I Will Touch the Skies – A Pokemon Fanfiction

Distortion

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A/N: General trigger warning, this chapter gets somewhat dark and some scenes might be unpleasant to read.

DISTORTION

My eyes sluggishly fluttered open, and I realized I hadn't died. The enormous, flying worm had brought its inky black wings bearing down on us in a way that should have crushed me under its massive weight, and yet I was breathing. Conscious. Still unmoving, I slowly clenched a fist, digging my fingers into my palms that I could barely even feel. A flash of darkened red thunder boomed overhead, causing me to whirl my head toward the sky, but I only found more ground. I was somewhere… different. No longer did I stand atop Spear Pillar, but somewhere where the ground had turned to hard, reddish stone with countless bumps and little holes littering the surface, devoid of any vegetation. The tone of the colors here was wrong. Everything was faded in a way that made the world look like it was withering, yet it was not. My feet shifted tentatively on the ground, and it pulsated, revealing crimson veins throbbing below the stones that seemed to bend the material to make space for themselves. With every movement, the ground shifted in turn like a heartbeat. Like it was alive, in a very uncomfortable way.

"Where am I—"

My voice came out distorted and constantly shifted in pitch. During the Darkest Day, Shiftry's neutrality had turned everyone's voice to the same, monotone pitch, but there was no order to it here. Sound bent and twisted, and carried as if I was underwater. My skin felt like I was underwater, too, or maybe covered in some heavier material like oil or ink. The air here was thick and it made moving around slow. I rubbed the side of my arm, hoping to make the gross feeling of ink covering my skin go away, but it refused to budge.

Calling where I'd been standing the ground had been disingenuous. It was a floor, walls and a ceiling all in one, slowly curving in on itself as if gravity had no meaning. There was a pond on the ceiling— or I supposed 'ceiling' here was inaccurate, but it made things easier to fathom— that made me feel like I was about to fall up for a second. It wasn't even dripping back 'down' like it should have. Glancing to the side, toward the end of the curved island, was an endless stretch of a sky so dark blue it almost appeared purple with countless, darkened clouds from which red lightning continuously boomed. If I looked long enough, I could see faces in the clouds, like a child finding shapes in the sky. Smiling, horrified, pained, and everything in between.

More islands floated in that void as far as the eye could see, some barren, some sporting mountains and hills, ravines and rivers— even forests full of trees that grew in impossible spirals, their bark a sickly green pulsating with the same red that permeated everywhere here if you looked close enough. There were even a few near the small pond above me, where I could see their leaves in detail. Calling those leaves was generous, considering they looked like a tuft of human hair, or maybe fur that stood on end. Black close to the bark, and a darker brown at their edges.

Wind constantly swept across my skin that was nearly silent. A whisper carrying unintelligible voices that made my skin crawl, muffling even my thoughts. I'd heard this exact sound before— Barry Lane's Ominous Wind during our battle in Pastoria, but less focused, as if the tiny crack his Staraptor had opened had forced all of this out into our world like pressurized wind. If I squinted, I could see smaller dark clouds, gathered in-between my crescent moon shaped island, from which I could hear muffled screams. Those same voices the wind carried.

Was I in…

No. No, that couldn't be possible. It just wasn't.

The shape of this place gave me the exact sense of smallness Dialga's dimension had. As if it was an entire other world that would go on forever if I could travel through it. With that realization came the uncomfortable itch under my skin and a familiar weakness in my legs that would have left me frozen here forever, had I allowed it to take control, but I couldn't stay here and do nothing.

Cecilia and the others weren't anywhere on this… 'island'. I could tell, because since it was curved, I was able to see every nook and cranny of its surface. It was relatively flat and besides the lake surrounded by a few of those creepy trees, it was featureless.

"I can't catch a break," I sighed, on the verge of tears. I crouched and hugged my knees tightly.

I was so, very tired. It felt like I'd been fighting a lifetime, but it had been less than a week since the bombs had even exploded, and that was only from my perspective. I took a weary step that sent the rocky ground below into a fit, but aside from the uncomfortable sound, it was bearable.

Uncomfortable. I was finding that adjective to be a perfect descriptor for this place. Even when I'd been witnessing time, I hadn't been this on edge. IT wasn't a sharpened knife held against my neck that would have me feeling like every breath against the blade could be my last, but something far more insidious. It was a shadow lurking in every corner. A never-ending stream of paranoia that gripped my very being and had me on the verge of a mental breakdown. It was like being on edge all the time, constant dread that bore its full weight atop your shoulders, and I couldn't shake the feeling that I was being observed. Eyes lurking behind every rock, every edge, every tree, I could SEE. My heartbeat was so loud I could feel the blood pump in my ears and down my legs, cold sweat clung to my skin, which was hyper-aware about every single touch— my hand gripped my shirt where my heart was and squeezed, but it wouldn't stop. This place was mad. Mad. It was like everything that shouldn't be was here and it was making my head spin. The way the hair on the trees flitted in the wind, swaying back and forth. The strange, red tint the water had, so faint you'd miss it ALL nine times out of ten. The way things seemed to change positions when you didn't look at them for long enough—

A groan laden with pain emerged from my closed-off throat, and I slumped to the ground as a flash of red, nowhere as bright as it should have been, appeared to my right. There was an awkward pain shooting up my hip as my Pokeballs dug into the skin, but it was my mind, that was in disarray. Something here was watching me, and I had no idea if— if it was that thing that had crawled out of that wound in the sky or something else, but its sight was unbearable to the point that a little voice in the back of my head considered jumping off the edge of my island to free myself from this sight.

A little blob of metal crawled toward my head. Mimi's eye frayed with panic when they saw that I wasn't just lying down, but actually suffering. Seeing their eye wobble and bounce around their golden gear shook me out of what must have been a panic attack, and I remembered. I had people I cared about here. Cecilia, Mira, Maylene— if I was doing this bad, then what was happening to them? If Cecilia had been on the verge of a mental breakdown before, then she was in so much more danger now. Hell, Maylene didn't even have her Pokemon to keep her grounded like I did!

"Shit…" I said, standing upright and blinking away the tears. I hated the feeling of the ground pulsating against my hand, and it sent goosebumps up my arms. When two arm-like blobs protruded from Mimi and shook my leg, I bit my lip. The pain would center me. "I'm sorry, I didn't mean to release you." As soon as I grabbed their Pokeball, the spikes burst from the steel type's body and they puffed up as large as they could, which wasn't very much. "You don't want back in the ball?"

Meltan mewled a long, annoyed note that reminded me of something sharp scraping against metal. They hadn't seen me this close to breaking down since they'd first met me, even, and the want to support me superseded how terrified they were of this place, even if they acted like they weren't. It was difficult to miss the constant rippling across their metallic body or how they could barely maintain their solid form.

