Post by scissorhands on Mar 12, 2017 17:18:38 GMT -8
“Okay, Leafeon,” Alby said in a hushed tone to his trusted friend. Alby knelt and Leafeon stood with its back arched downward, both hidden in tall grass.
His words were spoken and Leafeon slowly walked forward, parting grass seemingly blade-by-blade until it reached a clearing. Its nose was the first bit to break the plane before Alby called a Magical Leaf to be rocketed forward and out of the grass.
“Move forward!” he called.
A series of rainbow-colored leaves swept across an unsuspecting, small yellow bird with white, cotton-looking wings. It tried as it could to flap downward and generate momentum to propel itself upward, but the leaves kept it from doing so.
The Pok?mon turned its head frantically in the direction of Leafeon, crying out before a slight, blue, frozen-seeming beam shot with precision at the grass-type.
“Now!” Alby called.
The Ice Beam snapped against Leafeon’s body and threw her to the ground. The rainbow-colored leaves scattered and abated, so the small bird began to turn away. And then, almost seeming without cause, the bird erupted into electricity and fell to the ground in a heap.
Alby reached quickly to a side pocket of his pack, grabbing a small Pokeball and depressing the button to let it expand.
He cast it through the air, arching and slow but with precision. It soundlessly crashed onto the exhausted Pok?mon’s body and for a moment everything was blindingly red.
Alby shielded his eyes. When he looked back, the Pokeball seemed to be wrestling vigorously with itself on the ground until, after a few long seconds, it thrust one last time and rolled to a stop.
“Yes! Yes!” Alby called out.
He jogged to Leafeon who seemed to him to be relatively unfazed by a few lines that looked like freezer burn across its small body. “You okay?” he asked, covering the marks with a small haze of medicine from a blue spray bottle. Leafeon sealed its eyes affectionately, nuzzling its trainer for affirmation.
“And, Joltik,” he said, looking around and trying to spy his tiny Pok?mon, “I think you have finally perfected your timing jumping from Leafeon’s back. You didn’t take that Ice Beam at all! Perfectly sneaky, my friend. Swablu never saw it coming.” Joltik came leaping from nowhere Alby was able to see, perching itself on its trainer’s shoulder.
Alby walked with Joltik and beside Leafeon to the Pokeball on the ground. He picked it up and breathed in and then out, relieved. “We’ve been trying to get to you for a long time,” he said, “you’re really strong and put up a heck of a fight. Just like you did when it happened.” He paused for a second and said nothing before he closed his eyes and breathed deeply again. “I promise I’ll be taking good care of you from now on, buddy,” he said.
-
A large wooden arch greeted Alby as he found his way back across the border of Floaroma town. He was bombarded by the overwhelming essence of any and all types of aromatic flowers that were so copiously planted that the town looked almost like it was lit up in a color wheel of lights. There was sense that throughout the town the only sound one could hear was the light whistling of the breeze travelling through.
The Pok?mon Center was not far off from the signage welcoming visitors to the town.
Doors closed automatically behind him and a few patrons and trainers making their stay at the Pok?Center gave him passing glances and smiles. He approached the counter, uncharacteristically vacant.
“Hello, Alby,” the nurse at the counter said as he walked up, “How are you today?”
“I’m well,” he said, “how are you?”
“Very well, thank you. Do your friends need a little help?”
“A couple of them do. Especially my newest, here,” Alby said, smiling and handing over the Pokeball from his belt that had the fewest scratches and blemishes.
“Who do we have here?” the nurse said.
“That’s Swablu.”
“Oh! You’ve been on her trail for a while, haven’t you?”
“Yeah, it’s been a while. But you remember everything.”
“I think that’s so sweet of you, Alby. Your sister would be proud. We’ll go get Swablu and your others going for you.”
Alby thanked the nurse before she walked away from the counter with Swablu and Leafeon’s Pok?Balls. He turned away from the counter and walked to a couch situated in front of a fireplace that wouldn’t be lit until later in the night. Even in Floaroma Town, Sinnoh was a place that needed fire after the sun went down.
Beside the fireplace, there was a framed newspaper’s front page. It depicted a headline that spelled out, “THE END OF GALACTIC” and showed pictures of several trainers who had been at a chaotic scene. Alby remembered hearing about the event on the news. He recognized one of the trainers in the picture on the paper. Alby had seen him in the finals of the Ever Grande Conference on television before.
As he sat, Joltik crawled from his shoulder and down his arm to Alby’s fingers. Alby lifted his hands in the air, wiggling his fingers in all directions and letting Joltik playfully weave throughout them. The tiny Pok?mon was just a bit too big to do it seamlessly and occasionally would get knocked off and have to climb back up to start over.
“Alby!” a voice called, someone running through the doors of the Center.
Alby turned his head and looked to a familiar face.
“Ali! I can’t believe it took you even this long, man,” Alby said, shaking his head and laughing a bit.
