Pokemon Mystery Dungeon: Hands of Creation

Chapter 122 - The Timekeeper

A little Treecko climbed on Owen's shoulders, grasping at his cheek.

"Yes?" Owen cooed.

She tried to climb onto his head, so Owen bent his neck and let her. She fell quickly, tumbling into Owen's ready hands with a yelp.

"Almost, that time," commented Mhynt, sitting next to him. The Sceptile helped Remi try again, guiding her with a single claw. She was so tiny compared to the two of them.

The sun was bright. Clear skies. It was a great day for Grass Pokémon, and the warmth was nice on Owen's scales, too. He spread his wings and called upon the sun, intensifying its power.

"Aaaah!" Remi fell back, too fascinated by the new light, and landed in Owen's arms again. She reached for Mhynt next.

"Hey, Owen!" someone called.

A Mew flew over with a package in his arms. Owen's stomach growled.

"Got the takeout!" he said, puffing.

Behind him, a Meganium, Haxorus, and battered Flygon followed with their own packages.

"What happened to you?" Owen asked Gahi, smirking. "Marshadow run you into the ground again?"

"Nuh-no," he replied quickly. "I'm, uh, I'm learning. Not a big deal, er whatever..."

"Gods, you're even picking up his accent!" Owen laughed.

"Impressionable," Mispy said with a sigh. She trotted to a sunny spot on the ground and fell on her side, stretching her legs.

Demitri's eyes drifted to Remi. Owen was familiar with his body language by now and sensed envy. Seemed that the couple hadn't been able to get an egg yet. In due time, Owen figured.

Mew set the food down and produced a much smaller package inside. "For Remi, too," he said.

"No junk food, I hope," Mhynt hummed, though her voice lacked hostility.

"Hey," Gahi said. "You have time for, you know."

"I don't know," Owen lied, raising a scaly brow.

Gahi growled.

"He-hey, don't do that with Remi around," Demitri said quietly. "She'll get scared..."

Remi was pointing and laughing at Gahi, who stiffened up and looked away.

"Yeah, well..." He fidgeted. "Fine. We'll spar when she's tired."

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Necrozma, if you're throwing memories at me, not now, please! Owen said as he panted, running as fast as his tiny legs would allow. Trying... to not die! Not yet!

No response, of course. He still wasn't sure if Necrozma was responsible, if this was a continued deluge from Dark Matter, or just something else. He didn't have time to process it. He didn't want to think about it in this chaos. Remi. A daughter. He had a daughter, and he'd forgotten about her for countless centuries. Where was she now? Did she wonder what happened to him? How different had they become?

Marshadow had been an ever-looming threat, so it was good that they'd dedicated some time to planning how to mitigate his impact. Unfortunately, he was still hard to stop. Too strong, too evasive, and even if they all focused on him—

Owen glanced at what he thought was a threatening shadow, but nothing came up. He pressed on.

—Marshadow would just sink into the ground. They couldn't spend all their time thwarting Marshadow when there was so much to plan... And yet there Owen was, staggering away from the roads to get away from that unstoppable threat. It was good that Gahi had been ready.