“Midnight! I’m going into town!” Caddi announced.
“Mind having Kya along?” He asked. “She should get some time outside, and I don’t think you’re going to be out there looking for Lea by how you said that.”
“She can come.” Caddi agreed. “I was just going to see if I can earn some more bits. She might like it since I usually like to do music performances. I got this weird sound board from a friend of mine that I’m going to use.” Caddi held up a board with 64 buttons on it in a standard square design.
“Cool! Who’s was it?”
“I don’t have to tell you my sources!” Caddi exclaimed, staring at him with her pure blue eyes before she disguised herself as Kiwi. “Kya! I’m going into town! Wanna come?!”
Kya burst into the room, accidently skidding into a wall when she tried to stop. “Do I get to help look for Mommy?”
“Um, no… But I’m gonna do music stuffs if you wanna come see.”
“To the music!” Kya exclaimed. She ran to the door, barely missing the door frame.
“Any idea when she’s gonna have a better time seeing with one eye? Or is she always going to have issues?” Caddi asked.
From one side of the room, Blissey answered. “Well, she has been getting better. I’d say she’ll be able to go around normal in a day or two.
“That’s good.” Midnight responded. “I’ll see you later Caddi.”
“A kiss for the road?” Caddi asked.
“Well I gu-”
“Are we going or not?!” Kya poked her head back inside. “I have been promised music! And I will get said music!”
Caddi rolled her eyes and got a small kiss from Midnight before she walked out the door.
“So you said stuff about music. What kind of music stuff?”
“Well, every once and a while” Caddi started to answer. “I’ll go into town to earn some bits to live off of. Since I’ve been staying with your family, however, I’ve been helping to make sure we all don’t run out of money.”
“When I get a piano, can I help?”
“I guess if your mom lets you, you can.”
“Yay!”
The two of them reached the center of town and Caddi started to set up with some help from Kya. It had been a while since anyone had seen Caddi, and everypony was excited to see what she was doing today. By the time Caddi was all set up, there was already a fairly large group of ponies to watch. There were even some pokemon in the audience.
Caddi started up the equipment and used her magic to press the various buttons to play certain sounds that when played along with the already playing music, sounded amazing to the audience. At one point, a few of the pokemon flinched at a sound that resembled a pokeball, but other than that, everything seemed fine.
Then at one point during the performance, Caddi just stopped the music altogether. She had noticed that in her audience were three very familiar figures. The first was Angela, who looked very tired, like she hadn’t slept since the night before. The second seemed to be Bright Ire, but her mane was a different color. More of a blue than yellow. The last was an umbreon, but unlike your average or shiny umbreon, this one had pink rings.
“LEA?!” Caddi shouted, looking straight at her.
“Where’s Mommy?!” Kya exclaimed.
Both Ire and Angela turned their heads to look where Caddi was staring. Lea had her paw on her forehead as she slowly shook her head. She looked like she was about to speak, but then she was tackled to the ground by Angela.
“Where have you been?! We’ve been searching the whole entire city for you! Do you have any idea how pissed I am at you?!”
Lea pushed her adopted sister off of her. “I thought you and I had a chat a while ago about how I wasn’t your friend and you wouldn’t bother me again unless you found the pony I was looking for.”
“And who would that be dear?” Ire said, joining the conversation. Her horn was still growing from the translation spell she had just cast on the umbreon. Slowly all the ponies and pokemon nearby were backing away.
“That would be you, Rage.” Lea smiled.
Ire had a shocked look before it became one of anger. “It’s not Rage, it’s Spell. And it’s not Spell, it’s Ire! How do you even know my real name?!”
“Well I…” Lea was at a loss for words. “I’m not sure, but that doesn’t matter.”
“Wait, why were you looking for Ire, Lea?”
“I’m not your friend Lea! Stop thinking that!”
Caddi tried to fly over to join the three of them, but forgot she was disguised as a unicorn and fell flat on her face. Kya had ran over quickly to the group to tackle Bright Ire before she could do anything else to her mom.
“What did you do to my Mommy?!”
“I AM NOT ANYONE’S MOM, AND I AM NOT LEA!” The umbreon yelled at the top of her lungs.
“Oh, but that you are.” Ire goaded. “And if it weren’t for my regrets, I would let you keep disagreeing.”
“Oh what kind of regrets would you have?” Angela sneered.
“All I wanted to do was get rid of who she was so she would be an obedient pokemon.”
“Is that all?! How wonderful!” Angela growled.
“You did what to my mom?!” Kya yelled, her blind eye twitching.
“Hey, I said I wanted to, not that I did. Instead she just can’t remember who she is. She doesn’t have access to those memories. Though she should have just acted like somepony with amnesia. Instead, she seems to know who I was and built a whole personality for herself which I can’t explain.”
“Great, that makes everything better!” Caddi said as she joined the group. “And let me guess, you can fix it?”
“As a matter of fact, I can.”
“And why the hell should we trust you?”
“Because since I didn’t remove her memories and just locked them away, I actually have all her memories. And while for me, they all seem vaguely dreamlike, I still know them.”
“Prove it!” Caddi challenged.
“You made her cry trying to surprise her back when you two first met.”
Caddi gave a wide eyed look before looking down at the ground. “Yeah, okay… you proved it.”
“So do you want me to fix her or not?”
Angela looked like she was about to strangle Ire. Or worse. Instead she simply replied. “Fine! But let’s go somewhere other than the middle of town.”