“Came as fast as I could,” the young man with the dark skin but bright clothes seemed to yell, startling everyone around them. Alby laughed, still, as Ali sat down beside him.
“You caught it, man, you caught it.”
“I did,” Alby said, ”wasn’t easy. Had to use Leafeon’s Magical Leaf like a net or something to keep it down. We did the Joltik trick.”
“And it worked this time? You think they’ve got it down?”
“Yeah,” Alby said, “Joltik timed it perfectly. Hid perfectly on Leafeon’s back. It was all surprisingly smooth.”
“Hey, I’m happy for you man. Your sister would be proud, I mean it.”
“Thanks. Thanks,” Alby said.
“So what’s next, man?”
“To be honest with you, I haven’t even really thought about it. I think since Ella passed, I haven’t thought about much other than finishing what she started. This was kind of the last piece. Those guys are finally gone and it feels real now that I know they can’t hurt Swablu.”
“But you’re gonna go somewhere, right? Gonna go challenge gyms or something, right?”
“I don’t know, I think—“ Alby said but didn’t finish.
“Alby, you can’t just go back to the shop. You’re strong enough now.”
“I don’t know, man. Don’t think I haven’t thought about it. I have. I would feel terrible leaving my parents, is the thing.”
“Your parents are going to be fine, Alby. I can tell you what your parents want—they want their teenage son to be able to go do things and see things. I’m pretty sure they’ve never planned on you staying with them forever.”
Alby sat and looked at the fireplace a moment. His Pok?tch changed time on the hour, the motion catching his eye. He looked back to the fireplace and it started up abruptly, seemingly aligned with the time.
“What are you gonna do?” Ali said, “Work in the flower shop for the rest of your life?”
“What about you?” Alby said, “Hand off the reins of the shop to someone else. Come with me—let’s go somewhere, let’s challenge gyms.”
“I can’t. I wish that I could, but there’s no one else who can do it right now. I sound like a hypocrite, but my family depends on that income.”
Across the room, the nurse quietly placed a tray with two red and white balls contained down on the counter. She said, calmly and just loud enough to be heard over the soft rumbling of the fireplace, “Whenever you’re ready, Alby.”
Ali said, “Go get your Pok?mon and do something. When I can find someone to hand over the shop to, I’m gonna come join you. We’ll be champions and we’ll be bigger than this town. It’s our dream to make a living battling. I remember you telling me that when you were 4 years old. Go do it, Alby, I’ll catch up.”
Alby looked at his friend and then looked away, back down at Joltik. He stood up and held Joltik out at arm’s length. He said, “What do you think, dude?” to Joltik, “You think we can beat a Salamence? A Gyarados?”
Joltik closed its four eyes and leapt around emphatically. “Yeah,” Alby said, “me too.”
Alby walked to the counter and picked up the Pok?Balls in either hand. He looked at them for a moment, one covered in blemishes and the other without a spot. He pushed in their center buttons simultaneously and the balls became little bigger than the berries scattered all around Floaroma town. He attached them to his belt. He recalled Joltik to its Pokeball as well.
“I guess,” Alby said, turning to the couches across the room and speaking to his still-seated friend, “I’ll see you when I see you.”
Ali rose and walked steadily across the center, approaching Alby and embracing him. “Good. See you when I see you,” he said.
-
The sun had started to set slowly and streaks of orange and purple bent into his cold bedroom through windows on the top floor of a drafty home. Alby was packing everything he could fit into his small pack that normally only held a few medicines and vacant Pok?Balls. He had a few days’ worth of clothes, his Pok?dex, a compact sleeping bag, a water bottle, and what little money he had. He had little enough packed that he stood and questioned, for a moment, whether or not he was actually ready to step out the doors of his home and go somewhere completely unknown. But he grabbed his badge case last, opening it briefly to look at the three Sinnoh-region badges he possessed. They glinted as he tilted the case back and forth, throwing off the sunlight that would strike it. And he knew he had won difficult battles and gotten through difficult times in that moment. And he knew he could trust his Pok?mon. He closed the case and flipped it over. On its bottom, a small scrap of paper was taped on that read:
“Alby: We’re in Sinnoh! Time and space all started here. But please don’t ever let either of them stop you.
—Ella”
He clutched the case tightly and took a breath before he lodged it, too, into his small orange pack. He took off his jeans and shirt, dirtied from the day and threw them into the large mouth of a hamper in the corner that was shaped like a Loudred. He pulled on his maroon, slim-fit pants and put on an aqua-blue snap-t fleece. It had red accents and, over a long-sleeve t-shirt, felt like enough for the chilly Sinnoh evening. He looked in a mirror briefly. He ruffled his hair a bit and stared himself down before he slung his backpack on and walked through his bedroom door.
His parents weren’t home—it was their date night. He knew date night was important for them, too, to try to take their minds off of everything that had happened over the past year or so for their family. He had already purchased a ticket, too. So, while he felt badly about leaving without a formal goodbye, he knew it better to let them have their night and make his boat on time.
