Astra stepped onto the Dewford docks, looking around curiously as Brendan brushed past to help Mr. Briney tie down his ship. Scattered piers stretched far along the coast, and Astra could spot at least a dozen moored boats similar to Briney’s and space for many more. There were even a few big ships carrying a multitude of colored metal boxes. Dewford Town itself gleamed ahead of them, not quite as sprawling as Rustboro or even Petalburg, but still cutting a striking image into the silhouette of the towering hills in the distance.

“Ah, feels good to be on land again,” May sighed, stepping off the boat next to Astra. She peered up at the sky, then glanced at her Pokedex. “Hm, it’s only just past noon. The gyms are basically open twenty-four seven, so we could probably still fit in a badge fight after we look around, yeah? Gym Leaders aren’t the kind of people who head home early.”

“Look around?” Astra asked, blinking at the other girl in confusion. “What do—oh right, your routine for visiting new places.”

“Routine?” Brendan looked up from the rope he was tying. “You have a routine for that, May?”

“I’ve been shuffled around to a bunch of towns, so my first-day schedule has been perfected into a fine art.” May explained, brushing a hand through her hair with a grin. She held up four fingers and ticked them off as she continued, “See the sights, pick some fights, grab a bite, then say goodnight.”

“We didn’t really do that when we got to Rustboro, though,” Astra observed. “We got a hotel room and went straight to the gym.”

May waved her off. “Nah, you dragged us into that berry shop first, remember? The entire front half of the gym was a museum, too. That counts!”

Astra considered that and nodded. Made sense.

“Anyway,” May continued, “I figured we could poke around and get the lay of the land for a bit before we smash the gym down. See some cool stuff, find a place to stay, that sort of thing. Maybe figure out what we’re going up against, too.” She added, looking off at the city speculatively.

“As fun as that would be,” Brendan began, brushing his hands against his pants as he stood back up. “We do have to deliver that letter to Steven. I think we should take care of that first.”

“Mhmm, mhmm,” May hummed, nodding solemnly. “Alright, we’ll do that then. Where is he?”

“I don’t know myself, but Mr. Stone said we could ask Gym Leader Brawly where...” he trailed off, face going blank. May looked at him through mockingly lidded eyes, exuding smugness.

Astra could already see where this was going. “If we have to go to the gym to deliver the letter in the first place, we might as well challenge the gym while we’re there. But If we’re doing that, we’ll want to figure out where we’re staying and maybe sightsee a bit beforehand?”

May pointed at Astra triumphantly. “See?” she said to Brendan. “She gets it.”

She withdrew the finger and offered Astra her fist, which she happily bumped with her own. “I am a bastion of understanding,” Astra cheekily proclaimed.

May huffed, smiling. “Sure you are, shorty.”

Brendan rolled his eyes and sighed. “Alright, I guess it can wait for a few hours. Where did you guys want to go sightseeing anyway?”

“What was that about sightseeing?”

Astra turned, and saw Mr. Briney clamoring off the deck of his ship, Peeko perched on his shoulder. “Oh, we were going to go explore the town a bit before we hit the Gym,” Astra explained. “You’ve been here before, right? Any recommendations?”

Briney nodded, stroking his beard. “Well then, if you’re looking for something to do in Dewford, there’s not too many options; the town isn't big enough to get things like three level shopping malls or contest halls or museums, and you three wouldn’t enjoy or even be allowed in the places I like to go. Thankfully, there is one place that you can wash away a bit of time: Dewford Town Hall.”

“Oh,” Brendan sighed, looking annoyed. “That place.”

May and Astra looked at Brendan, confused.

“What's up with the town hall?” May asked, after a wary pause.

“Why, it’s only the biggest collection of gossipmongers I’ve ever seen in the entire country!” Mr. Briney proclaimed. “People here are so starved of entertainment that they latch onto any piece of news they can get their hands on and spread it around like a typhoon relocates beachfront townhomes.”

“...In horrible mangled pieces?” May ventured.

Mr. Briney nodded. “Aye, it’s incredible how quickly people distort rumors out of proportion. Lot of it is nonsense or disgusting, but sometimes there's a real good nugget of info floating around that’ll come in handy; I’ve heard a few tales of ill-planned trips out to sea there myself. Usually had to snag those fools out of the wrecks they made of their crafts not long after.”

“It’s a blasted den of misinformation and info-mongering is what it is,” Brendan snapped. “No integrity to it at all, just hearsay and anecdotes.”

“Wow,” Astra said, blinking. “It’s rare to see you get that worked up. Have you been there before?”

Brendan hesitated. “Once, a long time ago. But that doesn’t matter,” he said, waving a hand as if to brush the question aside. “As a researcher-in-training, I am inherently opposed to finding information via sourceless gossip—”

“You fell for a rumor, didn’t you?” May asked, a big, cheeky grin spreading across her face.

Brendan glared. “Listen—” he started.

“Absolutely, overwhelmingly fooled.”

“Listen—”

“Totally sucker-baited.”

“May, I swear to—”

“Got yourself gaslit by an electric stove.”

“I was ten years old!” Brendan shouted, throwing his hands up. “And someone told me that they saw an Alakazam with five spoons in the Granite Caves! So I went to go look, broke my flashlight, and got lost in the dark for six hours!”

He spread his arms out, voice dropping to a harsh, pained whine. “There’s barely any Kadabra in those caves! I nearly got my leg bitten off by a Mawile! And—it’s not funny!”

May—currently wheezing and grasping onto a wooden pole for support—clearly thought otherwise.

“Five spoons?” she gasped, giggling uncontrollably. ”What does that even mean!? Pffahaha—oh my god, you’re killing me—”

Brendan slumped, sighing. Astra gave him a reassuring pat. “That must have been terrible. I got stranded in the woods the night before I became a trainer and got chased by some wild Poochyena; I couldn’t imagine how much worse it would have been without any light at all—not to mention being enclosed in a tunnel.”

“Thanks,” Brendan said, giving Astra a wan smile. “Heh, I guess you ‘get that’ too, huh?”

“Bastion of understanding,” Astra repeated, nodding sagely. She looked back at May, who was receiving a disapproving stare from Mr. Briney.

“Lass, I don’t think an ordeal like that is something to laugh at,” he warned, frowning. May choked down the last of her guffaws, sighing happily.

“Heh, spoons,” she muttered, one last snicker slipping its way out. “Oh man, I don’t know why that got me so hard. Yeah, yeah,” she added, waving absently toward Brendan. “Not laughing at you, it was that weird rumor you fell for.”

She coughed, which sounded a rather lot like ‘dolt’ to Astra. Brendan gave May a flat stare and rolled his eyes.

“Right!” May slammed a fist into her palm, a wide grin on her face. “I gotta know what else these idiots cooked up! Brendan, you’ve been there before, right? Do you still know the way?”

