had fallen. "Wait, what? What happened to Geara?"

"I'm not done talking," Madame X hissed, and upon hearing that tone of voice, every sensible Team Xen member would have swallowed their tongue.

So of course Madelis instantly opened her mouth again. "It's important for me to know, though…"

With incredible patience, the Madame said, "What's important is - "

"Just tell me!" Madelis exclaimed, desperation bleeding into her voice.

That wasn't the only thing bleeding into the lounge that day. A blur of motion, a flash of steel and a sudden spray of blood, painting the wall red. Nastasia didn't scream when the sword went in, but Madelis sure did. By the time she realized what had happened, Madame X had already pulled her blade free, and readied herself for a second blow.

Nastasia glanced aside to see Neved rolling closer in his wheelchair. His dark eyes were locked on the Madame as she shook the droplets of blood from her sword.

"Y-You stabbed me?" Madelis cried out, her voice high-pitched and strangled. She clutched her left arm, which was already bleeding profusely, and the color began draining from her face.

"Insolence!" Madame X hissed. "You dare speak when you have no right to?!"

Madelis flinched backwards.

"You're nothing but useless weight dragging me down," the Madame continued, bearing down on the bleeding, trembling Madelis with murderous intent. "If you are no use to me, then there is no reason for you to exist.

"S-Stop!" Madelis stammered frantically.

Everything happened at once. Neved sent out his Dhelmise at the same time as Nastasia averted her eyes. Madame X lunged for Madelis' throat at the exact moment the Dhelmise positioned itself in the way, and instead of opening up Madelis' throat, her sword got tangled up in the Pokemon's ghostly seaweed.

Slowly, Madame X turned around to glare at the wheelchair-bound man. Her reflective visor made it impossible to see, but Nastasia could easily imagine a pair of steely eyes burning a hole in the man's chest.

"N=Neved, what are you doing?" The terrified Madelis asked.

"The right thing," Neved said calmly. Though he had yet to walk again, though he had yet to be outfitted with a prosthetic arm, he met Madame X's glare with a resolute look of his own. "I won't allow senseless killing."

"Failures drift to other failures," the Madame spat. "Such is the way of this world."

"Spare her as you spared me," Neved implored. "She still has use for us, and you know it. Set aside your anger and think this through."

Slowly, Madame X lowered her blade. Her helmeted head shifted a fraction of an inch, as if she seriously considered Neved's words. Then…"Hm," she grunted. "Very well. Your continued resolve has impressed me. However, as of this moment, she will no longer be a Xen Executive."

Madelis stared at their leader without a word, shaking like a leaf.