Alby grabbed a pen that he’d gotten on vacation once, and which looked like an Alolan-bred Exeggutor, and paper, scrawling out quickly a note that read:
“Mom, dad. I’m sorry to leave without notice. I forgot it was date night and I’ve already bought my ticket. I’m taking my Pok?mon and going away for a little bit. I’m going to try something new for a while.
I have my Pok?tch with me—contact me that way whenever you want. I’ll call to check in tomorrow when I dock. I love you both.
—Alby”
He set the paper down on the table with the pen across it.
-
Alby was sprinting at one point after having been dropped off by the flower shop’s delivery car that had taken him, forgetting just how far it was to Canalave City from Floaroma. He spent so much time glancing down at the clock on his Pok?tch that he had barely noticed the docks on the horizon.
He could hear someone cry out, “Last call!” in the distance. His feet finally felt wooden planks beneath them and he audibly pounded his way across the stretch as quickly as possible.
“Hey!” Alby called, “Hang on!”
No one seemed to hear him. In his haste, he knocked a person he didn’t take time to recognize to the ground, nearly falling himself. He called a sorry backward, but didn’t have time to see the damage he’d done. No one appeared to be holding the ship, so relied on himself, jumping from full sprint off of the dock and onto a small walkway that they had begun to draw back onto the boat. He held the hand railings and stabilized himself as it swayed back and forth for a moment.
“Hey! What the hell are you doing?” A startled attendant at the top of the ramp called down.
“I have a ticket!”
“It’s not gonna do you any good if you’re dead!”
Alby held the railings and inched his way up the ramp. He breathlessly reached the top and faced the wide-eyed attendant. He wordlessly smiled and handed him his ticket before taking a deep, stumbling step onto the deck of the boat. He walked away quickly and steadily to avoid having to interact with the attendant anymore.
The wind picked up more and more quickly as the boat began accelerating in the deeper water. The air was becoming biting, but Alby was determined to look out onto the beauty of the water for more than just a moment.
He approached the bow. The sun had all but completely set, so he could see few-to-no-people on deck with him. He drew a Pokeball from his belt and called forth his partner as calmly as was possible.
Swablu’s small, yellow body seemed to glow a bit in the moonlight. It was hesitant and drew away from Alby at first, but he cradled the Pok?mon in his arms to shield it from the bite of the wind. Swablu, sooner than Alby had anticipated, buried its face in Alby’s body, accepting comfort. He pet the Pok?mon gently.
“I know you’ve been through a lot,” he told Swablu, “and I know you cared about my sister. Ella was my sister, did you know? I’m going to protect you like she did. Those guys aren’t going to hurt you anymore. I promise, if you’ll be my friend and if you’ll trust me then I’ll do right by my sister. I’m your friend and I’m here for you, Swablu.”
Swablu seemed to coo a bit. Alby held it tightly and looked out to the ocean. His nose was bright red and his eyes had water being flicked from their edges by the wind. For a fleeting moment, just on the brink of the boat’s apparently leaving Sinnoh waters, Alby thought he saw a purple, pink, and gold figure streak across the sky. It looked almost like a swan, and he was almost sure it was the source of a trail of colors left imprinted on the night sky that looked like the cosmos.
“Hey!” a voice said from behind him, the only other noise in the night beside the rush of the wind and lapping of the water against the hull of the boat.
Alby turned, still cradling Swablu, in the direction of a girl that couldn’t have been older than he was. She was clutching her body tightly and shivering. She wore a boatneck, olive sweater over a collared white shirt. She had on leggings and small, stylish-looking sneakers. It all begged the question from Alby before he even said hello back, “Aren’t you freezing?”
“It’s funny you’d notice that,” she called over the wind.
Alby paused in thought for a moment. “Why?” he said.
“You knocked my stuff all over the ground earlier when you ran into me! I almost missed the boat because of you! I didn’t have time to grab my things!”
“That was you?” Alby said.
Her eyes were large, looking astounded, and streaked with tears the wind drew out.
“That was me, yes,” the girl said.
“I’m,” Alby said, “I’m really sorry. I didn’t mean to, I was in such a rush.”
“What’s your name, yellow Swablu boy?”
“My name?” Alby said, looking around.
If it had been possible for her eyes to grow larger, they did then.
“No,” she said, “the other guy with the yellow Swablu.”
“I’m Alby.”
“You’re what?” she said.
“I’m Alby.”
“Okay, Allie. You owe me a jacket, just so you know.”
In a move that utterly confused Alby, the girl approached him and continued berating him while petting his Swablu. Swablu, incidentally, perked up and seemed affectionate with the girl.
“And if I freeze to death tonight, it’s on your conscience. I hope you know that, Ashley.”
“My name is Alby. I’m sorry about your stuff, I really am. I can give you the money I have. It’s not a lot.”
Alby held Swablu in one arm and, with his other, reached into the side pocket of his bag and drew what money he had.
“Amy,” the girl said, “I don’t want your thirty dollars.”
“Then what do you want?”