“Yeah, but I still don’t really like the idea,” Brendan sighed, rubbing his head. “I dunno, maybe I'm being stubborn. Astra, what do you think?”

“I’d like to check it out,” Astra said. “Even if we don’t hear anything useful, it’s bound to be interesting. Maybe they’d know where Steven is?” she hazarded. “He’s the champion, and if things here are really that stale, then they’d probably talk about him a lot, right? We’d be able to deliver the letter before challenging the gym.”

Brendan grimaced. “I guess you have a point,” he admitted. “Alright, fine. We’ll check out town hall for a bit.” He turned to look at Mr. Briney. “Captain Briney, I know you said you’d ferry us to Slateport after we were done here, but—”

“Oh, don’t worry about me,” Mr. Briney chortled. “I’ve got old friends in every port Hoenn has; I’ll be able to entertain myself for a few days here while you lot gallivant around Dewford. If you need to find me, just come back to the ship. If I’m not here, either Peeko will come find me or, well, I’ll come around eventually. It’s where I sleep, after all! Hohohohoho!”

“Sounds good,” Astra said, nodding. “We shouldn’t be more than a few days.”

They’d better not be. Having fun and sightseeing was nice and all, but she’d already spent two and a half weeks as a trainer and only had one badge! If she kept that up, those six months would vanish before she knew it.

“Oho, confident, aren’t you?” Briney said, stroking his beard. “Well, don’t take Brawly lightly! Lad’s got a light heart, but I’ve seen him weather some dangerous tides around these parts; no doubt his team is as tough as he is!”

May shrugged, brushing her hand through a bang. “Meh, we beat Roxanne easy enough, this’ll be no different.”

Mr. Briney gave May an amused smile, then whistled sharply. Peeko landed on his shoulder and cawed, preening as Mr. Briney stroked his feathers. “I suppose I’ll let you lot get to it, then!” he said, trundling down the docks. His free hand rose in farewell. “Come find me in a week or two!”

May blinked, then scowled. “Hey, what do you mean a week, you shitty geezer!?” she roared, shaking a fist at his back.

Her only response was a rolling chortle of laughter. “Tch,” May muttered, frowning at Briney’s retreating form with slightly warm irritation. “Like he knows anything. We’ll walk outta that gym with a handful of badges in no time, right guys?”

“Yeah!” Astra cheered, pumping a fist in the air. “We aren’t gonna be stopped by anybody! Though, I hope it goes a bit smoother than my fight with Roxanne did.”

“A little decorum, that's all I ask,” Brendan griped, gazing at the sky in beseeching resignation. He sighed. “Honestly, Briney’s not wrong, but...we’ll deal with that when we get to the gym. For now, let’s...check out the town hall, I guess.”

“We’re right behind you!” Astra said, smiling. May nodded in agreement, and the three of them set off into the city.

Dewford was quite alike to Petalburg and Rustboro in that it was overwhelmingly filled with tall, square buildings of concrete and glass, though none of them were quite as tall as the skyscrapers of Petalburg and Rustboro. However, where Petalburg had been fairly quiet and unobtrusive, and Rustboro had been...well it had been a bit depressing, Dewford had an air of casualness. (And salt. It never seemed to diminish, either. Was it because this was an island?)

She looked at a store on the beachfront and saw a cardboard cutout of a man wearing floral-patterned clothing and grinning wildly, holding a surfboard to his side. The sign next to him looked hand-drawn, the letters stylized to resemble crashing waves. They passed the store, and Astra saw a giant mural taking up the lower walls of the alleyway behind it, showcasing bright, cartoonish figures amidst a fascinating display of geometric flowers.

Astra looked at the mural with open awe for the few moments that she could see it. Wow, this town was a lot more colorful than the others! At least, in a way she could appreciate. And the locals seemed to mirror this casualness as well. Most of them walked around in notably lessened amounts of clothing than the humans in other cities, preferring partial-sleeved or even sleeveless shirts and forgoing pants in favor of shorts (unlike Brendan, who still insisted on slapping some shorts over his pants). Many of them even seemed to have drawn pictures on their skin, and it reminded Astra of the Kirlia back home who would dye patterns into their coats with fire ash or other pigments. Their emotions were also a lot brighter, and she could feel a much greater presence of whimsy and simple cheer. It was plenty refreshing in contrast to Rustboro, whose people had been rather more stressed, fearful, and—well, maybe that hadn’t been the norm, actually.

Astra shook her head, dismissing the thought as she turned her head to look at the services on display throughout the streets. Mr. Briney might not know about anything their group would find fun, but that didn’t mean they didn’t exist. Surely there’d be someplace cool to poke at—ooh, like that seafood place! That sushi bar in Petalburg had been great, and now she really wanted a second try at it. Or—huh, was that sign advertising a dancing class?

“Oh, this looks interesting,” she mused, examining the myriad posters on display as they passed. One looked oddly Kirlia-like, with a very thick and stiff white skirt, but the others were wearing more ornate attire or, uh, something that looked like they’d thrown it on a practice dummy and had the Guard go feral with his spear. She stopped to examine that one a little closer. That Dragon Dance: Revelation game at the arcade had made her wonder what actual human dance styles were like, but what kind of routine embodied such ruined clothing?

Astra stared at it for a moment. Break dancing? That...were you supposed to use it to break things? How would that even work? She turned away from the sign with a sigh, jogging for a second to catch up to her friends. Strife really was embedded into everything humans did, it seemed. Still, the other posters looked interesting. Maybe they could come back and check it out before they went to Slateport.

“Hey,” Astra asked, falling in line with May and Brendan. “Do you guys know how to dance?”

May blinked at her, slightly baffled.

“Dance? I mean...kinda?” she hedged, looking unsure.

“A little bit?” Brendan volunteered, looking a bit lost as well. “Why do you ask?”

“Oh, I saw a building that taught people how to dance right back there,” Astra explained, “and it reminded me I haven’t really gotten to move around like that in a while. The game at the arcade does not count!” she stressed, jabbing a finger in May’s face.

May huffed and crossed her arms, looking determinedly at the traffic light they’d stopped at. Astra glared at her for a moment more, before bursting back into a grin.

“So you both know how?” Astra asked, very nearly bouncing in excitement. “That’s great! We dance all the time back home; maybe you can show me your moves sometime?”

“I mean, I guess? I dunno where we’d do it, though. Considering how the arcade went, I’m not sure you’d find something like a club appealing—” Brendan started, confusing and exasperating Astra. A club? How was dancing being connected to violence again!? “—but we could probably get like a boombox—” Boom—oh, come on! “—and jam out at a park or something,” he finished, nodding.

Astra looked at May expectantly, and May gave her a thoughtful look in return. Something like recognition flashed across May’s face, and she turned a wry glance toward Brendan.