"Listen carefully, for this is your final chance," Madame X continued, sheathing her sword in one smooth gesture. "This is what you are to do from now…"

~~~~~~~(II)~~~~~~~

---

Location: West Gearen City, East District, Saki's (vacation?) home

It has been thirteen weeks since I started my journey. I don't want to look back too much. Feels like, if I stand still, something is going to catch up and swallow me. Feels stupid to write down. Can't shake that feeling though. Only thing I can do is keep moving forward. It can't keep chasing me forever., right?

Three days before we embark on our journey towards GDC. Somehow, Melia is getting tickets. Not sure where.

Week Three of embracing resilience. Resilience report: still resilient.

The Sakitron hovering over his shoulders made an annoyed grinding noise. "Allotted time for self-reflection has passed. It is time to continue hanging out funly. And have fun."

"Yeah yeah," Will grumbled, closing his journal and shoving it back into his backpack. "I'm coming."

That brought him to the Saki in the room; Saki's self made guardbot, which she'd seen fit to outfit with explosives and a freaking gun. Those things were rare. That she hadn't strapped a boxing glove to her metal hands was an odd moment of restraint that Will would rather attribute to forgetfulness instead.

"Feeling parched?" Saki said. "Water is the key!"

Eh. West Gearen had left him feeling a bit parched. Why not?

A minute later the terrified crook locked inside of the jouse with him was seated next to him in one of the many well decorated rooms. Will took a sip of his water. It was nice. A bit warm.

"Ah yes, a nice glass of water do cleanse the pipes, don't they?" Saki said. She turned around and performed another scan of the hallway, as if she still thought the other thug she'd thrown out the window a few minutes ago would somehow come crawling back and take off with more.

"Psst," the remaining burglar called out to him. She glanced nervously at Saki, then continued trying to get his attention. "Hey! Will!"

"No," Will replied, taking an angry sip from his water. He had more important things to take care of.

"Come on man! You need to help us!" She hissed. What did she say her name was again? Kalista?

"Go away, I'm drinking water."

She groaned and tugged at her pigtails. "This is incredibly stupid! I can't believe I'm stuck here with Will and an over-energetic robot! Graah!" She kicked against one of the chairs. Will took another sip of water. "I guess it serves me right for trying to break into a house owned by the Blakeoryes…they think they're so cool just because they have a lot of money and a lot of property. They just think they're cool because they owe a huge school, and have a lot of money and…they're a bunch of crooks that don't care about anyone but themselves! So screw those guys!" She turned and began yelling at Saki next. "You hear that Sakitron? Screw you and screw your entire family lineage!"

Saki turned to regard Kalista with a puzzled look. "Wait a moment. Processing…processing…I have come to the conclusion that Kalista is a crybaby and a weenie."

Will began choking on his water.

"Congratulations, weenie."

"Ugh!" Kalista groaned.

Maybe Kalista shouldn't have tried robbing the place. Or assaulting him when he tried to stop her and her partner.

After they drank water in a fun way, it was time to sit down and do…something.

So they did. They sat down on a couch. It was a hard couch. Will didn't really like it. How could someone as bony and thin as Saki enjoy sitting on something so hard?

"Ah, isn't this exhilarating?" Saki sighed as she rested her robotic body against the nearest bookshelf.

"We're just sitting down on this couch," Kalista grumbled. "But all right."

"Yes, this is correct, but we are sitting down as friends who are family," Saki reaffirmed. "Are we not?"

"I mean…" Kalista began protesting.

Saki's head snapped around with a metallic whir. Her blood-red eyes settled on the silver-haired crook. "If Kali complains one more time, she will be seen as a rebel and eliminated immediately!".

"Eep!" Kalista yelped, curling up into a little ball on the couch. "I'm sorry!"

Sakitron kept glaring for another thirty seconds, the iridescent glow of her mechanical eyes glowing stronger with every second that passed. Then, when Will thought that Kalista was just about to pass out from fear or start wetting the couch, Saki grumbled, "You better be…"

With the doing of something complete, Saki took them back downstairs to the list of rules her friend and previous home-guardian Erina had left behind for Will to follow. "Let us have the fun times!" She declared again. "We can do one thing or the same over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over - …"

Something began beeping. For a moment, Will thought that Saki might have implanted a microwave or something within the 'Tron, but unfortunately that wasn't the case.

"Oh? It seems as though I need to recharge my internal battery," she declared. "You know what they say…internal battery dries up fast when you're having a moderate amount of enjoyment with friends."

Fortunately that never seemed to bother the actual Saki.

"I shall return soon!" Saki continued. "Anyone who tries to leave will be listed as a rebel and eliminated immediately. Do not try to jump off the roof either!" That part seemed directed at Will, oddly enough. It felt a bit personal. "I assure you it will not end well, but in a SPLAT! I have access to all security cameras as well. Do not try my eternal amount of patience. I will turn off that feature just for you!" With that last threat delivered, Saki gave them a salute. "Ta-Ta now, lovelies."

With that, Saki rolled out on her unicycle-legs. The moment she was out of earshot, Will sat down at the living table and pulled his journal again.

"Will, this is our chance!" Kalista whispered. "We have to get out of here! We can't go through the front door, but I have an idea! There's gotta be a manual on that robot, right? Maybe we can deactivate her somehow! Meet me upstairs!"

Will shot her a frustrated glare, before clicking his pen and continuing writing.

"Hey!" Kalista hissed. "I said meet me upstairs, come on!"

He didn't dignify her with an answer. The pay Erina, the current caretaker of Saki's home, had promised was really good. Enough to finance their activities in Grand Dream City for weeks to come. In a big city like GDC, Team Xen was sure to take advantage of the rampant corruption that had impeded an organized response to their major terrorist attack on Terajuma. But two could play that game. Maybe good connections and some tactical displays of violence and pressure wouldn't be enough to get the right people to talk. Money talked where all else failed. He'd learned that lesson the hard way in Kugearen City.

…bribing people was expensive. They might have to pay Karrina's buddy rent, too. Best to accumulate as much as they could.

"Fine! Be that way! I'll figure out a way to get out myself!" Kalista pouted. "Jerk!"

Kalista the…the Anti-Assist grunt, as she called herself, stomped off, leaving Will to his own devices. That suited him just fine; he had a few things to figure out.

Tapping his pencil against the table, he took a moment to formulate his thoughts and began writing again.

Why take mom?

It couldn't have been because she was a strong trainer. She hadn't been locked up with the others, they'd been forcing her to help with some project of theirs. Something that they had built. Of all the people on the Oceana, Crescent included, they had come for her. As far as he knew, his mother wasn't an engineering genius or anything…was she? He…he couldn't remember that, either.

Is there a dad coming for me -

He crossed out the "for me" part. Wrong question, not important enough.

to find his wife?

There. Still unlikely, but at least plausible. He liked to keep hope that he had at least one blood relative out there.

Find spirit healer. Find Aelita.

He'd place that one up there with figuring out the connection between Nim and the people found encased in stone.

Tell Venam that -

The sound of glass breaking upstairs pulled him from his thoughts. He thought he heard the weird girl cursing up a storm upstairs and sighed to himself.

Saki was going to kill her.

"Yeah yeah," he said. "Fine. I'm coming."

In her stupid desperation, the crazy Anti-Assist grunt had started wrecking the glass display cases that showed off Saki's collection of rare stones, fossils and gems. She was scouring the place, still looking for the manual with reckless abandon.

"There you are!" She said. "Look around and find something! If we don't we're going to suffer a lot more!"

Suffer? All he'd suffered was some lukewarm water.

Nevertheless, the girl was starting to get a bit panicky, so Will decided to help her find a way to deactivate Saki, get the doors unlocked and then toss the weird girl out himself.

Turned out, the manual wasn't even hidden. In her frantic search for documentation, she had somehow missed Saki's actual office. Will pushed the door open, spent about a minute looking around and then found the manual lying there on the table.

"Huh."

He began reading.

Welcome to the manual of Sakitron! Made by myself, Saki! Sakitron is a super cool, super awesome robot with maximum capabilities.

Will smiled. That sounded like the Saki he knew. Surely she, Val and Adam would have made it to this spirit healer with Aelita by now, right? So where were they now?

She has access to all the security cameras around the house and can control them.

All of them? That sounded so cool. Saki would probably sleep like a rock at night knowing that.

She has rockets and gatling guns at her disposal too! She's so cool! Despite all this though…she has one weakness. Her kryptonite is the off button on the back of her neck!

Huh.

Click that and she's going into sleepy-time mode!

Could he get a button like that?

Easy as that -

"You read my diary!" An angry voice behind him yelled. Will nearly jumped out of his skin as he whirled around to see Sakitron standing right behind him!

"How could you do this?" The poor thing continued in distress. "I thought we were homies? G-dog and E-dog we were!"

"Who?" Will asked.

"But you're a no good rat!" Sakitron continued, which was really uncalled for. before screaming, "YOU SHALL BE ELIMINATED FOR THIS!" which was entirely uncalled for.

The damn thing then lunged for him, one of its metal fists rearing back to wallop him.

"Kirlia!" Will cried out, just barely getting his hand around a Pokeball and pressing the button. Sakitron was a blur as she darted towards him and smashed her heavy, metallic bulk against his body. For such a Saki-sized contraption she packed a lot of punch, and before Will knew his body was catapulted through the window and sent plummeting towards the ground.

He didn't even have the time to scream as the ground rushed up to meet his face - only to stop a literal inch away from his head.

A hundred broken shards of glass rained down on the ground around him.

Kirlia wandered into his view and craned her head up to look at him. Her expression was as enigmatic and blank as ever…although he thought he saw something like amusement in her crimson gaze.

"Thank you," he said.

A crackle of purple energy erupted from her shattered horn and she flinched in pain. The next second, the telekinetic field that kept him suspended dissipated and Will slumped to the ground.

"Pathetic," Sakitron yelled after him from the first floor. "Disgusting. PUTRID."

Will scampered back to his feet again, ignoring the painful twinge in his ribs. Sakitron was starting to get on his nerves a bit.

"I shall have my revenge on you, Will. Come back inside and fight me like a human!" Sakitron kept yelling.

Will heaved a sigh that came out as a pained groan. "Feel like fighting like a human?" He asked Kirlia.

She shook her head, her green pigtails falling about her face as she did.

"Too bad. We're going back in."

"Wiiiill!" He heard Kalista's voice from somewhere inside the first floor. "Don't you dare leave me behind! You can't just leave me here with this thing!"

"Do my ears deceive me?" Sakitron said in a sickeningly sweet voice. "Is Kalista trying to escape my LOVING grasp?"

A shudder made its way down Will's spine. He couldn't even imagine Saki having a loving grasp, let alone this thing.

"I shall not have any of this!" Sakitron yelled. "Kalista, I'm coming for you!"

"Please no!"

Will looked up just in time to see Kalista sprinting for her life across a balcony, followed closely by the metal menace.

"Come on," he told Kirlia. "Time to stop Sakitron from killing someone."

Kirlia looked less than pleased with that task.

"I know, I know…"

Together with his little Psychic savior, Will headed back into the house. For some ungodly reason the front door was still left unlocked. He wasted no time in locating Sakitron and her next victim - especially because said victim wouldn't stop screaming.

"Get away from meeeee!" Kalista howled as Sakitron slowly and menacingly rolled towards her.

"Why does Kalista deny my loving gestures?" The wheelie horror demanded of her prisoner. "Do you not like a fist to the face? Or a missile to the pelvis?"

Wait -

"Stabbing in the eye?"

Kirlia's expression grew tense. With a sharp gesture she crushed every single display case around her and then swept her arms through the air, coalescing the storm of glass into one giant lance of swirling, razor-sharp fragments.

Kalista had time to scream and dive for cover before Kirlia sent the spinning obelisk of glass flying towards Sakitron's neck

"Not so fast bub- !" Sakitron exclaimed as she spun around. The sheer mass and momentum of Kirlia's attack slammed into the robot and flung off its feet, through the air, through the wall which all but exploded and out into the yard. A tumultuous explosion sounded as the spear of glass promptly detonated, which was followed by the sound of thousands of shards of glass clattering to the ground, impacting the walls and generally turning the garden into a walking hazard.

"Uh oh," Will muttered. Erina wasn't going to like that.

"Y-T-YOU WILL PA-PA-PAY FFFFFOR YOUR CRI-CRIM-CRIMES!" Sakitron's voice echoed from outside. "I -I-I-I-I- WILL DESTROY YOUUUUUUU !"

Kalista watched in horror as a crippled Sakitron began wheeling its way back into the building. One of its arms had been shearn off by Kirlia's assault and sparks flickered across its exposed wirings, but that only slowed it down.

"I ha-ha-have 360 vi-vvvvvvv-ision!" Sakitron sputtered.

"Do something!" Kalista yelled.

"Any other ideas?" Will asked.

Sakitron rolled right past Kalista, its red eyes locked completely on him.

Kirlia raised her arms and something like a bubble popped inside of the room. An expansion of psychic energy swept outwards, throwing both Will and Kalista to the ground and flaying the paint and an entire layer of plaster from the ceiling above. White dust and debris came raining down on them from above as an enormous invisible hammer connected with Sakitron's head and nearly tore it off her shoulders entirely. Her head remained connected by nothing more than a few wires and some plastic, but that too didn't stop her because Sakitron proceeded to grab her head in her hands and started wrenching it back into place.

It was still rolling towards him, one side of its face all mangled, revealing a hard, skeletal layer beneath. That single orb of red light glowed with uncanny menace.

Before Kirlia could switch her plan up, Kalista suddenly shot towards the robot and managed to flick the switch on its neck.

"...A.a…..do I dream? Daaaisy….daaaaisy…."

Sakitron began listing heavily to the right, before the power to her systems completely shut off and she clattered to the floor.

Brushing the plaster off his face, Will shot an annoyed look at Kirlia. "And then they say I lack restraint," he grumbled.

He could have sworn that the blank stare Krlia shot him had something like annoyance in it.

"There," the burglar panted, her silver hair now several shades darker thanks to the fine layer of dust. "She's turned off. Im getting the hell out of here! See ya later, loser!"

With that, Kalista bolted.

With a sigh, Will rested his head on the floor. Stuff continued fluttering down from the ceiling, slowly but surely coating the entire wing in dust, pieces of plaster and flakes of paint.

A subtle glow of purple and pink energy enveloped Kirlia's body. The next second she was. Did she…did she just teleport away? Where to? Why?

"What the HELL happened here!" Someone yelled. Rapid footsteps approached him from the main hall and Erina came skidding around the corner. "Will!" She shouted upon seeing him lying there in the midst of the destruction. "What the hell did you do! I left a SPECIFIC list of things for you to partake in. SPECIFIC."

…in hindsight, he wasn't entirely sure where things had gone wrong himself, either.

A fuming Erina stepped past him and then came to a stop when she spotted the defunct, dismembered Sakitron lying on the floor. Her jaw dropped. "Omigosh. Is that Sakitron?" Embarrassed, she put her hand on her forehead and turned away. "Ah…I knew I forgot to tell you something. Oh well. You are an experienced trainer who is supposed to be able to deal with anything thrown at him, right?"

Will wiped a piece of plaster from his hair.

Erina drew up a heavy scoff at him. "Nevertheless, the house was vandalized, and Saki's precious rocks have been stolen as well." Sternly, she shook her head in disapproval. "No, no, this just won't do. I'm sorry, but this will have to come out of your reward deposit." With that she withdrew a cheque from her breast pocket and began penning on it. "Let's see…the reward listed was…one million…taking in all of the damages, I'd say that brings…a million down to…five-thousand." She tore the cheque off its book and angrily slammed it down on the only table left standing. "You brought this upon yourself, and I hope you think about your poor job here. Good day to you, Will."