“I think I need to borrow your fleece for the night. I think that’s only fair.”
“But I’ll,” Alby started to say but did not finish.
“You’ll what? Freeze?” the girl said, emphasizing her shaking.
Hesitantly and peaking a brow, Alby set Swablu down and pulled his fleece over his head. A gust of wind drew his t-shirt up and his shaking was almost instant.
“Thank you,” the girl said, pulling it over her head.
“You’re—“ Alby said, “You’re w—welcome,” he managed through shivers.
“I’ll give it back in the morning,” the girl said.
She turned away and began walking. Alby called out, “What’s your name?”
She held herself up and turned briefly back toward Alby. “My name’s Piper,” she said. She began walking away and Alby picked up his speed and followed her at a distance. He called out, “Your name is Piper? You’re making fun of my name and your name is Piper?”
-
Alby woke up dressed in several layers and covered in the blankets on his bed. He had spent the night sleeping beside Leafeon for body heat’s sake. His cabin was small and was primarily bare, cold metal in construct.
“Does this boat have heat at all?” Alby said, looking at Leafeon.
Leafeon looked at its trainer and then leapt out of bed. It shook itself and stretched out its legs. Alby followed his Pok?mon’s lead, standing and stretching.
His thinking was that he could crank the heat in the cabin’s shower and warm that way, but he struggled for several minutes just trying to find a way to turn the dial that would make the water hot at all. He got it to room temperature and stood uncomfortably, shaking and going as quickly as he could.
He put on his pants from the day before and another t-shirt without anything else. He wanted to meet with Piper without another layer for emphasis.
He walked beside Leafeon on the deck. There was fog on the surface of the water that would roll and bound away from the boat as it cut through. The sun had risen, but only just. There was some patchy frost on the railings along the side of the boat.
Several people were on deck. They were wearing sweaters, eating breakfast in deck chairs, and reading newspapers. Along the side of the boat, balanced by her elbows on the railing, Piper was sipping a hot drink, wearing Alby’s fleece. Her hair hung back in a messy bun from her head.
“Morning,” Alby said from behind her.
She was mid-sip when he approached. She swallowed and lowered her drink.
“Good morning,” she said. “How’d you sleep?”
“It was great,” Alby said. “You?”
“Great as well, thanks for asking.” Piper smiled and laughed. “Who’s this?”
Piper leaned over, drink still in hand and began caressing Leafeon’s back and ears.
“That’s Leafeon. I think she was a little cold last night.”
“I see,” Piper said. “Sorry your trainer didn’t think to put you in your Pokeball, Leafeon.”
Alby rolled his eyes while Piper and Leafeon seemed to laugh together.
“Where are you going when we dock?” Piper said.
“Going to scope out the town. Gonna download a map of the region on my Pok?tch. See if there’s a nearby gym,” Alby said.
“So you’re going for the Pok?mon League, huh?"
“That’s the plan, yeah. What about you?”
“I’m a travel writer, kind of. I used to challenge gyms too, but I started to love the places more than the challenges, I think. So I write about the places I go from a Pok?mon perspective.”
“You make a good living?”
Piper sneered at him and laughed a little. She said, “I do okay.”
“Did they say how long until we dock?” Alby said.
“Should be in about 45 minutes, I think.”
Piper stood from kneeling to pet Leafeon and leaned on the railing of the boat again. She sipped her drink.
“When do I get my fleece back?” Alby said.
“When do I get all of my things back?”
“So you’re saying I’m not getting it back? Is that it?”
She exhaled and looked at Alby. She placed her drink on the ground beside her and stretched her arms up, peeling off the fleece.
“Here you go,” she said. She handed the fleece to Alby. He took it in his hands.
“Thanks,” he said.
He paused for a moment, saying nothing but looking at Piper and watching her begin shivering a bit, sipping more voraciously from her drink.
“Hey,” he said again.
“Hey,” she said.
“Look, I like this fleece a lot. I'm not gonna give you my fleece. But, coincidentally I have this old blanket with me. It’s really thick and warm.”
“I don’t need some blanket you sleep in every night, April. I’m gonna be okay.”
“No, I don’t sleep with it. It just has sentimental value. It’s a long story. It's really warm.”
He took off his pack and pulled a thick, patterned blanket from it. He stood with it and said, “Here.”
She took it from his hands and reluctantly wrapped herself in it, exposing just her head and her hand with the drink in it.
“It doesn’t smell too bad, I guess,” she said.
Alby smiled before he put on his fleece. For a moment he remained cold, but he warmed up quickly. And then he turned to walk away and took a few steps back toward his cabin. But he stopped himself. He craned his neck and looked back at Piper, seeming immobile. He looked at her for a moment, watching the batter her bun and send strands of her hair all over. Her face seemed to be growing redder and redder after every time he'd blink.
“I think I can see Kalos over there,” Alby yelled back, walking over to Piper. He leaned on the railing as well. Leafeon curled up at his feet.