“Well, it seems we’re being conscripted into dancing to earn the favor of our favorite red-eyed pale lady.” She wiggled her eyebrows, smirking deviously. “Are you ready to—”

She drew herself up, staring down at Brendan imperiously. “Boogie Down!” she commanded in an odd, snobbish cadence, her arm waving dismissively to the sidewalk ahead.

Astra stared at her friend in abject incomprehension. Lady? May wasn’t usually that verbose; what in the world was she going on about? She turned toward Brendan, expecting the same confusion, or at least his usual exasperation.

Instead, he looked like the Dusk Equinox had come early.

“You’re a fan of—!?” he started, eyes gleaming, before he caught himself and coughed. A grim smile came across his face, sharp eyes boring into May as he held his head high. “I may be so inclined, dearest May,” he intoned, inclining his head as he deepened his voice. “But only so long as you...”

He paused for a moment, eyes flicking toward the still red traffic light. Astra looked between the two, blinking rapidly. What was going on!?

The light left Brendan hanging for a long, awkward five seconds before it turned green.

“Sashay left!” Brendan commanded, imperiously sweeping his arm toward the crossing.

May recoiled, eyes wide in false shock. “The nerve of you!” she gasped as she began to...walk sideways? Astra tilted her head. She was moving her legs oddly, in a sort of criss-cross, making her lower body sway side-to-side. “For such insolence, there can be only one recompense!” May said, eyes narrowing. “You must... shimmy right!”

“Gah! How could you!?” Brendan yelped, similarly starting sideways across the road and...spasming? He was holding his arms up and shaking his shoulders back and forth, while he traced out squares with his footsteps.

Astra followed them, completely lost for words. They passed by a few pedestrians halfway across, and Astra shared a brief moment of kinship with their mutual bafflement, though theirs was considerably more amused, judging by the smiles and light laughter. Actually, now that she looked for it, nearly everyone in the intersection was staring at them. Astra pulled her hat down, cheeks burning. Did these idiots have to make such a giant scene!?

“What is even happening?” she murmured, watching them spout indecipherable, snobbish phrases at each other and contort into ever more bizarre movement patterns. It looked too purposeful to be spontaneous, so was this just...another human thing?

Astra was getting a little tired of how many ‘Human things’ there were. Sometimes it felt like she couldn’t talk to her friends for more than a few minutes before needing to get clarification on something or another, and while she would always be grateful for their willingness to answer, the necessity of it was still frustrating. Sure, all the answers she got were always interesting or exciting, but how much more of that was there going to be before she could reliably understand whatever any given human would do or say?

Even if May and Brendan were drawing way too much attention, the way they were laughing and grinning through bursts of mock outrage and reprisal looked fun. But even if they had been in private like Brendan suggested, she wouldn’t have the slightest clue how to join in properly. Sure, a bit of oddly organized spontaneous dancing wasn’t anything too troublesome, but if she didn’t know something as presumably trivial as this, what would she have trouble with once she reached her goal? What help would she be to her village if she made Champion and still failed because she didn’t know some arcane human ritual simply because she wasn’t one?

“Enough!” May stated, knocking Astra out of her thoughts as they arrived at the opposite sidewalk. She peeked out from under her brim, and much to her relief found that they’d stopped...whatever they had been doing, though their performance had elicited a few cheers and scattered applause from the pedestrians nearby. May’s face contorted oddly as she fought to keep her expression in a disdainful scowl. “Your spastic gyrations sicken me!”

“Well, sorry my moves aren’t good enough for you, Countess von Snarky,” Brendan shot back, his expression bright despite his heavy breathing. “I can’t believe you memorized that whole bit! Must’ve been an old copy too, they edited that line in the re-release.”

“Yeah, we had a whole box of old horror flicks from—wait, what!?” May paused, shock and outrage warring on her face. “Why? How!? That was one of the best lines in the movie!”

“It’s just gyrations now.”

“Oh, of course,” May groused, throwing her hands up in disgust. “Fucking Pokestar.”

“What?” Astra asked, edging a bit closer now that the bizarre spectacle seemed to be over. Brendan looked at her, blinking.

“They had to update the language for modern standards,” he explained, shrugging. “A lot of movies from back then—”

“No, not...whatever that is,” Astra interrupted, frowning. “What was—” she waved in the general direction of the crosswalk, “—that!?”

“Oh! That was...uh, we were kind of mimicking a scene from an old vampire movie,” Brendan explained, scratching his head with an awkward chuckle. “There was a bit where some people were forced to dance and...well, I bet we looked kinda silly, huh?”

“Maybe you did, but I rocked that shit,” May boasted, perhaps a bit too quickly.

Astra looked at them, blinking slowly. “What movie?” she didn’t ask. “What was it about?” she failed to question. “Can I see it?” she never spoke.

“Well, it looked fun,” she said instead.

“Well, we can have even more once we get moving,” May commanded, pushing Brendan forward. “C’mon, I wanna throw pencils at conspiracy theorists!”

“Alright alright,” Brendan yelped, stumbling. “We’re nearly halfway there, stop shoving. You’re worse than that guy in the ballroom.”

“The guy with two left feet who tripped and burnt everyone in his row into a crisp?” May asked. “Oh man, that was hilarious! The expression on his face when—”

Astra followed along, half-listening as May and Brendan chatted about their movie. Brendan started talking about the special effects on a talking, bloodthirsty Honedge while May reminisced about the ‘bastard hunk of a main villain’.

And Astra...was there, too.

Dewford Town Hall was an ornate building on the outside with extraneous pillars and fanciful carvings in the stone, but the main chamber—a grand space filled with tables, benches, and enough people to occupy nearly all of them—very strongly reminded Astra of the restricted houses where the Kirlia enjoyed fermented drinks back home. It was loud, with an ever-present susurration of voices filling the air, but the atmosphere was much more like a babbling brook than the harsh, spiky aberrance of the arcade. There was even a second floor, though perhaps ‘balcony’ was more appropriate as it seemed designed to allow everybody above to see everything below.

“For a ‘blasted den of misinformation’, it sure doesn't look like much,” May observed. She peered up at a nearby TV, which featured two humans talking to a third in a Pokemart. “Though it’s a lot more casual than I expected.”

Brendan raised an eyebrow. “It doesn’t have to look like a Grumpigsty to constantly churn out muck. What exactly were you expecting anyway?”

“I dunno,” May shrugged. “It’s a town hall, I thought it’d be more, you know...governmenty.”

“How are we doing this anyway?” Astra asked. “Do we just...walk around and listen?”

“I guess,” May said. “Wait, actually, how about we split up? We can each take a section and see if there’s anything crazy worth getting the full deets on, and then once, uh.” May paused and looked up at a nearby clock. “Once that hits the top of the hour, we meet back up outside and share what we found on the way to the gym. Sound good?”

Brendan shrugged. “Sounds fine.”

Astra’s face fell. They were splitting up? But what if she ran into something she didn’t have the context for? She almost certainly would, actually; wasn’t finding outlandish and unusual hearsay the reason they were here?

