//------------------------------// // 10. Just Awake // Story: Alola to a New World! // by Tapu Meme //------------------------------// It happened sometime around noon. On the Land, Paige woke up and went to work. A bit more solemn than usual, but nothing noticeable to her peers. Underwater,  Rafe woke up and went to school as usual, but only after he and his dad had a short but confusing discussion about the trip to his mom’s place and discordant music in the night. And for the hunt, the hunters sitting beneath an old overhang of cooled lava rock still felt yesterday's headaches, sorting through their thoughts and trying to decide how to act. And, halfway across Equus, Arceus decided to choose just now to project his voice across the world. “Greetings citizens of Equus, both old and new.” Arceus’ voice echoed through the mind of every being on the planet. Whoever didn't panic or plead insanity realized the importance of what was happening, and quieted down to listen. Mason Kale, in particular, lunged for a blank paper. He smoothed it out on his desk and spoke aloud Arceus’s words as they came to mind. Even in the panic of the police headquarters cubicles, his hatsu recorded his every word in bold, looping cursive onto the page. “I am Lord Arceus, creator of the creatures that you have seen over the past few days.” Grandma Sala dreamt these words as her salandit tribe fell into panic all around her. Avior let the three hunters clamber onto her back and flew away to escape the panicked fire-types, her liftoff scattering the dying embers of last nights campfire. There wasn’t much room on the old garchomp’s back, however, and they almost missed the rest of the announcement trying not to fall off. “You have no reason to fear me for I come in peace.” The two hippocampi guards in front of Queen Oceania’s throne room looked to each other with worry. They could hear a commotion behind the heavy limestone doors, and they were torn between eavesdropping on it or paying attention to the telepathic announcement that they may or may or may not be hallucinating. “I am the one who brought the creatures you see to this world, they are known as Pokémon.” “Your fault, hmm?” Barodius flicked the lights off from his desk, the dragon crystal’s fire bringing a flurry of animal screams and Cassarina’s pleads for help reigning them in. “I have my reasons for bringing them here, I will be holding a summit with the world's leaders so that they can help inform their citizens the best.” Paige’s father frowned deeply, something that didn't slip past his wife. She put a wing over his shoulders, and they exchanged a look that spoke volumes. “For now I issue a warning; Even if some do not appear as such, the Pokémon are just as intelligent as any other creature that calls this world home.” Zip Zam looked back at the horsea hiding under some coral in front of his house. “So...you really can understand me?” The pokemon nodded furiously, and Zip Zam gasped in delight. “Since they are MY subjects I will not tolerate their mistreatment or abuse. Treat them as you would your own neighbor.” A gardevoir, trapped and unconscious in a cage, would have barked a sour laugh if she could control a single muscle in her body. Some of the stronger animals and pokemon in the surrounding cages had woken up and were now screaming and rattling the bars of their confines. She wished she could join them, but she didn't have the strength in her body to get up. The cellar doors banged open, and three ponies came down the steps. A tall unicorn, balancing something being carried on the back of a heavily muscled earth pony with her magic, and a young bat winged pony between the two of them. They stopped at a rather unremarkable cage that housed only a young teenage minotaur. The unicorn, with great effort, lifted the body off of the earth pony’s back and put it on the floor of the of the cage. The batpony held open the door, then let it slam shut on its spring-loaded hinges. “Pokemon who have awoken in this new world, do not seek to harm the natives of this world. To the pokemon that experienced certain... Changes... when you arrived; You are the ones who proved that not all of your kind deserved vengeful retribution, consider this your reward.” Milotic’s brow creased at that. “Changes?” She murmured. “He means me!” A silvery, shiny eevee jumped up and down in front of Milotic. “Pokemon that experienced changes?! I’m telling you, I used to be human!” “Woah Little Dude.” An alolan raichu put his paws up and floated back. “Calm yourself.” Milotic watched how the eevee hopped about, how he relied on his back legs to kick himself into the air and how he sometimes forgot to land on all fours. “To live new lives, free of the burdens of the old world, a chance to start anew. As sentient beings of varying intelligence, the laws of the respective countries you now reside in apply to you, and only those laws.” Tapu Lele sighed at ‘varying intelligence.’ That part was a bit rude, she thought out loud to Kite Flyer, the only pony in the Mailroom. Kite Flyer nodded without listening, tossing another letter into an overflowing box labeled ‘Pepe Silvia’. “That is all for now, the Pokémon are not to be harmed simply out of spite. If you have any qualms with what I have done, I reside in a temple located within the Everfree forest and welcome all who would like to speak, or a pocket dimension outside of the space time continuum, so if any of you wish to face the sheer power of a god, feel free to come by.” At these words, a yellow shell cracked open to let an eye peer out, staring through a gap in some twisted, vine covered trees. And just its luck, there was the marbled walls of the old Temple. Just as they remembered. “Goodbye for now, though I doubt this will be the last you hear of me, and peace to you all.” Avior touched down at the base of Mauna Loa, knees buckling under the extra weight. “Okay, everyone off before you break something.” The graveler fell off without any further complaint, slamming a small crater into the dirt. Gerson was a bit more careful getting off, and Gon decided to stay right where he was on top of Avior’s head. “Well,” Gerson said cheerfully. “I do believe we have a lead. For our hunt, that is.” “Arceus,” Avior murmured. “Arceus really just spoke now, didn't he?” “A Temple in the Everfree Forest.” Gon recited. “We need to find an Everfree Forest. Is that on Hawhinny?” “Ow…” The graveler finally pulled himself out of the ground. “If I never fly again, it’ll be too soon…” H-hewwo…? The graveler blinked and looked around. “Who said that?” “I think it was Tapu Lele!” Gon held up his Z-crystal and concentrated. Are you here, Tapu Lele? Oh, Gon! Yes, it’s me! Did you guys hear that--what am I saying, of course you heard it. Where are you guys right now? We are at the base of Mauna Loa. We got chased out of a salandit tribe’s encampment. Gon said, almost interrupting himself with his next thought. We have a lead to Arceus! We just need to find Everfree! Okay, okay, I hear you Lele laughed soundlessly. I’m glad you’re all okay. Hold on a second... There was silence on the other line for a moment. Avior sat down with a huff, and the two hunters on the ground followed suit. Finally, a response. Gon, everyone, listen, it’s important. Nice of you to talk to us this time. The graveler complained. Instead of, you know, injecting us with flares like some kinda mad doctor. Gon cast an indignant look over to the graveler, but he heard Lele sigh on the other end. Yeah, I know. I won't be doing that again...much. Look, I don’t have a lot of time, so listen carefully: Chief Barodius is really powerful and really, really dangerous. I won’t be able to reliably communicate with you with crystal magic at all as long as he has me working for him. So, I’m sending a pony named Mason with directions to this Everfree Forest. He has a more secure method of communication we can use, and he can tell you all about Operation Cross-Contamination. I need to know where you guys are so I can send him there, okay? Gon looked around where they had landed for any landmarks. What caught his eye first was a dense forest off to the left, but he was pretty sure that trees were too plentiful to be at all reliable for this sort of thing. To his right, there was a sign that Gon couldn't read, but it had a picture of a volcano and a red circle with a line cut through it, so he had a pretty good guess of what it said. Finally, he looked back up at the mountain, and noticed the Salandit tribe’s spurts of Flamethrower directly above them. Lele read his mind as he searched. I got it. He’s on his way now. If I may ask, Most Honorable Tapu, Gerson spoke up now. Why are you staying in the police station, close to Barodius? You could join us for the hunt. You don’t need to be there. Actually, I do. If I don’t mediate pokemon and pony relationships, we are going to make some very powerful and very angry enemies here. It’s a delicate balance, and I’m the only one who can do this. I don’t like this. Gon admitted. It’s like he’s got you in a pokeball. Don’t think like that. I’ll be fine. But listen, if Barodius finds out about you, you guys will really be in trouble. I’m going to temporarily cut off all crystal communications, effective as soon as this call ends. Will you reopen it soon, Most Honorable Tapu? Yes, as soon as Barodius stops breathing down my neck. I can’t keep it open for too long, otherwise I’ll be found out. We understand. Good. Mason is about a quarter of the way there. Sit tight, and he’ll be there before you know it. Goodbye for now. And the Z-crystals stopped glowing. It took a moment for the hunters to reorient themselves back into the real world, where Avior was sitting with a bored expression. “So,” She asked, picking her teeth. “anymon want to fill me in?” Mason, as it turned out, was a pony who looked to the pokemon a little like an awkward preteen evolution between a Mudbray and a Mudsdale. He wore only some saddlebags, a collar-like necklace, and a white button-down shirt that a policepony’s badge and jacket would usually be worn over. His eyes were sharp and shrewd, giving him an air of being rather suspicious of whoever or whatever he was looking at. Whether that be a tree, a stray cobblestone, or the group of four slightly-burnt hunters sitting at the bottom of a volcano he had come all this way to meet. Mason had spotted them from the trail, and cantered over. He glanced from pokemon to pokemon as he