The Recruit, Part Two
The sun had risen, casting out scarves of red and orange, and still Lance had not seen another soul. Kana marched at his side. Her tail-flame had been a guide in the thick predawn gray; now, in the light of day, it was merely a reassurance. Toku glided overhead. Swaddled in Lance's scarf, she looked perhaps less dignified than a hakuryu should, but was undoubtedly the warmer for it. Better for his pokemon to be out and ready. He had no way of knowing how close the other recruits were—no way of knowing when their paths might suddenly cross.
Late-morning, a light snow began to fall, deepening the hush of the forest. The wild pokemon were closeted away in their dens. A single rattata broke cover to scuttle quickly across the silvery dusting of snow, leaving maple-leaf patterned tracks. Lance glanced backwards, where his own tracks stretched out. Should he be covering them? But the snow would do that job soon enough, and anyway, Lance wasn't averse to being found. Being found would mean a battle, and a battle would mean a token.
He walked on, weighed down by his pack but refreshed by the quiet beauty of the landscape. The light had turned dusky when he noticed the trees beginning to thin out. A forest fire, Lance determined, seeing the scorched bark, but it must have been some time ago. New trees had begun to shoot up, their slender trunks already taller than Lance. Ahead in the distance, a massive oak stood alone at the center of a wide clearing. Lightning had cleaved a gaping hole into its broad trunk.
Lance's mind flashed to the icons on his map. This must be the first waypoint! But he checked his excitement, scanning the ground that lay between him and the oak carefully. Circling the perimeter, he found tracks leading out from the oak, but they were not the fine-grooved imprints of human hiking boots. These were three-toed, with a size that suggested their owner would tower above Lance.
"Toku, can you see if anything is waiting inside there?"
After a tense few minutes, the hakuryu gestured him forward with her tail. When Lance poked his head inside the hollow, he was hit with the scent of musty, rotted leaves and another, ranker odor that put Lance in mind of dried blood. The hollow gaped wide enough for two kairyu to slumber there comfortably. Matted fungi, large leaves, and bits of rags were heaped to one side. Opposite, Lance caught a glint of bronze. He hoisted himself inside and found a bronze weight holding down a laminated map.
The map was to the same scale as Lance's, and indeed, was identical in almost every respect, except that where Lance's map showed a red x marker, this one showed the icon of a hollowed oak. From the oak, a route curved westwards, ending in another x. The next waypoint!
Lance hesitated. His pack contained a black marker. He could mark this new route without taking the map with him. Maybe he was meant to. Antares had instructed them to take each other's tokens, not leave the others stranded in the woods. As he rippled the map through the air, it occurred to Lance that he was probably not the first recruit to face this choice. He knew his legs were shorter than most of the others and he had far less experience with winter hiking. At least one person, maybe many more, had already held this map, and decided to leave it behind. He thought he knew why. This hollow made a bad place to lay a trap. There was nowhere to hide except in the hollow itself and, remembering the tracks outside, Lance doubted that was the smartest idea. Better to leave the map, and hope to seize some tokens later on, when the recruits converged at a later waypoint.
After copying down the map, Lance continued a few miles along the new route until he spotted a divot sheltered by two closely entangled trees. He staked his tent, finished the first day's rations, and fell to sleep snug in his sleeping bag with Toku, Kana splayed out over them like a gently-breathing heater.
He woke to a soft thump. Poking his head out, Lance saw that it had snowed heavily during the night. Only the dense branches of the trees above had prevented his tent from being completely buried. As he stared out at the glittering white landscape, Lance realized he'd been laxer than he ought to have been. He should have set a watch. The silence of the first day didn't mean no one was around—it just meant Lance hadn't seen them. For the rest of the day, he kept on higher alert as he trudged through the thick snow. But the landscape remained hushed around him, and the sky clear.
Towards evening, the ground sloped downwards, into a valley where the trees grew thicker and closer. As he continued, the branches intertwined as if grasping hands, to form a structure like a tunnel. The light cut out as Lance passed underneath. Inside, the air was warmer, stiller, and somehow thicker. Bright yellow husks hung on all sides—he'd entered a beedrill grove.
"Carefully, Kana," Lance whispered. A stray ember could bring the whole swarm down on him.
Kana's tail-flame cast a dim, wavering glow, illuminating pitted tree bark, large, heart-shaped leaves, and dark red berries. Lance's footfalls were muffled by the peat that covered the ground. He craned his head around the tree tunnel, but no telltale glint of bronze caught his eye.
As he quickened his pace, the ground shifted under him. A hard root closed tight around his leg and jerked him upward. Reflexively, Lance splayed his hands outward to steady himself, but they swung through the empty air like helicopter blades. Heat bloomed against his side; he turned his head to see a massive flame building in Kana's mouth.
"No!" he cried out shrilly. This grove would go up like tinder if she let the flame loose. "Swallow it, Kana!"