But...well, maybe she had been a bit too reliant on having May or Brendan around to field her questions. She hadn’t exactly planned to have them around in the first place when she’d begun her journey; maybe it was time to practice for if she found herself alone again.

“Sure,” Astra said. May grinned.

“Alright!” she said, clapping. “I think...me and Brendan can take the ground floor; Astra, you go see what's happening upstairs.”

She pointed over to the stairwell. Astra eyed it, then the balcony above. She shrugged. “Alright, I’ll see you guys in a bit then?”

“Yep! Find something juicy, would you?” May said.

“Try not to take anything you hear at face value,” Brendan added, grimacing. “People can get weird when they want attention.”

Astra nodded and took off, ascending the stairwell. At the turn halfway up, she glanced back down toward her friends and frowned.

If they had decided to split up, why was May dragging Brendan away?

...Well, it wasn’t the first time she hadn’t understood them today.

She sighed, then trudged up the stairs and tried to muster up some enthusiasm. There’d bound to be someone talking about something interesting, right?

“I’m studying up on the upcoming craze known as CORRECT PSYDUCK,” the man at the table explained, turning around the book on the table. An image of a rotund, vaguely aquatic yellow creature with a wide bill and glassy eyes looked out at Astra from the pages. “Do you believe there is any connection between CORRECT PSYDUCK and literature? My intuition tells me there’s a relation, but I can’t figure it out. Perhaps there’s a book that can tell me exactly which PSYDUCK is CORRECT...”

Astra stared at the man. To her left, a vocally indecisive woman whined to her friends about a collection of glossy papers she held, each of which showed a different example of the yellow Pokemon ‘up for adoption’. Rapid footsteps and childish giggling rushed around behind her as a trio of children played with toys of the creature, each one still accompanied by an uncut price tag.

The surrounding tables were no better; every human within this third of the balcony seemed to have been infected with a strange yellow plague. Their clothes, their interests, their belongings; all of it centered around this Psyduck pokemon. She hadn’t even said anything to the man; she’d walked up and he’d just started talking at her.

“I don’t know,” she finally replied, blinking. “Er, sorry, what...is ‘Correct Psyduck’, exactly?”

“CORRECT PSYDUCK,” the man stated, as if she’d somehow messed up the words (though, the way he said it was...odd), “is the newest and hippest trend in Hoenn! It’s just getting off the ground, but the whole world will know about it soon enough! We’re on the cutting edge of popularity!”

“...But what is it?” Astra asked.

The man hesitated. “We’re...figuring it out!” he claimed, not meeting Astra’s gaze. “But it’s sure to sweep the nation quicker than every tidal wave in the last decade combined!”

Astra frowned. They didn’t know? What was going on? “How new is Correct Psyduck?”

He shot her an annoyed look. “The rise of CORRECT PSYDUCK—” the man stated, even more firmly—how was he pronouncing it like that!? “—was made clear to us by Randy just two days ago. He’s always on top of the newest trends in Hoenn, so when he told us this was going to be big, we all hopped on board!”

He pointed at an old man with a long, white beard at another table, who seemed to be rigorously contemplating a poorly painted wooden figurine of a Psyduck.

Astra knew she didn’t understand much about how human interests ebbed and flowed, but even then this all seemed rather bizarre. It didn’t seem particularly harmful, but it would be worth digging a bit deeper just to figure out what to tell her friends later. Maybe they could make sense of it? Or at least have a laugh. Thanking the man for his time, Astra went over to Randy.

Randy looked up at her approach, hazy blue eyes meeting her own. “Oh, hello there! Are you here to learn about the newest and hippest trend in the nation?”

“I suppose I am,” Astra replied, momentarily distracted by how shoddy the paintwork on the wooden Psyduck was. Did the artist even know how to mix pigment so it spread evenly? The layers were so globby the poor duck looked like it had a full-body outbreak of warts!

She shook her head, looking back at the human. “You were the one who told everybody about all of...this, right?” she asked, gesturing to the frothing mass of yellow.

Randy nodded, turning to face Astra fully. “That I was! I’ve studied the rise and fall of many a passing craze in this country, so when I found out what the next one was, I just knew I had to be at the front of the line! Nobody tells ol’ Randy that he isn’t keeping it cool!”

Astra blinked at Randy, then glanced around the horde of duck-obsessed fad chasers.

“Sure,” Astra said, vaguely grateful May wasn’t here. “But how did you find out about ‘Correct Psyduck’, exactly?”

Randy leaned forward, looking around furtively as his voice dropped to a whisper.

“It was revealed to me in a dream.”

“Ah,” Astra said, nodding understandingly. Dreams weren’t the most reliable—or coherent—medium of future-sight, but at least the reasoning was sound. “May I ask what the contents of your dream were?”

“It was a very quick affair,” he explained, folding his hands. “As far as I recall, it had been a normal dream—as much as one can remember those at all—when I suddenly became aware of myself, and found myself floating in a black abyss. A Psyduck appeared to me, and it was as if the words appeared in my mind by themself: PSYDUCK CORRECT.”

He waved his hands at the end, fingers wriggling mystically. Astra tilted her head, brows furrowing.

“Wait, I thought it was ‘Correct Psyduck’?”

Randy shrugged. “They didn’t hear me right and now they’re kinda stuck on it.”

“I see...but what does that all mean, exactly? How is that going to get so popular?”

“It’s quite a conundrum,” he mused. “I only knew that it was important. The popular theory is that Psyducks themselves are going to be the ‘correct’ choice in...popularity? Combat? Something or other.”

Astra looked at the figurine again. One of its eyes was, somehow, painted upside-down. “I can’t say I see the appeal myself,” she admitted.

Randy shrugged. “Ain’t ever been a trend that’s gotten everybody on board. Even Pokemon. Might not even be a trend at all.”

“Hm?” Astra tilted her head, blinking.

Randy idly plucked the figurine from the table and examined it, humming thoughtfully. “It could be one special Psyduck, it could be that Psyduck is the right choice for something...” he mused, “or maybe it could be something a Psyduck will do? A ‘PSYDUCK’ will ‘CORRECT’...something.”

“Like what?” Astra asked, frowning at the wooden sculpture.

“Who knows? Crime? Orre’s economy?” He huffed, his mouth twitching into a grin. “This conversation?”

“Maybe that awful paint job,” Astra quipped, to Randy’s laughter.

“Is my work that terrible?” he bemoaned, eyes twinkling. “What a wound to my soul! The pain~! Oh, I am slain!”

He clutched at his chest and gently collapsed onto the table, leaving Astra in a fit of giggles. Randy joined her a moment later, chuckling as he pulled himself upright. He considered the figurine for a moment, then tossed it on the table. “Well, if nothing else, arguing about nonsense like this is a decent way to fill the time. Maybe next time there’ll be a fad about...I don’t know, Ironic Noctowls. That sounds fun.”