approached, rather haughtily in Avior’s opinion. “Alright,” He said, looking at all of them and none of them down his nose. “Can any of you talk?” For a moment, no one answered, too shocked by the pony’s blatant disregard for manners. “Depends,” Avior looked down at him right back. “Can you get your head out of your rear end long enough to hear us?” Mason blinked, then made a sort of ‘fair enough’ nodding gesture. “Well, then it looks like this weird necklace works. I’m Mason Kale, sent by Tapu Lele, as you all know. So! Where should we start? The new instructions for the operation? That announcement from that Arceus dude?” “Do you know where the Everfree is?” Gon blurted out, drawing all attention to himself. “We need to go to the Everfree to find Acreus’s temple.” “...Do you now.” Mason sighed. “Look, kid, I understand that this whole voice-in-head announcement is kind of a big deal for you pokemon, but we can just get a map to Ponyville whenever we want. I didn’t let your Tapui lady inject me with a migraine pellet just for you to ask for directions.” “Hey, lay off the kid, will you?” The graveler crossed his arms. “Just tell us what's constipating your brain if you’re gonna be so whiny about it.” “You can start with Cross Commotion if you want.” Gerson offered, smiling as Mason glared at him. “Tapu Lele didn’t tell us much about that in any flare or conversation. All we know is that we would be given an update when y’all weren’t feelin so...tight lipped.” “Operation Cross Contamination” Mason strained the words through clenched teeth. “Is a plot to expose Barodius’s illegal dealings to the public in the least dangerous way possible. At first, all we had to do was find the hidden bunker where he keeps all of his experiments, but we haven’t had much luck on that front. That was back when my old boss and one or two other underlings were looking for it, so I’m hoping your Lady--” “TAPU LELE!” “WHATEVER! --is going to have better luck than we ever did. We might have to wait a couple of weeks, though, so that the pokemon mess is old news and the island won’t be divided on the issue of bringing down our corrupt Chief. Did you get all that?” “Yes,” everyone except for the graveler said in unison. “Good. Moving on.” Mason reached into his saddlebag to retrieve a clipboard of blank pages. He set it on the ground and grabbed an empty fountain pen between his teeth. “Uh…” the graveler began to say timidly, but Mason ignored him. “Yeh might be outta ink there, sonny.” Gerson suggested, but Mason ignored him, too. “Whah we neeh toh do righh now ish delegah eahh o’ you guysh to shpeshific tashksh…” Mason mused as he drew a clear line down the center of the paper with vividly black ink, much to the pokemon’s shock. “We hab two frontsh dat need to be manned: the Operashun--” Mason scribbled ‘O.C.C.’ on one side of the line. “--an’ th Hunt fo’ Arceus.” Mason wrote ‘H.F.A.’ on the other side of the page. “Get that out of your mouth.” Avior gave him a solid poke to the back of his head. “And speak clearly.” Mason rubbed his mane indignantly, spitting his pen into his other hoof. “We’re splitting into two groups. One to go find Arceus, and the other to stay and help take down Barodius. The hunting party should be as minimal as possible for two reasons: to travel faster with less baggage and to leave behind more backup in case Barodius acts up before we’re ready for him.” “I want to be on the hunt.” Gon piped up. “Hang on!” Mason grabbed the pen in his mouth again and started making a list of words on the back of the page: MASON SHARK DOG TURT ROCK PAIGE LADY The hunters stared at this in confusion as Mason put his pen down. “These are all our functioning operatives. We just need to sort out who is going where, and why.” “Is that what it’s supposed to be?” The graveler asked as he peered over Mason’s hooves. “Those don’t look like names.” “It’s a list of...code names. It has me, all of you four monsters, and Tapui Lady, and one of my colleagues that you haven’t met yet who’s still at the police station.” A light bulb clicked on in Gon’s head. “Put two more names!” He shouted down at Mason. Mason gave him a questioning look so Gon explained, “My Aunt Mito and Grandma Abe are at the Police Station with Tapu Lele. They can help, too! So, please write them!” Mason shrugged and added MITO and ABE to the end of the list. “Alright then,” Avior declared. “to restate a rather pertinent question Gon asked before: how far away is the Everfree?” Mason thought for a moment. “I think it was by a town called Ponyville, in the Equestrian mainland. The mainland itself is two-or-three weeks by boat, and a day’s flight from here, and that’s not counting how far inland you’d have to travel after that to get to Ponyville, and from there to the Everfree.” “Then I’ll be on the Hunt for Arceus,” Avior said immediately. “I can fly, and I don’t want to be anywhere near this island if Barodius and Dharak are on it.” “I feel the same way!” Mason chuckled, then went back to being serious. “If that’s how it is, then we can just send you on your own--” “I want to go on the Hunt, too!” Gon cried out before Mason could change the subject. “I have something I need to ask Arceus for!” Mason ignored him. “If we only have