The charmeleon choked back on the flame. She clamped her mouth shut, face contorting. Acrid-smelling smoke dribbled from her clenched jaw, but not a single spark.
Lance expelled a shaky breath. A trap. He and Kana hung upside-down in the grip of tough vines. Toku, who had escaped the trip-wire, blinked quizzically at them from where she hovered in the air.
"Cut us loose," Lance almost said. But this was a trap. Someone had set it, and that someone couldn't be far away. They'd approach to deal with their catch. Then Toku could deal with them.
"Hide in the trees," Lance whispered. He thought he caught a shuffling sound in the distance. "Don't flame, Kana, whatever you do."
Yes, those had to be footsteps. Lance tensed to call out for Toku—
"Sleep powder," a low voice commanded.
A warm tingle bit into Lance's exposed skin. A massive yawn knocked his head to the side.
"The butterfree," Lance began, but his tongue was too heavy to finish the command. Sleep surged remorselessly over him.
Lance woke to darkness. His head was fogged, and a giant root dug painfully into his back.
"Toku?" he said. And then it came back. The trial. The second way-point. The butterfree. He scrambled to his feet, straining to penetrate the thick darkness. "What happened?"
Toku's answering trill was muted. He followed the sound of her voice, tripping over his pack in the process. Inside, he found his head-light and tugged it over his head. The yellow light spilled out over an unconscious body. Freckle-dusted face, with bleached hair tied back in a ponytail—Opal. A butterfree, a weepinbell, and a golbat lay slumped a few paces away.
"You beat them!" Lance said in surprise. From the dispirited tone of Toku's voice, he'd thought the battle had gone the other way. Kana's tail-flame cast a dim, wavering glow, illuminating pitted tree bark, large, heart-shaped leaves, and dark red berries. Light flickered in the distance and resolved into Kana's shape. The charmeleon's mouth stretched wide in a yawn.
They found Toku huddled on a makeshift nest of fine-haired moss. At first, Lance didn't see any sign of injury, but at last he noticed a long, deep cut across her back. The skin around the cut had turned an unsettling purple.
"The beedrill attacked?" Lance said, dropping his voice to a hush midway through the question. When Toku nodded, he glanced around nervously, but the yellow cocoons hung silently and the leaves didn't stir. "I think you've been poisoned."
Poisoned. What were they going to do?
The hakuryu didn't answer, just coiled herself tighter with an unhappy whine. Lance stumbled back over to Opal's unconscious form. Inside the other recruit's pack, he found three bronze tokens and a map depicting the route to the next waypoint. This, along with an extra day's worth of rations, he shoved into his own pack.
"We should go," Lance said, half to his pokemon, half to himself. Everything felt fuzzy, and his legs dragged like weights. Sleep spore attacks on humans could have an after-effect of up to twelve hours, he remembered from training.
He glanced uneasily at Opal. The two of them had never talked much, but Opal had been at the center of the dinner conversation every night, cracking jokes that sent the other recruits roaring with laughter, though honestly, Lance had never been able to make sense of the humor. Should Lance leave him here, or send up a flare? If he sent the flare, Opal would be taken back to the camp and Lance wouldn't have to worry about sudden sleep powder attacks. But Opal would lose his shot . . .
"Let's go," Lance murmured. He picked up Toku, who lay limp and heavy in his arms. Ten minutes later, they broke out into dark, frigid air. Shivering, Lance was tempted for a moment to turn back into the grove's musty warmth for the night. But that would be too risky. Another recruit could come or Opal could wake up.
They had a bigger problem, though. Toku was poisoned. Their packs hadn't come with any antidotes and Lance had no idea where, if at all, berries grew here that could cure the beedrill's toxin. Shelter first. He stumbled onwards for almost a mile, relying on the faint beam of his headlight and the full sky of stars to pick his path. Kana was too sleepy to walk.
At last Lance pitched tent at the base of a broad oak, ringed by thick bushes, and called out Ibuki to stand guard, even though the gyarados was anything but inconspicuous. Toku was still coiled tight, moaning faintly, Kana had fallen asleep the moment she hit the ground, and Lance could barely keep his own eyes open.
Later, Lance woke abruptly. He held still for a moment, straining to catch footsteps. Nothing, but as he glanced blearily around the low tent, he realized Toku was gone. Wiggling out of his sleeping bag and pulling on his coat, he stepped outside. He found Toku pressed against a tree trunk, her face twisted in concentration.
Shedding, Lance realized, as he bent closer, but this wasn't a normal shedding. The shed layer of skin was unusually thin and purpled in hue. A half-remembered story from one of Elder Kyo's lessons surfaced in Lance's mind of a poisoned hakuryu that had shed his illness.
Toku was doing the same, but the toll it was taking on her was obvious. Lance kept the hakuryu company for another hour. In a low, lulling voice, he spoke mostly nonsense, fragments of stories from the Ryu's Gift, new stories he'd heard in the training camp. "And when we come first in the rankings, Toku, the miniryu will join us. That'll surprise everyone back home, won't it?"