The disappointed woman stormed off again without another word, leaving Will to wonder why he couldn't have just taken a request to go poking around the sewers again.

About twenty minutes, a reunion with a Kirlia much smarter than him and a lot of confused faces later, Will headed into the Help Center to proclaim a job…moderately done, gathered the reward and then left again -

- and came face to face with Karen.

"Hi Little Dove!" She said, quickly stepping into his personal space and leering into his eyes with a twitchy, maddened gaze. "Took you long enough!"

"Karen?" Will sputtered, taking a quick step back to put some distance between the lunatic and himself. "How'd you - ?"

"I may have discovered something super cool in the Hidden Library! Y-You remember that, right?! The place we discovered together?! Oh how time flies~!"

"Where did you come from - "

"Momma told me that time was an illusion, so I hit her in the head with an hourglass and asked if her pain was an illusion. Momma didn't like that."

"Why - "

"Anyways! You and I are going to the farthest room located in the Hidden Library! I will explain to you once we have arrived! My presence shall be your reward."

"What, now?" Will asked.

Karen's eyes narrowed. "Oh, I apologize Little Dove! That might have come across as a request, but it was an order! People would kill to be in your shoes, you know?" She giggled madly. "Many have already tried, I think. You do love following orders, do you not? Do you not? Do you not?"

The insane gleam in her eyes told him that declining wouldn't be his healthiest experience of the day. "Uh, sure."

She clapped her hands. "Oh, good! Because, Little Dove, let me tell you a secret!" Karen made a point of dramatically looking around, then cupped her hand at her lips, bowed towards him and whispered, "I would have hunted you down if you had declined! Come then, with me!"

The moment she finished issuing her orders she took three steps and then promptly teleported away.

…so it was going to be one of those days.

The journey back to East Gearen was a quick one, and before long Will entered the Hidden Library again and made his way to the chamber all the way in the back. That was where he'd last seen Karen the previous time she required his assistance.

There, Karen was already waiting for him. Her request was simple; help her unlock the door to the treasure she wanted.

That was all.

Simply that.

Will didn't want this lunatic anywhere near his friends. She'd known precisely when and where he'd appear in the city. Chances were she knew where he'd been hanging out. Melia had been all over the news. She'd know where to come knocking if he displeased her.

That left him with precious few options.

Quietly, he stepped towards the black tile Karen needed him to stand on.

"Will, step off of that pressure plate right now!" Karrina shouted out of nowhere before her large, angry Granbull roughly shoved him off of the pressure plate sending Will crashing to the ground for a third time that day.

Karen gasped with dismay. "You didn't give Will enough time to distribute his weight onto the plate! Now you've gone and wasted so much time!"

"I'm not letting you guys go any further than this," Karrina snapped, darting towards Will and, weirdly enough, offering him her hand. Granbull, meanwhile, continued leering at Karen.

Karen inhaled sharply. "HON!" She yelled at the top of her lungs. Will noticed how badly Karrina flinched when the madwoman did. "Zis is utterly and stupendously unacceptable! Step AWAY from the Will, ma'am."

"Thanks," Will muttered as Karrina hauled him back to his feet.

"Stop messing around, Karen!" The Stormchaser snapped. "I don't know what you're up to, but you better state your business. Now."

Will didn't think he'd even heard Karrina sound so angry before. Not even when they sealed her inside of her room with ice.

"...Um, lol," Karen said cheekily, coyly putting her index finger to her lips. "Do I know you?"

Karrina's mouth fell open. "You don't remember me?"

"No sweetie," Karen said, as if she were addressing an infant. "You just aren't very memorable, y'know?"

Furiously, Karrina shouted, "You don't remember the night you killed my parents?!"

Horrified, Will turned to look at Karen. She what?

Still acting so painfully coy, Karen cheerfully said, "Lol, nope."

Karrina's lips curled into an angry scowl. "They were the caretakers of this library before me! You killed them because they wouldn't tell you where it was hidden!"

Karen squinted one eye together in a playful wince. "Okay yeah. I did do that," she playfully said, before gasping, as if just now realizing who she was talking to. "Little Duck! You've gotten so big! When was the last time I saw you?"

"...the night you killed my parents," Karrina said, staring at Karen with wide eyes.

"Gosh, now that was a wild night, right? Lol!"

Her face twisting in fury, Karrina yelled, "Do you think this is funny?!"

"I plead the 5th," Karen mumbled.

"I've had enough." Her Granbull began stalking towards Karen, flashing her a furious glare as it did. "I've been watching you for a while. Getting stronger day by day just so that I could avenge my parents finally. So then, call out your Pokemon. Let's end this."

Karen's eyes darted towards the Granbull without a hint of fear. "Who let the dogs out, amirite? Lol."

With a furious gesture, Karrina sicced her Pokemon on the madwoman. With inhuman precision, Karen side-stepped just enough for the Granbull to miss her, before teleporting herself several meters away from the offending Pokemon.

"Little Duck, I think you need to calm down and bring it down a few thousand notches," she said with an almost offended tone. "Also, have you tried training that thing? Bitch was slow as hell. Lol, get it?"

Karrina's screams were tinged with desperation and an almost maddened fury. "I SAID SEND OUT YOUR POKEMON!"

"Close the library? Got it!" Karen called an enormous influx of power to herself in a scarily short window of time. Her eyes glowed with a sharp, piercing purple as she levitated into the air. The candles dimmed, the lights flickered. Her will bled into the air like an invisible order, and the library answered in kind.

Stone groaned, metal rattled and the entire building shifted. A heavy thump reverberated through the building from above.

Karrina's eyes darted around. "Wh-What did you just do?" She demanded.

"I closed the library," Karen hummed back. The field of power surrounding her dissipated and the madwoman landed solidly on her feet. "With us inside of it. Ergo you can't climb up and out because the entrance was submerged once again!" She put her index finger to the corner of her mouth and giggled like an innocent schoolgirl.

Karrina stared at her in horror.

"You locked us in here with no way of escaping?" Karen breathed. She frowned, then added, "Wait oops, that was Little Duck's line." The amused sparkle in her eyes disappeared. In a cold tone, she began explaining, "But I did, didn't I? We're going to spend an eternity down here. That means that we're…" She paused and her frown grew even heavier. "Family? Oh! Yes! That's what all of this means! We're related by blood! Oh, little Duck, oh Little Dove! I'll be the mother and you two will be my little birds. Okay?!"

Will imagined Tesla catching wind that he'd been locked into a dusty old tomb by an actual insane psychopath. She'd come down on this place with a wrath Aeviun had rarely seen before…and she would be playing right into Karen's hands.

She'd fallen for the same trap before already. Team Xen had ambushed and captured her. What was worse, magic was a wildcard. Magic was a threat he didn't know how to counter. If Tesla tried to tear this library apart to get him out, Karen would…Karen would do horrible things.

Unacceptable. He got himself into this mess. He had to get himself out again.

"You're smoking some good shit if you think we're just going to be okay with all of this!" Karrina growled.

Karen's face contorted in rage. She stomped on the ground and the entire library shuddered. "Is that any way to talk to your mother?" She howled, spittle flying from her lips. The literal next second her expression was all sorrow and playful happiness again. "Omfg, I need to sob and post about this on MyBitchAssChildrenDaily." She sobbed. "I can't bear the sight of my unruly children. Please, leave me to mourn on my own."

Horrified, mustering what little defiance she had left, Karrina leveled a glare at Karen.

And Karen's cold, detached expression made Will want to curl up inside of his own grave. In a flash, she'd produced a kitchen knife, its edge tainted with dried blood. "Do it or I'll cut you up like your parents," Karen hissed.

Oh God.

Her vacant stare far, far more terrifying than any of her previous mood swings had been. The tough, no-nonsense Stormchaser Karrina began stepping back. Wordlessly she recalled her Granbull and then hurried out of the chamber.

This had gone far enough. "I'm going to need you to open the library again, Karen," Will said, hoping that diplomacy and calmth would get Karen to impulsively undo her decision.

Karen turned her lifeless, blank expression towards Will next. "My favorite child is entering his rebellious phase? Oh, this cannot do!" She produced her kitchen knife again, casually levitating it around her fingers with more magic. "Does mommy need to spank you?" The knife flew back to her hand and she held it just like Geara had brandished his. "Or tickle you?"

The casual threat drove Will over his frayed nerves. He took several rapid steps back, his right hand going for Froslass' Pokeball -

The knife flung towards his face with terrifying speed, only to come to a dead stop a mere inch away from his right eye.

Will froze like he had never froze before. He didn't dare to blink, didn't dare to breathe. For a fraction of a second his heart stopped beating, before it began violently thrumming within his throat.

"Little Dove, Little Dove, if you send out your Pokemon I will poke out your remaining peeper," Karen said in a sing-song voice. "Oh little dove, that would be so sad! I would have to wipe the jelly from my fingers again. So do not test me."

The hole of terror her words punched into his thoughts existed for no more than a couple of seconds before anger at the injustice and depravity of what she said filled it up. He glared at the lunatic, hating how satisfied with herself she seemed, hating how peaceful and serene her smile was. it didn't make sense.

He wanted nothing more than to lash out, give in to his anger and start a fight. His Pokemon and him had handled lopsided confrontations before.

That being said, fighting Karen in the library just seemed like suicide with extra steps. She was magic. This place made her more magic. He had one peeper.

And Karen knew it.

"Okay," he said, his voice tight and his throat tight. A different approach, then. "Sorry. M-Mom."

"Little Dove, I am so disappointed," She said, the deep exasperation in her voice making it seem like she'd simply forgotten to…to put on an expression. Her face was entirely, utterly blank. Like any other person might forget to put on their make-up. "I would have expected this kind of behavior from my daughter! Not you!"

Will tried to mask his sudden horror, wiping his face clean of emotion. He wasn't sure if he did it on time, if Karen managed to see the effect her act had on him, so he quickly added another layer of deceit to further distance himself. "She's just being a teen," he said numbly.

She nodded sadly. "Girls will be girls, as they don't say at all actually. But that's neither here nor there, truly. What was I saying again?" She contemplated that for a second. "Oh yeah. I have to get dinner ready. We're having dusty books tonight."

Without even giving Will a second to process that, Karen skipped off, giggling to herself. Only when she was gone did he dare to breathe normally again.

He was starting to really dislike that woman.

With nowhere else to go, Will backtracked his way towards the main hall again. He expected Karen to jump out from around a corner and yell "BOO!" with every step he took, but that didn't happen. Knowing her, she really was stoking a fire somewhere to start roasting these timeless old tomes for their dinner.

Likely burning their remaining oxygen supply, too.

"Will, over here," Karrina whispered at him from around one of the many bookshelves. "I don't know how you got mixed up with that wench, but…" She stopped to scan her surroundings. "Actually, it isn't safe to talk here. For all we know she may be listening. Come on, let's head to the east wing, okay? I'll explain everything there."

To the east wing they went. Karen kept warily eyeing the library as she led him towards another section of the structure altogether, one where Karen hopefully wouldn't be able to gain entry.

"There's something you need to know," she began. "Karen is part of the Elite 8. She's a strong and ruthless trainer. But that's not all…she's a ruthless killer that stops at nothing to get what she wants."

Will thought back to his first meeting with the madwoman. It was reasonable to assume that those men were all dead.

"Usually she's good at hiding that side, but recently, it's gotten a lot worse. Some say she lost her sanity, but I think she's always been like this."

Karen must have kept things together if she'd been allowed into the Elite 8. It boggled the mind to see someone like her standing at the same height as Tesla. It didn't make sense.

"What is this place really?" Will asked.

She didn't hesitate to tell him the truth. "The Hidden Library is a collection of all the knowledge the Garufans have gathered. My family comes from a long line of Garufans. Our duty was to protect this place from all that try to uncover its secrets." She paused, then uttered a weary sigh and looked at him with some annoyance. "Annnd…you kinda led her down here, which invalidated the work of me and my entire family."

A head's up that he was screwing up so heavily would have been nice the first two times. "I'll make up for that," he promised.

Karen shook her head. "Look, no hard feelings. We need to find a way to get her to say the magic incantation again. If we don't…we're literally stuck down here forever."

Considering how royally he'd messed things up already, Will decided against informing Karrina that dying of dehydration or oxygen deprivation seemed more likely to him.

And then people said he didn't know how to handle social situations…

Karrina told him that her mother had left her a series of notes, and that there had to be a spare spell book in the west wing.

Which was locked.

At least the key was supposed to be down there somewhere.

"Is there anything here I can use against her?" Will asked as they started searching the many, many dusty old pieces of furniture for the key to the west wing. "You said this place is a collection of all Garufan knowledge your people gathered."

"The knowledge down here isn't for your eyes, Will," Karrina said. "It doesn't matter anyway. Unless you have a translation book I don't think you'll be doing any reading."

If this place and its magic belonged to the Garufans and only the Garufans could use magic, then it stood to reason that Karen had Garufan blood running through her veins as well.

A member of the Elite 8…he refused to believe that such a powerful and royal institution would accept an outright murderous lunatic into their ranks. Something must have happened to trigger that change in Karen, turning her into this…this caricature of a person.

They found the key after a few minutes of quiet searching and wasted no time in booking it - heh - to the west wing of the library. There, Karrina unlocked the door and they both filed - heh - inside.

Only to learn that somehow, Karen had beaten them to it.

"Little Dove…" her voice echoed through the large, labyrinthine wing of the library. Will and Karrina froze in their tracks. Instinctively, Will crept towards the shadow of the nearest bookshelf and took shelter in its darkness. "Little Duuuuck…I know you're in here somewhere…I could hear your footsteps."

Karrina slowly covered her mouth with her hands to mask her breathing.

"You know…I just wanted to give you something you didn't have anymore, Little Duck!" Karen's voice continued, through the peculiar way the library had been constructed made it impossible to pin her voice down to any one location.

"A wonderful and LOVELY little family that definitely loves and cares for you!" The monstrous woman continued. She sounded like she was close to tearing up. "And the fact that you won't even come out to say hello to your mother when she's calling you is just too much to bear!" She sniffled. "Little Duck…little Duck…If I didn't know better…I would think that you hated me."

Will's eyes darted towards Karrina. Her hands were trembling.

"And that would make me very…Hysterical.

A cold pit dropped into his stomach. Nervous sweat started dropping down his back.

"I see," Karen said. "So that's how it is. You two sure do love your games. As do I!" She suddenly shouted, and when he heard her footsteps making their way down the hall, their close proximity was a very unpleasant surprise. "We're going to play such a good game! You. Will. Just. Love. It." She uttered a howling, broken laugh. "Little Dove! Little Duck! We're going to play a little game I like to call ultimate King of the Hill. The rules of this game are simple! I know you're here to reach the end of this room! BUT I WON'T LET YOU!"