“Maybe.” Astra hummed, nodding at the man and turning to leave. She could already envision May bursting into laughter and Brendan making those funny exasperated faces. She paused as a thought struck her. Had that been the only thing he’d seen?

“Did anything else happen in your dream?” she asked, turning back to Randy.

Randy stroked his beard. “Now that you mention it, the Psyduck did seem to say something peculiar right before I woke up.”

“What was it?”

“‘The rocks know.’”

Astra waited a moment. “...Know what?”

“Beats me.”

“Weird.”

“Very strange,” Randy agreed.

Astra left, shaking her head in bemusement. What an odd bunch. Now, how to explain this to the others? Hopefully that’d have something equally bizarre to share as well.

“Okay, so growing half a foot in like, a week is weird, right?”

“It’s not what I’d call common, no.”

“And you saw her face, right?”

“You mean how her nose kinda changes shape every day?”

“See! I knew I wasn’t crazy!”

“Listen, just because she, uh, shapeshifts now and then, that doesn’t mean you should jump from ‘she’s in a cult’ to ‘she was summoned by a cult!’”

“Look I’m just saying, it makes a lot of sense if she’s some sort of eldritch horror brought on by some backwater idiots. She covers herself all the time, her face keeps shifting around, she doesn’t know shit from fuck—”

“You know what an eldritch horror is?”

“...Uh.”

“...Well, I wouldn’t exactly call Astra a horror, would you?”

“I had to explain a lot more about hygiene than I ever thought I’d have to...”

“Alright, but she’s still our friend.”

“Well, duh!”

“So it doesn’t matter if she’s just had a very bizarre upbringing, or been...summoned through an astral rift by a doomsday cult—”

“Heh, astral.”

“—We should still hear her out about whatever the actual truth of it is.”

“Of course, but we’ve just been kinda circling the drain for a week and a half! I don’t think just ‘being her friend’ is going to get us much further, man.”

“...You’re right. Every time we bring the topic up she just gets kinda vague and we still don’t even know where her home is. It’s pretty clear she doesn’t really want to talk about this herself, and I don’t think we’re going to get any answers just by waiting it out.”

“We never did get around to asking about that time limit thing.”

“It just never seemed like a good time for it!”

“Well, maybe now’s the time for it. How are we gonna work this, anyway?

“Maybe we should just ask her outright. Rip the band-aid off.”

“Weren’t you the one saying we should be all sneaky with it before?”

“That was before her face started morphing around. It kinda pushed the timetable up, yeah?”

“Fair enough. When are you thinking? Probably can’t fit it in between here and the gym; we gotta get focused for the fighting!”

“Right, and after that we still need to go look for Steven. How about after that? We’ll ask her tonight, or at least tomorrow.”

“That works. We’ll get her talking right after Steven.”

“Right after Steven.”

“...I should pick up some ice cream too; she likes that. Do you think she’d like mint?”

“Wouldn’t hurt. Did you want to actually look around before we have to go, or...?”

“Oh, right, yeah. See you in a bit!”

“Later.”

“—But his daughter Ikaku is attending that musical contest over in Slateport next week, so he’ll have to make an appearance.”

Astra raised her head, hurriedly scanning the crowd as she pushed away from the balcony railing she was leaning against. Did someone say...? Ugh, take one minute to spectate the ground floor and you miss something actually interesting!

“Oh right, that weird public concert Slateport does every now and then. I hear a couple of upcoming names are attending, like Greywood’s boy. They’re hauling his personal piano all the way out there, or so I hear.”

A concert in Slateport? Astra could still recall...er, that one trainer she and May had met right outside Petalburg mentioning a musical contest there; was it the same thing?

“Really? Maybe he’ll hit it off with Ikaku. Don’t you think clarinets pair well with pianos?”

“In classical sure, but with these new styles—oh, that reminds me, my daughter has been looking into these strange videos online about very odd duet music—”

Astra listened a bit more, sighing as the speakers swerved into chatting about their children. Well, that didn’t last long. Still, there were a couple interesting names dropped. Ikaku and Greywood, who played a ‘clarinet’ and a ‘piano’. If she went to that musical contest, would she be able to meet them herself?

Attending whatever this musical contest was might be a good time, she supposed. Playing her violin was always fun, and it might be nice to get some feedback as well. Trevor’s sheets were helpful, and she thought her practice was going well, but it was hard to tell how much she had improved without knowledgeable criticism. Maybe she’d get along with the other musicians? She’d not been able to really discuss the topic with May or Brendan very effectively; it would be nice to meet someone who understood it all a bit better! But would she participate...?

Well, she still had plenty of time before they got to Slateport. She’d see what was happening and decide from there.

“—And my cousin swears he saw Steven Stone walking down the beach the other day, but he’s so totally full of shit. Like, he swore he heard screaming coming from the Granite Caves two weeks ago right before—”

“I’m sorry, did you say someone saw Steven Stone?” Astra cut in, having briskly rushed toward the table of teenagers as soon as she overheard Steven’s name.

The speaker, a young man maybe a little older than Brendan, blinked at her. “Uh, yeah. I was just saying, my cousin told me he saw him walking along the beach the other day, but it’s probably a load of crap, you know? Why would a guy like him ever go to a beach?”

“He doesn’t seem the type,” another boy agreed. “He spends like, all of his time training or something, right?”

“He’s so pale! He’d have to slather himself in lotion if he didn’t want to fry to a crisp.” A girl chimed in. Her eyes turned a bit glassy as a faint blush appeared on her cheeks. “I wouldn't mind helping with that...” The girl giggled, much to Astra’s horror. “Shame he’s so camera shy. I wonder what he’s like in private~”

Oh fuck no. “Did your cousin say what beach it was?” Astra asked, desperately trying to get back on track. She did not need that forsaken emotional image about Steven Stone.

The first teen let out a bark of laughter. “Visiting, are you?” he said, cracking a smile.”There’s only one real beach in Dewford, and it’s north of town. He didn’t say much else about it. Hey, why are you askin’, anyway?” he asked, sitting up. “You a fangirl of his or something?”

Astra looked at him blankly, still a bit frazzled by the girl's rather vivid emotional broadcasting. “Fangirl...?” she asked. What did that mean? Fan? Like...cooling? Did Steven employ women for the sole purpose of cooling him off, or something? “Er, no, I don’t, uh, fan.”

Though she might dunk him in cold water if asked. Or even if he didn’t ask.

“I was just trying to find out what part of Dewford he’s in, is all,” she continued. “Thanks for—”

“Wait wait wait,” A girl interrupted, shooting to her feet. “What do you mean by that? Is Steven Stone actually in Dewford!?”

“Uh.” Astra paused, looking around at the table of very curious teens suddenly staring straight at her. “...I should go,” she decided, backing away.

“Wait—!” the girl called, but Astra was already four tables away and picking up speed.

Well, it wasn’t a solid lead, but a sighting was better than nothing, she supposed.