At last, sleep and the deepening chill forced Lance back into the tent. When he woke again, the sun was already blazing low in the sky. Toku's shedding was complete, but the hakuryu seemed as weak as a miniryu. She flinched terribly against the cold wind, her skin raw and sensitive. Lance undid his coat for her to rest inside, but the extra weight slowed him down, especially as the terrain began to turn mountainous.
The route climbed upward—Lance stuck on his crampons and began his ascent. He soon realized the full sun was no blessing. The ice that had formed overnight grew slippery and treacherous as it began to melt. When he grew weary of his slip-slide progress, Lance ordered Kana to burn the ice off the path. After that, the walk was wet and muddy, but at least his feet no longer wheeled out from under him. They found shelter that night in a small alcove carved into the mountainside. This time, they each took turns at watch. Lance's turn fell in the deep of night. He stared out into the inky blackness, straining his ears for the sound of footfalls, but he heard nothing except the occasional crash of rock and the scratching sounds of digging far away.
Once more, the day dawned clear. Lance set a hurried pace up the mountain path. He had been overtaken in the night by the uneasy sense that everyone was ahead of him. When he came to a clear open bend, he looked back out over the broad span of forest he'd already crossed, wondering if he would spot another recruit—Opal, perhaps—on his trail. But if anyone was moving far below, he didn't see them. As Lance lingered, it hit him that his position was open in more ways than one. He could see everything from here—but he could also be seen. He tilted his head up. Directly above him, perhaps a half-mile upwards, the black silhouette of a recruit was visible against the red-brown rock. Over the distance, their features were impossible to make out, but their gaze seemed to lock onto Lance's face.
A crack split the air. A moment later, the sky above Lance filled with dark shapes.
Clouds, he thought absurdly, but heavy.
Time slowed to a sap-trickle. The narrow path had no alcoves. He stood flanked by sheer cliff and empty air.
"Twister!"
Lance heard his own strangled shout as if from a distance. A vortex burst from Toku's tail with such force that Lance staggered. As air met rock, he flashed to their first gym battle. The stones had crashed down anyway, the twister hadn't held—
But here it held. Her face tight with concentration, Toku jerked her tail to the side, and the whirling mass of rocks followed. A silence stretched like an indrawn breath, and then a crash shook the mountain. Lance stood frozen as the reverberations slowly died away. When he looked back up, the figure had vanished. Did they expect to get away with that? Lance thought, sudden fury churning in his stomach.
"Get them, Toku."
The hakuryu shot upwards. Lance took off at a sprint up the steep path. Twice he slipped and fell on the ice-slick rock, scraping his face and hands, but he continued to run, propelled by the hot aftershock of panic, ignoring the cramping of his stomach and the shortness of his breath. Twenty minutes later, he rounded a bend onto a wider outcrop to see Toku facing a towering wall of ice. Behind it, Lance made out the face of another recruit, a dewgong, and a golem.
Delphin. She stood a foot taller than Lance; her eyes were wide-set and her hair was cropped close to her scalp. Lance had been paired a few times with her dewgong. "Too scared a stray attack's gonna hit her to give proper commands," had been Hunter's scathing evaluation of her battling, and Lance hadn't disagreed. She blanched now as she caught sight of him.
"You're all right!" Delphin's voice came muffled from behind the ice wall. "I-I'm sorry, I didn't mean—"
"To send the mountain down on me?" Lance finished for her. "Metal claw, Kana."
The charmeleon broke the ice-wall with one blow and planted herself menacingly over the dewgong, fist alight. Lance's mind worked furiously. With Toku so weak, the dewgong's ice attacks could be deadly. But Delphin didn't know that. If she thought they were at full-power, maybe she'd give in without a fight.
"Give me your token and I'll let you go."
Delphin stared at him. "I can't," she said slowly. "Mine's already gone. I—"
"Opal got you?" Lance blurted out, his mind flashing back to the two extra tokens in Opal's back.
A startled look crossed her face. "Yeah," she said after a moment. "Listen, I really wasn't trying to—" She shook her head as if at a loss for words. "I just panicked."
"Recall your pokemon and roll their pokeballs to me."
When she hesitated, he nodded to Kana, whose tail-flame flared.
Delphin raised her hands hastily. "Okay!" She recalled the golem first, then the dewgong.
"Your third?" Lance asked, as he picked up the two pokeballs.
"She's just a venonat, not a fighter—"
"The venonat too." Was he making the right choice? Lance suspected Hunter would have already knocked Delphin out. "Walk ahead of me."
They set off in a silence cut only by Lance's heavy breathing. His sprint up the steep mountain path had been misjudged. Delphin's legs were longer than Lance's, and the pace she set made his sides burn.
