There was a noise in Astra's metaphorical ears. It buzzed loudly, incessantly, drowning out all else. Her head was starting to burn, scrapes and abrasions brought about by a cacophony rending wounds unto her mind.

  Just last season, being yelled at by the near-entirety of the Villages Elders would have been an anxiety-inducing nightmare beyond compare.

  She'd had worse nightmares since then.

  As she finally looked up at fourteen Elders, all of whom were utterly failing to grasp the apparently convoluted concept of speaking one at a time, Astra simply sighed. Were they even speaking coherent words at this point? They were overlapping too much to tell.

  She had thought she'd been ready to face their panic and anger. Make some arguments, get through it all calmly, sway them to her point of view...

  But there were so many devastating topics waiting, not to mention the big one at the end, that she suddenly couldn't find it within herself to give a fuck. Screw this; if they wanted to chastise her for how she conducted herself out there, she'd like to see them try to do it! They wanted an argument? They would get a blasted argument!

  Fed up, Astra raised a glowing hand, brought forth the memory of Rusturf Tunnel, and let the memory of the Exploud within—

  —Scream.

  A cacophonic roar shattered the overlapping panic and outrage of the elders, and as one they fell silent, gaping at the image of the hulking monster. Astra looked around, blinking slowly.

  "Are we good now?" she asked, channeling a bit more of May's mannerisms than was probably warranted. "Got the panic out? Fantastic. Can I keep going or are we going to waste time yelling at me for making friends?"

  The Matron, who had been by far the most vocal about Astra's 'reckless fraternizing', flushed so vividly she resembled a Pecha berry more than a Kirlia.

  "Do you think you can just brush past this rash behavior!? You've endangered your entire mission not even a single whole day into it! Need I remind you that the Ancestor had a human companion before she founded this Village, and even with what happened to her you would still consort with them like this!?"

  "Yes, I did," Astra returned, her gaze as inflamed as a storm-omen dawn. "And I'd do it again! I wouldn't have made it nearly as far as I have without their help, nevermind coming across the Granite Caves! They've had my back every step of the way, they've answered nearly every question I had about human society, and they helped me figure out what I was even doing! May saved my life when this Exploud attacked us!" she roared, flinging out a memory of those precious few seconds where the taller girl had yanked her out of the path of the Exploud's blind, maddened charge.

  "Maybe it was impulsive of me to accept May's offer to rest and travel with her, but if it was then it was the best fucking mistake of my entire life. They are my friends, and I am not leaving them."

  Astra concluded with a fierce gesture through the air, breathing deeply as her body demanded more air of her even without having spoken aloud. The Matron sputtered, and she cast her gaze around, noting the faces of the other Elders. Anger, surprise, disapproval, intrigue, contemplation—

  Her grandfather...concerned. But beneath that, immeasurable pride. At his side, Rena looked conflicted. The Alakazam would hold no favor for any human, but she nodded regardless.

  The Charred stepped forward and laid a hand on the Matron's shoulder, who flinched. They looked at each other for a brief moment, before the Matron scowled and twirled away, returning to her seat. The Charred turned to Astra, eyes sharp. "You are certain of this?"

  Astra collected herself, clenching her hands and letting out a breath.

  "Yes," she replied. "I've spent more time directly talking to them than I suspect nearly all of you combined have even seen a human. They care about me. I care about them. You all trusted me with this mission. I've already gotten results none of us ever dreamed of," she said, nodding toward Rena. "All I ask is that you trust me about this, too."

  The Charred's eyes flickered over the illusion of Astra's friends.

  "Do they know?" she asked.

  Astra hesitated, then shook her head. "They know more than I wanted them to," she said, quietly. "But...not what I am. But all of humanity will, eventually. Isn't that why I'm doing this?" she asked in turn, a fragile, wry grin on her face. "To make sure that when they find out, we won't needlessly burn away?"

  The Elders looked at each other, conferring quietly. Many frustrated faces appeared, the Matron most of all. Rena frowned at her.

  "Astra gave me hope when I had lived the vast sum of my life with only despair," she challenged, publicly. "Then she fulfilled that hope far faster than even the most wildly optimistic dream would have dared to venture. She will not fail in this, either."

  At Rena's assurance, the mood, reluctantly, began to soften. Faces shifted from muddled discontent to begrudging acceptance. After a minute, even the Matron could only scowl impotently.

  The Charred looked amongst them all, then nodded. "So it is settled. The matter of Astra befriending humans shall be her own dilemma to address, for good or ill."

  "It could be useful, even," The Presenter mused. "We will all be exposed to humanity eventually; these two could be a test case."

  The Scarred grunted. "Knowing how a beast will react to your actions lets you know how to control it. Should these humans prove emblematic of their kind, knowing their disposition to our existence ahead of time could be critical."

  Astra frowned at the comparison. They weren't beasts...

  Nevertheless, she'd take the victory she had.

  "I don't think I'll be telling them I'm a Kirlia anytime soon, but..." she hesitated. "Well, they found out some stuff that I need to figure out how to explain, and maybe I can use that to—"

  "We will figure all that out another time," her grandfather interjected, waving the topic away. "If all this arguing is out of the way, I would quite like to hear the rest of my granddaughter's tale. I think we will need to hear it all to make any good judgements, correct?"

  Astra gave her grandfather a grateful nod. "Yeah. There's still a lot to go."

  The Charred looked around. "Shall we all agree to save any further serious discussion for the end of her tale, unless it is sufficiently necessary?" Receiving multiple nods and agreements, she nodded to Astra in turn. "Very well. Continue, if you would."

  Astra sighed in relief. She hadn't actually skipped much of the 'argument', but at least it was over for now. Where was she? Right, leaving Petalburg.

  "So the next morning we left Petalburg and on the way out May got me something called an almond poppyseed muffin. It tasted really good, but the drink she had—coffee—was awful and bitter," she began again, tossing out images and sensations as she went. "Then we got onto the topic of Pokemon Typings and I accidentally flirted with her—" Why the fuck did she say that.

  "YOU WHAT!?" her grandfather erupted.

  Astra wondered if the Exploud would still be willing to punch her in the face.

  The tale of the Petalburg Woods passed swiftly. The Bead-Haired Elder wrung a promise out of Astra to check out the musical event in Slateport, and the Scarred leaned forward intently throughout the many battles against wild pokemon and trainers Astra and May had met along the way.

  Steven's battle elicited a hushed disquiet among them all, and Astra could practically see them recalculating the value of the wooden barricades they'd been putting up. The strange non-Psychic pressure Steven gave off also gave them pause, but none knew what it was. Astra quietly skipped over her subsequent fight with May, and the Aqua grunt's buffoonery outside Rustboro was a source of laughter for all.