"I… we might get attacked? I have no idea what this place even is," I muttered, scooping Mimi up in my hands. "But if you really want to keep me company while the others rest in the balls, I really appreciate it. That's very brave of you, Mimi." I slowly rose to my feet again, opting not to scan my surroundings. The less I focused on this place, the better. "To be honest, I have no idea if I can make it without you, but let me know if it overwhelms, okay?"

Mimi chimed, easily dissolving into liquid and crawling up my sleeve until they reformed on my shoulder and clung to a patch of my tangled, dirty hair for support, both physical and emotional.

"Okay, we have to… yeah, we have to figure out a way out of here somehow." Something told me that just waiting wouldn't work here, or maybe it was just the dire need to keep on the move, just in case I managed to hide from the constant gaze bearing down on me like the sun. "I guess I'll tell you about everything you missed since Saturn to keep my mind off of all of this while we walk."

Near the lake was the edge of our island, where another lay close by and I figured I'd get a better view of this place (though I would have to mentally prepare myself for it). Putting one foot in front of the other was hard, like I had to learn how to walk again. Every movement frayed more than it should have, my legs teetered like they were about to fold. This was what I imagined being drunk must have been like, and combined with the nonsensical gravity of this place, I was getting nauseous pretty quickly. Still, I distracted myself by telling Mimi everything we'd been through, including my failures. Back when I'd fought Saturn, I had believed that keeping the grunts— the victims of Galactic's cult— alive was impossible due to Regice, but Virtuous had figured it out anyway. Granted, she had her ACEs with her and I didn't. Still, though Meltan was somewhat miffed, they were glad that I hadn't let myself be consumed by violence, be it for Saturn or Mars.

"When we made it to Spear Pillar, I… saw something. It feels like a dream now, but I saw different versions of myself, all diverging from Solaceon. That was when I got into my first real fight with another person, and the first time I killed," I mumbled.

We were getting closer to the lake, now. Out of fear that we could get attacked by some water type, I blinked, checking the place with my empathy— my knees buckled and my head nearly exploded with pain and sorrow. The intangible whispers which had been impossible to understand suddenly took shape and coalesced into more voices than I could count. More than Spiritomb, more than Dusknoir when he opened that torturous maw on his stomach…

It grows in him. A disease that leaves him only a few weeks to live and has cut his ambitions short. His parents are in too much pain to come visit him any more and all he has for company is the sound of his heart rate monitor.

She foams at the mouth and convulses from the electric shock. A Raichu and a tall man loom over her. All she's ever wanted to do was free her people from the boots pressing down their neck, but she has failed.

The mind of a boy, always second place and never first. He is a guiding spirit, yet he yearns for a position he will never have because he is dead. Every time, he's come just short of everything he's ever wanted.

They're not real. I focus on Mimi's screeches and the taste of metal filling my mouth. They were echoes. Remains of what had once been, but the people themselves weren't suffering. Wiping the drool off of my chin, I managed to refocus my vision and realized I was leaning against one of the trees and I'd somehow stumbled back a few hundred feet without realizing. The bark itself was slimy and sticky, and I wiped the substance on my pants as I heaved and caught every breath like it'd be my last. Mimi warbled in my ear, probably asking if I was okay.

"I'm sorry. I… won't do that again," I grunted.

Tired.

The steel type glanced at the rusty-looking water and their hand turned to a sword-looking appendage. I sobbed a little and had to shake my head to center myself and remember that none of that loss had happened to me.

I heaved and wiped the seemingly endless sweat off my brow. "There's probably nothing in there… I think. I just wanted to make sure, but there are too many… things here to distinguish individuals."

This was like I was in Jubilife for the first time after getting my powers all over again, except each emotion was so much louder and depressing that focusing on a single spot was impossible. I had noticed that those little clouds above me were the general direction from which these negative emotions were the largest. They weren't clouds made of water vapor, then, but nodes of concentrated anguish where spirits gathered into one bundle of negativity. Some of them in the distance were massive, but then again, there were a lot of dead people and Pokemon.

From the context I'd gathered speaking to Mathilda, there was no more doubt about it. This was the Dusk, which meant that that horrifying thing which had dragged us in here and fought Dialga was the embodiment of Distortion, the being which ruled this entire realm. Distortion was so much more than I thought it could be. It was, in truth, an all-encompassing aberration that affected every aspect of existence, from visuals, to emotions, to gravity itself— it all combined into a terrible cocktail of distilled discomfort that could drive a person crazy if they paid too much attention to it. What seemed like a short path could elongate into an endless journey, while distant objects could suddenly loom right before your eyes…

Case in point, I was supposed to have made it to the lake, by now, but the way there stretched on and on far longer than it should have, like those dreams where a hallway was constantly elongating and you never made it through the door. When I did, I looked back 'up' at where I'd been, which had previously been down, and what should have taken a mere two minutes had instead taken nearly ten. I scratched my neck and adjusted my collar. It wasn't tight, but it felt like it was, anyway, and that was ignoring the fact that I'd been moved when panicking about those spirits.

The water was eerily calm, but I ignored it and made my way near the edge while Mimi whispered warnings in my ear. "Thanks, but you don't have to worry, I won't… yeah, I'll be okay. I've got to get my friends back. I gotta." The little blob of metal slid down my back and leg until they became a golden bracelet around my ankle, then a solid block of steel keeping my leg anchored to the ground. "Okay, that works too."

I needed to stop coddling them. They weren't a fighter, but that didn't mean they were useless. I had approached the brink cautiously, terrified of what I'd be about to see, but having them with me was doing wonders for my mental state. Being alone in here…

Legendaries, I hoped the others were okay.

I peered over the edge of the abyss.
The island's edge did not drop away into any
familiar void. Instead, it seemed to bleed into
the surrounding darkness, as if the land itself
was dissolving into the inky emptiness around
The boundary between the solid ground
and the abyss was indistinct, shifting with a
disconcerting fluidity. My eyes struggled to
focus, to make sense of the ever-shifting
landscape to see if there was anywhere I could
LEAP to. The space below was an endless
maelstrom of darkened clouds and floating
debris, from islands the size of cities home to
forests with the exact same trees to small asteroids
orbiting around nothing. Some of these places
appeared distorted due to the light bending wrong,
and it was difficult to judge distances once things
got too far. There was a smaller, barren island
below us that I believed to be within JUMPING
distance. I could JUMP there… probably? I
wasn't the fittest, not after spending so much of
my time with my ankle in a cast and getting carried
everywhere, but there wasn't really another way,
was there? I had to JUMP, didn't I? There was no
other choice but to fall, no other way to move forward.
After that island, a path presented itself, suspended
in mid air and twisting around like a coil, so I'd be
able to move easier, at least. So I FALL—

Something weighed both of my legs down, and instead of the grand leap I'd expected, I stayed stuck near the edge. My feet stopped struggling against Mimi, who had anchored themselves to the ground by burying themselves into the cracks and staying there, though the metal bled into the ground like two solids cropped onto each other like some video game. Given a few more seconds, I might have torn through them, but the little time they'd afforded me had been enough to realize that I had no idea what I was doing. For one, I hadn't scouted the edges of the entire island, and two, I had no idea if I'd keep falling down to the island, even if that jump looked to be achievable.