Though why in the world did he need women to follow him around and fan him off? Did he train so much that he was constantly overheated? Humans were, as always, extremely strange.

“—I just don’t trust that head scientist of theirs with something as important as the world's first space colony,” somebody said, breaking through the soft din of the hall.

Astra turned away from one of the elevated televisions scattered around the building—the one that had been reporting on the Mossdeep Space Center—and looked around for the speaker. She spotted a man in a green suit sitting at another table near the television with two companions; an older man in beige and a woman dressed in crimson. Were they talking about the Space Center?

“Yes, she gets results,” the man in green continued, “but haven’t you heard all the rumors about interpersonal drama and rushed development? We’re lucky she didn’t make the damn rocket or we’d be seeing fireworks over Mossdeep next month.”

“Those rumors are unfounded,” the beige man argued, leaning forward. “Mere slander hurled around by colleagues jealous of her hard work.”

The crimson woman nodded in firm agreement. “Dr. Vir has made incredible advancements in a great deal of fields; they’re even using her personal power generation designs to power the base, and those were given full approval by Wattson! You know,” she gestured to the TV, “the man who gave Dewford a power grid worth a damn?”

This seemed to mollify the green man a bit, as he contemplated his folded hands, frowning. “Wattson or no, I’m still not convinced. Her methodology is unsound, and I’ve heard complaints about—”

“Oh forget about the damn complaints,” the beige man cut on looking annoyed. “I didn’t come here to yap about drama, I wanted to talk about the mission! Have you seen the press release about the engineering on that rocket? The innovation for the materials alone—!”

Oh, now that sounded interesting! Astra’s first experience with the human world—discounting May giving someone advice on how to stuff her in a ball forever—had been her listening in on a television through a window on the outskirts of Petalburg. She’d discovered that humanity had devised means to travel the heavens and it was still unfathomable how they were able to accomplish such a thing. Perhaps these three could tell her more about it?

Astra edged closer, brushing past an elderly quintet huddled around a very intense-sounding discussion involving needles and cloth. The woman at the table turned her head at Astra approach and held a hand up to her companion.

“Hold on a second, Gav,” the woman said, giving Astra a smile. “Hello there! Is there something we can help you with?”

Astra smiled back. “I just overheard you talking about the rocket in Mossdeep and got curious. Do you guys know a lot about it?”

“Gav does; he’s a bit of a nut for technical things like that,” the man in green affirmed. “Though we’re all big fans of space travel. May I take it that the cosmos has captured your attention as well?”

“Oh I’ve always loved the stars,” Astra said, taking a seat. “My grandpa did too; which is why my name is Astra.”

“Oh I love that name!” the women in red gushed, smiling brilliantly. “Very retro! You can call me Maggy, that’s Gav, and Mr. Stuffy over there is Isaac.”

“Stuffy!?” Isaac protested.

“Darling, you wore a tacky green suit to a casual outing,” Maggy informed him, eyes sparkling. “You have worn tacky suits to every outing you have ever gone on.”

“It was incredible how you managed to only get a bit damp when we went surfing,” Gav added. “I still have no idea how you did it.”

“Oh screw off,” Isaac grumbled, “They aren’t tacky.”

Astra smiled at the interplay. Still, this wasn’t what she’d sat down for, amusing as it was. She turned to Gav.

“You were saying something about the rocket’s engineering a bit ago?” she prompted. Gav’s eyes lit up.

“I was!” he said, and quickly began to babble. “So they’ve gotten this new material for the front end of the ship, right? It cuts through air like nobody’s business, and the thermal protection is out of this world—”

Astra learned a few things in rapid succession:

1: For some reason, the rocket would catch on fire at some point during its journey. This was because—

2: Apparently anything moving fast enough would catch on fire, because the air couldn’t get out of the way quick enough and it went over like a much greater version of when you rubbed your hands together when they got cold. How fast was that? Well—

2.5: You don’t know MPH? Uh, walking usually averages to about three miles per hour. Anyway, as I was saying—

3. The speed this happened at was roughly six thousand miles per hour, and those rockets regularly got up to twenty-five thousand, which would be like if Astra was able to sprint across the village a half-dozen times before someone else blinked. Wow, wasn’t that dangerous? What happens when they get to where they want to go? Well, they had a whole bunch of equipment and steps dedicated to slowing down before they landed. What if all that failed? In that case—

4. If the space rocket crash-landed into a city, the explosion would probably ruin a whole neighborhood. It wouldn’t be special in terms of total damage to life or property, but it’d really ruin the mood. Wait, what do you mean that wasn’t especially damaging? Well that rocket is meant to go to space, not detonate. If you wanted one to do that you’d use—

5. Humanity had built rockets which flew at impossible speeds that were purpose-built to explode and would annihilate a solid square mile of damn near anything. And they had built a lot of them.

“—But they’ve been steadily disarming those things for decades. I think Hoenn has...actually they might all be gone, though who knows for sure. Well, eventually we’ll only have the ones made to transport things into orbit or beyond,” Gav finished.

“Can’t come soon enough, I say,” Issac grumbled. “We need more hands working on helping people, not hurting them.”

“Yeah,” Astra croaked, hands tightly clenching the fabric of her dress. “I’d...like that too.”

They’d made weapons that could turn entire forests into wastelands. Why? What in the world would make them need such horrific weapons? Her village had crafted spears to fish, hunt, and ward off Poochyena; what sort of threat needed humanity to vaporize such a large area? The only thing she knew of that necessitated anything near that level of violence was when her—when that Alpha Mightyena menaced the village. What were they so scared of!? At the very least the rockets seemed to be gone, but if they made more of them...

“Bit of a grim swerve there, Gav,” Maggy said. “Can we go back to the cool space stuff?”

“Yeah!” Astra agreed, grasping onto the lifeline fervently. “Like, uh...I know that one is going to build things on the moon, but what else do those rockets bring up there?”

“Eh? Well...” Gav furrowed his brow, staring up at the ceiling as he pondered the question. He scratched his nose. “Well, Devon sent up a fancy new satellite a few months ago.”

“Devon!” Astra exclaimed, a wave of relief flooding through her at the familiar name. “I know them! I was just in Rustboro a few days ago helping them with something.”

Maggy paused, side-eyeing Astra. “Were you now?” she hummed.

“Yeah, it was a whole thing,” Astra said, huffing. She shook her head. “Anyway, what are they doing with the, uh, satellite?” she asked, pondering the strange word.

Gav shrugged. “Spying, probably.”

Astra stared at him, her smile frozen on her face. “...What?”

“Well it’s essentially a big camera, right? So they’re using it to take pictures of the landscape to make maps or something—”

Astra brushed a hand over the Pokenav in her pocket. She’d...never questioned how they’d made it, had she?

“—But everybody knows you don’t use something that takes those kinds of pictures for just maps.”