  The Gardener nearly tackled Astra off the stage when she brought up the flower shop, and the entire retelling came to a halt so Astra could retrieve the seed packets from her backpack.

  "Cheri cures paralysis, Chesto...wakes you up? I don't know how you're supposed to eat it when you're asleep, honestly. Rawst cures burns, Aspear cures frostbite, and Persim cures confusion," Astra explained, handing the packets to the ecstatic Kirlia.

  Her grandpa was, as she had expected, having a conniption.

  "Look at that purple sheen!" he exclaimed, wresting the Rawst packet from the Gardener's hands. He gazed at the depiction longingly. "Do you know how hard it is to depict purple!? This could be just the key I need! Those yellows are fantastic too! Are the leaves on these trees accurate? There's a whole new palette of pigments here!"

  "I just want to know how they taste," Astra admitted.

  The collective nodded in agreement, and even the Scarred had perked up at this. The selection of novelty in food was very limited, and having five new ingredients to play with had everyone's mouths watering. The gathering took a break while the Gardener rushed off to personally delegate adding another two hundred berry bushes to the gardens on top of the ones they'd already planned out to account for the new Abra.

  Astra foresaw a lot of Kirlia finding good work in the fields in the coming weeks. She hoped the new berries weren't as finicky as Leppa—those miracle plants barely took root anywhere, and were five times as slow to grow fruit as Pecha or Oran. The amount of concentrate that had let her troupe travel to the Granite Caves had been uncomfortably costly; she didn't know precisely how many Leppa it took to distill a full-power flask of concentrate, but she knew they wouldn't replace what that one trip to the caves had cost for months.

  Heading back to the plaza to see what the commons chef had made today, Astra soon had a bowl of Pecha-soaked Zigzagoon laid across slices of roasted Seedot. Crunchy, smooth, savory. Ah, decadence. She hadn't had something this complex for quite a while. Ice cream had been monolithically sweet and creamy, the sushi place had been weeks ago, that fast food place May had taken to her was soulless, and the remainder of Brendan's hot dog at the arcade had hardly been quality, even if it had tasted good.

  "How's the meat?" the chef asked, carefully adjusting a few skewers laid across a rare metal grate atop his fire pit. "The butcher said the Zigzagoon was autumn-born, and I want to know if it tastes any different."

  It had orange fur? Huh. Astra chewed thoughtfully. "It might be a little more tender than normal?" she guessed, more out of a desire to say something than any real observation. "High quality, though."

  The chef nodded. "That's what I've been hearing. I think their coloring gives them some sort of preferential treatment within their packs, so they eat more, eat better, and eat more consistently, which makes them overall healthier, and thus tastier. Interesting, but not particularly exciting, you get me?"

  "I'm sure you'll have all the excitement you want in a couple weeks," Astra said, gently scraping some excess food residue from around her mouth with a Psychic field and dropping it into a nearby bucket. "The Gardener just got five new types of berries to grow."

  The chef whipped around so fast that a chunk of Zigzagoon flew off the skewer and nailed Astra in the eye.

  "What!?" they yelled.

  "AAAAHHHHH!?!?" Astra calmly replied.

  "NINCADA!" Astra's pokemon screeched, falling from stars-knew-where and latching himself to the chef's face.

  Her break failed to improve from there.

  A short while later, Astra returned to the sky-stage with her head totally soaked and her eye partially bloodshot from a furious scrubbing in the river, Nincada having been thoroughly chastised and then forcefully deposited into a very abashed Grovyle's arms.

  She stared balefully at the re-gathered Elders, ripping a chunk of prime Poochyena from the apology skewer as she did so.

  "Right," she said, pre-empting the numerous questions she could feel coming, "let's get back into this. Does anyone know what the fuck an Armaldo is?" She gestured with the skewer, ignoring the muted offence to her language as she conjured an image of the ancient Pokemon. "Rustboro's Gym had the skeleton of one of these things in the lobby and even though we definitely don't have any around here, I somehow knew what it looked like even when humanity only had incorrect guesses."

  "Another working of the Ancestor?" the Presenter muttered, the sentiment echoed amongst the others.

  The Dyed, mostly quiet up until this point, jumped to her feet, pink-hued coat swishing around her in excitement. "I know that head!" she exclaimed, pointing excitedly. "One of the previous Elders had that same sort of skull hung up in her home! Super unique; it really brought the whole house together!"

  "Hm?" one of the woodworking Elders hummed—the Carpenter, Astra recalled; he made furniture and other Kirlia-sized wooden objects. "Oh yes, I recall her. One of my earlier patrons; she had me make a whole new set of furniture to go with the thing in celebration of her passing the Ancestors trials and becoming a Gardevoir. Terrifying woman, and off in the head as well. You'd have to be, to intentionally get struck by lightning and not only come out of it alive but taunt the heavens to try their luck again a half-dozen more times."

  Astra felt her mouth drop open. Across from her, she saw Rena's eyes open wide in surprise as well.

  "She did what!?" the Alakazam exclaimed. "I lived underground all my life, but I've seen how damaging false-lightning is. This Elder took on the real thing multiple times? Why!?"

  "Boredom and power make for a terrible combination, Rena." her grandfather sighed. "I cannot recall that Elder personally, but while I have only seen a bare few Gardevoir myself, I have seen that often they simply do not know what to do with their new status after achieving whatever they wanted out of it initially. Evolving is an unambiguous boon, and I never knew any to regret their change, but there are hurdles to overcome and expectations that might not be met."

  "They are strong, but there is not much that a Gardevoir can do that could not already be done by a Kirlia or two," the Scarred interjected. "Much can be said of doing much more, much more easily, but very little is inherently new; one would have to work to discover novel uses of their newfound power.

  "Combat-wise, the Poochyena are no less immune to our third stage. Their increased reach allows one to use a spear more effectively, but that is not the point." He nodded to Astra. "Your father was a Spearmaster beyond all others in the village, but—while he was happy—it seemed to me there was always something in his heart that was unsatisfied with how comparatively little it helped him advance his passions."

  "It can be isolating as well," The Charred quietly added. "There have rarely been more than three or four Gardevoir in the village at once over our long history. Not only did it require innumerable intense, personal sessions with the Ancestor, once they did achieve the form...they shared the same form as the Ancestor. While it did not take long to acclimate, seeing those you once loved and cherished reflexively flinch and retreat from you can be...unpleasant, especially coming out of the trials. The number of true peers one would have is also reduced to mere single digits; if you were unlucky, it would just be her."

  "Near everything in the village is built expecting a Kirlia to use it as well," the Architect chimed in. "Imagine you go home and now you have to hunch down to go in your door. That the roof you grew up under now bashes your head in if you stand up straight."