Three hours later, the path fell abruptly into a chasm. Two wood posts stood three feet apart, but the rope bridge that had once stretched between them lay in tatters. Nature? A badly-placed battle? Or deliberate sabotage from a recruit who had already passed through? Lance searched the nearby crevices for a bronze weight and map, but he found nothing. Delphine crouched by the two posts, examining the rope tied to them.
"Anything?" she asked, as Lance came up behind her.
"No. How's the bridge?"
Delphin shook her head. "Impassible. But—" She got up slowly, posture deliberately unthreatening. "I think Kioshi could get us across. My dewgong."
Lance hesitated. There was no way Toku could carry him all the way across right now. "What did you have in mind?"
"An ice-bridge. I've used them before. Kioshi can make her ice strong enough to support my weight."
"Fine." He tossed the pokeball to her, watching closely for any sign of a sneak attack, but Delphin ignored him. The bridge her dewgong shaped was two feet abreast and slightly convex.
"I can go first, if you don't trust it."
"You go first," Lance said, "but your pokemon stay here."
He couldn't help holding his breath as she slid across the bridge, but the ice held steady beneath her. She gave Lance a small wave from the other side.
He recalled Kana and the dewgong, and sat gingerly down on the ice. Even through his layers of clothing, the cold was palpable. The journey lasted less than a minute, but that minute was terrifying and exhilarating in turn. He slid frictionlessly across the ice, wind whipping past his ears, aware that all that separated him from a thousand-foot fall was the skill of a trainer he hardly knew.
The rocky ground of the opposite side felt blissfully firm under his feet as he stumbled off the slide. When he looked up, Delphin was watching him warily. He managed a small smile.
"Thanks. I'm not sure how we'd have crossed without you. When we get off the mountain, I'll give you your pokemon back. Neither of us knows where to go next, so let's just go our separate ways, okay?"
Delphin smiled too. "Thanks," she said, relief clear in her voice. "That's fair."
The descent down the mountain took another three hours. The sun was almost completely sunk when they split ways.
"Good luck," Delphin said.
"You too."
And then she was gone, and Lance stood alone in the dark. He'd passed the third waypoint, but had no map to show for it. From here, the path was unknown.
A waterfall. That was the key. Lance and Toku spent the next day in search of running water. At last Toku located a small stream, which they followed until it joined a broader, fast-moving river. Here Lance grinned. Ibuki materialized in the water with a loud roar, and cut northwards against the icy current. Lance draped himself against her smooth scales, grateful for the respite. Between the aftermath of the sleeping spore and his panicked run up the mountain, his whole body ached. The sound of Ibuki cutting through the water was soothing, and before Lance knew it he had drifted asleep.
He woke to the crash of a waterfall. The tall, white cascade was a relief to see, but as Lance looked around he began to wonder where the map could be hidden, if it was there at all. When he posed the question out loud, Ibuki spun round and whipped her tail out, cutting the waterfall's flow for a second. Lance had a brief impression of gloomy vastness before the crash of the water resumed.
"Behind the waterfall? Okay. Toku, can you cut an opening with a twister? Then Ibuki, dive through."
She leaped through the scattered spray into a dark wide cave. The water continued for several feet and then climbed into rocky shore. As Lance swung himself off Ibuki's back, a low moan rose from deeper within. Lance froze. Another trap? He edged forward cautiously, his headlight illuminating the rock step by step. A figure was swaddled in a sleeping bag against the back wall of the cave, as far from the water as possible. Sweat glinted on his forehead and his eyes were squeezed shut.
"Alto?" Lance whispered, recognizing him as one of the oldest recruits in the cohort. His forehead was hot against Lance's palm. "What happened?"
Alto blinked twice, squinting slowly up at Lance. "Climbing," he rasped. "Climbing the cliff. A water demon leaped out. Fangs and blue scales. I lost my grip . . ."
"A gyarados attacked you?"
"A water demon. Broke my arm, I think. It wanted to eat me, but my pokemon held it off. Exhausted them. If it comes back, I don't know—"
"Gyarados don't eat humans," Lance said sharply. Alto's fevered state unnerved him. "Can you get up? We need to send your flare."
Alto's eyes widened as he stared over Lance's shoulder.
"It's come back," he whispered, stiffening.
He must have finally noticed Ibuki. Lance turned to wave her out of sight, and saw the water was churning up in the pool. Ibuki sank down suddenly with a strangled cry. Lance sprang to his feet and raced over to the shore-side.
A moment later, two gyarados broke the surface. In the dark, it was hard to make out where one ended and the other began. A low grunt, as an aqua tail hit home. The wild gyarados, Lance thought.
The battle took place half under-water, half out of it. The gyarados were intertwined too tightly for Toku to come to Ibuki's aid. Lance was reduced to rapid fire commands—"Teeth!", "Tail!", "Belly!"—whenever the writhing ryu came back into sight. It seemed to Lance a whole hour had passed, but perhaps it had only been ten minutes, when Ibuki surfaced alone. She reared back her crested-head and let out a bellow that echoed deafeningly in the small cave. At the noise, Alto moaned and pressed his hands over his ears.