“Ah,” Astra said, faintly. “So their machine up there can just...look anywhere in Hoenn and give them a picture of it?”

“They’re not the best quality, but yes,” Isaac grumbled, folding his arms. “Might not be too worrying now, but who knows how good cameras will be in the future? Wasn’t even eighty years ago when they figured out how to fly people across the region without pokemon; if Devon makes a satellite that can peek in my windows, we’re gonna start having some problems.”

Eighty years. They’d figured out how to fly only eighty years ago. Barely any time at all, really. A few cycles of hatchlings growing into mothers and their hatchlings growing to have eggs of their own. Astra didn’t know if her village had really done anything within that time. They’d made new songs and dances and that sort of thing, sure, but humanity...they’d built weapons that could destroy expanses of land and machines that roamed around the stars and spied on people. Did the village's protections even work on something without a mind!? How were they ever supposed to catch up with that!? This was—! This was...

Astra stared down at her hands, her hat obscuring the small prickling she felt in her eyes. Why did every new thing she learned seem designed to crush her future? She’d only sat down to learn about space and rockets.

This was supposed to be fun.

“I think I’m done here,” she murmured, pushing her chair back. Her three conversation partners blinked at her.

“But we’ve barely even started!” Gav protested. “I got sidetracked like three times, and I’ve hardly touched on...anything!”

“I know,” Astra said, giving him a small smile. It wasn’t his fault. She was just...

Tired.

“I, uh, promised some friends that I'd meet up soon, so I figured I’d wander around a little more before I leave.”

“Shame; we haven’t even gotten to the experiments they’re bringing up there,” Isaac said. “One of them involves finding out how plants grow without gravity, you see.”

“Oh let the girl go,” Maggie chided. “Don’t be a halfwit who makes a lady miss a rendezvous."

“Thanks.” Astra nodded at Maggie, and managed a small grin for Gav and Isaac as she departed the table. “I hope the space mission goes well.”

“Shouldn't’ve gone off on the missile rant,” Isaac muttered to Gav before Astra left earshot. “People don’t like that sort of thing.”

“Didn’t hear you complaining when I made those fireworks for your thirtieth—”

Astra sighed to herself, looking around for somewhere else to go. She didn’t think she had much left in her after...that.

The woman in red hummed and watched her go.

“Have you heard about New Mauville?”

Astra looked up from an entire bakery's worth of pastries and treats laid out before her. She had no idea why the elderly ladies sitting here had brought enough sweets to cover the entire table in decadent sugar, but she had tried something called a ‘scone’ with some Cherri jam and had subsequently been stuffing her face for the past five minutes. It was crumbly and a bit dry, but by the stars was it good!

“I have not!” she chirped, her telepathy allowing her to ignore the mouthful of jam still stuck in her jaws. “What’s New Mauville?”

The old lady speaking to her smiled. “Oh, it’s some old underground power plant a bit south of regular Mauville that Wattson worked on a few decades back. They shut it down for some reason, and now it’s just a bunch of rusting gizmos and electric pokemon.” She leaned over the table, her voice dropping to a murmur. “I’ve got a brother who lives up in Mauville, he says that old derelict plant has been shrieking and wailing at odd hours of the night lately. Not just any noise either, he says it sounds like a banshee got mixed up in one of them electric generators and went bonkers!”

“What’s a banshee?” Astra asked, pausing to take a sip of tea. It was Cacnea, and tasted a little bitter, but it canceled out the extreme sweetness of everything else at the table. They did have honey, but she was already starting to overload on the absurd sweetness of the pastries.

“Oh, it’s a Galarian myth—”

Another elderly lady across the table snorted. “Galarian? You absolute boghead, that myth’s from Tir’nog. Just ‘cause the islands are close doesn’t mean they’re interchangeable!”

“Tir’nog, then,” the first woman corrected. “In any case, it’s about this ghostly woman who shows up outside the homes of people who’re about to kick the bucket and starts wailing.”

Astra paused, slowly lowering her scone. “...Ghostly? Is...is it haunted?”

“According to my brother, it might be! He took a look himself, but he couldn’t get inside—the whole thing has been blocked off for ages, though you still see some people go in and out sometimes. Said he saw a lot of flickering lights, and then when the screaming started he hightailed it out of there. Apparently it sounded like someone was torturing sheet metal. He reported it, but apparently the Jennies aren’t doing anything.”

Distorted screeching and flickering lights? Old, abandoned metal labyrinths? Astra shivered. “Oh, I don’t like that. I don’t like that at all. This place is south of Mauville?”

“Yes; somewhere on Route 110, I believe.”

“I’ll make sure to keep my distance, then. The last thing I need is to go poking at some terrible screeching ghost.”

The other old lady snorted again. “You should go tell my lads that; they keep faffin’ about with those busted down radios when they get hammered and it’s a right pox.”

“Oh right, your man was teaching Shawn about broadcasts, right? How’s that going?”

Astra munched on another scone. For as much as humanity had made some really unnecessarily terrible things, they had really nailed it with bread and sugar. Still, maybe it was best she took her leave; her stomach was starting to feel a bit sickly after inhaling so many of the treats, and a quick glance at her Pokedex showed that—oh, she was late, actually. May and Brendan were probably wondering where she was!

She pushed back her chair and stood, stretching her arms out as she sighed contentedly. “I’ve gotta go; thanks for letting me sit for a while!”

“Oh it’s no trouble, dearie!” the woman exclaimed, giving her a kind smile. “Enjoy the rest of your day!”

The rest of the table echoed the sentiment, wishing Astra fond farewells. Astra hurried away, heavy in stomach but light in step. Aside from a few...rather upsetting nuggets of information, this hadn’t been a complete disaster. Weird Psyduck club, the extremely worrying knowledge about rockets and missiles, an important warning about haunted power plants, and even a hint of Steven’s whereabouts! Not to mention that musical event in Slateport. If she wanted to check that out, she’d have to really double down on practicing with those music sheets—

“—And that damned blast in Rustboro cut off my flight!”

Astra slowed, looking pensively at the table between her and the stairs. An ancient-looking man sat at the head of the table, surrounded by a few not-as-old adults and a good handful of teenagers. Had her mistake affected him, too? It seemed that not even leaving the mainland was enough to distance her from that horrible memory. She sighed and started circling around, doing her best to ignore the conversation as the younger members of the table picked it up.

“Yeah, I had to cancel my school trip too. I think every plane and ship in the region got locked down for the rest of the week.”

“It’s no wonder! Did you even see what it looked like? You don’t just have a giant black death pillar shoot out of the forest and go on like it’s a regular Friday. That clip on the news still freaks me out.”

Astra closed her eyes and took a deep breath, exhaling slowly. Just had to block it out. Just block it out, and get to the stairs. Not much further now.

“That mini-desert is crazy too. Everyone says it’s haunted, but nobody’s seen any Ghost pokemon, and they’re still trying to figure out what that weird yellow haze even is.”