  "That all your chairs are too small. All your tables are too short. Your bed doesn't have the space or beddings to hold you. Can't even use a latrine without hunching in on yourself," the Carpenter finished, looking down. "I worked the best I could, but true quality furniture requires time to make. She had to wait days before she could sit down comfortably. Nobody ever thinks about those things beforehand."

  "Were I to speculate, I would hazard that this Elder took the initial hurdles of the change hard," her grandfather said. "I cannot say why she wanted it, but once she had it perhaps she needed something to do with herself to prove the change 'worth' it, or perhaps simply to have something thrilling to do that would be unthinkable for a Kirlia. Challenging a storm a half-dozen times is certainly a feat beyond comprehension, so one supposes she must have succeeded."

  How grim. Part of Astra wondered why anyone would ever try becoming a Gardevoir if there were so many downsides, however front-loaded or temporary. But then...well, if she were facing down her current situation but had the option to evolve beforehand, she had a hard time imagining she'd turn it down. And it was only because her own parents had been Gardevoir that they had—that the village had survived, and for her to have hatched in her Grandfather's care.

  …She guessed that there was a reason Gardevoir were so rare. Given the way they had to do it, it took a certain kind of Kirlia to even try, let alone succeed.

  "Did she ever talk about the Armaldo skull?" Astra asked, re-railing the topic. "Humanity said that they went extinct a long time ago. Did she find it buried in the ground somewhere?"

  "As far as I recall, it was a gift to one of her forbearers from the Ancestor back during the founding," the Carpenter explained. "The creature itself was some sort of labor beast from...before then."

  Astra frowned. "So did she find it?" she muttered to herself. "If she'd dug it out of the ground around here, wouldn't there have been more skeletons? If it had been alive, why are they all gone now? And I don't think she would have just gone around to dig one up elsewhere, since I haven't seen any other strange skeletons. So...what, she'd just found one somewhere exposed and dragged it here on a whim? The display seemed to imply the species had been gone for a lot longer than the Village has been around; why would an Armaldo skull just be lying around on the surface?"

  "It wouldn't be the first time humanity has been wrong," Rena said. "They didn't know we were in the Granite caves. Maybe they didn't know how long these creatures lingered in the world, either."

  Unbidden, Astra's thoughts jumped back to the recipe she'd read out to Steven in the Granite Caves. Ancient Hoenn humans that had vanished long ago, using ingredients that were now long vanished or would require a...project from Devon...

  …That machine that could turn fossils back into Pokemon? Were Lileep another extinct Pokemon species? But why would that cave have a recipe that needed ingredients that were, supposedly, so long deceased?

  Perhaps she was jumping to conclusions, but there was some pattern here, Astra could feel it. The local Human population vanishing alongside two Pokemon species and an entire Berry line? Had it all occurred at the same time?

  What happened back then?

  Almost mechanically, she moved past the topic, regaling the Elders with her fight against Roxanne. She spoke of Marill taking out one Geodude, only to fall to another's surprise electric attack. Treecko taking that one out, and then facing down Roxanne's Nosepass and the colossal Seismic Shield it had conjured. The double knockout where Astra had experienced some sort of Psychic hyperfocus, guiding a well-fired Seed Snipe into Nosepass's ear while Treecko got crushed under a boulder. Winning by sheer dint of Slakoth being on her team at all.

  The aftermath where she evolved was partially glossed over in the specifics, though she was heartily congratulated all the same. She would have revelled in it more, but her previous question still lingered like a bad aftertaste.

  And as she moved on to her reckless testing of the Ancestor's Orb in the Rustboro forests, above the disconcerted grumbles and worried glances between the Elders indicating a discussion being saved for later, she could almost imagine that putrid yellow column hovering in the air to the northwest.

  Bile slid up her throat, and as she coughed and sputtered her way through a cup of water, she found that she would rather let some questions rest for a long, long time.

  The afternoon progressed, the sky steadily darkening into a crimson dusk. Astra's story continued to sing through the air throughout it all. As the tale wove on, tangents and interruptions became ever less frequent, until she was more or less monologuing for several hours.

  Reuniting with Brendan while chasing the Aqua grunt into the Rusturf Tunnel, catching Nincada on the way and battling against the Exploud Patriarch to rescue Mr Briney's Wingull, Peeko. Meeting the Devon President and accepting the courier mission, witnessing the miracles of human medicine at the Hospital, shopping for her new outfit, visiting the wonderfully beautiful lighthouse at dusk.

  Roxanne's class by itself took a long while to go through, even condensed. The Scarred was especially grateful for the knowledge on how to identify a Pokemon's Typing and the whole chart of strengths and weaknesses.

  Her brief aside for her trip to the Arcade was a great source of interest to the Short-Haired Elder, to Astra's lack-of-surprise. He was the foremost dancer in the village, after all.

  "It's not quite a tool that enables dancing," he said, closely examining a false image of the Dragon Dance: Revelations machine. "But it does help one master a sense of timing and rhythm. Were this platform more freeform I imagine it would allow much better performance. Perhaps a larger number of steps, but many of them redundant with one another. It needs options for expression."

  He watched Astra's first attempt at the one song she had played and hummed.

  "A decent attempt for one so newly evolved, but the space and your clothing restricted you too much. The music itself is...energetic," he tested.

  Behind him, the Bead-Haired Elder let out a loud whoop. "It's revolutionary is what it is!" she cheered. "I have to figure out how to make that screeching sound! Something like that violin of yours? What gives a good twang? Ah, this will be a challenge!"

  The Short-Haired Elder sighed. "I'm certain I will have to devise some new moves to go with them soon. Could you replay—"

  "Sorry, but I really need to finish," Astra politely rejected. The Elder shrugged.

  "Another time, then," he said, returning to his seat.

  Brief mention was made of Astra catching Swablu and revisiting Devon to retrieve the briefcase and tour their labs—Researcher Mami's Dark-type infusion module granting machinery immunity to Psychic manipulation garnering some very worried outbursts before Astra clarified that the module hadn't been finished and, judging by how Mami herself had been mildly confused as to why she was making it, also seemed to be a special creation for the employee's friend, so hopefully it wasn't going to be in widespread use and there wasn't too much they could do about it pre-emptively without some serious consequences and weren't we saving the questions for later!?—and then they were off to Dewford, albeit with the Scarred mumbling to himself about giant pits and falling trees.

  "Along the way, we passed by something called 'Winter's Eye,'" Astra said, fog seeping into the image of her memory. "It turns out to be the source of the random snowfalls we get."

  "Really?" her grandfather asked, leaning forward in astonishment. "Fascinating. I've heard many theories, but—how is it doing such a thing?"

  "They don't know either," Astra said, shrugging. "It's too cold to get near, though I'm not sure how hard they've really tried. But there's another part that's more important: the island is screaming."