Lance didn't have the heart to cut short Ibuki's celebration. He felt too relieved himself, anyway. He'd been all but helpless during the battle, trapped at the edge of the water.
"You did brilliant, Ibuki," he murmured, when the gyarados finally quieted. She let out a low rumble of pleasure as he ran his hands across the sensitive undersides of her cheek-fins.
With Kana's help, Lance heaved Alto, who had slipped into unconsciousness, onto Ibuki's back. Together they crossed the waterfall, back into the dazzling wintery light. Lance did his best to position Alto comfortably against the trunk of a tree. In the recruit's pack, Lance found his token, a laminated map marked with the final red x, and an emergency flare. The flare burst in red like an overripe fruit. When Lance looked back from the top of the waterfall, the light was still hanging in the sky.
He'd hoped the final stage of the journey would continue along the river, but after only a few miles, the route diverged. Lance recalled Ibuki and shouldered his pack, lighter now in terms of rations, but weighed down by five bronze tokens, including his own. He only made it five more miles that day. His steps came slow and heavy, like a sleepwalker.
That night, his dreams were a confusion of images: Toku crawled out from a massive shed husk, suddenly the size of a miniryu. His cousin Ibuki shouted at him by the riverside, clutching a bag of laundry, until her bellowing transformed her into a red-eyed gyarados. Lance was flying, alone on the back of some great ryu. But his eyelids were incredibly heavy. At some point his fingers went slack, his grip loosened, and he tumbled into a roaring white sea.
The sky was still dark when Lance opened his eyes on the sixth day of the trial. Chewing listlessly at his trail rations, he stared hard at the thick red x on the map. His pack seemed heavier than ever when he hoisted it onto his back, and his legs ached, but at least his head felt clear. Ten miles and they would be done.
The cold seemed less biting today, but the sky was overcast, leaving the world a veil of whites and shadowed grays. Lance focused on his footfalls. A light snow covering had descended in the night, hiding roots and stinging nettle.
After five hours and two brief rests, Lance reached the tower. It rose up suddenly in the distance, a brooding black silhouette cut out against the pale sky. He quickened his pace. In a half-mile, the trees ended, cleared away in a twenty-meter radius of the tower. Closer, Lance could see that the structure was in serious disrepair. The rampart at the top had worn away jagged and the walls were pockmarked where stones had fallen loose.
Lance didn't spot any movement in the tower, but he was uneasily aware that with such a structure it was entirely possible to see without being seen. Maybe his approach had already been noticed.
The fresh covering of snow that lay between Lance and the tower seemed undisturbed by tracks, but from the uneven way the snow had fallen, Lance suspected the ground had been previously turned up by battle. He circled the perimeter twice. As they came round the second time, Kana let out a startled hiss, lifting her right foot. A barb was embedded there—it was three times the size of a natural thorn and blue-gray in hue.
As he turned the barb in his hands, Lance understood all at once just who was waiting in the tower.
"How do you feel, Kana?" he asked quietly, examining the deep cut where the barb had entered.
Kana's answering yip was strong, but she stared uneasily down at her foot. Poisoned, Lance thought, his heart sinking.
There was no point waiting, then. They had to challenge the tower before the poison's effect worsened.
"Burn a path."
They approached like a forest-fire. Any further barbs or traps dissolved in the heat of Kana's flame. But no movement came from the tower; no pokemon interrupted their progress with a challenge.
At last, Lance stood in front of the ancient, iron-fastened door. As he stepped forward, the ground gave way suddenly under his feet; he was thrown backwards. A blue-gray shape burst from the dirt, its hot breath grazing his cheeks for only a second before it vaulted away. The door to the tower jerked open.
Hunter stood inside. She wore a small smile, but somehow the expression wasn't friendly.
"So you made it," she said softly, bending to retrieve something from her nidoqueen. "I was beginning to wonder."
A pokeball. Lance's hand jumped automatically to his belt. Only two balls there—Ibuki's was gone.
"How many tokens did you manage to get?"
"Four." Lance's tongue smacked clumsily against the roof of his mouth. "Four and my own."
"Four, huh? Not bad. I've got five. Five and my own," she added, a hint of mockery in the repetition.
Lance's gaze followed Ibuki's pokeball as Hunter tossed it from hand to hand.
"I'd offer you the same deal I've offered everyone who's made it this far," she said after a moment. "Give me your tokens, and I'll let you pass without a fight. Raw deal, do you think?" she added, seeing Lance's expression shift. "Maybe. But people took it. The ones who didn't—well, they won't be taking the oath tomorrow. Don't worry, though. That's not the deal I'm offering you, 'cause I owe you. Don't like owing people, but there it is. I'll let you keep your own token—hell, I'll let you keep an extra one too. That'll set you on the command track. Give me the rest, and you can pass."