For what felt like the thousandth time today, I sighed in relief. "Holy shit… thank you, Mimi," I forced out. "I was just drawn in. Th—there's an expression for this, you know? L'appel du vide, it's Kalosian. Cece explained it to me once." Mimi ignored my ramblings and prickled at my ankles to beg me to get away from the edge, and I did. They freed my ankles once they felt that I was stepping back and slumped into a puddle, exhausted. "I think we'll need Buddy to help. I know he's tired from the constant battling, but there isn't much of a choice and I need people here to keep me sane."

What would have happened if I'd fallen? Would I have kept tumbling, for eternity?

Better not to think about it.

I was worried about what this place would do to him given his ghost typing, but it wasn't like I had much of a choice, and while Sweetheart was an option, I was certain she wouldn't be able to resist the mental assault that the Dusk would bring. At least Pokeballs work in here. I brushed a finger against Jellicent's Pokeball. The bright light was swallowed by the wind, yet Buddy appeared anyway, his red eyes widening at the sudden shift in the environment. This was a rather large change from Spear Pillar. What came immediately after was his head swelling under the sheer amount of spirits around, along with their lingering energy. Hell, Mathilda had spoken about how every single dead ghost came here to recuperate, slowly feeding on the scraps that thing left by simply existing to gain their strength and travel back into our world. True ghost or not, it would make any Pokemon like Jellicent react a certain way if they weren't used to it, as I'd feared.

His Pokeball was still clasped tightly in my hand. "Bud? Are you feeling alright?" I glanced away from his maw opening with rows upon rows of jagged, frozen and poisoned teeth in a similar way that he'd taken down Wormadam. Out of his mouth came a distorted moan, slowly morphing into an agonized scream. Parts of the smaller clouds above our heads trickled down to him, twisted and coalesced— Night Shade! "Shit!" Immediately, I beamed him back into his Pokeball, and once the nascent shades dissolved, I looked down at Mimi, whose eye was wobbling again. They'd never seen him like this, hadn't they?

He wasn't meant to be here, ghost type or not, and there being so much ambient energy around was I assumed like what had happened to Saturn's Glalie with Regice, but on steroids. I wasn't going to be able to ride him to other islands.

"I guess that's not going to work, 'cause nothing ever goes right." After clipping the Pokeball back on my belt, I clutched my forehead with both my hands and groaned. "Okay, Grace. Okay. Think. How are you going to do this?"

The rest of my Pokemon were off, either unconscious and in desperate need of a visit to the Pokemon Center or they were unable to be here without going mad. Mimi pointed at one of the smaller rocks, and I nodded, understanding after a few seconds. If things looked this desperate, and there was no choice but to jump, then it'd be best to test gravity around here. The steel type enveloped the small rock and vaulted it into my hands by extended an arm, and I shivered in disgust when I felt it writhe around my palm— oh Arceus, oh fuck, it was clipping into my hand and skin— I threw it as far as I could over the edge, which wasn't very much, and I saw it swing up instead of where down felt like it was, all the way out of view.

I laughed, amazed at how awful things were. "Arceus, this is hell. Stranded in the damn Dusk. What else can I—"

I froze, realizing that we'd all been dragged here. Not only my friends and their Pokemon, but Cynthia and Cyrus too. Those wings had been too large to spare any of us, and something told me that they could have been larger had Distortion wanted them too, but did that mean that Mesprit was here, too? I really had no way to know, but they were my only hope now that they'd been freed.

Contacting them… well, screaming wasn't going to work, though I did try. I called out their name for a good thirty seconds, then waited a minute, and then called their name again. Three times, I did this with no results, going all around the island as I did so in hopes of also maybe finding a spot for me to travel to. It wasn't like there was a direction in particular I wanted to go to. If I couldn't use my empathy to find the others because of how painful it was in this dimension, then I would just be traveling in a random direction and hoping for the best, not even knowing if my voice carried that far due to the way sound was distorted here. I did make sure not to look to the edge when I did so, at least. Mimi was too tired to keep me from jumping again.

So long as I could be away from those horrors resembling trees, I'd be better off mentally.

Leaning against my knees for support, I wheezed and held back a scream in order not to scare Mimi, who was clinging to my pants in case I tried anything stupid again. Nothing was working, Arceus fucking damn it!

I really…

Really didn't want to have to use my gift again.

But nothing ever came easy in life, did it? I couldn't get one fucking clean win.

I forced a smile on my face and stared down at Mimi. "I'm gonna head back to the center of the island and open up my empathy, okay?" The steel type wobbled, clearly unsure of my decision. "In normal circumstances, I'd just wait, but I can't. There's weakness in isolation, here, you see? Think about what would have happened to me if you hadn't been here. It might get worse the longer I wait."

Meltan's eye flattened, then turned into a perfect 'o' for understanding or agreement, which was something they'd nabbed from Cass. I made a similar sign with my thumb and index finger, then took a deep breath as my eyes narrowed. The dirty bandages on my hands chaffed as I clenched my fists and focused. It might knock me unconscious, but if I could move around and bundle up all of the negative emotions floating around this island, Mesprit might take notice and—

"Found you!"

I stumbled as a scream rippled through my throat and I covered my face by reflex, and Mimi quickly slipped under my clothes and up on my head, turning themselves into a blob full of spikes that pricked my scalp. I internally cursed for freezing again as my hand went for my Pokeball, but it stopped when I saw Mesprit staring at me with a tilt of their head, as if they were confused. While everything here appeared faded out, their skin was still a brilliant, pale blue and pink.

"Wha—"

"You were going to release one of your Pokemon against me?!" Mesprit gasped with a hand over their mouth. "After I went as fast as I could to find you?! What's wrong with you?!"

My face flushed. "No— your voice sounds monstrous—"

"Well yours does too, Shard!" the Guardian complained. "You and your little ingot are forgiven for now."

