Pokémon Distraught X/Shattered Y

Chapter Une

IV Years Later- Vaniville Town

The crisp green water of the lake was cold against my feet as I walked through low tide, kicking up droplets of water and small pebbles as my house got closer and closer.

Surskit danced across the water's surface, wild Kecleon snapping at them with their tongues. A Gorebyss surfaced and sprayed rainbow droplets in the air, the rising sun catching them perfectly. I smiled at the sight, even knowing what disasters had caused this beauty.

There did not used to be a lake outside of Vaniville Town. The flooding caused by earthquakes in Lumiose and Santalune drenched our town, caused the collapse of a cliff in Cyllage City, and turned the Laverre-Shalour-Coumarine area into a permanent mess of constantly changing weather.

I did a project about the earthquakes for school when I was eleven years old. It went well, but I had found that some people refused to speak of it. At the Vaniville Book Drop, one librarian was happy to show me the room with all of the old news clippings and file archives. The other shook her head and told me to get out whenever I asked her.

People had been divided by the strain put on Kalos, I guessed, as I got to the end of the sandbar and stepped into a patch of cool lemongrass. A few Scatterbug crawled up a tree trunk, and I smiled at them. Beside my feet, a Dwebble skittered into a rotten log.

I've been out for longer than I promised I would be, I remembered. Reaching into my pocket for my house key, I dashed up the beach and thudded onto our deck. My jaw hit the polished oak wood, and one of my Crocs flew into the bush.

"Good morning," my uncle said, watching me with a bemused smile on his face as I picked myself up and brushed the dirt off my jacket.

"It is a very good morning," I replied. "Even with my face in the deck, I felt that it was good." I placed my key back into my pocket. "Sorry I'm late. I got distracted by the lake." 

"No matter," my uncle said. "If I were the kind of person who got mad at you for that, I wouldn't even let you go down there." He placed the newspaper he was reading on the table and stood up. "There was a package for you from Lumiose." 

"From Lumiose? I didn't order anything fro-" 

"Pola. Think about it." My uncle grinned at me. "Do you remember when you sent in your Pokémon trainer's application a month ago? If you got a package from Lumiose, that means Sycamore-Flare Labs has accepted you!" 

We stood on the deck for a moment. I studied the morning glory plants entwined around the railing of the deck, their pink-purple-blue-white flowers going perfectly with the wood grain. 

"I think you may be right," I replied carefully, taking off my leftover Croc and hurling it into the bush. I'd pick them up later. Maybe after lunch.

"Well, go inside and open your goddamn package then!" My uncle gave me a playful shove, and I stepped into the kitchen.

There was indeed a package for me, a small cardboard box with a line of Scotch Tape down the seam. I tore at the tape with my fingernails and pulled out a small blue device that barely fit in one hand. There were red stripes down the sides, and the top part appeared to be a projector. The bottom half of the device had a screen and a row of small buttons.

"Sycamore-Flare must have a lot of money to be sending these things to kids," I joked, running my finger along the buttons. "Whatever it is." 

"A Holo Caster," my uncle said, looking over my shoulder. "I'm a little surprised that you don't know what it is- everyone had one around five or six years ago, when Ly-" He stopped himself in the middle of the name. "Go on. Power it."