Piper looked at him and smiled. She said, “Oh yeah? Where? I don’t see it.”
Alby pointed outward across the water to what he was sure were the docks of Coumarine City.
His words were spoken and Leafeon slowly walked forward, parting grass seemingly blade-by-blade until it reached a clearing. Its nose was the first bit to break the plane before Alby called a Magical Leaf to be rocketed forward and out of the grass.
“Move forward!” he called.
A series of rainbow-colored leaves swept across an unsuspecting, small yellow bird with white, cotton-looking wings. It tried as it could to flap downward and generate momentum to propel itself upward, but the leaves kept it from doing so.
The Pok?mon turned its head frantically in the direction of Leafeon, crying out before a slight, blue, frozen-seeming beam shot with precision at the grass-type.
“Now!” Alby called.
The Ice Beam snapped against Leafeon’s body and threw her to the ground. The rainbow-colored leaves scattered and abated, so the small bird began to turn away. And then, almost seeming without cause, the bird erupted into electricity and fell to the ground in a heap.
Alby reached quickly to a side pocket of his pack, grabbing a small Pokeball and depressing the button to let it expand.
He cast it through the air, arching and slow but with precision. It soundlessly crashed onto the exhausted Pok?mon’s body and for a moment everything was blindingly red.
Alby shielded his eyes. When he looked back, the Pokeball seemed to be wrestling vigorously with itself on the ground until, after a few long seconds, it thrust one last time and rolled to a stop.
“Yes! Yes!” Alby called out.
He jogged to Leafeon who seemed to him to be relatively unfazed by a few lines that looked like freezer burn across its small body. “You okay?” he asked, covering the marks with a small haze of medicine from a blue spray bottle. Leafeon sealed its eyes affectionately, nuzzling its trainer for affirmation.
“And, Joltik,” he said, looking around and trying to spy his tiny Pok?mon, “I think you have finally perfected your timing jumping from Leafeon’s back. You didn’t take that Ice Beam at all! Perfectly sneaky, my friend. Swablu never saw it coming.” Joltik came leaping from nowhere Alby was able to see, perching itself on its trainer’s shoulder.
Alby walked with Joltik and beside Leafeon to the Pokeball on the ground. He picked it up and breathed in and then out, relieved. “We’ve been trying to get to you for a long time,” he said, “you’re really strong and put up a heck of a fight. Just like you did when it happened.” He paused for a second and said nothing before he closed his eyes and breathed deeply again. “I promise I’ll be taking good care of you from now on, buddy,” he said.
-
A large wooden arch greeted Alby as he found his way back across the border of Floaroma town. He was bombarded by the overwhelming essence of any and all types of aromatic flowers that were so copiously planted that the town looked almost like it was lit up in a color wheel of lights. There was sense that throughout the town the only sound one could hear was the light whistling of the breeze travelling through.
The Pok?mon Center was not far off from the signage welcoming visitors to the town.
Doors closed automatically behind him and a few patrons and trainers making their stay at the Pok?Center gave him passing glances and smiles. He approached the counter, uncharacteristically vacant.
“Hello, Alby,” the nurse at the counter said as he walked up, “How are you today?”
“I’m well,” he said, “how are you?”
“Very well, thank you. Do your friends need a little help?”
“A couple of them do. Especially my newest, here,” Alby said, smiling and handing over the Pokeball from his belt that had the fewest scratches and blemishes.
“Who do we have here?” the nurse said.
“That’s Swablu.”
“Oh! You’ve been on her trail for a while, haven’t you?”
“Yeah, it’s been a while. But you remember everything.”
“I think that’s so sweet of you, Alby. Your sister would be proud. We’ll go get Swablu and your others going for you.”
Alby thanked the nurse before she walked away from the counter with Swablu and Leafeon’s Pok?Balls. He turned away from the counter and walked to a couch situated in front of a fireplace that wouldn’t be lit until later in the night. Even in Floaroma Town, Sinnoh was a place that needed fire after the sun went down.
Beside the fireplace, there was a framed newspaper’s front page. It depicted a headline that spelled out, “THE END OF GALACTIC” and showed pictures of several trainers who had been at a chaotic scene. Alby remembered hearing about the event on the news. He recognized one of the trainers in the picture on the paper. Alby had seen him in the finals of the Ever Grande Conference on television before.
As he sat, Joltik crawled from his shoulder and down his arm to Alby’s fingers. Alby lifted his hands in the air, wiggling his fingers in all directions and letting Joltik playfully weave throughout them. The tiny Pok?mon was just a bit too big to do it seamlessly and occasionally would get knocked off and have to climb back up to start over.
“Alby!” a voice called, someone running through the doors of the Center.
Alby turned his head and looked to a familiar face.
“Ali! I can’t believe it took you even this long, man,” Alby said, shaking his head and laughing a bit.
“Came as fast as I could,” the young man with the dark skin but bright clothes seemed to yell, startling everyone around them. Alby laughed, still, as Ali sat down beside him.
“You caught it, man, you caught it.”