Mimi protested at the fact that they'd been called a mere ingot, which I knew was many pegs down from the titles they used to hold like 'Eternal Alloy', but there were no time for pleasantries, even if it felt surreal to finally be this close to Mesprit in real life. They were at their full power, now, and their body rippled with limitless energy that gave life to this place. I hadn't noticed at first, but the red veins covering the floor seemed to flinch at Mesprit's mere presence, and the trees pointing down above us swayed as far as they could away from them like a bunch of worms. Already, I was beginning to feel slightly more upbeat and not pulled down by the heavy emotions this place carried.

"Thank you for answering my call, Mesprit. I need your help for—"

"Your call? I just tracked you using that piece of me in your head," they said, exasperated. "It's not like your voice would be audible over Giratina's from far away."

"What? Is that the name of that… that thing that ripped the sky apart?"

Mesprit nodded, almost annoyed with me.

My feet shifted uncomfortably against the ground. It having a name made it realer to me. "I can't hear anything, though."

"Oh, right. Human," they said, rolling their eyes. "You must have forgotten. He keeps screaming over and over, it's really getting on my nerves. Your fragile mind must have blocked it out every time so you don't go mad."

Oh. Okay, that was just going to be a thing, then. Opting to ignore the tickling feeling working its way through my spine, I stepped forward. "Please, Mesprit. You finding me means that Mira is probably safe, and I think she'll have Uxie find her uncle first, but Maylene is alone and Azelf… what happened to Azelf?"

"Oh, my sibling's dormant, at the moment. I assume the empty shell gave a long-lasting order before Giratina brought us all to his world. A void of emotion he might be, he certainly doesn't lack in willpower!" Mesprit giggled. "But very well. I shall aid you in your quest to save your fellow humans. First, we find my sibling. I can feel them nearby."

The Legendary waved a hand, and the ground began to elongate slowly into the emptiness ahead. As the path stretched, the surrounding scenery was dragged along with it. Light, pebbles, the cracks in the floor and even the ground itself bent in a way that gave me a headache if I looked at it for too long; yet I was utterly enthralled with this process. The ground elongated into a bridge leading to another island, this one as small a floor of my apartment complex back in Jubilife with a single tree growing in the middle. The path stretched 'up' and twisted around in a way that I was really not comfortable with seeing, or even walking on. The visual effect created was disorienting; the perspective of the path shifted and warped. The bridge I was supposed to cross looked like a bizarre, undulating ribbon, snaking into the distance with a dizzying, hypnotic motion. In the few conversations I'd had with Cassianus or Mira's Alakazam and they spoke to me about psychic manipulation, ground had always been described as the most difficult material to move. It could be ripped away with enough strength and better technique, but it often wasn't worth it for a psychic type to expend their energy on it during a fight.

Despite this, Mesprit had already floated away and was beckoning me. Not only had they manipulated the ground, they had bent it to their liking and extended it into a narrow path I could follow, all without causing the structure to break from the force they applied.

"Come on, now. Don't be slow."

"I'm going to fall…" I hesitantly trailed off.

"Gravitational issues have been handled. I can tame bits of it here. Look!" Mesprit waved a hand, and I screamed as both me and Mimi were dragged onto the twisting path. Instead of falling into the void, we stuck to the pathway the psychic made. "See? No need to throw a fit."

"P—please warn me the next time you do that."

"Fine! Sorry!" they said, very passive-aggressively.

I clung to the floor for dear life. The ground was barely wide enough to fit me, and everywhere around me was essentially what felt to me like the sky. Sometimes as a kid, when my dad dragged me to one of the parks in Jubilife where we'd nap on the grass, I'd wake up and feel like I was falling up in the sky until I shook off the sleep. For once, I didn't care about the heartbeat-like pulse below me, and I crawled on the ground while Mimi squirmed inside my jacket. It felt less like solid floor and more like I was crawling on a trampoline or a mattress that swayed and bounced with each motion. Sometimes I'd feel as if I'd just been about to fall, only for me to realize that only my head had entered a zone where gravity was different and the rest of my body was still safe close to the ground.

"You're so slow! Do I need to carry you everywhere?! If I use too much of my power for a sustained amount of time, Giratina will get angry at me for messing up his realm," Mesprit grumbled.

Slowly, I stood up and tried to ignore the fact that the perspective was getting me nauseous. For the most part, other than some gravitational anomalies, it felt like walking normally, just on a soft surface, but having an all-encompassing void all around me and seeing my destination be sideways compared to me had my brain constantly playing tricks on me and making me think I was about to fall. I did make it to the island without a hitch, though, so Mesprit's powers were working.

"Of course they're working. Just because we're in the middle of Distortion doesn't mean I'm useless!" they huffed. With a flicker of their arm, the stretched bit of ground returned to normal, and they directed me forward. "I will admit, I cannot go all out, however."

"May I ask why?" I asked, already mentally psyching myself up for the next crossing.

"It has to do with the nature of this place." Mesprit spun around me and squinted at Mimi, who shrunk like water at their heavy gaze. Their eyes swung up at me, and I averted my gaze. "Hm, your knowledge of Distortion is rather incomplete. Dusk? Ah, yes what ghosts call it. I haven't been out in forever, so I nearly forgot."

I bit down on my objection that would have demanded how the hell I'd been supposed to know anything about this place, but I assume Mesprit figured anyway, because they stuck out their tongue at me. "There isn't really anything dusk-like about this place. When I imagined it, I guess I thought it'd be like… well, like dusk."

"You think like a human!" Mesprit yelled. I could feel their frustration like a physical thing. "Ghosts don't see color, you daft Shard! This expanse to them looks almost the exact same as your so-called dusk— ah! Don't step there!"

My foot hovered over a patch of ground that looked exactly the same as everything else. "Why?"

"Take a gander," Mesprit said with a smirk. The Guardian came close to the ground and plunged a tail into it. It wasn't like water, either. There was no disturbance, not even a tiny ripple. It was, well, like putting a limb into another solid. "You would have fallen through the floor, and it would have been annoying to get you out before you asphyxiated. Human bodies are so fragile!" They rolled their eyes.

I blinked as Mesprit pulled out their tail. Like pushing fabric, the solid ground I was on moved with a single look from the psychic and I crossed the dangerous area unabashed. As soon as we made it to the edge of the island, another path extended to a mountainous island full of gaping, maw-like openings leading into caverns. I noticed a meteorite-like boulder rush sideways from above us. "So you didn't answer my question. Why can't you go all out? What's the nature of this place? Its shape?"

"Beyond what you already know, I can't… move things around here, hence the stretching and bending," Mesprit explained. "Distortion is a reflection of our plane of existence. Anything that happens here ripples out into our world, and vice versa. If I were to rip parts of these islands apart instead or summon barriers out of thin air, Giratina would throw a fit. It's better to use what's already there to contain the damage."