“Who says I want to?” Lea said from the sidelines. “Maybe I’d like to stay this way. I’m perfectly fine not being whoever you want me to be, and that should be enough! My mind, my rules.”
“Gosh! You sound too much like Ire!” Caddi rolled her eyes. “Come on! We’re going home!”
Caddi picked Lea up in her magic, and as she was leaving, told the group of ponies she would have another performance tomorrow and apologized for the disruption.
Upon entering the building, Ire turned on them, her horn glowing. “Why is my husband tied up in a chair!”
“Woah! Leave them alone! I asked them to keep me like this when they wanted to untie me.”
“What?! Why would you want that?”
“In case Grumpig decided to try something using me. She didn’t, but some after effects of what she did to me kind of made me attack them.”
“So calm down Ire.” Caddi said, dropping her disguise as Kiwi. “Now will you fix our friend or not.”
“Not! I’m not letting her!” Lea exclaimed.
“Since when did Lea act like my wife?” Quarry asked, getting a glare from Ire.
“This may be like the effect I got from when I blocked her memories. Instead of getting mine, she just got some of my personality.”
“My sister is you?!” Matrix said, his one eye starting to twitch. “You better fix her now or I’m going to make Angela tear you to shreds. Mainly because she’s good at that and I’m not!”
“Alright!” Ire said, slightly scared of the thought of being torn to shreds. “You! Get over here!”
Ire picked up Lea in her magic. Lea squirmed in the air for a few seconds before she became limp. Ire had her eyes closed and was staying very still. within a few minutes, Lea was set on the ground and Ire opened her eyes.
“That should work, though i’m not sure since I don’t have Grumpig here to tell me what to do.”
Slowly, Lea started to wake up and picked herself up off the ground. When she seemed to be stable on her feet, she slapped Ire’s face.
“That’s for removing my memories!” Lea slapped her again. “That’s for attacking my family.” Then Lea gave her a hug. “And that’s for helping fix what you did.”
“Mommy!” Kya pounced on her mom.
“Hi Kya! I’m so glad to see you and not be in danger.”
“We need to talk about getting a piano.”
Lea laughed. “Alright, but first I want to unpink myself.”
“Aww! But I like you as pink!”
“I don’t.”
“So, how much do you remember of the last few days?” Angela asked.
“For the most part, I can remember it well, Though not as well as my normal memories.”
“Well, I’m glad I could help, but I’d really like for my husband and I to leave.”
“Wait just a moment!” Matrix told her. “If you haven’t noticed, we’ve got a police officer staying here.”
“Yes.” Midnight spoke up. “You have a long list of charges Bright Ire. Or would it be better to call you Rage Spell?”
Ire quickly spun to face the thestral. Her horn was charged so much, that it was sparking. “Don’t you DARE call me that! I don’t use that name anymore and neither should you!”
“Leave her be Midnight.” Lea told him.
“Wait, what?” Angela asked.
“We still need her help. She can help us find Grumpig before she does anything else bad.”
“You seriously want her help?!” Angela yelled. “Are you missing a few memories? She tried to kill you! She treated you like an animal.”
“But she came around in the end. Besides, the second time around, I kinda picked up a few of her memories as well.”
Ire flinched. “Wh-which ones.”
“The ones that matter. No one should have had to go through what you did at that age. No one deserves something like that.”
“What are you talking about.” Matrix questioned.
“It’s… not something that concerns you.” Ire said quickly. “Let’s talk a break from all this and look for that pig pokemon in an hour or so.”
“Deal!” Lea told her.
After the hour had passed, the group figured out who would go looking for Grumpig. Lea wanted to go since she hadn’t done anything recently other than be someone else entirely. Angela decided to go because she wanted to talk with the psychic. Ire and Quarry were obviously going along since they had the best chance of finding her. They were bringing along Mightyena since they believed he might be able to find her scent. Matrix was also part of the group, though he didn’t want to.
“Matrix, you’re the only one of use who knows a move to put her to sleep.” Lea urged him.
“Why can’t we wait until you figure it out. I don’t want to face her again.”
“Are you really that scared of her?” Ire taunted. “She said that dark types were immune to psychic moves.”
“We’re supposed to be, but she’s… different. She can actually hurt me if only a little.”
“Before becoming Gale’s pokemon, Grumpig had her psychic powers boosted by Doctor Nurem. From what she said, there was some sort of accident and that gave her a bit more of a boost than she wanted, but it was fine for her none the less. She’s not sure what exactly happened to the doctor after that, but I think I might have some sort of idea.”
“Wait, who’s Gale?” Lea asked. “Did I miss something while I was gone?”
“Not something I want to talk about right now.” Angela said, wanting to get off the topic. She turned to Mightyena. “Do you have a scent of her yet?”
“I think so. Follow me!”
The group started to follow the bite pokemon at a quick walk, which slowly got faster and faster as the scent became more clear for him. Before long, they came to what seemed to be a park, but it looked as if no one had been caring for it the past few years.
“I remember this park.” Ire said, slowly retreating. “You guys can go ahead, I’ll stay here and guard the entrance. I-in case she tries to… to leave. Yeah, I’ll stop her if she tries to leave.”
“What’s so scary about this place.” Matrix asked.
“Matrix, leave her alone. I wouldn’t want to go in here either if I were her.” Lea scolded him.
“Oh, but why don’t you all come in? It would make my day.” Angela said from behind Ire, a dead look in her eyes.