Her voice suddenly came from far away, as if she'd just teleported away again.

"Ever been hunted down by angry Pokemon? It builds character. Better run, better run, Little Duck, Little Dove. For I am going to knock out two birds with many, many stones…HON!"

"How'd she even get in here? The door was locked!" Karrina hissed in dismay.

"HTWO!"

"She knows that the book we need is past this room. Impressive."

HTHREE!"

She whirled from her cover. "Well I'm definitely not scared of her."

The very next second the bookshelf she'd been using as cover burst apart as a cluster of rocks exploded through it like a cloud of shrapnel. Will wasn't sure if it was the sheer concussive force behind the blast that got her or the residue pellets, but the impact sent her spiraling to the ground in a motionless heap.

Will remained rooted in place, heart pounding in a frenzy. He purposefully steadied his shallow, panicked breaths.

A few things happened very fast one after another. First, Will realized that, somehow, Karen's Pokemon had nailed its target through solid cover. Second, as he dove to the ground and hit the deck, he heard a second blast tearing through the bookshelf, narrowly missing him. And lastly, he heard the heavy thumps of something extremely heavy trodding around on the other end of the room.

Karen had sent out her Pokemon to hunt him down.

That complicated things.

With little other recourse, Will began running. He rounded the corner of the bookshelf and nearly skidded an immediate halt when he saw something massive moving at the far end of the long, bookshelf-flanked hallway.

A Gigalith.

A huge Gigalith, larger than even Adam's, blocked the far end of the path.

"Shit."

It stomped one of its heavy, rock-like legs on the floor and Will had a fraction to dive for cover before another scattershot of rocks tore through the air and smashed a hole into the wall behind him.

His heart was beating in his ears as he considered his options. The maze-like interior of the west wing could allow him to snake his way around the massive Pokemon and then, somehow, get past Karen as well. The counterpoint was what would happen if he caught one of those Rock Blasts head-on. Karrina, likely tougher and sturdier than him, had taken a glancing blow through a solid bookshelf and it had sent her careening to the floor.

He wouldn't have Tapu Lele to stitch his body back together if he screwed up here. Karen would probably cry over his broken, mangled corpse for a moment. Then, she'd slap a bandaid on his forehead and decide that he was as good as new.

That mental image was as hysterical as it was terrifying and Will felt a nervous giggle brewing within his throat. He grit his teeth so hard that it hurt.

Conflict. Chaos. Life or death situations. He'd thrived during them before. More so than during any normal period of peace. He could thrive down here, as well. Turn Karen's insane game on its head.

Knowing that the Gigalith was lining up its shot as he was trying to get himself together, he began easing his way around the left of the bookshelf, further making his way into the darkness. A second blast tore through the bookshelf a meter away, showering him with pieces of paper and shards of wood.

In and out. In and out.

Off he went.

His sneakers pounded the hard, stone floor as sprinted through the labyrinthine structure of the library. His footfalls made a quiet approach of Karen's position impossible, but at least he presented a moving target to Gigalith. He didn't know how the damn thing traced him, but he took solace in the fact that each and every shot the Pokemon fired at him was a clear miss.

So long as he continued to run for his life, of course.

The creeping shadows of the massive bookshelves were only barely illuminated by the overhead lanterns. He whirled around the corner, found a dead end and then hugged the ground when another scattershot mangled the bookshelf he'd just been standing behind. He scrambled back to his feet and continued running,

Soon, he was out of the maze and set to cross the main path again - mere meters away from Gigalith's firing lane. At that range, it wouldn't miss.

Instead of risking a sudden crossing, Will remained standing still just long enough for the scraping noise of rock to betray the Pokemon was opening fire again. He darted out into the open and the Rock Blast narrowly whizzed past him.

Gigalith moved to reacquire his target, but Will was nimbler and far too quick. He darted across the walking lane and into the section of bookshelves to the right - where they soon parted and revealed an open space.

Elation gripped his heart as he banked sharply to the left and emerged into the clearing right before the door that would take him to his goal…

…only for freaking Karen to pivot out from behind a pillar and block his way. "Hi, how are you! Yeah, no, that was way too easy. Best two out of three?"

"No thanks," Will growled, intent on simply running past the madwoman.

She giggled at him. "Sorry, I made that sound like a question, but it was more of a demand." She thrust her arms towards him and bands of purple light enveloped his body. Will knew he was about to be teleported again and closed his eyes, hoping that the experience wouldn't leave him puking his guts out on the floor again.

In a flash of light, he suddenly found himself right back at the beginning of the library floor again.

Every. Damn. Time.

Even as Karen began scolding her Rock-type and sent out another pair of Pokemon to try and pin him down, Will spotted the route he'd taken before and took off sprinting again.

"I'll play too! You better run from my magic, Little Dove!"

Her…her what?

Her words sent another ripple of unease through his insides. Moving fast, Will put his back to one of the bookshelves and surveyed the library again.

It didn't take him long to find the disturbance. Something like a small Rift had erupted on the far side of the wing, way to his left. It was almost as if Karen had stolen one of Zetta's Rifts, positioned it horizontally across the floor and then half-heartedly kicked it across the floor towards him.

That was the magic she'd just told him to run from, then.

Rapid footfalls from the other side of the wing told him that Karen's other Pokemon was on the move as well. As long as it wouldn't blow him apart the second it laid eyes on him, Will was confident he could still make it to the other side of the wing again and show Karen that she wasn't only one who liked to resolve things with violence.

That was when the universe decided that it hadn't proven him wrong in a few days and that it was time to rectify that. A large, plume-covered Pokemon suddenly rose above Karen's position It flapped its wings, uttered a piercing shriek and then began shooting more stones at him.

There was no time for thinking or strategizing, no time for anything but to take off in a full sprint. That Karen had sent her Pokemon into the sky to strafe him was a hundred times worse than the lumbering Gigalith. Karen's black pocket-storm began chasing after him as if it had a mind of its own. Said mind would likely chew his feet out from underneath his legs if it caught him, so he had to stay on the move.

A constant barrage of razor-sharp stones cratered the ground around him, forcing him to duck and weave and sometimes even curl up into a ball and frantically protect his face from the wicked shrapnel it kicked up. One particular spray of Rock Blast impacted literal centimeters away from his face, leaving his ears ringing.

Having only half a vision while prioritizing speed over running straight meant he was constantly slamming into things as he labored to keep distance between himself, Karen's Diancie and that black curse sweeping after him. At one point, that freaking Diancie lunged for him from a passageway to the right and Will had no choice but to duck into the left one, heading into what he knew was a dead end.

Since getting torn apart five seconds into the future was better than getting torn apart immediately, his mind went along with the snap decision, and Will found himself picking up speed as more rocks exploded near his feet. He felt a sharp pain lancing through his right calf before he lost feeling in the entire thing.

No feeling was better than agony and the adrenaline carried him onward. He hurried into the dead end, spotted the place where Gigalith had narrowly missed his chest the last time he'd occupied the corner and wasted no time in scampering up there. He put his left foot in the hole and pushed off with all his strength, his grasping fingers just narrowly gripping the upper ledge of the bookshelf .

Underneath him, Karen's Rifty curse began spreading across the floor.

Frantic now, his breath coming in increasingly shallow bursts, Will kicked and fought against the massive bookshelf, kicking half a dozen books out of their shelves and onto the ground, whereupon the Rift promptly consumed them.

His next breath came out like a panicked whimper. Desperation and far, far more adrenaline than could ever be healthy for the human body propelled him up and then over the bookshelf. Karen's flying Pokemon blew apart the entire bookshelf in response, but by then Will had landed solidly on both legs - now the sensation's coming back? Seriously? - and the remaining meters between him and the exit melted away.

"Best four out of seven!" He heard Kare yell into his left ear before she promptly struck him across the face with the palm of her hand.

It wasn't any pain that shoved him off-course so much as it was the sudden shock of Karen slapping him out of nowhere. With her bare hand. When she had magic.

"Young man, how many times do I have to tell you, no climbing in the library!" Karen snapped. "Looks like I'll be giving you that spanking after all!"

It was ridiculous. She had the tactical wherewithal to attack him from the shadows, approaching him from his fucking blindspot and she'd gone for a slap to the face? Like that? Venam could hit harder than that! Hell, he was sure Saki and Amber could slap harder than Karen could!

Will turned his forward stumble into a scramble for the closest thing he could use to clap back - a heavy-looking blunt object in the form of a Garufan book - and snatched it in his hands.

"OMG, I cannot believe you and I are having our first spat Will! We are like a married couple!" Karen sobbed, waving her hands to wash cool air towards her face. "Are you going to cook for me now?"

With a snarl, Will swung the heavy book at her head with the intent of knocking her lights out. Instead of knocking the insane witch to the floor, his improvised weapon struck an invisible edge or something and it promptly exploded into a cloud of loose pages and pieces of leather a centimeter away from her face.

Freaking magic.

Breathing heavily, exhausted from all the exertion and the utter whiplash of emotions that was being in Karen's proximity, Will threw the remainder of the Garufan book at Karen's face. He was absolutely, two-hundred percent, objectively done with this.

"Excuse me!" Karen snapped, angrily batting at the pages that fluttered around her head. "Little Dove, what the in the name of the actual holy living fuck was that!"

"Some…some heavy knowledge," Will breathed, slumping against the pillar Karen had been hiding behind.

He expected the lunatic to flip the fuck out and start poking holes in his ribs, or stick something sharp in hsi face or something. What he didn't expect was for Karen to clutch her stomach and begin laughing.

Laughing.

"Oh, oh, Little Dove!" She gasped, her titillating laughter bouncing off the walls. "Your humor makes my insides all quivery! Oh, fine! Because you insist! Best four out of seven! I'll use my entire team this time!"

Will was about to tell Karen where she could stick her number four and her number seven when out of nowhere Karrina's Granbull came barreling in through one of the bookshelves and slammed into Karen's body. Another field of magic kept the Pokemon from crushing her ribs to paste, but the impact did knock the madwoman back several meters.

Karrina?

"Girl, you made a huge mistake forgetting about me!" Karrina yelled, nimbly maneuvering through the hole her Pokemon had made in the bookshelf.

Damn, was he glad to see her back on her feet!

"Little Duck!" Karen yelled with joy. "Finally over your concussion? Perhaps you'd like to help Will out for once?"

She took to the sky again, rapidly stringing together another magic incantation that led to the freaking ground beneath their feet ripping itself upwards and shifting into the form of a series of massive stone spikes, not unlike Nidoking's Earth Power. With a manic grin Karen shoved her palm in Will's direction and flung her stone weapons towards him.

Karrina's Granbull reacted with the ingrained speed and reflexes of a well-trained Pokemon. It flung itself in the path of the improvised spears and they burst apart against its body, showering the area with bouncing shards of stone and another cloud of dust.

"Woooow, you expected that didn't you?" Karen said. "You're learning."

Karrina moved to join Will, quickly fixing her ponytail in place with her left hand. "I'm cute and smart~! Comes with the territory."

Karen's eyes narrowed. "Is that right?" She said. the calmness in her voice raising Will's was getting out of hand far, far too rapidly. This needed to end. "Little Duck, you seem to be far more worth my time than I initially thought. This spell is still kind of in its early stages but I need to test it out on something."

"What?" Karrina said.

Again, Karen enveloped herself with the mystical aura of the ancient Garufa. Again, she called power and intent to herself and began putting a spell together.

Will inched away as Karen shifted all of her focus into her spell. He reached for two Pokeballs in particular.

Karen's incantation finished and the next instant, a black bubble of sorts enveloped Karrina's body. It crackled with foul, malicious energy and the Stormchaser cried out in pain, falling to her knees as she clutched her head. "What…is…this?" She demanded. "I…feel so…what is happening to me?"

Slowly, Will pinched the two miniature spheres between his fingers. Ever so slowly, he began easing his hand out of the satchel again.

"This power is a conglomerate of your rage and anger," Karen happily explained, the full force of her concentration occupied with tormenting her little duck. "I am simply doing you a favor and releasing them outward, Little Duck. But let's not talk here, I know a room that's far more comfortable!"

Will was ready when she next teleported away, taking Karrina and her Granbull with her. There was only one room she could really go, anyway.

He sent his Pokemon out and gave them their orders. One of them disappeared in thin air. The other he recalled again to preserve the element of surprise.

Next, he took a few deep breaths to get the oxygen flowing and establish some modicum of calmth. Then, he pressed on.

As he expected, Karen had taken her hostage into the far chamber at the end of the west wing. It was just as dark and dimly lit as the others, its black and grey tiles illuminated by the combined efforts of dozens of lit candles and several mystical, green lanterns.

There, in the center, Karen had put her captive Stormchaser on display, still imprisoned in that odd bubble of swirling, negative energy.

Her expression was contorted in pain.

"That's close enough Little Dove," Karen warned him when Will began approaching them. "Who knows what'll happen if you get too close to her negativity? Lol, I don't. This is the first time I've cast this spell."

"Can you free her?" Will asked.

Karen uttered a barking laugh. "Sorry! Can't do that even if I wanted to! Never learned the words to that spell. Whoopsie!'

Alright. Okay. That made things simple.

Simple, but not easy. Then again, things never were in Aevium, were they?

"It's not like I want my Little Duck to stay so negative all the time!" Karen continued. "I would do anything for my Little Dove and my Little Duck alike!"

Perhaps, in her own contorted, perverted way of thinking, Karen genuinely felt affectionate for him. Perhaps that affection even extended to Karrina.

"I…I hate her…for what she did, Will," Karrina groaned out. "I hate her…for what she did…to my family…and I…"

"It's okay, Karrina," Will said. "I'm going to set this right."

Upon hearing her cue, his ever-reliable silent killer burst forth from the ceiling. A Shadow Ball right off the bat splashed across Karen's frame and the madwoman gasped so dramatically that Will knew she faked it.

But that didn't matter, either. Froslass struck a beautiful feint and as the lunatic pivoted in response, Will sent Fraxure into the fray.

"Little Dove! So violent!" Karen squealed as Fraxure blasted her with a Dragon Rage. "I love it when you get rough!"

Then the next step was going to blow her mind.

The blast of draconic energy exploded across the room, flash-vaporizing the many, many candles strewn about and throwing Karen off her feet like a ragdoll. She slammed into one of the heavy and carved stone pillars with such force that it should have shattered every vertebra in her spine.

Of course, Karen being what she was, that didn't happen. Instead, the shimmering shield of magic absorbed much of the blow. It shattered like a mirror, falling apart into several gleaming shards that quickly melted away into nothingness.

Will doubted anything short of a Legendary Pokemon could annihilate Karen so thoroughly that she wouldn't bounce back somehow. But when Fraxure blasted the Garufan witch away from Karrina, it allowed Froslass to do what she did best.

Penetrate and annihilate.