“I did,” Alby said, ”wasn’t easy. Had to use Leafeon’s Magical Leaf like a net or something to keep it down. We did the Joltik trick.”
“And it worked this time? You think they’ve got it down?”
“Yeah,” Alby said, “Joltik timed it perfectly. Hid perfectly on Leafeon’s back. It was all surprisingly smooth.”
“Hey, I’m happy for you man. Your sister would be proud, I mean it.”
“Thanks. Thanks,” Alby said.
“So what’s next, man?”
“To be honest with you, I haven’t even really thought about it. I think since Ella passed, I haven’t thought about much other than finishing what she started. This was kind of the last piece. Those guys are finally gone and it feels real now that I know they can’t hurt Swablu.”
“But you’re gonna go somewhere, right? Gonna go challenge gyms or something, right?”
“I don’t know, I think—“ Alby said but didn’t finish.
“Alby, you can’t just go back to the shop. You’re strong enough now.”
“I don’t know, man. Don’t think I haven’t thought about it. I have. I would feel terrible leaving my parents, is the thing.”
“Your parents are going to be fine, Alby. I can tell you what your parents want—they want their teenage son to be able to go do things and see things. I’m pretty sure they’ve never planned on you staying with them forever.”
Alby sat and looked at the fireplace a moment. His Pok?tch changed time on the hour, the motion catching his eye. He looked back to the fireplace and it started up abruptly, seemingly aligned with the time.
“What are you gonna do?” Ali said, “Work in the flower shop for the rest of your life?”
“What about you?” Alby said, “Hand off the reins of the shop to someone else. Come with me—let’s go somewhere, let’s challenge gyms.”
“I can’t. I wish that I could, but there’s no one else who can do it right now. I sound like a hypocrite, but my family depends on that income.”
Across the room, the nurse quietly placed a tray with two red and white balls contained down on the counter. She said, calmly and just loud enough to be heard over the soft rumbling of the fireplace, “Whenever you’re ready, Alby.”
Ali said, “Go get your Pok?mon and do something. When I can find someone to hand over the shop to, I’m gonna come join you. We’ll be champions and we’ll be bigger than this town. It’s our dream to make a living battling. I remember you telling me that when you were 4 years old. Go do it, Alby, I’ll catch up.”
Alby looked at his friend and then looked away, back down at Joltik. He stood up and held Joltik out at arm’s length. He said, “What do you think, dude?” to Joltik, “You think we can beat a Salamence? A Gyarados?”
Joltik closed its four eyes and leapt around emphatically. “Yeah,” Alby said, “me too.”
Alby walked to the counter and picked up the Pok?Balls in either hand. He looked at them for a moment, one covered in blemishes and the other without a spot. He pushed in their center buttons simultaneously and the balls became little bigger than the berries scattered all around Floaroma town. He attached them to his belt. He recalled Joltik to its Pokeball as well.
“I guess,” Alby said, turning to the couches across the room and speaking to his still-seated friend, “I’ll see you when I see you.”
Ali rose and walked steadily across the center, approaching Alby and embracing him. “Good. See you when I see you,” he said.
-
The sun had started to set slowly and streaks of orange and purple bent into his cold bedroom through windows on the top floor of a drafty home. Alby was packing everything he could fit into his small pack that normally only held a few medicines and vacant Pok?Balls. He had a few days’ worth of clothes, his Pok?dex, a compact sleeping bag, a water bottle, and what little money he had. He had little enough packed that he stood and questioned, for a moment, whether or not he was actually ready to step out the doors of his home and go somewhere completely unknown. But he grabbed his badge case last, opening it briefly to look at the three Sinnoh-region badges he possessed. They glinted as he tilted the case back and forth, throwing off the sunlight that would strike it. And he knew he had won difficult battles and gotten through difficult times in that moment. And he knew he could trust his Pok?mon. He closed the case and flipped it over. On its bottom, a small scrap of paper was taped on that read:
“Alby: We’re in Sinnoh! Time and space all started here. But please don’t ever let either of them stop you.
—Ella”
He clutched the case tightly and took a breath before he lodged it, too, into his small orange pack. He took off his jeans and shirt, dirtied from the day and threw them into the large mouth of a hamper in the corner that was shaped like a Loudred. He pulled on his maroon, slim-fit pants and put on an aqua-blue snap-t fleece. It had red accents and, over a long-sleeve t-shirt, felt like enough for the chilly Sinnoh evening. He looked in a mirror briefly. He ruffled his hair a bit and stared himself down before he slung his backpack on and walked through his bedroom door.
His parents weren’t home—it was their date night. He knew date night was important for them, too, to try to take their minds off of everything that had happened over the past year or so for their family. He had already purchased a ticket, too. So, while he felt badly about leaving without a formal goodbye, he knew it better to let them have their night and make his boat on time.
