Broken Souls

Blaze

Ten and Hershey embrace in what starts as a tackle and ends as an awkward attempt to position themselves in such a way that they can stop moving and remain in contact without putting at least one of them in agony. They're a flurry of wings and hooves as they try to adjust and Ten's thoughts are a hurricane of confusion and excitement. Someone was waiting for me, he cries, no one has ever waited up for me before. No one!

The others are more cautious, eyeing each other across the city hub of Pallet Town. The old team's still giddy with the excitement and relief that accompanies finally being home, but the new team is primarily confused and raw from-

I don't have to think about that right now.

Fang and Reginae are both cautious, and Fang's eyeing the Gyarados with a suspicious squint. I mentally signal for him to drop it and he looks away, half-scowling. Hyacinth, on the other hand, walks straight up to Dusty and Shell and extends her hand.

"Was that so hard? Go on, now you try." I say to the team, pushing Reginae out from my side. He buckles but finds himself removed from the group, and Bronze is staring down at him with his arms crossed.

"Hey," Reginae says.

"Hey." Bronze says.

"So you're her starter. Her... real starter."

Cooly, Bronze responds, "Yes. Yes, I am."

"Nice to finally meet you. So that has to be..." Reginae hesitates, "Lilly."

I can't discern the emotion I'm getting over our connection.

"That's her." Bronze says. The subtext of are you done now is too snide for me not to notice it.

I throw a hand around Reginae's head and just below Bronze's shoulder. "Good to see my boys getting along. You two are going to have so much fun together. Now, I know this is a sudden shift in conversation, but what level are you guys, Bronze? We're in our low sixties, which we should be able to push up above seventies before we fight Red, but I need your levels for reference. I don't want you to throw yourselves against Red's Pokemon and for it to turn out you guys are still sitting in your fourties."

Thanks, Reginae says, with a sideways flick of his amber eyes.

Bronze brings a hand to his chin. "We weren't Pokemon in Kalos, so it's unclear how our experience would factor into levels. The Pokemon near Mount Silver are supposed to be in their fourties, so if you want to test us against those, you could get a pretty good gauge on what our current level is."

Lilly nods, by his side. There's a new tension between them, a longer pause when they look at each other before making decisions. Two years of history I have no knowledge of spread out between us. "We've grown," she says. "All of us."

She's beautiful as an Ampharos. I focus myself. There will be years and years for this to sink in, if I play my cards right. I need to get through what, six weeks? Six weeks are nothing.

"Okay." I say. "I could catch you all again, but the Poke Balls wouldn't work until I had six Pokemon in my party and I don't want to limit my party back down to that number. However, if you're not caught, we run the risk of something happening to you."

Suicune walks over, purple mane flaring out behind them. Are you associated with the box man?

"The what?"

The box man, repeats Suicune, frustrated.

"You mean Bill?" asks Dill. "He's my homebro. We should so go talk to Bill."

"If we try to rig the system, Red will take it out on anyone who helps us." I say, with a quick shake of my head. "Morty's in danger as it is. Roping any more people into the situation is going to add too much collateral damage. There has to be some other way to prevent you from being caught."