"So it goes both ways? What about our world?" I asked. "Does anything go on here that affects it?"

"Rarely. Look around, girl. This place is more inactive than not."

It was true. If I took a step back, beyond the induced paranoia, fear and other negative emotions, other than some islands and rocks floating and moving about, and the grouping of spirits, there was nothing really going on, and it would be like this forever.

But dead ghosts were also supposed to gather here, not just echoes of the dead who had already passed on. That meant that Dusknoir was here somewhere.

A topic for later. First I needed to get more information out of… no, that the wrong mentality to have. We were friends. Exploiting them for knowledge was wrong, if I was going to do better and not repeat what had come beforehand. Break the cycle. That was what Repentance— what I was about.

"How moving," Mesprit hummed.

"If you ever want to stop talking about this, you let me know, okay?" I hesitantly said, hopping onto the next island. The wind near the cave's opening was a sinister thing. Buffered voices of the fallen, coming one after the other. The stone making up this hill was made of a similar material the ground was: a pinkish, light red. Though I could barely see inside the cave, it was easy to tell that the path wasn't going to stay uncoiled very long. It was already veering up and sideways right at the entrance. Still on my shoulder, Meltan chimed and the sound was swallowed by the cave faster than what was natural. "Can I ask more about Distortion?"

"Entertain me, Shard!"

Okay, so this was still fun to them. Good. "So what is this place for?"

"An appropriate term to use would be scaffolding," Mesprit pondered, floating into the cave first. I followed with a hesitant step, glad to have the light they were emitting with me. "Without this world, yours would collapse in on itself, and again, vice versa, though once upon a time, Giratina might not have opposed this. I can't believe all he got for breaking the rules was a slap on the wrist! Our Creator is too nice, sometimes."

I gulped as I carefully placed a foot in front of the other. It was trippy, seeing the way the path turned upside down like a winding snake ahead of us. I had never considered myself a claustrophobe, but the ceiling being so low and oppressive made me feel like the cave was closing in on me. The walls or ceiling also would sometimes bulge inwards, as if trying to close in on me, then recede just as quickly, leaving me disoriented and on edge. Mesprit kept saying it was just a 'trick of the light', or that it wasn't real, but it looked and sounded real to me, and getting skewered by a sharp row of stalagmites or stalactites wouldn't be ideal. My skin would already prickle with phantom pain every time they got near me.

Better distract myself and learn more about this place, then. "So… he's not good?" My voice didn't reverberate in the cave like it should have. Instead, it was almost muted. "Or he used to not be?"

"You humans and good and evil," Mesprit groaned, a sound which I guessed would have been particularly human had everything here not been distorted. "Even me and my siblings aren't great at deciphering what it means to you, and we were made specifically to understand you and to impart our gifts upon you. Giratina is another matter entirely, and so are many of His creations. Even Palkia, as understanding as she is!"

I blinked, not really knowing how to react to that rant. "By good here, I explicitly mean, is he going to end the world or not?"

"Of course not! He saved it, you…" Mesprit held back an insult, though I still felt it. "He was banished here by Him—" They were obviously referring to Arceus here. "And while I despised him— and still despise him in a way for going against His rules again, there is no denying his interference salvaged Creation from being permanently broken."

Broken, not destroyed. It was like Anguish had said. A being so powerful set loose still would have effectively ended the world as we knew it had it not been held back by this Giratina. Just when I'd been about to speak again, Mimi screeched and pointed above our heads, where two malformed shapes hovered together. Dead ghosts, I knew instantly. Then more, and more— hundreds were gathered together within this singular cave, as if they were taking refuge from something. Some were indistinguishable, but others, I vaguely recognized. The shape of a Shuppet, clinging closely to the cavern's walls. A Mismagius stared us down with piercing red eyes, his form almost solid as it would have been in the real world. A laughing Haunter surrounded by two Ghastly, who joined in as soon as they noticed us. These ghosts weren't aggressive, nor were they moving very much. Really, this kind of felt like a big club where they could tell each other stories about what was going on in their lives. Mathilda had told me that there were faces you remembered, after dying over and over, so clearly making friends was an option, even if they barely had the energy to move. But how did they get back in the real world, anyway?

"Tiny breaches don't have much effect beyond a visual and auditory distortion where the ghost comes back, though they have to expend a lot of energy to do so," Mesprit said. "A rift to fit Giratina is something else entirely. But why don't you ask what you truly want to ask?"

I hesitantly glanced down at Mimi, then back at them. "I mean, you know."

"But conversations are a lot of fun!" Mesprit twirled and their tails excitedly intertwined. "So ask!"

"Well, first, why did he bring us here—"

"I don't know, haha!" Mesprit laughed. "Maybe he wanted to get the culprit who almost ended His creation to himself, and you were all collateral damage. I'd ask him if he wasn't so angered and I could get close!"

I swallowed. "What did you mean by banished, exactly."

"Well, I hadn't been created yet when it happened," Mesprit said. "And this is just what He… He told us, before sending us off to our Lakes, when He spoke to us about Time, Space, and Distortion." Even now, Mesprit seemed to have the wind taken out of their sails when thinking too hard about their memories with Arceus. They didn't let it get to them for long, and their eyes brightened. "Simply put, Giratina was banished because he is a violent Pokemon."

I frowned. "Violent… like ghosts are prone to sometimes?"

We reached the most crowded part of the cave, packed with ghosts, and they all made way for Mesprit without a word. "Well, they do get it from him, but you think too small, Shard. You believe violence to be constrained to the urges you get, like when you wanted to cut Mars apart with your axe, or when your Pokemon kill something. That is a crude understanding of what violence is." I felt a little push on my back, a wordless sign that they were growing impatient with my tired pace. "Distortion's existence itself is violent, and blaming him for it would be like holding our sun accountable for every instance of scorching heat, parched earth, wilted flower and forest fire. Everywhere he goes, he warps and twists the world around him. He is the long quiet; the whispers you hear at night as a child that make you retreat under the covers; the random urges you sometimes get to commit a horrible act that leaves as soon as it had come; the item you swear you had left on your countertop, yet you've misplaced and only find hours later; the shadow that flickers just out of sight, always lurking at the edge of your vision; the cold, creeping dread that coils around your heart when you realize you're utterly alone." There was a short pause, and something like empathy flashed on the Guardian's face. I supposed they knew a thing or two about being trapped somewhere for eternity. "He was made this way, through no fault of his own, forced to observe the world, but never interact with it. In many ways, his situation is worse than mine. At least I have my siblings to talk to, and I can change things around my Lake."