Her arms crackling with ghastly energy, Froslass slit the strange bubble of curses open and squeezed her body through. There, she proceeded to fill the inside of the sphere with her own power, before swiftly wrapping her arms around Karrina's waist and pulling her out.

The second the Stormchaser vacated it, the bubble of dark aura imploded on itself, shrinking to the size of a coin. Froslass dropped Karrina like she was a plastic toy and swiftly seized the remnants of the Garufan curse in one of her "hands".

"Omigosh!" Karrina said, leaping back to her feet in an instant. "I feel so much better! Being trapped in that bubble was horrid!"

Karen glared at her with apparent disgust. "Dang, that's all it took? Some ghostly yandere bitch? That spell must've been weak. That, or I need practice. XD."

Froslass turned her murderous attention towards Karen, but before she could do anything particularly violent, Karrina stepped towards Karen - right into her firing angle. "You! You're terrible!" Karrina shouted.

Swiftly, Will raised his fist, signalling Froslass to hold her fire. Fraxure slowly circled around to the right, his eyes constantly darting between Karen and several positions behind her in the wall.

"You have no conscience at all, do you?" The livid Stormchaser continued.

"Perhaps I once subscribed to that show, but I'm kinda broke now," Karen laughed. "So no conscience for me, sister! This is just the way I am."

"Well, your little party trick didn't work," Karrina growled. "I still wanna rip your head off."

Will was starting to relate to that. He would have told Karrina that this wasn't the way, but who would he be fooling, really? Even if Karen wasn't some all-powerful psychopath, even if there existed a prison that could contain her without putting more lives at risk, could he really stand there and tell Karrina that she couldn't take Karen's life? When he'd given in to the exact same urges before?

"Hm, guess the cleanse was only temporary, then," Karen mused. "Oh well! Once I perfect the spell I'll have my own army of negative vampires."

There it was. If they let Karen walk, she'd simply wreak more havoc. She wouldn't stop, she wouldn't ever stop pursuing her twisted, warped interests, no matter how many people died.

So what was the solution then? Karrina could murder the woman with her bare hands driven by nothing more than rage and a desire for vengeance and the result would still be a net positive. She could wrap her hands around Karen's throat and squeeze until the madwoman stopped breathing and what would it cost?

Blood on her hands. A life on her conscience.

Did that matter if it rid the world of a threat this dangerous?

What was the difference between Karrina and him?

"Open the library's entrance and let us GO!" Karrina shouted.

With a heavy groan, Karen rolled her entire head in exasperation. "God, not this again! Why can't you just let us be a family?"

"We're NOT a family!" Karrina snapped. "And we never will be a family! You're sick. You need help. Divine help, at this point."

A tremor ran through the library. The entire ground shook.

"What now?!"

"The ground in this region really likes to shake a lot," Karen said casually.

Froslass cried out in alarm and fluttered towards Will. The next second, a Pokemon flickered into existence right next to Karrina's head. It resembled a large, floating eye more than anything, all white sclera and black iris. Three black appendages made it look like the letter Y, albeit upside-down. Although that could have been an A as well.

"Brii?" It said.

"...Unown?" Karrina muttered.

Two more of these Unown teleported into the room.

Fraxure uttered a low groan and began slowly retreating towards his trainer. Will quickly recalled him, then recalled Froslass as well. No reason to present these things with a threatening picture.

"...This is getting weird."

"Oop…" Karen murmured, before turning to face the wall Fraxure had been staring at before.

Another quake shook the library in its foundations, before so many Unown flickered into existence at that wall that they could have filled an entire pot of alphabet soup.

"That's a lot of friendos…" Karen said.

"Wh-What do you want with us!" Karrina cried out in fear.

Will caught a glimpse of…something. Something that, on one end, resembled an eye of sorts, a human eye with green specks and golden hues. On the other end, the something scratched at his brain and poked at his mind, deepening a disconnect between his senses and his mind that swept out through his thoughts.

As he struggled to process just what the hell that was about, the Unown happily opened up a huge, triangular portal that looked like it led straight into the starry night where the Oceana had sailed through when it accidentally skipped outside of reality.

"Yes!" Karen howled, throwing herself at the doorway with a maddened glee. "THIS IS WHAT I'VE BEEN LOOKING FOR! THE COMPLETE AND UTTER DESTRUCTION OF REALITY AS WE KNOW IT! TAKE US AWAY!"

All of Will's senses stopped processing input as everything became white static and blankness. A great swath of nothingness enveloped him as Karen's insane howling laughter echoed through his head.

In a flash, that whiteness exploded back into reality and Will found himself lying on top of a hard, somewhat warm surface. He scampered back to his feet and cast his gaze about his surroundings, searching for the volatile magic-slinging, teleporting bitch who -

Overhead blazed a golden sun. The sky was a sharp glare of blue above but then somehow deepened to indigo and then black the lower Will looked. The horizon was an inky blackness without stars. From where he stood, a forest to his right and an ocean sprawling out in front and to his left, the ocean seemed to fade away into nothingness. Emptiness. Hollowness.

Ah. So he wasn't in the Hidden Library anymore, then.

It was as if someone had spilled a bottle of ink across reality. Half of it had been eaten away, leaving behind just…darkness.

He could relate to that.

A massive, expensive-looking yacht had been docked to the pier he'd woken up on. It looked like it could have fitted four of Tesla's yachts back to back, making it appear more like a cruise ship.

Before he could think about the implications of waking up right next to a big boat, he noticed someone rapidly approaching him. Will's head snapped towards the girl and his heart stopped in his chest.

Maria?

Her long, blonde hair reached below her waist. Her eyes were red, though not the blood-red shade he'd come to associate with the likes of Crescent, Kirlia and a whole slew of people who wanted to kill him. She wore a black headband with some sort of crimson bow tied onto it and her expression was one of curiosity.

"Greetings!" The girl politely said.

…it wasn't Maria. Of course it wasn't. He'd taken a walloping and he'd just been teleported against his will twice in rapid succession. His mind was taking blond girls and automatically associating them with Maria or Melia at this point.

"You must be the new villager we've been hearing about!" The girl excitedly continued. "My name is Alice! But you can just call me - "

She spoke. Will knew she did. He saw her lips move. But the sound she uttered didn't resonate within his brain at all. His mind rejected what she said, and when it did, the familiar headache came back with a vengeance. "What…what did you say your name was?"

"I said just call me - "

She repeated the sound. This time, Will caught something that sounded like "twenty-nine"

She likely saw his struggle, as she quickly continued, "But it seems as though you are having trouble pronouncing that. So please, just call me Alice. You have come a long way to get to Atebit Town. You must be tired."

Will frowned. "Where am I?"

Alice looked at him with surprise. But then, she giggled, and unlike a certain someone hers actually sounded childlike and innocent; an actual expression of humor instead of an extension of one's insanity. "Silly! You are in Atebit Town! You should know that!" She shook her head. "Honestly, who buys a ticket to a new world without knowing where they are going?"

Yeah, that had him written all over it. "Hello Alice. My name is Will. It's nice to meet you."

Alice scrutinized him, likely taking in his disheveled appearance and the big scar on his face. He must have struck a frightening figure. "You are strange," she said. "But you seem kind. This is an island for kind people only. Please, come on in."

The girl seemed to be in her early teens. Younger than Melia had been when he first met her. He could think of worse people to follow, so when Alice offered to take him with her, he didn't think twice about accepting that offer.

But as he followed Alice away from the docks and towards a forest of sorts, it began dawning on him that something wasn't right. Worse than that, something was wrong, very wrong.

Aside from the blackness consuming half the horizon, something about the trees and the sky and even the road he tread on was off. It was as if he looked at them through a blurry camera or something. The colors were just out of a focus, just enough for his brain to figure something was off.

He glanced around, feeling ill at ease. The trees were silent. No wind to justle their leaves. It was quiet. Everything was just motionless in a way that left him feeling uncanny.

Even the footsteps of the rapidly approaching Karrina on the road ahead were off. They seemed a tenth of a second out of sync, again not enough to immediately come to mind, but just enough to realize something wasn't right.

"Oh, thank heavens, Will!" The Stormchaser cried out. "You're here too! I thought I was alone in this INSANE world!" Then, she noticed Alice, and her expression became one of suspicion. "Oh my gosh, there's another of them with you."

"I don't believe we have met?" Alice said, cocking her head sideways as she stared at Karrina. "My name is Alice."

Alice stepped forwards to offer her hand and Karrina moved as if jolted by lightning. She darted towards Will, nearly skidded out of control and then grabbed him by his arms, putting him between her and little Alice. "I don't like it here and I don't trust these munchkins," Karrina hissed in his ear.

For her part, Alice only laughed. "You are funny! I did not know you could RUN so fast. If I did know then - "

"Then what, huh?" Karrina challenged her.

Instead of finishing her sentence, Alice looked up and then glanced over her shoulder in the direction Karrina had just come from. "I believe I hear trouble ahead! We must go see what is happening!" She cried out before hurrying down the path alone, completely forgetting about her guests.

Will made to move after her, but Karrina grasped his right arm by the bicep to stop him. "This is not cool," she said. "I'm not going over there and you can't make me!" She looked like she was one stiff breeze away from breaking down crying. "What happened to us?!"

"Likely an alternate dimension," Will said calmly. "We've been through those before."

"You freed me from that spell and then those Unown showed up, right?" Karrina insisted. "Unown are known to live in an alternate dimension where only they exist…could this world be…a world of their own creation/?" She gasped and put a trembling hand to her mouth. "Does that mean Alice is an Unown? Oh shit, I'l talking like her now! I'm gonna puke…"

"Karrina?"

"You're gonna be alright, Karrina," she muttered to herself. "Just look into the horizon…" The Stormchaser began running off again, but she hadn't taken more than a few steps before she spotted the sea…and the strange horizon beyond it. "And see…the void?"

"Karrina, look - "

The woman spun around, buried her fists in his shirt and pulled herself against him. "Will, there is nothing over there!" She said frantically. "Just darkness. The trees cut off. The water STOPS."

Her breathing became faster and more shallow. She was panicking. "Karrina."

She pulled one hand back from his shirt to rake through her hair."THE WORLD IS FLAT HERE?"

"Karrina!" Will said forcefully. "Look at me. Karrina, hey, come on." He put his hands on her shoulders and gave them a squeeze. "Go sit down. Catch your breath. Breathe. I'll fix this. Okay? I'll set things right."

"Okay," she gasped, her face pale and her eyes distant. "Okay…"

He helped to ease her down against one of the trees. "Breathe," he ordered. "Focus on that. Just breathe in and out. Yeah. Like that. Stay here. I'll come for you."

It was likely that Karrina wouldn't be able to pull herself back together without him staying there to talk her through it, but he had to be honest here. What worked for him might not work for her at all, and they still had an unpredictable and insane psychopath to track down. Then he could figure out how they could get out of this place…wherever the hell Atebit Town really was.

He'd figure that out.

It didn't take him long to run into the first sign of trouble. Up ahead, right at the entrance to a collection of houses and gardens, Karen and her yellow-plumed flying Pokemon were facing off against another kid. It was a guy this time, the spitting image of Alice except for his different clothes, somewhat harder facial features and shorter hair.

"Just give it up, manlet," Karen snapped at him. "You're out of your league by a long shot."

Well, shit. This would be Karen terrorizing the locals. He couldn't have that.

"Hah! If that's what you think!" The boy snapped back. "I haven't even begun to fight yet!"

"Well yeah, the battle just started," Karen deadpanned. "I hate messing with small fry…Archeops, bite his head off."

Alarmed, Will began running towards the two, his hand going for Froslass' ball -

"In that case, I'll use one of my monsters!" The boy exclaimed. "I choose you!"

The kid didn't throw a Pokeball or call forth an already-hidden Pokemon or anything like that. Instead, a flash of white light erupted at the spot where the kid pointed. A form of blue light expanded from the ground, swiftly increasing in size and gaining the shape of…of…

Well, whoever he was, the kid had one thing right; it was a monster alright.

The creature that just appeared from thin air was roughly the same shape as a Rhydon, but its proportions were all wrong. Its hide was a pocketed and mottled red, marred with scars. Its front arms were elongated and much broader than its stocky hindlegs, giving it a hunched-over appearance. It had two drill-like horns instead of one and its tail was longer and ended in a set of spiky protrusions. Whatever that thing was, it easily towered over Karen, twice as big as a Rhydon.

"Wait, what the fuck is that thing…" Karen said, staring up at the strange abomination, which Will would guess was a Rift Rhydon or something like that.

"Monster! Use Life-Ender!" The boy ordered, thrusting his palm out at Karen's Archeops.

The creature moved with startling speed, snatching Archeops by its tail. It slammed the Flying-type against the ground, before flinging it against one of the houses. Archeops smashed through the wall like a cannonball, but then blue, crystallike spires erupted from the ground and grew into the opening, covering it up again. As Will watched, those spires changed colors to match the background, effectively camouflaging the damaged section of the house.

"Bye Archeops," Karen said.

The creature then reached out, seized Karen by her torso and casually threw her off into the distance, too.

"And there goes me, lol," she said as she sailed off.

Will watched the madness unfold with bated breath. If he hadn't found the masters of this dimension, then he sure found its ruling class.

"You were awesome, Monster!" The kid exclaimed. "Come back!" The strange, sickly-looking creature turned a translucent blue and then disappeared into thin air.

With that, the boy turned to face Will. "Not another one!" He dramatically said, scowling at what he likely thought was a second interloper. "You are lucky that Monster is tired from battle! Like any good trainer, you must heal your Pokemon when they are tired! But next time…"

The boy glared at him for a few more seconds, before turning away and walking off, leaving Will with more questions than answers.

Which was basically status quo for him at that point, but that didn't mean he had to like it.

Feeling like he didn't have anything to lose, Will continued on and entered the…well, Atebit Town, he guessed. He passed by a sign that led into something called the Funky Forest and followed the main road past a few flowerbeds towards one of the wooden houses.

The sign next to that one read "Alice's abode".

Will knocked, was greeted by a warm, "It's open!" And then invited himself in.

The house, if it could be called that, seemed to be a one-story structure with several tables, a trio of bookshelves and more flowerbeds than he'd ever seen inside of a building before. Trending to the flowers was Alice, who looked up in surprise when she saw him enter. That surprise turned to a bright grin however when she recognized him. "Oh! I forgot that we had guests. I am not very good at this."

"That's alright," Will offered. "May I come in?"

"Yes, sure!" She said, gesturing for him to enter her home. "I prefer to stay inside and read about Pokemon. Have you heard of Pokemon?"

"Yes," Will smiled. "I have."

His enthusiastic response had Alice beaming at him. "You are very funny!" She smiled. "I am glad I met someone as kind as you, William. So very kind."

Unease began stirring within his stomach. He was pretty sure that wasn't how he'd introduced himself. "My friends call me Will," he said.

"Oh." Alice blinked at him. "Do they now?" She was silent for a couple of seconds, before frowning and glancing over at the door. "Oh, but I think I hear my brother outside. It has been very long since I have last seen him. One second, Will."