Alby grabbed a pen that he’d gotten on vacation once, and which looked like an Alolan-bred Exeggutor, and paper, scrawling out quickly a note that read:
“Mom, dad. I’m sorry to leave without notice. I forgot it was date night and I’ve already bought my ticket. I’m taking my Pok?mon and going away for a little bit. I’m going to try something new for a while.
I have my Pok?tch with me—contact me that way whenever you want. I’ll call to check in tomorrow when I dock. I love you both.
—Alby”
He set the paper down on the table with the pen across it.
-
Alby was sprinting at one point after having been dropped off by the flower shop’s delivery car that had taken him, forgetting just how far it was to Canalave City from Floaroma. He spent so much time glancing down at the clock on his Pok?tch that he had barely noticed the docks on the horizon.
He could hear someone cry out, “Last call!” in the distance. His feet finally felt wooden planks beneath them and he audibly pounded his way across the stretch as quickly as possible.
“Hey!” Alby called, “Hang on!”
No one seemed to hear him. In his haste, he knocked a person he didn’t take time to recognize to the ground, nearly falling himself. He called a sorry backward, but didn’t have time to see the damage he’d done. No one appeared to be holding the ship, so relied on himself, jumping from full sprint off of the dock and onto a small walkway that they had begun to draw back onto the boat. He held the hand railings and stabilized himself as it swayed back and forth for a moment.
“Hey! What the hell are you doing?” A startled attendant at the top of the ramp called down.
“I have a ticket!”
“It’s not gonna do you any good if you’re dead!”
Alby held the railings and inched his way up the ramp. He breathlessly reached the top and faced the wide-eyed attendant. He wordlessly smiled and handed him his ticket before taking a deep, stumbling step onto the deck of the boat. He walked away quickly and steadily to avoid having to interact with the attendant anymore.
The wind picked up more and more quickly as the boat began accelerating in the deeper water. The air was becoming biting, but Alby was determined to look out onto the beauty of the water for more than just a moment.
He approached the bow. The sun had all but completely set, so he could see few-to-no-people on deck with him. He drew a Pokeball from his belt and called forth his partner as calmly as was possible.
Swablu’s small, yellow body seemed to glow a bit in the moonlight. It was hesitant and drew away from Alby at first, but he cradled the Pok?mon in his arms to shield it from the bite of the wind. Swablu, sooner than Alby had anticipated, buried its face in Alby’s body, accepting comfort. He pet the Pok?mon gently.
“I know you’ve been through a lot,” he told Swablu, “and I know you cared about my sister. Ella was my sister, did you know? I’m going to protect you like she did. Those guys aren’t going to hurt you anymore. I promise, if you’ll be my friend and if you’ll trust me then I’ll do right by my sister. I’m your friend and I’m here for you, Swablu.”
Swablu seemed to coo a bit. Alby held it tightly and looked out to the ocean. His nose was bright red and his eyes had water being flicked from their edges by the wind. For a fleeting moment, just on the brink of the boat’s apparently leaving Sinnoh waters, Alby thought he saw a purple, pink, and gold figure streak across the sky. It looked almost like a swan, and he was almost sure it was the source of a trail of colors left imprinted on the night sky that looked like the cosmos.
“Hey!” a voice said from behind him, the only other noise in the night beside the rush of the wind and lapping of the water against the hull of the boat.
Alby turned, still cradling Swablu, in the direction of a girl that couldn’t have been older than he was. She was clutching her body tightly and shivering. She wore a boatneck, olive sweater over a collared white shirt. She had on leggings and small, stylish-looking sneakers. It all begged the question from Alby before he even said hello back, “Aren’t you freezing?”
“It’s funny you’d notice that,” she called over the wind.
Alby paused in thought for a moment. “Why?” he said.
“You knocked my stuff all over the ground earlier when you ran into me! I almost missed the boat because of you! I didn’t have time to grab my things!”
“That was you?” Alby said.
Her eyes were large, looking astounded, and streaked with tears the wind drew out.
“That was me, yes,” the girl said.
“I’m,” Alby said, “I’m really sorry. I didn’t mean to, I was in such a rush.”
“What’s your name, yellow Swablu boy?”
“My name?” Alby said, looking around.
If it had been possible for her eyes to grow larger, they did then.
“No,” she said, “the other guy with the yellow Swablu.”
“I’m Alby.”
“You’re what?” she said.
“I’m Alby.”
“Okay, Allie. You owe me a jacket, just so you know.”
In a move that utterly confused Alby, the girl approached him and continued berating him while petting his Swablu. Swablu, incidentally, perked up and seemed affectionate with the girl.
“And if I freeze to death tonight, it’s on your conscience. I hope you know that, Ashley.”
“My name is Alby. I’m sorry about your stuff, I really am. I can give you the money I have. It’s not a lot.”
Alby held Swablu in one arm and, with his other, reached into the side pocket of his bag and drew what money he had.
“Amy,” the girl said, “I don’t want your thirty dollars.”
“Then what do you want?”
“I think I need to borrow your fleece for the night. I think that’s only fair.”
“But I’ll,” Alby started to say but did not finish.