"I… I don't know what to say to that," I admitted, rubbing the side of my arm.

"Good," Mesprit nodded. "You could not fathom it, anyway." There was a short pause, and a deep frown that looked wrong on their face. "Stop."

I wanted to ask why, but they knew better, so I did. I hadn't noticed during Mesprit's speech with Giratina, but there were no more ghosts around. We'd reached some kind of circular— no, rectangular— no, long and thin— a chamber whose shape I couldn't place. Mesprit looked behind me, sighing in an exasperated manner, and when I followed their gaze I noticed that the path behind us had closed off. We were completely isolated without a way to access the outside. The air grew thicker, more oppressive, and the acrid stench filling my nose made every breath I pulled a bigger struggle. The walls of the cavern, now slick with a viscous, black substance that hadn't been there, pulsed rhythmically as if alive and swallowed the ambient light until we were left with nothing but pitch blackness.

I was blind.

I couldn't see. I couldn't see. I couldn't see, nor hear, nor feel, nor smell, nor taste. My feet were no longer in contact with the ground, as if I was hovering somewhere. I couldn't— no, no, no. I could see. Light popped like bubbles at the corners of my eyes; a dimly, starlit sky that expanded like fireworks that I could hear, even with my wounded ear, each growing closer and closer until I smelled the blood so strongly that I could taste it in my mouth and the back of my throat.

Denzel's corpse flickered in and out of the dark, his body face down and his back utterly destroyed. A canvas of suffering marred by the merciless touch of fire. The upper back was a mottled patchwork of color: livid reds intermingled with the ghostly pallor of dead tissue, while some areas were blackened and charred, the skin burned away to reveal raw, angry flesh beneath that was still smoking. The faint smell of burned flesh lingered in the air. Large, angry blisters bubbled up in grotesque forms, some intact and taut with fluid, others ruptured and oozing with raw and jagged edges full of puss. The burns grew more and more pronounced, deeper, more horrifying. Across the expanse of Denzel's shoulders, the burn wounds formed two hollow, darkened pits where the skin had blistered and burst, resembling a pair of sunken, hollow eyes, while a gash split his back horizontally, with rows of blisters acting as its teeth. The thing laughed with the sound of burning fire and spoke, its voice and the markings of its face still remaining even after Denzel had disappeared at last and only the lingering odor remained.

SMELL the cooked flesh. SMELL how familiar it seems to you. SMELL your best friend decaying away.

I could smell it, even as I was brought to my knees. It was all that remained in me.

As of someone had shined a spotlight, another spot in the darkness lit up, revealing Chase's body, again with his face down. In his thigh, two darkened craters punctuated the skin, leaking more darkened blood that should have been in his body, and in his lower back, an even larger wound had penetrated through. The entry wounds were ragged and torn, surrounded by a circle of bruising and jagged skin that was swollen and inflamed. The two, small wounds on his thigh turned to tiny, beady eyes with no light to them while the hole in his back distorted into a mockery that shouldn't have been able to fit, yet did anyway. My eyesight expanded, then zoomed into the individual wounds without my doing, as if my face was right there. Each wound was a volcano across a pale expanse of skin, each drop of blood a gushing, overflowing river capable of drowning me.

SEE—

Everything vanished, and darkness fled with continuous howls of every pitch. The cavern returned, as did the ambient light, and the corpse was gone. The pathway ahead had even revealed itself to us. I stared at my hand and saw it shake uncontrollably until I clenched it with much difficulty.

"How unexpected," Mesprit slowly hummed. "My apologies, Shard. I would have freed you faster than the few seconds it took, but you're so forceful about hating messing with emotions that I had to work around it."

"What… happened," I mumbled through chattering teeth. Every time I blinked, I saw them burned into my retinas. "Why?" I sniffled. "Why?"

They were okay. I'd told myself that it was better to hope for the best.

But Legendaries.

How in the world was I supposed to think that now?

"Those were spirits. The reflections of the dead sprung an illusionary trap," Mesprit explained. "They were probably jealous about what you have, so they made you see something you were worried about. Onwards! Unless you want me to patch you up?"

Mimi worryingly warbled at me, and with a trembling breath, I answered, "I'll… deal with this."

—

We were finally leaving the cave, now. I never thought I'd think this, but I was glad to be out in the open again. I'd taken to blinking as few times as possible so I could stop seeing them lying lifeless, but the smell? It still lingered, even now, though it was thankfully fading. Both of them were.

Once more, Mesprit stretched the ground toward an island with a loud waterfall that we were walking directly toward, as if we were standing on a wall. The waterfall itself changed directions midway through and fell out of view— or at least I didn't want to lean and look to see where it went. The waterfall was like a mockery of the real thing. The water was too uniform, with no foam or splashes, and it originated from a point in a rock that seemed almost random. Everything here being unsettling was starting to wear down my mind.

But I was glad I was out of that place.

"How far?" I asked.

"Distance is odd, here," Mesprit quickly answered. "But we should be getting close to my sibling. I feel them." The floating Legendary pointed down into the cascading water. "Jump in."

"E—excuse me?"

"You heard me. Ride the waterfall."

"Can't you carry me or something? Is that water even healthy? Won't I fall off— gah!" A sudden force pushed me down the water, accompanied by one of Mesprit's giggles, though they did keep Meltan away from the water and grabbed them in their arms. Some of the liquid got into my mouth, which I instantly spit out. The water didn't… well, it didn't taste like it should have, but the difference was impossible to place. At least I was somehow floating and swimming in a waterfall, which was…

Arceus help me. So long as I could get myself and the others out of here faster.

"No psychic powers if I can help it," Mesprit said. "This waterfall is perfectly navigable for you. Get swimming."

I didn't really have to swim, given that the current was carrying me wherever it was that the waterfall led. Hell, Mesprit didn't even have to mess with gravity to keep me in the sinuous currents. My buoyancy here seemed to be far higher than normal, but I was already tired, so I wasn't going to complain. For what felt like more time than it actually was, the current led me down to another lake, this one only knee deep somehow. A waterfall of this size and volume should have made it way bigger than it actually was. I crawled out of there and onto shore as soon as I could. There was a constant feeling of something tickling my ankles and legs that I didn't want to experience for one second longer. Although my clothes and skin should have been wet, the thick, invisible grime or ink or whatever was covering me kept me dry.

I still patted down my clothes, just in case, and Meltan tried to crawl out of Mesprit's embrace, to no avail. "Sit still, ingot! None of your squirming will make any difference!"

"They want to—"

"I know what it wants! I just don't care!" Mesprit huffed.