  "…Screaming how?" the Charred asked in the sudden silence.

  "Apparently it's only something Psychics can experience," Astra replied. "To everyone else it's only a strong wind. But what I felt...it was like a presence in the very air around me, a pressure exuding a constant, oppressive, pleading despair."

  "It is emitting a Psychic scream that strong from so far away? What a powerful anomaly..." the Scarred mused. Astra shook her head.

  "It wasn't really Psychic, I think. It was just...a thought," she explained, haltingly. "A thought that was so loud and powerful and recurring that it just...embedded itself in the air around the island. Me and my friends theorized about what the other effects were caused by, and part of me thought the island was some sort of cage. What for, I couldn't say. A monster."

  "A monster seems like the most reasonable guess," Rena...suggested? Something about the tone felt incongruous. The Alakazam grimaced. "Let us hope whatever it is stays chained within; tales of the Long Winter paint the time as one of scarcity, danger, and woe; I would not wish to reckon with any beast able to bring it about."

  Astra's audience nodded in agreement, and the Kirlia continued on.

  "Right. Well, we arrived at Dewford shortly after leaving the Eye behind. Once we docked, we decided to go visit the Town Hall for fun because of it being a 'blasted den of misinformation and rumormongering' according to Brendan," she gave Rena a wry smirk. "Apparently he had a bad experience six years ago when he tried to follow a rumor about an 'Alakazam with five spoons' in the Granite Caves and wound up lost in the dark for six hours and nearly got his leg bitten off by a Mawile."

  Rena snorted, her laughter a staccato of high pitched huffs. "It seems my cousin's legacy remains. I doubt he would have enjoyed being reduced to some passing rumor, much less that it led more humans into our caves, but..." she looked down at the shiny silver spoon in her hand, smiling sadly as she flicked it around her fingers. "I appreciate that he left a lasting mark upon this world.

  "As for your friend," she continued looking back at Brendan's image, "I'm unsure if I had a hand in his encounter. Sometimes I found myself in a sort of mental haze; performing my duties and taking actions against invading humans without much conscious thought. I don't recall dropping {???□???????■???} on anything that wasn't a {Blank One}, but... Mmm. It was likely some other Mawile," she concluded, then paused, frowning.

  "Wait, why did he go looking for {?????????□??? ???????????????}?" Rena asked, baffled. The other Elders reeled at the visceral imagery associated with her cousin's name: an embodiment of flesh and bone being torn, broken, and utterly obliterated. "My cousin would have—the human would be—was he trying to die!?"

  She looked to Astra for an explanation. Astra thought back to the moments before she left the Granite caves, her expression turning thin.

  "Brendan is a very intelligent moron who lets his curiosity override his ability to make good decisions," she explained, a shade of bitterness coloring her tone. She blinked when her grandfather broke out into a coughing fit. "Are you okay?" she asked, worried.

  Her grandfather stifled something that sounded suspiciously like a chuckle. "Nothing, dear," he said, grinning at her. "That just sounded...familiar, is all."

  Astra eyed him warily. "Right..." she said, slowly. Then she shook her head and turned back to her illusions, throwing up another image from her memories. "Anyway, the Town Hall. There were a lot of humans talking about...basically anything. A lot of it was weird; this one group was obsessed with this Pokemon called Psyduck, which their leader saw in a dream—wait."

  She paused, suddenly overcome with a sort of baffled revelation. That guy had said he'd seen whatever phenomena 'Psyduck Correct' was in a dream—she could almost hear the chastisement of her somehow incorrect pronunciation even now—and at the time she'd assumed it was a dream-sourced vision of the future. Except she hadn't known Humans could be Psychic at the time, and she hadn't seen anything at all to indicate he was one either.

  …Had he made up that entire craze from a regular dream? Had she just taken all of that at face value???

  "I am a fucking idiot," Astra announced, to collective confusion. Unbidden, her mind produced a vision of May giving her an incredibly sardonic 'duh'. "Whatever. The humans talked about all sorts of nonsense. Some things were interesting, though; firstly, there's an abandoned power plant south of Mauville that's being haunted by something making a lot of screeching noises."

  She paused in thought. Hadn't Steven mentioned the power plant during his rant? It had to be shut down to give endangered Electric Pokemon a home. Shrugging, Astra continued on.

  "Second, they've sent machines up to float far above the clouds in the sky, armed with artificial eyes to see everything on the ground."

  "Does that include the village?" the Architect asked, looking worriedly at his stage that they were all occupying. "If they see things from the sky, my creation would surely be visible, no?"

  Astra hesitated. "I'm not sure," she said, scratching her head. "I have one of their best maps on me, and our forest is simply a giant mass of grey squares. But they could see the routes around us. I don't know if they can or can't, but...I think they simply haven't tried."

  Fearful glances were traded between all present, eyes glancing upward into the sky. Astra grimaced and forged ahead.

  "Well, thirdly, I also found out a little more about the music contest in Slateport: apparently it's 'really weird', and both an 'Ikaku' and 'Greywoods boy' will be attending, who use something called a 'clarinet' and a 'piano' respectively."

  "More instruments!" The Bead-Haired Elder cheered excitedly, visibly relieved at the topic changing to her specialty. "You simply must show me what these sound like when you get the chance! Attending that contest is mandatory, you hear me!?"

  "I'll certainly check it out," Astra allowed. She wasn't certain about entering it, but...well, she did want to see how well her admittedly limited practice had been going. Spectating was always an option if not, though.

  …Right. She sighed, rubbing her arm as she stared at the grain in the wooden floor. Time for the bad news.

  "There are two more, very important discussions I had in the town hall," she began, her voice turning sombre. The Elders picked up in the downturned mood, all of them sitting to attention with curious frowns. "The first is a discussion I had concerning the rockets Humanity is sending to the moon, which has its own set of two very important facts.

  "Fact one: these rockets can travel so fast that they could cross the entirety of the village a dozen times in the space of a blink."

  This novel's true home is a different platform. Support the author by finding it there.

  She looked around at her vocally disbelieving audience, feeling the light leaving her own eyes.

  "The second is that some of these rockets are not built to travel to the moon. They are instead built such that they could explode with enough force to level the entire village in an instant."

  There was a ghastly, horrified silence. And then a cacophony of noise.

  Incomprehension, disbelief, protests, despair,

  All these and more, a torrent of frustration and despondency.

  Astra waited, enduring the flood as best she could. No, she wasn't mistaken. Yes, it was real. She wished this was some sick prank.

  But it wasn't.

  "So we are doomed, then," the Presenter said, staring blankly. "The moment they discover us, our village will perish in the blink of an eye."