the shark on the hunt…” Mason tapped the paper and the names that he had written on the back of the page shimmered onto the diagram, with SHARK on the H.F.A. side, and the rest of the names on the list on the O.C.C. side. “There.” Mason said with a self-satisfied grin. “Now this is Ideal.” “Now, hold on, sonny.” Gerson crossed his arms. “I have a coupla things I’d like to ask of the Big Mon Upstairs myself. And I don’t think whatever I want to ask is gonna be on the forefront of Miss Avior’s mind when she finishes her two-day trip.” “I get it.” Gon realized. “It can’t just be Avior. She needs someone with her that can communicate with the island.” “And someone with directions.” Avior snorted. “Now who do we know who checks all those boxes?” All eyes were on a now very nervous islander pony. “H-hey wait..” “But I wanna go!” Gon wined. “I want to see Arceus!” “Don’t you have a Grandma back at the station?” The graveler reminded him, and Gon drooped. “Yeah...but..” Gon sighed. “I..guess I’d have to ask them first…” “Don’t worry, she’ll understand.” Gerson said with a sultry grin. “Perhaps you could introduce me...?” Everyone at camp groaned at him, and Gon looked a bit more distraught than before. “I’m only kidding.” Gerson waved a claw dismissively at their disgusted faces. “Moving on” Mason continued. “If I would be better to send on the Hunt for communication purposes, then I should go alone.” “No way! I’ll fly you faster and cheaper than any plane, guaranteed.” “And how,” Mason turned around to glare at the giant blue shark towering over him. “will I ride on your back, hm?” “You just hold on.” Avior shrugged. “I can’t! How am I supposed to ride a flying shark over an ocean with no harness or safety belt!?” “You don’t need one. I can keep you on my back if I’m using the move Fly. It’s like..a harness...made out of Aura.” “She used to carry important people all the time back on earth!” Gon added. “She knows how to Fly.” Mason cast one more suspicious glance over his shoulder. “...I’ll think about it. But!” He pointed a hoof at Avior’s nose. “Only if you take me for a test fly first.” “Deal.” Avior said with a final looking nod. Mason turned back to his paper and dragged his name from the O.C.C. section and onto the H.F.A. side. “Alright, now let’s send this to the Tapui Lady.” Mason tapped on the paper with his pen twice, and the ink sank into the page, not fully disappearing. It stayed like that for a few seconds, as if loading, then the ink started clearing up again, with slight alterations. “Looks like she replied!” Mason announced.”But...she only wrote…” The only change to the diagram Mason had drawn was a circle around the names MITO and ABE, with an arrow pointing to the circle labeled “Who?” “Hang on,” Mason started writing again, clarifying that those names were requested by Gon, and what he had said about them being at the station with Tapu Lele. Tapu Lele’s reply was a bit more delayed that time around. The camp waited for a good few minutes, staring at the faded ink and wondering... Finally, the ink cleared up with Lele’s new message: “Cassarina must have tampered with my mind. Gon, go with Mason and Avior on the Hunt so that she doesn’t tamper with yours. Gerson and Graveler, don’t come to the station, I will fetch you when the work day is over. Avior, Mason and Gon should leave RIGHT NOW. There is no time to waste for this hunt. Keep in touch, Tapu Lele.” “So that’s it, then.” Avior said with a shrug. “If it’s really going to be a day’s journey, we might want to make some preparations. Pack some snacks, empty our bowels…” “A bit too much information there, Miss Avior.” Gerson sighed, looking up at Gon. The little riolu’s brow was creased with worry, and he kept staring at Tapu Lele’s message. He didn’t react to anything else around him. “We’ll stop at my house.” Mason said, standing up and folding the papers into his saddlebags. “That should be a sufficient test flight, I think.” Avior helped Mason to climb onto her back. Fortunately, her ability was Sand Veil rather than Rough Skin, so Gon was just fine on his perch and Mason had a rather comfortable seat near her back fin. He looked over at the two pokemon they were leaving behind. A sly smirk spread over his face, as if he was taunting them. This effect was ruined when let out a rather embarrassing squeal of surprise when Avior stood up and spread out her wings. “See you both soon, I hope.” Avior offered, with a draconic bow goodbye. “Likewise.” Gerson said with a similar bow that the graveler tried to copy. “Put in a good word for me when you meet our maker, would ya?” “Stay safe, kiddo!” The graveler called to Gon, who barely nodded in reply. “Alright,” Mason said nervously, as Avior crouched and gave her wings a test flap. “so how does this Aura harness thing wor---AAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHhhhhh” Avior shot up from the ground in less than a second, the wind whipping away the tail end of Mason’s scream as she flew away. The two remaining hunters watched as she flew past Mauna Kea, then behind the mountain and out of sight. They remained in awkward silence for a few moments, before Gerson finally suggested a topic of conversation. “So...did you ever think of evolving?”