For a long second, Lance considered it. Exhaustion lay on him like a hard gray weight. Toku's scales were still tender, poison was working its way up Kana's leg, and Ibuki was out of his reach. He could become an agent, follow Hunter into the command track. If anyone was going to beat him, he wouldn't mind it being her.
But becoming an agent wasn't enough. Surpass the others, Archer had said. Lance couldn't come in second. He couldn't.
"No," he said quietly, and then louder, "No. No deal."
Beside him, Kana let out an approving growl. Hunter sighed.
"Look, I like you, so I'm going to give you one more chance. Keep two tokens. Give me three."
She doesn't want to fight me! Does she think she'd lose?
Wordlessly, Lance shook his head.
"So be it," said Hunter.
Even as her shoulders dipped in a shrug, a sharp whistle split from her mouth. A brown blur dove from the ramparts, seizing onto Toku. Hunter's fearow. His talons gripped a black strip of cloth, which he rubbed once, twice, across Toku's face before she bucked him off. The fearow retreated with a triumphant caw. But Toku sagged suddenly, listless as the miniryu in the casino tank. She sank through the air, twisting as if trying to shake off an invisible grip, and thumped to the ground. When Lance called out to her, she didn't stir.
"Sleep spore," Hunter said flatly. "She won't wake up anytime soon, not with that dose. Butterfree-boy gave me some, in exchange for sparing his token. Thought it would come in handy."
Lance stared disbelievingly at Toku's still form. When he looked up, he and Kana were flanked by Hunter's nidoqueen and scyther. Above, her fearow circled.
You expect battles to be straight-forward. Two opponents meeting on a clear field. Lance shook his head against the ghost of Hunter's words. Three against one. It was three against one now—
"I gave you a chance," Hunter broke his thoughts. Her voice was as angry as he'd ever heard it. "Don't give me that face. I even gave you two chances." She drew in a breath and seemed to collect herself. "Gust, earth power, slash."
Lance reeled. How were they supposed to defend against three simultaneous attacks?
"Flamethrower—"
The gust knocked Kana off her feet. A plume of earth sent her flying backwards, where the scyther's blade connected with a hard thunk against her back. The charmeleon pushed herself back up, eyes glinting furiously at the injustice of the situation. Lance swallowed. Even Kana couldn't defend against three skilled opponents.
They had to try, though. What else could they do?
"Flame the scyther, keep your tail ready," Lance shouted, and Kana sprung forward with a roar. But the scyther side-stepped her flame easily, lifting off into the air, out of reach, even as the nidoqueen slammed roughly into Kana from behind. As Kana spun round with a gleaming iron-tail, the fearow appeared out of nowhere. His hard-edged wing absorbed the attack. An instant later, the scyther struck another blow off Kana's back. Lance winced.
Kana swayed. Her tail-flame doubled, then tripled. She dove forward at the fearow, who soared easily upwards. Kana leaped after her—uselessly, Lance thought, because an updraft had already borne the fearow far above their heads.
But as Kana leaped, she changed. Her outstretched arms rippled; her tail elongated; broad wings unfurled from her back. She hurtled forward like a pure white comet. Before Lance could process the shift, she overtook the fearow, gripped its tail-feathers in one three-clawed fist, and slammed the bird into the stone-face of the tower. As the fearow dropped like a stone, Kana's fire engulfed her.
For a moment, all of them stared in silence at the blazing bird. Then Kana, as if not yet satisfied, struck a metal-fisted claw against the fearow's charred back. The crunch of a breaking bone reverberated across the clearing.
With a hiss, the scyther shot forward, blades bared.
"Flamethrower," Lance called out giddily. As the scyther dipped down to avoid the flame, Kana fell on her with metal-claw. Fire billowed out from her from mouth; she threw herself into a tight spiral, the flames spinning into a vortex, and caught up as the scyther limped away through the air. The flaming twister crashed them both into the ground. Kana broke upwards, tail blazing a brilliant blue. The scyther lay crushed on the ground.
Hunter's face had turned terribly pale. She stared up with her mouth hanging as Kana somersaulted gleefully through the air, expelling puffs of fire.
"Dig," Hunter whispered. Her nidoqueen vanished into the ground. An instant later, the earth surged under Lance. The nidoqueen flung him down, purple toxin pooling in her claw as she held it over his neck. He twisted frantically, but couldn't break her grip. A scent, sweet and spicy like jasmine mingled with wild garlic, clogged Lance's senses. He coughed, sputtered, and felt his head start to spin—
Kana ripped the nidoqueen from Lance's chest and flung her across the clearing with a terrible roar. She shoved her snout forward, fury softening into concern as her eyes quested over his face.
"I'm fine," Lance rasped. His chest panged as he pulled in a breath of clear, cold air. When he looked around the clearing, the nidoqueen had vanished once more under the dirt.
Lance's fingers closed around the thick blades of Kana's back. As if in a trance, he hauled himself upwards, until he was perched between the charizard's wings.