  "What was the point of all of our preparation!?" The Scarred howled, gripping his spear with both hands, veins nearly popping out of his skin as he clutched ever harder onto the shaft. "The wooden barricades, the days upon days of drills and spars; there is no spear sharp or fast enough to cut apart an explosion!"

  "I thought I had borne witness to their full might when my cousin fell," Rena mused, expression unreadable. "Have I traded one death for another? I cannot believe it to be so; you would not be so cruel."

  "Astra would do no such thing," her grandfather agreed. "She has told me herself that the plan will still work. There must be more that we have not heard."

  They looked to Astra, expressions and postures brimming with an array of despair and hope. While the existence of these rockets had been a nightmare, the Kirlia was glad that she had this small piece of good news waiting for them.

  "Fortunately for us, they apparently got rid of them after the war," Astra said, smiling at the sudden wave of partially confused relief on their expressions. "They could still make new ones, but for now we still have time to do what we can."

  "What's 'war'?" the Scarred asked, suspiciously.

  Astra's smile fell. She stared at him, thinking. "I will answer that, but I am going to keep going, first. I'm nearly finished, so it won't be long."

  The Scarred frowned, but nodded. Astra looked around, then sighed.

  "I found out what it was shortly after I found out about the rockets, and I...didn't take it well. The earlier experience with Winter's Eye, an...earlier depressive realization, and a sudden eruption of violent negativity within the town hall itself resulted in me being unexpectedly worn down. Despite this, or rather, because of this, I decided that I needed to rush for Dewford's Gym to battle Brawly and have something positive happen that day."

  "Were you not just having fun with your friends on the boat?" her grandfather asked, concerned and confused. Astra let out a hollow chuckle.

  "Just because it was my reason doesn't mean it was right," she explained, looking away from her grandfather's increasingly pained expression. "Nevertheless, I challenged the Gym Leader—Brawly—while I was utterly exhausted; I even zoned out or slept through parts of May's challenge—she went first," Astra added. "When I had my turn...Brawly was very nice about it, and he gave me several chances to call it off, but he demolished me with barely any effort at all."

  Rena blinked at her, the light of understanding dawning in her eyes as she understood what exactly had brought Astra to her doorstep in such poor condition. The Presenter, however, merely looked worried.

  "You lost to a Gym Leader? Are you allowed to try again?" he checked.

  Astra nodded. "Yeah; he even has a way to guarantee it—I just have to fight a bunch of other trainers in pitch-darkness. None of them can sense where other living things are like we can, and I can share that sense with my team. Plus I think some of them have better night vision than I do.

  "Aside from that...well, my friends were really concerned for me, and it was so bad that even May was sincerely trying to get me to take a break. But I ignored that and just yelled at them..." she muttered bitterly. "Then, using the info we got from Brawly, I forced us to spear-line straight to where Steven was: the Granite Caves. Then we had another screaming match in the mouth of the cave, and, well..."

  Astra trailed off and gestured to Rena. "She knows the rest better than I do."

  "I was in the middle of a rest period," Rena reminisced as all eyes flocked toward her. "One that I had desperately needed at the time, having relinquished the previous two to take care of neglected errands and monitor an abnormally strong trainer who had both uncovered a minor Creche and then inflicted massive damage to it. In the depths of my dream I detected a distant, barely coherent Psychic distress signal. Due to my own exhaustion, I did not recognize that the situation was unusual, and I mistook you for a lost Abra."

  Her eyes flicked to the quintessence facades of May and Brendan. "As my duty demanded, I roused myself as best I was able and went to your 'rescue', overpowering your friends' resistances and teleporting them deep into a Zubat warren in retribution. Then I brought us both back to my home, where I discovered your 'duplicity.'"

  The spoon in her hand curled and twisted in odd ways, the Alakazam looking ashamed. "I admit it took me a moment to work through my remaining tiredness and the fury that a 'human' had tricked me, but when I discovered your true identity I laid you to rest in an alcove and used a Psychic trick I know to ensure you had a good slumber."

  "It worked wonderfully," Astra assured Rena, both her and her grandfather smiling at the Alakazam. "Of course, once I woke up we had a whole lot of conversations and a tour, but I think you can tell everyone of your home at another point.

  "But one thing I do want to touch on is that your home deteriorated because humanity stole away every single evolved or combat-capable Pokemon in the caves, and the majority of the remainder on top, yeah?" Astra asked.

  Rena nodded, frowning. "That was what caused it all, yes. But why focus on that?"

  "Because I know what happened to them and why."

  Rena's eyes widened. Astra looked around the silent platform, and gently waved away all of her images.

  In their place, a single figure stood. Steven Stone, Champion of Hoenn looked out at the gathering with piercing steel-blue eyes, a neutral smile adorning his handsome face.

  "Once I left Rena's home, I—well first I met Aron on the way," she amended, "but we met up with Steven Stone immediately after, inside a hidden cave he'd uncovered earlier that day. He—well, he actually gave me some kinda painful guidance which facilitated Aron joining my team, but then...

  "Then he told me about the war."

  She looked to the Scarred. "Earlier, you asked me what that was. I want to ask you something in return. Those exploding rockets that can devastate entire forests...what do you think they were using them for?"

  The Scarred paused, face frozen as he thought about the question.

  "...Alpha Mightyena?" he guessed, doubt easily showing on his face even as he spoke the answer.

  Astra slowly shook her head. "Nobody would burn a whole forest just for a Mightyena."

  The Elders exchanged looks at Astra's statement, a private communication passing through the air.

  "Despite its ability to level a forest," the Gardener started, her voice faint. "I would like to hope that they were not created to do precisely that."

  "They were not," Astra confirmed. For a heartbeat, silence reigned once more. Closing her eyes, she waved a hand and brought forth a memory from the town hall.

  "What is war?" a past version of Astra asked.

  And Brendan, by her side and so painfully, endlessly supportive, answered as best he could.

  "People...don't always get along," he had said, his voice momentarily ringing with the same fatigue she had felt. "Sometimes they think people should or shouldn't act a certain way, or they want something someone else has, or they're scared or jealous or a thousand other things. When enough people feel that way...or when a few people with loud voices want people to feel that way...then entire regions can disagree about how things should be.

  "When people disagree hard enough, and their emotions run too high, they can get into a fight. And then someone can get hurt. But regions like Hoenn and Kanto are made of thousands and thousands of people. When two regions disagree, and they get into a fight...there are a lot more people that can get hurt, and they get hurt worse, and the fighting can last for a long, long time."

  Horror. Astra looked at the Scarred, looked at everybody.

  "They weren't meant to be used on Pokemon or on the land," she said, quietly. "They created them to attack each-other. What I learned from Steven Stone was this: forty years ago, Hoenn—the collective human population that calls this land home—was attacked by another nation: Kanto."