“You’ll what? Freeze?” the girl said, emphasizing her shaking.
Hesitantly and peaking a brow, Alby set Swablu down and pulled his fleece over his head. A gust of wind drew his t-shirt up and his shaking was almost instant.
“Thank you,” the girl said, pulling it over her head.
“You’re—“ Alby said, “You’re w—welcome,” he managed through shivers.
“I’ll give it back in the morning,” the girl said.
She turned away and began walking. Alby called out, “What’s your name?”
She held herself up and turned briefly back toward Alby. “My name’s Piper,” she said. She began walking away and Alby picked up his speed and followed her at a distance. He called out, “Your name is Piper? You’re making fun of my name and your name is Piper?”
-
Alby woke up dressed in several layers and covered in the blankets on his bed. He had spent the night sleeping beside Leafeon for body heat’s sake. His cabin was small and was primarily bare, cold metal in construct.
“Does this boat have heat at all?” Alby said, looking at Leafeon.
Leafeon looked at its trainer and then leapt out of bed. It shook itself and stretched out its legs. Alby followed his Pok?mon’s lead, standing and stretching.
His thinking was that he could crank the heat in the cabin’s shower and warm that way, but he struggled for several minutes just trying to find a way to turn the dial that would make the water hot at all. He got it to room temperature and stood uncomfortably, shaking and going as quickly as he could.
He put on his pants from the day before and another t-shirt without anything else. He wanted to meet with Piper without another layer for emphasis.
He walked beside Leafeon on the deck. There was fog on the surface of the water that would roll and bound away from the boat as it cut through. The sun had risen, but only just. There was some patchy frost on the railings along the side of the boat.
Several people were on deck. They were wearing sweaters, eating breakfast in deck chairs, and reading newspapers. Along the side of the boat, balanced by her elbows on the railing, Piper was sipping a hot drink, wearing Alby’s fleece. Her hair hung back in a messy bun from her head.
“Morning,” Alby said from behind her.
She was mid-sip when he approached. She swallowed and lowered her drink.
“Good morning,” she said. “How’d you sleep?”
“It was great,” Alby said. “You?”
“Great as well, thanks for asking.” Piper smiled and laughed. “Who’s this?”
Piper leaned over, drink still in hand and began caressing Leafeon’s back and ears.
“That’s Leafeon. I think she was a little cold last night.”
“I see,” Piper said. “Sorry your trainer didn’t think to put you in your Pokeball, Leafeon.”
Alby rolled his eyes while Piper and Leafeon seemed to laugh together.
“Where are you going when we dock?” Piper said.
“Going to scope out the town. Gonna download a map of the region on my Pok?tch. See if there’s a nearby gym,” Alby said.
“So you’re going for the Pok?mon League, huh?"
“That’s the plan, yeah. What about you?”
“I’m a travel writer, kind of. I used to challenge gyms too, but I started to love the places more than the challenges, I think. So I write about the places I go from a Pok?mon perspective.”
“You make a good living?”
Piper sneered at him and laughed a little. She said, “I do okay.”
“Did they say how long until we dock?” Alby said.
“Should be in about 45 minutes, I think.”
Piper stood from kneeling to pet Leafeon and leaned on the railing of the boat again. She sipped her drink.
“When do I get my fleece back?” Alby said.
“When do I get all of my things back?”
“So you’re saying I’m not getting it back? Is that it?”
She exhaled and looked at Alby. She placed her drink on the ground beside her and stretched her arms up, peeling off the fleece.
“Here you go,” she said. She handed the fleece to Alby. He took it in his hands.
“Thanks,” he said.
He paused for a moment, saying nothing but looking at Piper and watching her begin shivering a bit, sipping more voraciously from her drink.
“Hey,” he said again.
“Hey,” she said.
“Look, I like this fleece a lot. I'm not gonna give you my fleece. But, coincidentally I have this old blanket with me. It’s really thick and warm.”
“I don’t need some blanket you sleep in every night, April. I’m gonna be okay.”
“No, I don’t sleep with it. It just has sentimental value. It’s a long story. It's really warm.”
He took off his pack and pulled a thick, patterned blanket from it. He stood with it and said, “Here.”
She took it from his hands and reluctantly wrapped herself in it, exposing just her head and her hand with the drink in it.
“It doesn’t smell too bad, I guess,” she said.
Alby smiled before he put on his fleece. For a moment he remained cold, but he warmed up quickly. And then he turned to walk away and took a few steps back toward his cabin. But he stopped himself. He craned his neck and looked back at Piper, seeming immobile. He looked at her for a moment, watching the batter her bun and send strands of her hair all over. Her face seemed to be growing redder and redder after every time he'd blink.
“I think I can see Kalos over there,” Alby yelled back, walking over to Piper. He leaned on the railing as well. Leafeon curled up at his feet.
Piper looked at him and smiled. She said, “Oh yeah? Where? I don’t see it.”
Alby pointed outward across the water to what he was sure were the docks of Coumarine City.