His confusion mounting, Will watched the young teen brush past him and walk off. She hadn't been gone for more than ten seconds before the other blonde barreled inside.

"You again?!" The guy exclaimed, his eyes narrowing in suspicion. With that same dramatic, bravado-like voice, he said, "What are you doing in my house?"

"Alice invited me in," Will replied. "She heard you outside. Went to take a look."

The guy crossed his arms over his chest and leaned against the doorpost. "Alice heard me outside so she went to go look for me?" He repeated.

"...that's what I said."

He nodded in understanding, although the disapproval in his eyes never quite disappeared. "That does sound like something Alice would do. Ok. It is time we go look for my sister Alice. Knowing her, she got lost on the Funky Forest. It is a mysterious forest that no one has ever been through. If you take the wrong path then you will be sent home."

Who talked like that? Who were these people?

"The name is Allen, by the way," the guy - Allen - continued. "I'm a trainer. Let's go look for Alice. I bet she is scared."

Without even waiting for Will's response, Allen went off again.

Will closed his eyes, swallowed his growing sense of unease and did everything in his power to remain focused on the task to build up a disconnect between his feelings and what needed to be done.

…Karen had tried to get Archeops to kill Allen. Allen, who looked like he could have been the same age as Alice. How old would they be? Thirteen? Fourteen? Just old enough to hit their puberty. Two kids living in a sealed-off dimension where everything was just a shade wrong.

And Karen had tried to get her Pokemon to kill him by decapitation.

She wasn't just psychotic, she was rabid. It took a special kind of fucked-up to hurt a kid. To go further and try to kill one…so messily, for…what, standing in the way? Being at the wrong place at the wrong time?

This had to stop.

"I think…I have a horrible feeling…that I am going to have to take another life," Will whispered. To whom, he wasn't sure. Mom? Aelita? Melia?

He couldn't afford to care about that, now. He'd go with tbe leaky-box approach of acting now, agonize over it somewhere in the future.

So long as he could put a stop to Karen's rampage.

He exited Alice's abode and was about to head towards the Funky Forest when he spotted a second route. He hadn't seen it before because it was hidden behind the flowerbeds.

"Huh…"

Not sure what to expect, Will began making his way down that path instead. It took him through a small forest path towards a cliff of sorts. There, nestled in-between some rocks, someone had dug a grave, complete with a headstone.

It read: R.I.P. to THE TRAITOR.

"Will!" He heard Karrina's voice coming from his left. "There you are! You are difficult to track down, man. Listen, I've composed myself and I'm ready to find a way outta this nasty little realm. Got any clues on where we should start?"

Will pointed down the forest entrance. "We're looking for Alice in the Funky Forest. Likely she got lost."

Karrina looked at him like she already regretted her choice. "You're looking for Alice because she got lost in…the Funky Forest." She inhaled sharply. "Right. Well, while you go look for Alice, I'm gonna go ahead and hunt down Karen. Good luck."

Just like Allen, she didn't wait for his response and she hurried off again.

…the traitor. What could bring a pair of kids to regard someone as such? A father who had abandoned them? Maybe a mother?

Something to keep in mind.

He turned his back to the gravesite and set out again. He had a girl to find.

Through the Funky Forest he went - again and again and again and again because it took him the longest while to figure out that the thing that kept teleporting him back to the Funky Entrance was him stepping on the Funky Flowers that grew literally everywhere.

But as the saying went, seven times was the charm, and eventually Will found himself standing in front of a glassy-eyed little blonde. "Alice?" He said, peering at her face. "Are you okay?"

With a sharp inhale, Alice snapped herself out of her thoughts. "Oh dear! I seem to have taken the wrong turn and got lost in the Funky Forest. Thank you, Will! Let us go back to my home together. It isn't safe here!"

Will decided against asking questions. Instead, he followed Alice back to her home. When she led him inside and found both Karrina as Karen hanging out inside of her house, the girl didn't even seem surprised.

Alice ignored the way Karrina glared at Karen and the rather distant look in the Garufan witch's eyes as she took a seat at the table. "Thank you ever so much for saving me, Will!" She gushed. "The Funky Forest is a dangerous place with scary Pokemon! I tried looking for my brother, but alas, it was a futile effort."

"Brother?" Karrina asked.

"Yes!" Alice said. "My brother whom I live with here in Atebit Land."

Now there was an Atebit Land?

"I tried looking for him, but I ended up finding no one," the girl continued, blissfully aware that her brother had barged into her home literal seconds after she disappeared. "But I am happy that you were able to find your friend!" She continued, shooting a happy look at Karen, who just waved back at her.

"We're not friends," Karrina said through clenched teeth.

"We're family!" Karen cheered.

"No." She took a deep breath. "Alice, you wouldn't happen to know how to get out of this place, right?"

Alice's brows knitted together in confusion. "Your words are confusing. You took a boat here! Why would you want to leave so soon? We haven't had much company…"

"This place is cool and all, but we have a world we need to get back to ourselves," Karrina said.

"I see," Alice sighed. She sighed, then perked up and hopped off her seat. "Play time is over, I suppose! Ok. I don't know how exactly you'd get back to "your world" as you described…but I did hear about there being a secret exit located inside Caution Cave."

Will cocked an eyebrow. Who named these places?

"You can find it by getting past the Funky Forest!"

"Great!" Karrina said. "We'll be on our way, then."

"Not so fast, buttercup!" Karen spoke up. "I'm stayin' here. I like it."

Here? With Allen and Alice, so that she could hurt and maim them instead? "I don't think so," Will said.

"Oh, why can the lady not stay with us?" Alice pouted.

"Because the lady is not a nice lady," Will said, ignoring Karen's dramatic gasp. "The lady is, in fact, a very mean lady who hurts kids like you."

"Yeaaah…" Karen sighed. "That does sound like me."

"You are the f-freaking worst," Karrina hissed.

"Oh…" Alice said, looking immeasurably disappointed. Again, that didn't last long, as she suddenly smiled and said, "That's okay! My brother is a trainer! Our Pokemon will protect us even if the lady turns out to be a mean lady like you said she is!"

Her…her Pokemon?

"The Unown," Karrina whispered. "This is their realm after all."

Right. That made sense. It also explained Allen's "monster", who hadn't seemed bothered by Karen in the slightest.

Their realm. Their rules. Even Karen didn't seem to have a way around that.

Fine. In that case, this was likely the least dangerous place for Karen to stay. She would be contained white Karrina and him figured out what to do about her in the long term.

It was much, much better than the alternative.

"So you know what? It's fine! She can stay here. Yes, you. You can stay here!" Karrina snapped at the madwoman. "Just make sure you never leave."

"Hoookay," Karen grinned. "I'll stay put and behave like a good Little Bird."

"Alice, I'm counting on you to keep this one in check," Karrina then sternly told the little blonde.

"There is no need to worry!" Alice beamed. "We will have a grand time here!"

"And with that…" Karrina took Will's wrist. "Let's get the hell out of here, Will!"

"Goodbye, Alice," Will said as Karrina dragged him along. "Take care!"

"I will make sure to keep a good eye on Karen!" Alice said. "Thank you for visiting us, Willia - Will!"

Will had time to wave at the girl before Karrina threw the door shut behind them. "Okay, that monster has been contained, we are going to move out!" She hissed. "Keep up, Will!"

"Just watch out for the Funky Flowers," Will said.

"The what?"

Somehow he managed to keep the Stormchaser from getting the vintage Funky experience. They made it all the way through the forest, where they finally reached the…the Caution Cave, an opening at the bottom of a sheer cliff face that was just large enough for one person to shuffle their way through.

"Alright!" Karrina cheered. "This should be the cave Alice mentioned. Let's get on back to the library and find that spell book."

"Ladies first," Will offered.

"And encounter a third munchkin inside? No thanks!" Karrina said. "As your senior, I decide that you should be the one to go first!"

Will shrugged. So much for being a gentleman. "Sure, I'll - "

"Hey!" Allen's voice rang out.

Will spun around just in time to see Alice's twin brother running after them. He didn't look happy to see them go.

"Uh, who's this?" Karrina said.

Allen whipped around to glare at her, obviously even less happy to hear that Karrina didn't know him. "How dare you! The name is Allen! Don't forget it!" Facing Will again, he continued, "I heard you two were planning on leaving Atebit Town."

"Correct," Karrina snapped.

"Why!" Allen exclaimed, looking genuinely insulted. "Atebit Town is great!"

"Allen - "

"You think you're too good for this town?" The kid demanded

Will rolled his eyes. He was tired, his head hurt, he'd been teleported too many times for him to ever reconcile and he just wanted to leave this place. Time for someone else to do the social.

Karrina proceeded to do the social. "Quite frankly, yes. Now move aside, pipsqueak."

With a scoff, Allen shouted, "Maybe I don't want you two to leave so soon! Maybe I want to keep on playing!"

"That ISN't our PROBLEM, PIPSQUEAK!" Karrina yelled. She snorted. "Not nice to be yelled at, is it?"

Allen uttered a frustrated cry. "That's IT! Monster is still tired, but I still have awesome Pokemon that can beat you! I don't have a full team, but I sure as hell can borrow one!"

"...what?" Karrina said.

"EN GARDE!" Allen yelled. With a flash of light, a shimmering, crystalline Pokeball appeared in each of his hands and he flung them in the air. Like before, flashes of white coalesced into shimmering blue shapes that then took the form of Pokemon.

One of them took the form of a white-furred, quadrupedal Absol, just like the one he'd seen at Goldenwood Forest right before Team Xen struck. The other was Hapi.

Okay. So in this Unown dimension, Allen's command over fake Pokemon meant that it couldn't literally be Hapi, but it was a Togekiss nonetheless. It was even a Shiny version, just like Hapi.

Will responded by sending out Blaziken and Pidgeot. In this wide open area, Togekiss would be free to fly around and bombard his Pokemon with ranged attacks like Melia's did, but the same went for Pidgeot. Every single time Melia and him had raced together, Pidgeot had proven to be the faster flier.

It was time to see how Allen's Unown-spawned Pokemon held up against the real deal.

"Togekiss, attack!" Allen ordered. "Absol, you too!"

Something strange happened. Absol…changed. Its body radiated power and light like it was about to evolve. A sphere of light erupted from within its body. When the blinding glare of the light dimmed, Absol had changed. Its snow-white fur was longer and a pair of white, angelic wings protruded from its back. Its tail now had a more saw-like shape and the sickle-like horn on its forehead had grown wider and sturdier.

With a snarl, Absol lunged forwards.

Could…could Absol even evolve like that? Or was this another Monster scenario, where the Unown took a normal Pokemon and altered it? Was this thing even real, or was it like the Garufan ruins? Fake?

He'd find out soon enough. Allen's commands left him with precious little context as to what his Pokemon were about to do, so he'd just have to take the initiative and adjust his tactics accordingly.

Absol's horn glowed white and it swung its head around, sending multiple light blue blades of energy towards Blaziken. At the same time, Hapi gathered a sphere of pure Aura and oriented himself towards Pidgeot as it took aim.

"Pidgeot, to the sky! Blaziken, dodge them!" Will ordered.

Blaziken threw herself into a sideways combat roll to the side as the arcs of Night Slash carved deep gashes through the rocky ground. She came to a stop several meters to the left and instantly retaliated by kicking a large jet of flames towards Absol, forcing it to relocate as well.

Meanwhile, Hapi - not Hapi just another Togekiss stay focused - opened fire. The Aura Sphere sped towards Pidgeot, who was only barely able to take off fast enough. The concentrated blast of Aura tore through the spot in the air Pidgeot had just vacated, smashing a large, circular hole into the ground.

With several large, powerful beats, Pidgeot shot up into the sky.

"Forget the Pidgeot! Target the other one!" Allen ordered. "Absol, start running! Keep using Night Slash!"

That strange Absol uttered a cry in response and then began moving. The thing was fast, really fast. Its feet barely seemed to touch the ground as it sprinted across the rocky plain, whipping up a storm of energy blades towards Blaziken. At the same time Togekiss came about, charging up another Aura Sphere to start lobbing her way.

Fighting out in the open like this was a major disadvantage. If he couldn't change the terrain he just had to maneuver himself towards a more favorable one. "Blaziken, pull back towards the forest!" Will called.

Blaziken performed a backwards summersault to avoid the first barrage of Night Slashes. Powerful legs propelled her high up in the air as she jumped, putting her well out of range of Absol's attacks. Doing so put her in Togekiss's sight however, and the egg-shaped terror fired off another Aura Sphere her way.

Thinking fast, Blaziken slung an arc of flames towards the incoming projectile, intercepting and detonating it mere meters away from her face. Shockwaves buffeted her body, but failed to truly harm her. She landed at the edge of the treeline and then quickie melted away in the shadows.

"Togekiss, watch out above!" Allen yelled.

Pidgeot swept down from above like a bolt of lightning. How Allen had spotted him, Will wasn't sure, but it allowed Togekiss to suddenly veer off towards the right. Pidgeot's wicked talons missed him by a hair's breadth.

"Togekiss, Flamethrower!"

"Pidgeot disengage!"

Togekiss whipped around, spewing flames from its open maw as the great bird of prey soared past. The turbulent wind following in Pidgeot's wake dissipated much of the fire however, and Pidgeot wasted no time in banking towards the left, avoiding the rest of Togekiss' attack.

"Absol, give chase!" Allen yelled. "Togekiss, keep shooting!"

Absol bounded towards the forest, moving like a white blur across the rocks as it gave chase. Sickles of purple energy carved through branches and entire trees, cutting them down mercilessly. Overhead, Togekiss drifted closer, orienting its body in such a way that it could keep an eye on the prowling Pidgeot.

It wasn't a bad decision by any means. Rain down fire from above, pin the enemy down while another Pokemon outmaneuvered them and then deal the finishing blow. Breaking free from that situation either meant eliminating the air support or changing the situation on the ground. Allen was already covering his base in the air. That suggested he'd expect him to start shaping things on the ground.

Things like repositioning Blaziken or pulling her out entirely. If he understood things correctly, Allen would be expecting him to look for change on the ground.

Will thoroughly loathed doing things the enemy expected. Now this wasn't a fight to the death and Allen wasn't actually an enemy, but that didn't change matters much. Be it in a friendly match or a desperate struggle, acting like the opponent expected was never a good option.

"Absol, start looking for an opening! Togekiss, shoot Pidgeot down!" Allen called out.

"Pidgeot, again!" Will ordered. "Blaziken, stay in position!"

As Togekiss began targeting Pidgeot with more Aura Spheres, Pidgeot began picking up speed again. He rolled from the left to the right to avoid the ranged attacks screaming towards him, flattening his wings against his body as he plummeted towards Togekiss.

"Togekiss, get ready to dodge!" Allen ordered.

Togekiss broke off its latest Aura Sphere and began beating its cloudy wings rapidly to avoid Pidgeot's talons once again.

"Pidgeot, brake, brake!" Will yelled. "Sweep it into the forest!"

At the last moment Pidgeot's wings shot out from its body. He caught the wind and it began jerking him to a rough, bone-jarring halt. As he did, the storm of wind he'd carried along with him as he dove slammed into Togekiss' smaller, lighter frame. The wild turbulence flung it off balance and as it struggled to right itself, Pidgeot stirred up a windstorm with just a few flaps of its wings. The improvised gale storm flung the Fairy-type out of the air and it fell towards the trees in an uncontrolled spiral.

"Blaziken, catch!" Will shouted. "Just like Tesla's Charizard!"

"No, Absol, hit it!"

Blaziken had cleared buildings in a single bound in the past. Leaping through the upper layer of the forest to intercept Togekiss was child's play compared to some of the stunts they'd pulled in the past. As Togekiss frantically struggled to right its course, Blaziken managed to hook the claws of her left hand into its wing.

Absol's Night Slash cleaved through the air and narrowly missed the pair. Will could imagine the look of shock on Togekiss's expression as Blaziken wrestled its egg-shaped body against herself, before slinging it between herself and the ground.