  "Forty years...?" Rena whispered.

  Astra nodded. "They entered into a war, one which lasted for a decade. The entire land was stripped to the marrow, not just the Granite Caves. But the Granite Caves came first, because the Lairon and Hariyama were actively going up and destroying the city."

  With a nudge, the image of Steven came alive, speaking the final explanation he had given her just yesterday.

  "To answer your question at last, Astra…the reason that the Granite Caves have no Lairon or Hariyama is because they had become the solution to another problem. Kanto sought our extinction and brought a horde to crush us underfoot. We responded in kind.

  "We captured every single combat-capable Pokemon within these caves both to permanently stop their assault on Dewford, and to serve as soldiers on the front lines of our war…

  "And none of them came back."

  Silence, yet again. Rena stared at Steven's image, her hands and joints creaking from the tense boil of emotions undoubtedly running through her head.

  "They had a solution for the problem, before the war started," Astra softly murmured. "They were going to release human-trained Pokemon into the caves. They would then integrate and use their strength to deter other Pokemon from causing trouble. But then they ran out of time. Afterward...they had the whole of Hoenn to fix, and without knowing about your home, the caves appeared stable. So they...didn't prioritize it.

  "It was awful, but...I don't think they had a choice."

  "When my people simply removed the intruding Human presence from the caverns, did they have no choice then, as well?" Rena asked, her voice deathly flat. "There was no more of value in those tunnels by their own doing, yet they insisted upon access regardless. They hunted down and slaughtered my family. Regardless of their reasons or motives, I was left alone for the majority of my life in an endless haze of pain and decay."

  Her eyes flashed, and the weight of an ocean pressed down upon Astra's mind.

  "There is nothing that will bring them back, nor erase the solitude of my long vigil. I understand that you have found some companionship amongst them and the full circumstances behind it all. I will extract what I am due regardless. There cannot be anything less."

  Astra simply bowed her head. She didn't like it, of course, but...

  Well, once she became Champion, she hoped that she could allow Rena to heal, rather than just get vengeance. But one last answer was still owed.

  "Her name was Glacia, by the way," Astra said, eyes meeting Rena's. "The trainer who brought down your cousin. She was the previous Champion, and is still a member of the Elite Four today. I will have to defeat her in order to challenge Steven and become the Champion myself."

  Rena was silent for a long time. Her head fell, casting her face into dim shadow.

  "Let her know just what she did to us," she said, quietly. "And then, when we all stand on equal footing...tell her that I would like a word with her, won't you?"

  "Of course," Astra promised. She could do nothing less.

  Blinking tiredly, she squinted up at the descending sun. They only had a couple hours left before dusk. Judging from the expressions on everyone else, they were starting to feel it, too. Her tale hadn't exactly made for light listening.

  Best wrap this up then.

  "There was one final thing Steven told me," Astra said. "And it's uh. A big one."

  She could almost feel the groan emanating from her audience. Not that their shields would have actually let her, of course.

  Astra glanced around, wondering how to put this. She fiddled with the leftover meat skewer for a breath, then just shrugged and said it plainly.

  "Some humans can be Psychic, apparently."

  There were a lot of significant silences going on today. Astra couldn't possibly fathom why.

  Rena looked around, confused at the Elders' shocked faces. "You did not know that humans could hold power? They had an uncanny knack for enticing my younglings away. I only started noticing them...twenty years ago? But there have been many more in recent times."

  "We never had any humans come through our forest like they delved your tunnels," Astra explained, surprised that Rena had apparently known before she did. "That revelation is...actually why I came home. Steven noticed I was Psychic—and still thinks I'm a human!" she hastily amended at the outright panic emerging from the Elders. "Steven found out that I was a 'human' Psychic, and then right after we finished talking about that and he went to leave..."

  She brought up the image of May and Brendan once more.

  "It turned out these two assholes had been eavesdropping, so they found out too. It was...a lot," she admitted, thinking back to that hazy minute where she'd all but shut down. She didn't quite know what had knocked her out of it, but for a moment, it almost felt like she hadn't been alone in the fog. "After sorting myself out and promising to come back with an explanation, I teleported straight out of the caves, healed my team, found Mr. Briney again, and had him sail me to the coast to our south.

  "Then I came home, and now here we are." Astra finished, spreading her arms wide. She gave them all a tired, wry grin. "So that was my last two weeks, how have you all been?"

  They stared at her.

  Slowly, one of the stone-working Elders stood up.

  "I," the Chiseled spoke, her eyes all but glazed over, "need a stars-forsaken drink."

  She turned on her heel and vanished with a crack.

  The Elders looked at where she had vanished, then at each other.

  With a rolling wave of meaningful glances, muttered excuses, and muffled pops, several other Elders followed the Chiseled on her desperate quest to get absolutely rotbrained or simply attend to other matters and rest, quietly forfeiting their input in the matters to come.

  Astra snorted. "Should try living this shit," she mumbled, inadvertently pulling on May once again. "I didn't get to scream about it, you know?"

  A pair of arms embraced her, and Astra gratefully returned her grandfather's hug with a tired sigh. No words were exchanged, but a barrier was briefly lowered, feelings of warmth, comfort, and pride seeping through. Once they separated, one of the remaining Elders grunted.

  "Well, we'll all have all the time to scream we want when the Humans break down our gates and capture our people," the Scarred said, thumping his spear to the floor as he stood. "That even some of them have Psychic ability bodes ill for your infiltration, and worse for any defences we set up before the great ward fades into memory."

  "While I've heard many references to it, what exactly is this 'great ward'?" Rena inquired.

  "Our Ancestor enveloped much of this forest with enigmatic protections that turn away dangers from outside," Astra's grandfather explained. "The closer a dangerous being not of our line gets to the village, the more their vision or mind will be addled. Poochyena packs will—Mm, they used to find themselves following tracks that did not exist, chasing illusory prey that led them far away and faded into scattered light. Humans walk in circles, veering away from us with clouded eyes or exclamations of forgetfulness. I witnessed a brief glimpse of a man wandering the same few patches of woodland for half a day, never noticing the repetition in what he saw."

  "Waters take me, that sounds absolutely grand," Rena exclaimed, eyes widening. "But it is fading, you said? Can you not repair it?"

  "We have tried," the Presenter said, sighing, "but it is not broken; it is simply running out of energy. Some aspects already failed long ago, such as the Poochyena deterrents; even now, they hunt and poke at the outskirts. We've even had Nincada and Zubat make nuisances of themselves in recent times. The ward has a locus point, where it is anchored—a sort of monolith underneath the Ancestor's former dwelling, covered with symbols that seem to stare at you—but trying to simply push more power into it doesn't work, and attempting to grip onto the essence of the ward just..."