"Fly," he whispered, and Kana soared up into the air. Her skin gave off heat like a fire-warmed stone. Lance pressed his cheek into her back, letting his eyes dip for just a moment as he gave himself over entirely to the weightless rush of the air.
When at last he opened his eyes, Hunter stood like a pinprick of shadow at the base of the tower. Farther out, Lance could see the dark green heads of the trees, the place where forest rose into mountain. He even fancied he could glimpse the sea in the distance, where the gray roof of the sky bent into blue.
For a moment, he wished he could fly far away. But Toku and Ibuki were back below. Hunter was back below. The battle wasn't over.
Hunter was crouched over her fearow when Kana landed. Her nidoqueen let off a low warning growl. Hunter raised her head slowly, her jaw clenched.
"Hand over your tokens," Lance said steadily, from the height of Kana's back. "You can keep your own."
Her gaze dropped back to her injured fearow, to her scyther, still unmoving on the ground, and finally to her nidoqueen. Wordlessly, she turned into the dark entryway of the tower. A bronze token flew out, then another, and another, until five tokens glinted on the ground. She withdrew her fallen pokemon in two quick flashes.
"Ibuki's pokeball," Lance said.
The red and white sphere bounced off Kana's chest. Hunter turned into the tower, her nidoqueen at her heels. Five minutes later, a green light blazed from the ramparts. Motionless, as if made of stone, Lance watched the tower from Kana's back, until an hour later the roar of a helicopter cut the air. The black craft hovered for a minute; then it was gone.
Lance lingered atop the tower until dusk, half-hoping someone would stumble out of the woods for Kana to challenge, but no one came. The charizard rippled with unspent energy. Lance sat with his knees pulled to his chest, watching her twist and somersault through the air. Sunset turned the clouds into puffs of flame. When Kana at last landed on the rampart, folding in her wings, Lance asked quietly, "Are you ready to go?"
She stood several inches taller than Lance now, but her answering grin was the same.
The green flare flashed brightly in the dimming light. When the helicopter came, Lance stepped inside, but Kana spread her wings. She followed the craft back to camp like the blazing tail of a comet.
Three days later, Lance stood with eight members of his cohort in the center of camp. He held his back very straight, conscious of the new uniform he wore. The dark fabric was heavy, but finely-woven and surprisingly soft. The red R on his chest seemed to blaze in the faint gold light of evening. The air was cool and bright. It seemed the heavy snow of the past two days had let up just in time for the ceremony.
Antares surveyed the line of recruits. Her expression was neutral, but something in the tilt of her chin betrayed her pride. "Each of you," she began softly, "has proven your worth by trial. You have risen above your fellows and demonstrated your excellence. Some of you—" Her eyes seemed to fall on Lance "—have surpassed all expectations. You have indeed earned the uniforms you wear tonight. Now the time has come for you to take the oath that matches this uniform. Repeat after me: I am a rocket."
"I am a rocket," Lance murmured with the rest, feeling the words catch and light like tinder in his chest. "I rise above the mob. Unified in strength. Unmatched in aspiration. My blood, my fist, my heart, I pledge to our joint venture. This I swear—to hold fast; to obey; to act and not to falter; from this day, until the day our future is made whole."
When the oath ended, the camp stood completely silent. As Lance stared out, his heart racing, he caught movement in the shadows. A houndoom looked back at him, her lips seeming to draw back into a grin.
Was Archer here somewhere? Had he been watching the ceremony?
"Dismissed." Antares voice rang out. "Tomorrow you will receive your first assignments. But tonight —the rest of this night belongs to you, agents."
Agents. Lance couldn't help the grin that split his face at the new form of address. He followed his fellow agents to the main bonfire, where several other cohorts were already gathered. A red R gleamed on everyone's chest. People were roasting kiritanpo over the fire; in the corner, one sturdy table groaned with a vast assortment of drinks. Low chatter mixed and mingled. Someone pressed a bright green drink into Lance's hands. Alcoholic, he decided after a sniff, but he downed it anyway. The sharp, herb-y taste wasn't exactly pleasant, but new warmth rose in his stomach, and a glow spread across his cheeks. Agents from the other cohorts kept coming up to introduce themselves. Somehow, everyone seemed to know how many tokens he'd finished with. Lance smiled and nodded and tried to keep all the names straight in his head.
Delphin's familiar face came as a relief, when he ran into her by the makeshift bar.
"Congratulations!" she said. "They're saying you finished with ten other tokens. Is that really true?"
"Yes," Lance answered, tired of having this conversation every five minutes. "Congratulations to you, too. How did you find your way?"
"Kioshi has a good nose for water," she said with a shrug, "and after, I used the flares to set my course. But—I'm not really owed congratulations." She grimaced. "I didn't even finish with a token."
"I know," Lance reminded her.
She blinked. "You—oh." A sheepish grin crossed her face. "Oh that. Uh, sorry about that. I was lying when we met on the mountain. I still had my token then. I knew you could knock Kioshi out in no time flat, so I thought it was worth a try."