The next second, Blaziken punched a new crater into the forest's floor using Togekiss's body. It glowed a bright, blue sheen before its entire frame dissolved into light and vanished.

"Absol, Sucker Punch!"

An instant later Pidgeot came down on Absol like a hammer on an anvil, but Absol was faster still and slashed at him with its horn, somehow interrupting Pidgeot's divebomb while also dispersing his momentum, which Will hadn't even thought possible.

Wounded, Pidgeot beat its wings and ascended again, his head craning around as he tracked Absol's movements.

Allen, meanwhile, summoned another Pokemon. A blue-furred Ninetales appeared from thin air, shook itself and proceeded to call forth a snowy hailstorm out of nowhere.

"Ninetales, use Aurora Veil!" Allen then ordered.

Aurora Veil?

Absol darted aside to dodge a wash of flames, then used the sickle-like horn on its head to carve straight through the log that Blaziken flung at it like a javelin. Inside of the forest though, surrounded by trees and foliage on all sides, that meant Absol would have to remain stationary to defend itself. Combined with that quick Sucker Punch to ward off Pidgeot, Absol had sacrificed its freedom of movement for defense and offense.

Even as Blaziken pinned the Absol down with several blazing streams of fire, cutting off its avenues of escape, Ninetales cried out and surrounded its body with a veil of rainbow-colored wind. That wind rapidly swept out across the battlefield, making the outlines of Atebit Land look that much blurrier and more warbled.

"Good! Now shoot down that Pidgeot with Frost Breath!" Allen ordered.

The good news was, Blaziken managed to close the distance and laid Absol out with a rolling High Jump Kick to its head. It too turned into blue light and faded away. The bad news was that Pidgeot wasn't well suited to flying around in these circumstances. Its thick coating kept it safe for a while from freezing temperatures, but Pidgeot preferred a temperate, warmer climate even under the best circumstances. The cold made it harder to fly, the hail made it harder to navigate. He was at a severe disadvantage and Ninetales needed only one good hit to freeze over a part of Pidgeot's wings, which would lead to an immediate crash-landing.

Even worse, with Absol out of the picture, Allen sent out a Sableye next, which materialized right next to the Ninetales. That Aurora Veil wasn't a damaging move, but Will could imagine that it leveled the playing field somehow. He had to be careful here "Pidgeot come back!" But, as always, two could play that game. "Froslass, your turn!"

Blaziken emerged from the forest, two more victories under her belt and ready for more. That line of thinking was understandable, but dangerous. Better to play it safe until he knew what these new conditions meant.

"Ninetales, use Moonblast! Sableye, fire Dark Pulse at that Froslass!" Allen ordered.

Whatever Aurora Veil did, it didn't prevent Sableye from unleashing a beam of black light towards Froslass. At the same time, Ninetales gathered an orb of Fairy-type energy and proceeded to fire it at Blaziken.

"Scatter!" Will ordered.

Using her Snow Cloak ability, Froslass began turning intangible. Her ability did not render her immune to Ghost- and Dark-type attacks, though, and invisible or not, an attack with an area of effect would still hurt her. As Blaziken leapt aside, Froslass quickly surged up into the air, narrowly avoiding the searing Dark Pulse as she fully disappeared in the hail.

Counterfire in the form of more flames from Blaziken and a quick barrage of low-yield Shadow Balls slammed into the strange, rainbow-colored wind that drifted around Ninetales and Sableye. The flames seemed to wilt and diminish even before Ninetales countered with Frost Breath. What remained of Blaziken's ranged attack clashed against the frigid wind howling through the air…and lost.

The flames died out and neither of Allen's remaining Pokemon was harmed.

Then Aurora Veil was some sort of "soft" version of Light Screen? If so, was it possible Froslass could learn that as well?

Between those Moonblasts and Dark Pulses, a frontal assault with Blaziken wouldn't do him much good. If flames didn't work, he had to shift gears again. "Blaziken, that's enough. Come back." He pocketed her Pokeball and sent out Nidoking. "Froslass, focus Icy Wind on Sableye! Find an angle!"

Sableye pivoted. It gathered more Dark energy between its claws and the next instant, more jet-black pulses cleaved through the sky.

"Ninetales, use Frost Breath!"

Froslass, barely visible as she flickered through the hail, nimbly dodged her foe's attacks and struck back with her Icy Wind. The faintly glowing wind danced across the falling snow, its blue particles visibly slowing down as they interacted with the shimmering Aurora Veil.

That suggested Aurora Veil was an omni-directional shield, working differently from the various Screens.

Sableye tried to avoid the attack, but in doing so Icy Wind clipped one of its arms. The cold would numb Sableye's limb, rendering him slower and more sluggish.

"Nidoking, use Earth Power to create cover!"

Meanwhile, Nidoking got to work putting another one of Will's theories to the test. Shivering, his Poison-type stomped against the ground. The snow-covered ground erupted as hundreds of kilograms of earth and rock exploded into the air. The advance was twofold; the debris would physically interfere with the Frost Breath just like Aurora Veil did with Icy Wind, but unlike the mystical Veil, the dust and sand and falling rocks created a shroud of sorts that lowered visibility.

Nidoking didn't need to see where he aimed for the next part, but Ninetales very much needed a clear line of sight to do her thing.

Positive identification, Karrina had said. PID.

Sometimes Will just loved being contrarian. "Up and over Nidoking! Sludge Bombs, now!"

Nidoking slammed into cover against one of the mounds of rocks, which began rapidly glazing over as Ninetales blasted it full-tilt with Frost Breath. Nidoking, meanwhile, belched up several large, purple globs of sludge at his opponent. They sailed over his cover at an angle and exploded all across the battlefield, showering both Ninetales as Sableye with poisonous goop.

Sableye flickered in and out of existence as the sludge washed over him, effectively phasing through the worst of the incoming poison, but Ninetales didn't have that luxury. The Aurora Veil drastically slowed down the incoming rain of poisonous sludge, making it appear as if each globe had to sink through a heavy layer of water before it reached the Ice-Type, but with Froslass circling around to look for weaknesses, Ninetales was still effectively surrounded. Dozens and dozens of poisonous sludge sailed towards its, driven to slow-motion through the veil but very much there.

Nidoking rolled out of cover as Sableye flung a Shadow Ball at the frozen rocks, shattering them into a shower of frozen fragments, but the razor-sharp pieces of frozen rock merely bounced off of Nidoking's armored body. In turn, he slammed his arm into the ground and exploded an Earth Power into the middle of Allen's formation, forcing Ninetales and Sableye to evade once again.

Froslass flickered into existence in the midst of the two. Ghostly Silver Wind surged from her body and flung Ninetales off its feet.

The Aurora Veil burst. An omni-directional crack tore through the air as an entire layer of mystical energy wrapping around the battlefield unraveled and spun itself to pieces.

"Froslass, the Sableye!" Will yelled.

Ninetales fired a Moonblast at point-blank range at Froslass at the same time as the many, many segments of Sludge Bomb snapped shut around them like, impacting like a series of very unhealthy firecrackers. Nidoking threw in another Earth Power for good measure which reduced the visibility from "bad but manageable" to "where did the Pokemon go?".

When the dust and the snow lifted, Will saw that Sableye was gone. The blue-furred Ninetales lay on the ground, half buried by rocks and covered with a foul substance.

Froslass, meanwhile, lay on the ground, the eyes that flickered behind her mask dazed and tired.

"Darn it! I lost to you!" Allen cried out. He kicked the ground in frustration. "I guess it just wasn't meant to be."

"Well done, you two, well done!" Will said. He ran towards Nidoking, patted gave him an affectionate pet on the head and then moved to scoop Froslass up from the ground.

"That's right, it wasn't," Karrina snapped. "So just let us go now, okay?

"Yeah, ok," Allen begrudgingly agreed. "But the next time we meet…I won't be so kind!" He paused, then his expression grew calm and serene, and when he next spoke every trace of that hotheaded drama was gone. "Have fun out there in the real world," he said earnestly. "No one has ever left this place, except for one other person. I wonder just what they're doing out there? Maybe you'll meet them. Traitor."

RIP to the TRAITOR

As he picked the very, very light-weighted Froslass up from the ground, Will's thoughts turned back towards the gravesite he found.

Suffice to say Allen had some complicated feelings on the matter. Will didn't see that being his problem in the immediate future, however.

Karrina watched the kid leave. "Will…I know that was Alice's brother, but…I got weird vibes from him. The same ones I got from Alice." She turned and shot him an uneasy look. "Like, they felt like her, y'know?"

He wasn't sure if what Karrina sensed was the same as he'd sensed. Something about this entire place was off to him. As he was right now though, he doubted he'd be able to make much sense of it. He needed a good night's sleep, a heavy shower and preferably, Arceus himself promising that nobody was ever going to teleport him against his will again.

Instead, he just settled for a quiet, "Let's get out of here."

Karrina couldn't argue there.

After making sure that Froslass wasn't too badly hurt, Will recalled both of his Pokemon. Together, Karrina and him headed into Caution Cave, which turned out to be a small excavation site with several large pillars holding up the chamber near the entrance. The cave tapered off towards the back end, where a shrine of sorts waited.

"Dead end…" Karrina cried out. "This can't be a dead end! Maybe we need to do something about that panel over there?"

Will followed her gaze and saw that she was right. What he'd initially believed to be a shrine was, in fact, a tile puzzle. The pieces were different, but it was the exact same puzzle as the one he'd completed in Indriad's mansion.

A pair of blond-haired kids…Unown, one of Indriad's tile puzzles…if there was a link, he didn't see it. His head hurt. He was tired. He still had leftover debris from Saki's home clinging to his clothes and hair.

Time to pull back for now.

He put the puzzle together, ending up with an old, weathered stone pattern that resembled a Kabuto. "Huh," he said, running his finger across its stoney eyes. "Neat."

"Did you find something of note?" Karrina said. She joined him in front of the puzzle, leaning in to take a closer look -

Whereupon the ground beneath them opened up and swallowed them whole.

Four times. Four times he'd ended up sprawled across the floor in various states of consciousness in a single day. That had to be some sort of record.

"...ey!"

Images flashed in front of his eyes as he slowly blinked the blurriness away. He saw a mob of gray hair. A metallic, red-tinged mask. An armored dress.

"Hey!"

Will sucked in a pained breath as he climbed back to his feet. His right calf hurt.

Someone steadied him and helped him back on his feet. "Oh thank goodness! You're finally awake!"

"Karrina?" He mumbled.

Slowly, Karrina's face came into focus. "For a second there, I thought you weren't gonna make it…you okay?"

Will took a moment swimming his way back to full consciousness. "Fine," he said almost instinctively.

"Good," she said. She peered into his eyes again, found everything to her satisfaction and then left him to get his bearings on his own again. "I had no idea something like…Literally all of that existed down here. And truthfully, it was probably better if it stayed that way. Regardless, we're free. Also, good news! I found that spellbook. I even found that incantation we need to open the library again."

"Good," Will said. He saw that they were back in the central chamber where Froslass and Fraxure had redecorated. No trace of the Unown intervention remained. "I'm ready to head out again."

"Before we do…I want to go back to that room you and Karen were in. I have a feeling that she won't stay in that dimension for long, either, and I don't want her getting the treasure hidden behind that door."

"There's an actual treasure?" Will asked.

"Yeah," Karrina said, looking at him funnily. "Do you mean to tell me you went along with Karen without even expecting payment?"

"I didn't plan to go along with her at all," Will replied.

"Then what were you doing helping her in the first place?" Karrina exclaimed.

"Now there's a story…"

As Karrina led him back to the door Karen had been trying to open before, he told her about his fateful encounters with Karen. From the very first Help Request he fulfilled all the way to her rather jarring appearance in West Gearen.

"Huh, I expected as much, to be honest," Karrina said. "When we first met, you didn't strike me as the type to pursue power and wealth. Having you appear in Kugearen just cemented that."

"You weren't very helpful at Kugearen," Will dryly pointed out.

Karrina snorted. "You physically assaulted me and then sealed me inside of my room when I had been given a mission to complete."

"It sucks that it had to happen."

She eyed him. "But?"

"But I would do so again, in a heartbeat, if I needed to."

Karrina let out a thoughtful hum. "Good. Maybe you'll make a good Stormchaser after all."

Her approval shouldn't have meant much, but it still made him feel a lot better about the situation. To him, Storm-9 was only tangentially related to the real enemy. She didn't need to know that. "Thanks."

"You're welcome," she said. "There, just like you did with Karen before - step on that tile."

He did. Like he'd seen in the other Garufan ruins, the door barring their way disappeared.

"Let's go."

Together, Karrina and him walked into the sealed treasure room. An actual, decorated and heavy-looking treasury awaited them there. More lit candles surrounded it, making Will wonder who came down here to keep all those things lit. The Unown?

"This is what my ancestors have been keeping safe down here all this time," Karrina said with a reverent tone. "Now that the library's going to remain open, I don't think it's right to leave it behind. So, let's open it."

Before Will could say anything in response, Karrina undid the chest's heavy seals and flung it open.

Silently, the Stormchaser stared at its contents. "Oh my…this chest literally only has two small pebbles inside," she said. She knelt down and retrieved said pebbles from the chest, feeling around to check for any hidden compartments. "Yeah, just this. These pebbles being Mega Stones, but like…really?"

"Mega Stones?" Will asked.

"Oh, you don't know?" She turned to face him again. "If you haven't been told, then it's not my place to tell you. Hmm…just know that Mega Evolution is a temporary boost to power that very few people have been able to attain. If everything is in place, and your Pokemon holds the Mega Stone, it allows your Pokemon to reach a new form that drastically increases their performance." She held out her hand, smiling warmly. Two gems rested in the palm of her hand, one a deep shade of blackish purple and the other shimmering like the inside of a volcano. "There's one for Banette and one for Houndoom. It fits with the Houndour I gave you, doesn't it?"

Will couldn't meet her eyes. With as much grace as he could muster, he reached towards her palm. "You're…you're giving me one?" He whispered. He wasn't sure if he even deserved that. It was his fault that Karen had even gotten this close to begin with.

Just like it was his fault Houndoom would never fight again.

"It's my treat for helping me out!" Karrina said.

He hesitated. Karen had sought out something she called a Mega Ring before. It was likely that just possessing the Mega Stone wouldn't be much good.

He didn't have a Banette, nor did he really intend to find himself a Shuppet to train up. Froslass continued to excel at everything he asked of her.

…this would serve him as a reminder never to forget what his friends had done for him. He took the Houndoom Mega Stone and carefully stashed it away in his backpack.

"That's Houndoominite. If you find yourself a Mega Ring, you can use this to Mega Evolve your Houndoom," Karrina said. "Where to find a Mega Ring?" She smiled knowingly. "That's another story entirely."

Yes. She was sure it was.

"Aaaanyway," Karrina said, stretching her back, "I'm done here. I'm going to go open up the entrance so that we can leave. Feel free to explore the rest of this place if you want to. Just know…just know that you really helped me out there. I still want to actually apologize for what happened in Kugearen."

"What?" Will said.

Karrina nodded. "I didn't trust you then, and now I know for certain that this girl was the fool. So…" she averted her eyes for a moment. "Thanks. If you ever need anything, anything at all, come find me."

Will wasn't sure what to say to that. This day had gone completely off the rails. Alice and Allen, Karrina and Karen, the Unown…the Houndoominite…

It was too much for him to process.

With Houndoom's Mega Stone weighing heavily on his shoulders, Will left the library behind. He didn't intend to go back there again.