  He hesitated, searching for words. "It is like trying to grasp at shadows," he finished. "You can take a look at it later, if you wish; maybe you'd have better luck."

  Rena hummed, frowning thoughtfully. "I am unsure my knowledge would be exotic enough to succeed, but I will certainly try."

  "For now we must assume that the ward will fail entirely in time," the Scarred stated. "Until then, we must prepare."

  "I'm not sure how much you can get done in six months," Astra said. "Nor what you could, to be honest. The better trainers are more likely to have entire teams of Pokemon at the level of the Exploud, and some with partners much better than even him. Wooden walls aren't going to cut it, I think; especially since a lot of Pokemon can wield fire."

  "I will simply have to make their successes cost them more than they could ever hope to gain," he replied, eyes as sharp as his weapon. "I will discuss this with my students personally." Switching to a private connection, the Scarred met Astra's gaze. "May I contact you for additional insight another time?"

  "You may," Astra allowed. She wasn't sure what else she could offer, but if she could help then of course she would. "I'm going back to Dewford in a few days; beyond that, you'll be on your own until I come back again."

  The Scarred grunted in affirmation, then nodded at his fellows and left with another crack.

  There were only a few Elders left by now: Astra's grandfather, the Presenter, the Charred, and the Matron. Two more if you counted Rena and herself, Astra supposed, though she still felt weird about calling herself one.

  "Does anyone have any questions now that I'm done?" Astra asked. "Maybe only a couple, please? I've been talking and standing up here almost literally all day."

  Her grandfather hummed. "What did you mean by 'six months'?" he asked curiously.

  Astra stared at him. "That's how much time we have left?" she half-asked, incredulous. "How long I have left to become the Champion before the village is exposed?"

  The Elders stared back at her, nonplussed. They looked to each-other, then back at her.

  "Astra, why do you think we only have—" her grandfather hesitated on the unfamiliar terminology, "—two seasons left before the ward fails?"

  Astra frowned, raising a hand—then hesitated, the assertion that they'd told her before she left dying before it was sent. Surely one of them would have backed her up if she were correct, right? But as she looked around, she only saw confusion and worry.

  'I—uh. Well..." she trailed off, her words flickering as she tried to recall when she'd become aware of her time frame. "I just...thought that was how long I had? But I don't actually remember anyone telling me that," she realized, once more thinking over the first few days of her adventure.

  When would she have been thinking about time? Not the Pokedex; that was just her figuring out how Humanity measured time at all. Not the Wurmple fights, the Pokecenter, the Pokemart, Trevor—

  Astra blinked, recalling the kindly old man who had gifted her his violin and, more importantly, had advised her to slow down.

  'On the same account, surely traveling all across Hoenn would take you a few months, no matter how much you rush.'

  And then she'd thought about how long her trip was going to take and had come to her current answer by blindly guessing how fast she could sprint across all of Hoenn and conquer the whole league. Of course, that had been assuming she would take minimal breaks and there had been zero consideration for, say, training, failure, actually knowing how freakishly strong Steven was, suddenly having friends, or rescuing an entire cousin Colony.

  That wasn't a deadline, that was...she didn't know what that was! Some kind of racing goal. Running across Hoenn at that speed...was that really possible? Still, all this meant that she'd been stressing out over how fast she had to go for potentially no reason.

  "Ugh," Astra groaned, rubbing her head. "I turned a daydream into a divination. How long do I have?" she asked.

  "A nuanced question," her grandfather replied. "As I said, the ward won't fail all at once; its power will simply weaken over time. Eventually the strength and area it covers will diminish enough to allow humans to approach."

  "We checked the day you left," the Presenter replied, "and by my estimate we still have about eight more summers until—"

  "Seven winters," the Charred quietly interjected, extinguishing the pleasant surprise Astra had begun to feel. The elderly Kirlia's eyes bored into her, mouth set in a grim line. "I examined the locus some days after your experiment. The energy sustaining it had dropped, akin to a Kirlia swiping a cup of spirits from a barrel."

  "What...?" Astra breathed, stepping back in shock. "You—you mean when I used the Orb, I...?"

  The Charred inclined her head. "Drained seasons of time from the ward? It appears so."

  "You did what!?" The Matron shrieked, horror etched upon her face. She looked between the other Elders rapidly, shaking. "No, that's impossible! You all have tested that accursed sphere before, haven't you? We never noticed anything unusual then, right?"

  "Nothing unusual happened when I tested it," the Presenter said, frowning. "But I don't think we checked the locus so soon thereafter, either."

  "I also did not notice anything unusual," her grandfather agreed. "Perhaps it was a matter of distance, or Astra making use of the power?" he frowned, tapping his hand on his leg. "We have never...used the additional strength for anything. They were all simple tests to ascertain how the orb functioned and to make sure it still did."

  "My experience mirrors you both," the Charred said, "but though nothing unusual happened when I operated the orb, it still stands that the energy vanished at the same time as when Astra drew on its power. There were no mass incursions by Poochyena or humans to accelerate the normal means of power loss, and I cannot think of another reason."

  "I knew we shouldn't have allowed her to hold it," the Matron almost snarled. "Bad enough that it's invading her mind 'benevolently'," the word dripping from her mind like sludge, "but now it's draining our protections!? No, I refuse to let this go on any longer.

  "Astra," she said, turning to face her. "You will not be taking the Orb back out of the village. It's too dangerous by far."

  Astra hesitated upon hearing the Matron's stern, argument-refuting tone. Leave the Orb here? That was...she'd never considered it. The orb might have taught her to read and all, but as useful as that was it was still violating and the only other things associated with it were either confusing or apocalyptic. Returning it to the village's care would certainly be the sensible move, right?

  …So why then, instead of relief, did she feel a deep, dark sense of trepidation at the idea?

  "What was the purpose of giving her this orb in the first place?" Rena asked. "If Astra is to remain disguised, such a powerful item would be at a cross-purpose, yes?"

  "It is an emergency measure for if faced with something far above her abilities," her grandfather explained, brows furrowed. "We knew nothing of the human world, and I thought it best to prepare for the worst. And I still do," he stressed, looking at his fellows. "Imagine if Steven had decided to unleash his full might against her? That bird of metal was fearsome on its own with minimal direction. I doubt that our best spearmaster would be able to take it down, and Astra is not a spearmaster. The orb is meant to be a last resort for just such a situation!"

  "She's a Kirlia now!" the Matron retorted, gritting her teeth. "She can just teleport away! The Humans even have Psychics apparently, so it wouldn't even break her disguise!"

  "I'm—" Astra started, voice weak and uncertain of what she would even say, before another voice cut her off.

  "Each usage of the orb is theoretically a massive drain on our ward's time," the Charred spoke, eyes closed in thought. "I cannot condone the possibility of losing even more of what meager time that remains. If danger befalls her, teleportation is simply much less dangerous."