Lance strained to keep his face blank. "You had it the whole time?"
"All the way to the watch-tower. And that's where Hunter got me." Delphin let out a short laugh. "She didn't buy the whole 'lost-my-token' routine. Searched my backpack and patted me down until she found it. But you beat her in the end, huh?"
"I beat her," Lance said. Though at that moment, the words seemed completely false. Delphin had her token the whole time! Some agent Lance would make, if he couldn't catch an obvious lie like that. Hunter had obviously seen through it in a second. Lance glanced around the party, noticing Hunter's absence for the first time.
They hadn't spoken since their battle. Lance had spent the time since his return either curled up in bed with Toku or flying on Kana's back, exploring the area from the sky. He hadn't looked for Hunter—he hadn't wanted to face her. But it would be wrong to start his first night as an agent by acting like a coward. Lance slipped away from the party and headed into the forest, Toku draping herself lazily around his neck. The cold air beat refreshingly against his face after the heat of the bonfire.
When he caught sight of a figure sitting on a tree stump by their old battling spot, Lance wasn't sure at first if it was Hunter. As he stepped closer, he realized with a start what had struck him as odd about her silhouette. Her braid was gone. It lay in her lap like the discarded skin of a miniryu.
"Shouldn't you be at the party, where everyone can kiss up to you?" Hunter asked without turning.
Lance swallowed. "Are you all right?"
"All right? What do you think?" When she faced him, he saw her face was free of tears, but her eyes were red. "What are you doing out here, bothering with a grunt like me?"
"Don't be ridiculous." Lance said, narrowing his eyes. "I don't believe all these stupid rumors about tokens and tracks and promotions. They'll see how good you are and you'll rise just as quick as anyone. I'll tell Archer—"
Her short, bitter laugh made him flinch.
"Tell Archer," she echoed him mockingly. "Yes, you're his little protege, aren't you? That was clear from the beginning. And why not? You train dragons. You better keep your head about that. It's the dragons people care about, not you. No wonder I couldn't win, huh? Eighth-born scum of Viridian against dragons."
The tone hurt more than the words. Lance knew he'd beaten Hunter fairly. If anything, he was the one with a right to be upset. She'd planned to ambush him, planned to beat him three on one and rob him of his tokens. But she was also the closest he'd come to having a friend since Ibuki.
All the warmth of the alcohol had fizzled away. For a moment, Lance wished fervently that he had taken Hunter's deal and handed over his tokens. If he had, they could have scaled the watchtower together. If he had, maybe they'd be back at the party now, smiling in the corner as they watched the other agents make fools of themselves.
"Hunter—" he began, stepping forward.
"Lance." The soft voice cut the night air. He spun around to see Archer standing between two slim trees, his houndoom at his side. "Come with me."
Lance hesitated, his gaze stuck on Hunter.
"You're not making a great start as an agent if you can't follow simple orders," she said. Her eyes shone furiously in her pale face. "Didn't you hear him?"
So Lance turned away, trailing Archer deeper into the forest. He tried to imitate the man's noiseless footfalls and loping stride. He moves like his houndoom, Lance thought.
When they entered a small clearing, washed a bright silver in the moonlight, Archer turned. "Perhaps you are aware that you set a record. Your token total has only been surpassed by recruits five years your senior. Well done."
The two terse words of praise lit through Lance like a flame. There's another agent, Hunter, who's really amazing, he meant to say, but Archer's next sentence drove everything out of his mind.
"I think you've earned your reward." Archer held out a pokeball, its light blue surface crossed with yellow.
"Is that—"
"Your jackpot?" Archer spoke laconically, a hint of a smile playing around his mouth. "Indeed. I keep my promises."
Lance took the pokeball with trembling fingers. Toku nudged her head against the release, and light spilled out into the shape of a tightly coiled miniryu. Lance stared. He'd forgotten how small a miniryu could look. His eyes were squeezed shut, his head tucked into his tail.
"Hello," Lance whispered, crouching down. "I'm Wataru. Do you remember me?"
Slowly, the miniryu raised his head. First his gaze latched on Lance, and his eyes seemed to sharpen in recognition. Then his gaze rose to Toku. His little mouth sagged open as the hakuryu chimed a gentle trill of hello. His eyes traced every inch of her, from her proud silver horn to the pulsing blue beads of her tail, with an expression that proclaimed Toku all the stars in the sky, and the moon too.
Hoarsely, the miniryu trilled. Toku answered, gliding closer, and then the two were speaking, their tones overlapping. Lance's chest glowed with joy as he listened, splayed out on the scrub soil, heedless of the dirt staining his new uniform. Everything—agents, tokens, Hunter—had dropped completely from his mind.
At some point, Archer must have slipped away as soundlessly as he'd arrived. But Lance didn't notice. He sat listening to the soft melody of the ryu's speech until the sky lightened with dawn.