"You have to…" Legendaries, how to say this? I was too exhausted and scarred to go on a tirade about manners. Meanwhile, Mesprit was full of boundless energy and was pretending nothing had even happened. "Well, maybe not learn, but you have to try to understand consent. When someone doesn't want something, you don't do that thing."

"Why?"

"Because they don't like it."

"I can make it like it."

"Anything but that!" I yelled.

"See? You make no sense!" Mesprit threw Mimi back to me and sighed. "Having something to hold feels good. I just wanted to experience it before I have to go back to the Lake alone."

A sad scrappy noise left Mimi's body, and the steel type's eye turned wobbly.

I tapped a foot against the ground and nodded in understanding. "They feel bad for you, I think. So, uh, have them back?"

Mesprit beamed, instantly grabbing Mimi back so tightly that their eye nearly fell out of their gear. "A thousand blessings to you, ingot! Onwards!" The path ahead stretched toward one of the largest islands I'd seen. This one was basically a full-fledged forest, curved in on itself like a bowl. "Azelf is somewhere there."

"Good." I allowed silence to take hold. If I wasn't going to say it now, I'd never do. "Say, Mesprit. If there was this Dusknoir I was theoretically looking for—"

"Mars' owner."

My tongue pushed against the back of my teeth. I hated when people put it like that. It made me feel like they were absolving Mars from consequences or blame, even if they weren't. "He died, so he should be nearby somewhere," I explained. "And Uxie's told us that the only way to kill a ghost," I paused, "is to kill them here. Other ghosts can't, because of some sort of pact sworn at the beginning of their existence, but I could."

All I'd need to do was let Sweetheart out and hope for the best. What I didn't want to do, was have to have Mesprit fuck with her head to reach the result I wanted.

"I will not intervene in mortal affairs beyond getting you and the other Shards out of here," Mesprit said.

I stopped dead in my tracks. "...why?"

"Don't let it get to you!" Mesprit twirled and turned upside down. "Aren't you glad the world has been saved? Smile!"

My jaw clenched. "I really… really don't understand this rule thing. I don't think I ever will. Didn't you say Giratina broke the rules when you first found me? That he barely got any punishment at all? There are thousands of people, trapped in Dusknoir's body right now, even as we speak. Being tortured. My grandmother is in there."

Mesprit looked at me as if I was speaking Kalosian. "You don't even like your grandmother."

"It's not about that—" I clenched the bridge of my nose. I'd promised I wasn't going to use them, and this was a personal vendetta. It was also the right thing to do, but maybe I'd figure out another way to get Dusknoir once we found Cynthia. "Let's just get Azelf back."

This was my first time in a true forest in the Distortion world, and it was disconcerting how uniform it was. Seeing a few trees next to each other was one thing, but thousands? Every single one of them was the same as the last, from its length, to its width, to the hair-like leaves at their edges. Again, there were no branches and their green bark was so smooth they all looked artificially crafted.

"Look down!" Mesprit screamed.

Impulsively,
I listened. I'd wanted
to look down, right then
and there. I wasn't even angry
at the fact that Mesprit had ordered
ME around, really. Not after hearing the sheer
panic in their voice. I'd seen them sad or angry, but
panicked? My eyes stayed transfixed to the ground, as did
Mimi's, but Mesprit stared straight up at what must have been there
My… my eyes itched. Itched to see ITS form. To crane my neck up a smidge so I
could take in the shape of what madness truly looked like, right ABOVE.
Why was it, that letting go could be so appealing? What made the unknown so
terrifying, yet wondrous all the—

"Shard!"I blinked, my mouth feeling horribly dry, and I slumped against one of the slimy trees for support. "Huh?"

"I've been calling you forever. Are you okay? Did you see it? Do I need to tweak your brain? Uxie would be better at it, but emotions are effective at making you forget things, too!"

I held up a hand. "No. No, I'm fine. Uh, was— was that…"

I'd spoken its— his name before, but I couldn't. Not now.

Mesprit nodded. "What you saw on His Throne before being taken here— that inky black form— it's not his actual body. Your Champion's mind might have survived looking at Giratina—" I flinched. "—through a pale reflection, but seeing him in full? That isn't something someone can just… live after. Even ghosts avoid looking at him."

"O—okay."

"At least if he's around here, he shouldn't be bothering your friends. He's hovering around, so keep your eyes on your feet, just in case," Mesprit warned.

I shuffled and entered the woods. At least the trees would give me some cover. "Is he screaming right now?"

"Constantly."

The woods which had seemed so terrifying were a refuge, in comparison. Mesprit kept saying that Azelf was somewhere in here, but that was horribly vague and the island had a way of changing shapes and configurations, or at least it felt like it. The Guardian was adamant we were getting closer, though, and I was just a person, so I was inclined to trust them. As strange as it sounded, it did feel to me like we were traveling through a set path despite the forest looking the exact same in every direction, and the trees were all spaced out by the exact same length. It also felt like I was going straight even though I knew it was concave. At some point, Mesprit broke from the constant uniformity and looked behind us, and by the time I noticed, it was Mimi, who mewled as if to ask what was going on.

"Hm. I knew a ghost out in the open when Giratina was and remains this angry was strange," Mesprit slowly pondered.

The ghostly figure hovered behind us, its form partially obscured by the eerie shadows cast by the trees surrounding it. It took me a few seconds to understand what I'd been looking at. The ghost's body flickered like a faulty hologram, edges blurring and wavering in and out of focus. Its single eye, normally a piercing red, was now a dull, lifeless gray, barely reflecting the little light generated in this place. The eye moved sluggishly, as if struggling to stay anchored to its spectral form. Wisps of shadowy mist clung to the specter's body, seeping into it like ink being drawn into a sponge.

There were only a few Dusknoir in the world. Only Mars' had died in the vicinity of Mount Coronet days ago. There was only one Pokemon this could be, and he had followed us… why? It was easy to see him struggling to even more. Where he had exuded fear and pressure before, unleashing Arceus knew how many screams at will, he was now a shadow of his former self. Pathetic, almost faded entirely. Each time he dragged himself forward, he bled more of himself that he could barely replace with the shadows hanging in the air.

"It's been following us," Mesprit said with a tilt of their head. "In this place, I'm like a beacon. We're easy to keep track of."

"...aren't you going to kill him?"

"Why?"

"He— he was following us!" I pressed, fists clenching. "He wants to do something."

"It's too weak to even gather the shadows it's using to remain alive as an attack," Mesprit shrugged. "I will not interfere, nor will I break the rules or trample on Giratina's hospitality. Keep walking this way." They pointed… well, it was impossible to know where, but relative to us, it was forward and away from Dusknoir. "Willpower is close."