~~~~~~~(III)~~~~~~~

---

East Gearen City

Vasile Household

Melia was just about finished gathering their stuff when she heard the front door to Venam's house open. She paused, listening.

"It's me," Will's voice rang out through the hall. "I'm back."

"Hey Will!" Melia said, perking up when she heard him shoving the front door shut behind him. "Welcome back!"

"Take care of your business?" Venam's voice came out from the living room.

Will grunted noncommittally. That was never a good sign.

"How did your quest for preparations go?" Melia tried next.

There was a pregnant pause before Will grumbled, "I need a shower."

"Yikes, that bad?" Melia replied.

Judging by the springs in the couch creaking with strain, Venam had all but vaulted herself to her feet. Quick footsteps and a surprised and very amused, "What in the actual fuck happened to you?" verified Melias suspicions.

A bit concerned now, Melia peeked her head from around the corner of the little storage room next to the kitchen and caught a glimpse of a Will who looked like he'd partaken in a demolition project without protective clothes. A fine layer of dust had settled over his clothes and his hair, his jacket and pants had dozens of tiny crisscrossing cuts and something sharp had cut through the laces in his shoes, leaving them floppy and open.

He looked disheveled in a way that almost suggested he'd used himself as equipment for said demolition job. Melia didn't see any blood for which she was very grateful, but that just begged the question, what happened to him?

Venam didn't hide her amusement very well. "Dude, you are a freaking mess!" She snickered. "Is this your idea of getting ready for the big city?"

Will rolled his eyes at her. "Laugh it up. I'm having a day."

"What kind of day?" Melia asked. She motioned for him to head upstairs - that was where the shower was, after all. "What happened?"

"Went to the library," he said as if that offered any kind of explanation at all.

"You know they read books there, right?" Venam said.

Melia sighed. "Self-awareness is dead…Venam, of all the people to make a comment like that…"

"Hey! Melia!" Venam said in that high-pitched "I have been betrayed" voice of hers.

Will set his backpack down and took a moment to wash his hands. He walked stiffly, favoring his left leg over the right one. "I can categorically say that books were read. If you want details, it's better to ask Karrina. It's her story."

"Karrina!" Melia and Venam both shouted within a second of each other. They shot each other a disturbed look, before Venam hurried to check and then lock the door behind them. "Did she want payback?" She said, peering out of the window to check if Will had been followed. "Did you have to kick her ass again?"

Melia ran her eyes across Will's body again, this time looking for smaller, more subtle tells. Any sign of…abuse or…she swore if Karrina had put her hands on him or hurt him in any kind of way she'd personally throw that woman off of Mount Carotos! "What did Karrina want with you?" She asked, keeping her voice neutral and guarded.

He must have noticed the concern in her tone even though she tried so hard to keep it even, because he glanced at her over his shoulder and offered her a tiny little smile. "Nothing like that," Will said with that quiet, reassuring quality his voice had when things got bad. "It was a Help Request. It involved her past. That's not mine to share."

"A Help Request? How's helping other people's messes going to get us prepared for GDC?" Venam demanded.

"Never underestimate the power of a grateful ally, Venam," Melia pointed out. "Karrina's got a network bigger than ours. Did you…did you successfully help her out, then?"

Will finished washing his hands and quickly dried them off with one of the towels hanging in front of the oven. "Yes. She's in a much better headspace, now. She needed that."

"Did she at least pay you?" Venam blurted out.

"No, surviving a house-sitting for Saki paid me," Will said.

"What!" Both girls exclaimed at the same time. When Venam began producing angry sputtery noises, Melia took it upon herself to translate. "You can't just drop bombshells like that! Does Saki have a house here?" She paused, leaving Venam to her fuming for a moment. "Was it a nice house?"

"It really was," he replied, putting such an emphasis on was that it got Melia really curious. "She has a swimming pool."

"Oh, how nice!"

"Start talking!" Venam shouted. "Now!"

With deliberate slowness, Will hung the towel back. "Shower first."

Ho boy if looks could kill.

"You have ten minutes!" Venam ordered. "After that I'm personally dragging you out of the shower!"

The image of Venam dragging a very naked and wet Will through the house stuck around in Melia's head for far longer than was necessary and made her cheeks flush. It…was interesting.

Venam would do it, there was no doubt about that. But ten minutes? Was that realistic? Would he make that?

"I can do it in nine," Will argued.

What?

"Eight!" Venam shot back.

Huh?

"Seven."

What was happening?

"FINE! Six minutes and then you're talking!" Venam snapped.

Everything about Will screamed that he wanted to get the last word in and yell "Five!" but somewhere inside of his head, a bolt of restraint remained that likely told him that wasn't a good idea. So instead he went, "Fine," and headed upstairs.

"House-sitting for Saki," Venam fumed, angrily crossing her arms over her chest. "That is some bullshit."

"...are you seriously dragging Will out of the shower if he doesn't make the time?" Melia asked.

Venam scoffed. "I would, but imagine mom coming home right when I'm doing so? It took her ages to get used to the idea of me being into girls. That would send her all the wrong signals."

"Yeaaaah…" Melia agreed.

She didn't keep count, but by her estimate Will finished his shower and headed back down in record time. He'd put on one of those tight, somewhat form-fitting T-shirts they'd bought together as well as a pair of sweatpants. That shirt looked good on him. Really good.

"I was just about to get your ass," Venam said impatiently. "Took your freaking time. Did you get lost or something?"

"I didn't even know there was shampoo for dyed hair," he said as he sauntered up to the table. "Got distracted. Spent three minutes staring."

"You learn something new every day," Venam said. She straightened in her chair, alarmed. "You didn't touch it, did you?"

"No," Will replied as he pulled out a chair and sat down as well.

"Okay…wait, so what did you use then?" Venam continued. "We don't have toiletries for men at home anymore."

"Laundry detergent," Will said.

Oh. Oh no.

Venam's eyes grew as wide as saucers. "Dude, are you insane?" She hissed. "You can't be that stupid. Shit, I mean you can, but even you can't be that dumb!"

Melia leaned closer towards him and sniffed his hair. A little smile tugged at her lips when the smile hit her nose; a sweet, nostalgic mix of vanilla and cocos butter. "Oh, you liar!" She laughed. "For a moment you genuinely had me!"

He gave her a tired wink.

"What, he was bluffing?!" Venam exclaimed. "Oh, you big jerk! Can't believe I fell for that! Don't scare me like that man!"

"You literally played dead when we first met," he shot back.

"That was SO FAKE!"

"I believed you were on death's door."

"How are you that gullible and also the most paranoid guy I've ever seen!"

"Days and days of practice. It's good to know you care, though."

Melia watched her friends bicker with equal parts confusion and fondness. This was how things should be. How they would have been, had Ren not turned their back on them and joined the enemy. Some nights she still woke up, wondering where he was, wondering where he'd gone. She almost preferred the actual nightmares over those feverish moments of confusion.

Scoffing, Venam crossed her arms and looked away. "Yeah. no shit! Who knows what dumb antics you get up to if you don't have someone holding your hand! That leads to crap like you house-sitting for Saki! Speaking of which, spill it!"

But this…this was good. Venam needed someone like Will to keep her grounded at times, to push back against her more childish tendencies. At the same time, Will needed someone to goof off with, someone who knew how to relax and how to get others to have fun as well.

Will placed both hands on the table and exhaled slowly. "So there I was, wandering through West Gearen…" He drawled, gazing off dreamily into the distance.

"Oh you can be so insufferable!" Venam snapped.

With another weary sigh, Will relented. "Okay. Here's what happened…"

He painted them a ridiculous story of a stern woman who left him a list allowing him to sit, breathe air and drink water and a gang of delinquents who had made it their life's goal to hinder people looking to aid the Help Centers. He told them about a short and frantic Pokemon battle that had awakened a home-security system in the form of a robot made in Saki's image. A gun-toting entity that couldn't be bargained with and couldn't be reasoned with. A horrible, violent intelligence that didn't feel pity or remorse or fear and absolutely would not stop, ever, until it had gotten Will and one of those crooks to have a modicum of fun with it.

Melia shivered at the thought.

"Sakitron," Will growled in his most dramatic, grittiest voice.

"Oh my GOD you are so full of it!" Venam said. "I could almost see it happen, too! Leave it to Saki to build a freaking killer-robot with her face. And what a DUMB name as well. Yeah, but seriously, what happened?"

"No, I am serious, that thing nearly killed us," Will said, dropping all pretense. "It threw me out the window, Kirlia blasted it through the wall, it tried to kill that girl, Kirlia ripped off its arm and half its face, exploded the entire wing on it, but it kept coming."

"Oh my gosh, what?" Melia said. The realization came a moment later. "Oh. Oh! So that's where all the dust and bits of paint came from!"

"Yikes, sounds an actual fucking menace," Venam said. "Fucking Saki. How'd you kick its ass then?"

Will shot Venam a deathly serious, very overdramatic stare. "It…had an off button."

"Wat."

"...Saki installed an off button in her security bot?" Melia asked.

Will nodded. "That AA grunt booped it and Sakitron just fell over."

"...what an anticlimax," Venam grumbled. "Did you at least take home some kind of trophy?"

"What, like its head? To mount on Tesla's wall or something?" Will asked, much to Melia's horror. "I don't think Amber would like me very much after that."

Venam grinned. "No, but I would! I was talking about a piece of the wing you blew up, but that's fucking metal!"

"You guys!" Melia said. "Seriously! That's awful!"

"...it's kinda funny though," Venam snickered. A second later Will started laughing. It was soft and genuine and achingly sweet and it was just -

Will. Laughing with her friend. Honest, relaxed, safe.

That night, as everybody went to bed, Melia turned that moment over and over in her head. Will laughing. Will making them laugh, making her laugh. There was something about it, something…something special. Something that she felt she wanted to recreate, over and over again. She replayed the moment in her head, watching it from every angle as she began drifting off to sleep.

Will. Making her laugh. Calming, staunch and gorgeous.

~~~~~~~(III)~~~~~~~

---

AN: another chapter that got out of hand. We've ended things on Will subconsciously pining for Melia, it seemed only fair to put Melia through that next.

Originally I wanted to wrap up Narcissa's Hauntings and Odessa's wild ride as well, but then Hidden Library 3 turned out many, many thousands of words longer than intended. It was simply too relevant to the overarching story to narrow it down. Now I know that originally, Houndoominite wasn't a part of the Hidden Library, but I'm not about to write about things that aren't relevant to the story. Will isn't going to ever use a Banette or a Heracross and the Houndoominite is just too thematically relevant for him with Karrina there. Even if he can't use it. So…I made a change.

Regardless, that means the next chapter will feature the two remaining side quests and then finally we can hop on the train towards GDC.