  "It is not always easy to simply escape with a teleport!" her grandfather argued. "In an unfamiliar place, she may not even have a location close enough to arrive at! There may not be anywhere to go at all; recall how she came here from a small land surrounded by water? And what if her pursuers simply follow her until she runs out of power, hm? She needs the option; even with all it has done, I cannot let my granddaughter roam the world without a failsafe—!"

  A hand fell on his shoulder, and Astra's grandfather looked up at the Presenter, who was slowly shaking his head.

  "How likely is it that any of that even happens, though?" he asked. "It's not like she's seeking out danger head-on, and those friends of hers can warn her off any obvious hazards. And if she needs more power, can't she just down a flask of Leppa concentrate? My friend, I know where you are coming from, but it is simply more reasonable that she save herself with a simple teleport instead of blasting the landscape into another scarred wasteland while also draining our ward."

  Her grandfather faltered, and Astra could see the Matron give the Presenter a satisfied nod, while the Charred looked on in silence. Ah, they'd already made the decision, hadn't they? With the other Elders gone, even if she agreed with her Grandpa, that was still three against two.

  She would have to leave the orb here.

  …But she…

  …she didn't…

  …why didn't she want to…?

  "It isn't that simple."

  Everyone turned. Rena stared back at them cooly, the Alakazam's spoon twisting in her hand.

  "Back when my home was still fighting," she began, closing her eyes, "we tried to prevent the humans from entering our cave by teleporting them away. But then they sought ways to force their way through regardless, and found one.

  "There is a technique in this world, which negates all forms of escape. The concept of running itself becomes blocked, and one is forced to fight the opponent head-on until the end."

  She opened her eyes, her gaze grim. "One of our own went to deal with a group of invaders. She became trapped. Her name was {???■???□?●??? ??■?????????◆???} and, unable to teleport, the very notion of running away scoured from the world, we could only listen as she screamed out a warning, then simply screamed, and then fell silent forever. Humanity hunted down three more of my kin before we finally began to fight back, but by then it was far too late."

  Rena looked up, squinting into the clouded evening skies. "This ward may become compromised by the orb, but is it not already? These 'satellites' you spoke of, that float above the clouds and sky—they can witness all that happens upon the ground and have no minds to fool, correct? Can your protections even act upon them? If not, we will have to compensate, and there is no use sacrificing one tool to cling to the fading safety of another that may not even work."

  She looked at Astra. "You will take this Orb, and you will keep it with you at all times," she commanded, a waft of colossal Psychic pressure drifting across the air. "Learn to harness it properly," she glanced at her grandfather, eyes hard, "take whatever gifts it seeks to give you, and turn it to your own ends. I have seen what Humans can do. You will see more than me, in time. There is no precaution too great, and I refuse to let your voice fade when you have done so much to restore my own."

  Astra could only stare, too shocked to nod.

  The other Elders looked appalled by the contents of Echo's outburst, but when the Presenter began murmuring his assent and the Charred gave Rena a reluctant nod, Astra could almost see the conflict and frustration bursting through the Matron's shaking fists and screwed up expression.

  With an inarticulate scream of outrage, she swept around and vanished with a crack.

  "I suppose that's settled then," her grandfather noted, sighing as he stood up. He looked to where the Matron had vanished, a melancholic look on his face. "She argues like this because she cares, you know," he said to Astra. "It is how she became an Elder; single minded pursuit of safety and health for all the Ralts of the Village, and many of the Kirlia as well."

  "I...yeah," Astra managed, her voice dropping to a mutter. "Maybe too focused."

  She looked at Rena again. The Alakazam had bowed her head and was staring at her spoon, eyes locked on a far away memory as the implement twisted to and fro. Astra resolved to give her a hug after all this. She dearly needed it.

  "I'm keeping the orb then, I suppose," Astra said, to affirmative nods from the remaining three Elders. "Well then, I think someone should show me how to use the stars-forsaken thing then, yeah?" she said, leveling a glowering look at her grandfather.

  He winced. "Yes, I really should. I made a grave mistake by not doing so before your initial departure; I will not make the same mistake again. There is enough time left to go practice this evening if we finish here soon."

  Astra hummed. "Good. Now, there's just one more thing."

  She splayed out her hands, letting the exhaustion and exasperation fall onto her face. "What the burning fuck do I tell my friends when I go back? They know I went home and that I'm Psychic, and I promised to explain things to them, but I still don't know what or how much!"

  "Ah, now this is where I can help!" the Presenter cheered, striding forward. "We can take care of this quickly, and then you can go mess with doom orbs in the sand. Falsehoods are things we all have trouble with, but I am much practiced with creative wordplay. Tell me then, Astra," he said grinning.

  "What is the best foundation for a lie?"

  Astra blinked. "What?" she asked, cautiously.

  The Presenter grinned and, before planning out exactly what Astra should say, gave her a very simple answer.

  "It's the truth."

  Happy birthday to me~ And a very pleasant chapter-shaped gift to you.

  Of course, comment-shaped gifts (hopefully including opinions on said chapter) are welcome in return! Anything further is just frosting on the cake, really.

  If you feel the urge to do something nice that isn't as much effort as an omake, drawing, or song...(I've been seeing people generate these recently. It's fun, but don't forget to contribute to actual artists too!) I am an ego-driven creature. Terrible, I know, but feel free to speak of Hyphen in other circles you may know. Whenever I glace into the few Fic Rec places I pass by on the incidental, I never seem to find myself amongst the repeated few Poke-fic that regularly circulate around. Call it petulant, but it does feel a bit unfair after nearly 11 years...

  Talk to me on! Update my!

  Thanks as usual to my editors Fuzzy, Cat, Slain, and Irony.

  Chapter 45, 'Umbrage', will hopefully come out within the next week. There has been a delay; I apologize for the inconvienience. Alas, I cannot share the rest of this gift without it...well, I could, it would just be a little bit lesser.

  Next time, we travel to a place of great tragedy, with eyes full of smog and feet grit by sand.

  Peering into something so bereft of light...

  It's like...

  ...

  But that's nothing unusual.

  Isn't it?

  Till next time. Soon, very soon.

  See you in the sands, little ones.?

  Thank you for reading, and tell me what you think!

  ...oh, and before I forget.

  There are a couple pieces of art that I forgot to share on here. One is *very* late; it should have been shared last September, but it kept slipping my mind.

  An image celebrating Hyphen's 10 year aniversarry. Shared elsewhere on it's 10th anniversary. Posted here 10 months late. Whoops.

  Artist: HeartlessMushroom.

  The Ancestors Orb.

  Artist: Dexexe1234. He can be found in the discord above!