My hand clasped tightly around Sweetheart's Pokeball.

"Do not interfere with the Cycle," Mesprit warned. "Ordinarily, I would support letting your emotions rule you, but you'll die. Your name will spread and you will become the enemy of all ghosts. They will hunt and haunt you until the end of your days, and that Tyranitar you're planning on using."

The hold on my Pokeball trembled, and Dusknoir silently observed. "It's not fucking fair."

"Ghosts are closely knit beings," Mesprit said. "They are bound by rules and practices wound in a Covenant established by the first of their kind, who bled off of Giratina and who remain hidden. Their word is law. You cannot throw your life away, or I'll be alone again." The Guardian floated in front of my face and their eyes gleamed. "You said you would be my friend. We can't be friends if you die as soon as this 'League' stops guarding you at all times. Then I'll be alone again."

"It's— it's not fair."

Mesprit shoved Mimi back into my face, and I instinctively grabbed them in my arms. "Have the ingot."

Nothing ever went the way I wanted it to. Things always ranged from catastrophic to barely alright. Never would I be able to live with my head above the water. It was always going to be like this.

Grace Pastel… heed my words.

My head spun back to Dusknoir so fast my throbbed in pain. He was talking to me. No, it wasn't truly him. Each word out of his fading abdomen was made of a different voice that somehow sounded clear, even in the Distortion world. Voices of the people he had trapped within his— I growled and took a step forward. Was he fucking taunting me?

Mesprit frowned. "What are you doing, ghost?"

Heed my words… he slowly repeated, bleeding into the world. Literally, with each word he spoke, he lost parts of himself. Save her…

"What?"

Interest gleamed in Mesprit's eye. "No… you wouldn't dare."

She is innocent. Innocent. Innocent, the ghost said. Prisoner for decades. Observer. I knew… deep down, that it had to be this way. There is no other method to cheat a death of my own making.

"He wasn't following us for you!" Mesprit gasped. "He was following us to get close enough to Giratina—"

Dusknoir raised a finger.

A single finger. Weak, trembling, and as consistent as vapor.

And pointed it at the sky.

The world itself beat like a single heart, rippling across me with enough force to rip away the trees surrounding us. A barrier I hadn't realized was there had protected me from it, but Dusknoir was screaming with his actual voice, this time. Mimi flinched away as an inky blackness surrounded the ghost, throbbing with red like channels that looked like veins. Like tar, it clung to every inch of his threadbare skin and somehow made it solid. Dusknoir's body flickered erratically, and I caught his form fracturing into pieces that the human eye could not comprehend, yet he held strong and opened the mouth on his abdomen.

Thin smoke billowed out from the massive maw, uniform at first until they took shape as trails of gleaming darkness. A few turned into dozens, and that turned into hundreds, but there was a human shaped thing being vomited out of his mouth, too. The oil-like substance bled off of it, revealing a girl with skin so pale it was almost translucent. Her long, brown hair covered her face as soon as she slumped onto the forest floor with a dull, distorted thud, and Dusknoir just… became non-existent.

He was dead. I didn't know how I knew, but deep in my heart of hearts, I was certain he had just died for good.

"It… it drew on power directly from Giratina for this and died from the blowback," Mesprit muttered. "How interesting! I had no idea it loved her enough to die in her stead when ghosts are anathema to death!"

It took me longer than Mesprit to understand what I'd just seen. My hand twitched around the handle of a sharp implement that wasn't there, and I slowly approached the girl.

Shifting closer.

Ever closer.

Mesprit seemed content to stay silent and gauge my reaction when I crouched and a trembling hand hovered over the girl's head. I was scared, I realized. Terrified of the face I'd potentially see. Like jumping into a cold pool, I brushed it aside and sighed in relief when it was a different face that I'd expected, only for me to immediately spot the similarities with Mars. The skin wasn't as smooth— there was a small scar above her eyebrow and acne scars strewn about her cheeks, and the pores on her nose was visible— nor was she built as flawlessly, but it was her face.

"It's Mars," I said, disbelieving. "I'm dumping her over the edge— or— or leaving her here to rot, if you think that's interfering because she's also a ghost."

Mesprit hummed. "No, it's not her."

My soul nearly jumped out of my skin when the girl— the woman groaned.

"It's her— I don't care if she's amnesiac or whatever excuse you bring up, she's built for murder. She's a caricature!"

"It's not. Will you go against my word? they questioned with an annoyed tone, as best as I could tell, at least.

"Explain. Right now."

"Don't be rude." The Legend rolled their eyes. "This isn't Mars, nor has she lost her memories. Mars is truly dead," they said. "This girl is who Mars was based on— the original whom Dusknoir was safeguarding and keeping prisoner."

"...what?"

"Though I have to say, Dusknoir butchered her revival," Mesprit said, hovering around the unconscious brunette. "She won't live very long. Ten more years, at most, but at least she won't age!"

"No! We're ending this!"

"Why?"

"Because she's Mars," I pressed on.

"I mean, you can do whatever pleases you now that you're dealing with another human," they nonchalantly said. "But she's not Mars. She shares some of those traits, but Dusknoir accentuated those that he liked and dimmed the ones he hated, like having a moral compass. Anyway!" They clapped their hands and beamed. "What are you going to do?"

They were treating this like a movie. I hated it. I understood it, because this was a rest from the boring monotonous life they'd had in the Lake and they were happy they could stay out for a bit, but I still hated how it was all a game to them.

"You wouldn't get it anyway, stupid! Your brain is like an amoeba!"

I paced in front of the body, tongue scraping against the wound I'd opened in my mouth earlier, and considered my options.

"Could she have spoken to Dusknoir and told him stuff? Like, who to kill?" I asked.

"I'm certain he could hear her, but remember. This was not an equal relationship. He held the reign, and all she could do was watch."

Right. Even Mathilda had lamented over Mars' fate when I'd met her in the Lost Tower, so that tracked.

"I wouldn't lie to you anyway, Shard," they said, almost disappointed.

"So explain this to me, then. Dusknoir had this girl captured for who knows how long, and— and then what? He just used her as a model to build a psychopath?" My pacing grew quicker, as did my voice. "He loved her enough to sacrifice himself to bring her back, but he kept her trapped inside of himself and made a mockery of her? There's more to this than a ghost striving to revive their deceased trainer in a new world. The pieces don't fit quite neatly enough, even if you peg Dusknoir as an irrational actor."

"It probably wanted to keep the parts it loved. This girl," Mesprit paused to look down when she moaned again, "no doubt knows more about their circumstances. You like stories, right? You could take her with you, since she's about to wake!"

The reborn woman stirred.

Bright, amber eyes opened and faced us.

She screamed.

---

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