“Well, whatever it is, it ruined my vacation! Sucks that they still haven’t found anyone to blame yet.”

The ancient man snorted. “Blame!? They’re still trying to find out who did it? Then they’re damned fools, the lot of them! It’s obvious who did it!”

Cold sweat crawled up Astra’s back as she froze at the entrance to the stairwell, head snapping towards the elder. What!? He knew!? How—!?

“It was those demons in Kanto!” The man shouted, banging his fist on the table. “The whole region is nothing but a cesspit, so they’re obviously behind it!”

Astra stared at the man, shakily releasing her iron grip on the railing. What...was he talking about? Kanto? Wasn’t that one of the other regions across the sea?

“Oh no,” one of the men muttered. He looked at the old man pleadingly. “Grandpa, we’re in public, please don’t start ranting about the war again.”

“Kanto?” Someone else asked, sounding as confused as Astra felt. “What does Kanto have to do with anything?”

“The entire country is stuffed with criminals, is what!” the old man roared, attracting the attention of every table nearby. “Those lunatics couldn’t stand that we didn’t fall over when they tried to take Hoenn for themselves during the war forty years ago and they’ve had it out for us ever since! That traitor Moore already sold us out by handing Lavaridge over to his bastard granddaughter, so it was only a matter of time until—!”

“Grandpa!” the other man shouted, nearly tripping over himself as he rushed around the table. He clapped the older man on the shoulder and squeezed, his face a rictus of poorly hidden anger, panic, and exhaustion. “I need you to get a grip on yourself. There are children here. Listen, let’s just go get some fresh air—”

“Hey, my bestie’s from Kanto!” A younger woman shouted, practically steaming with outrage. “The hell is your problem, old man!?”

“My problem!? What is your problem!?” He thundered, face turning red and veiny. “All of you! Have you forgotten what they did to us!? Those devils and their blasted pokemon ate my little sister's dreams! I watched her waste away from terminal insomnia, ranting and raving for nearly a fortnight before she fell apart, and you have the nerve to tell me that things are different when they have outright war hawks running their league!?”

Hatred and pain. It steamed off the man like the miasma of long-rotten fish, putrid and caustic. He was shouting still, heedless of his grandson's frantic attempts at damage control and the outraged horror of the crowd. Astra’s ears buzzed as she stared at the scene, the cold metal of the railing once more shaking in her grip. The sounds were meaningless, but the emotion—

She knew this.

She remembered this.

Seething rage enough to drown all thought. Boundless enmity, waiting, simmering in impotence. Reaching out, flowing through her veins until the black smoke stained her skin and soul an abyssal black with malice enough to tar the skies—

“Astra?”

Astra did not scream. Part of her had recognized Brendan’s approach before he had even spoken. She just stared at the shouting match as the edge of the bannister dug into her palm.

“Hey, Brendan,” she said, slowly peeling her hand off of the railing. It ached, but it was fine. She was fine.

She had to be.

“What’s going on?” Brendan asked, and Astra heard him climbing the stairs. “You didn’t show up, and then we heard shouting from—”

“I say we take all of those damn Kantonians, march them straight up Mt. Chimney, and—!”

“—Oh.”

He paused a few steps in. He saw, and heard. Astra could feel his confusion, shock, outrage—worry. Part of her felt glad that he saw this and felt the same way she did about the furious argument in front of them. But the rage and anguish before her only grew further, the old man pulling everyone around him into his spiral of grief.

“Brendan?”

He looked at her and hesitated. “Uh.”

“I don’t want to be here anymore.”

Her skin prickled as another wave of people began to yell, and now there were even a few muttering their own condemnations of Kanto. A miasma of hate, spreading and seeping outwards, and she could almost feel the ash in her hair—

Banishing the memory was proving much harder than usual, today.

A moment passed. “Yeah,” Brendan said, nodding rapidly. “Yeah, we’re pretty late, and it sounds really ugly in there. May’s waiting for us down—Astra?”

He’d gone back down a few steps, but Astra hadn’t moved. She couldn’t see his face, but she could feel his worry redouble. But it was fine. She was fine. She was just too busy being fine to move.

Brendan hesitated again, then climbed up to her and gently put an arm around her shoulder. Astra twitched, but did nothing else. He pulled, and Astra allowed him to, following on legs as heavy as ancient trees.

“Let’s go,” he said, and softly guided Astra every step of the way.

They descended the stairs, the argument above growing quieter with distance. Other humans passed them by, an Officer Jenny among them, but none stopped to bother them. The crowd on the ground level was no less stifling than it had been before, but the anguish was distant, now. It was...a little easier.

“Brendan?”

Astra could feel him turn his attention towards her. Her mind was buzzing, and it felt like she was looking at the world through a rippling puddle. Machines in space that spied on everyone below. Weapons that flew faster than thought. The old man, ranting and raving about people from another land. The Aqua Grunt, both during that fight in the woods and when he threatened Peeko. And then...

“What is...war?”

Brendan stopped at Astra’s question. He stared ahead, confusion and dread billowing around his thoughts, before bitter melancholy suffused his soul.

“People...don’t always get along.” he said, and for a moment he seemed as tired as she. “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.”

Oh.

That’s why they made the rockets.

Humanity wasn’t fighting a Mightyena. They weren’t fighting any pokemon at all.

They were fighting themselves. They’d made weapons to burn out the land because they had to battle each other, and decided Pokemon weren’t strong enough. And when they managed to get pokemon that were strong enough...what kind of sick battle necessitated sealing away someone's ability to sleep? How could they possibly hate each other that much? Then again, maybe it shouldn’t have been so surprising. She still remembered fragments of that vision in Rustboro. That figure in the snow. Humanity had killed them too, hadn’t they?

She had hoped it was just a dream. But of course it wasn’t.

They still hadn’t learned anything.​

Astra knew hatred like that could—did—exist. After all...

For a brief moment, she had felt the same.

And if humanity could feel that way about each other, what would they feel about us?

“People...aren’t very nice, sometimes,” Astra whispered.

They just walked, for a moment. Slowly pacing towards the exit. Brendan exhaled softly, grimly staring ahead.

“No. No they aren’t.”

They stepped outside, Astra brushing Brendan’s arm off as they did.

“Thanks,” she murmured, managing to give him a tiny smile. “I’m good.”

He looked at her, brow creased and flickering with disbelief. “Are you sure? Maybe we should go find somewhere to take a break—”

“There you are!”

Astra turned and saw May push herself off one of the pillars holding up the building's overhang. She jogged over, giving astra an exasperated glare.

“We were waiting out here for ages!” she complained, “What, did you get lost or something?”

Astra blinked. “Sorry. I, uh, got distracted.”

“Someone was making a huge scene about Kanto,” Brendan explained. May looked at him blankly. Brendan stared back, then seemed to come to a realization. “Uh, they were talking about the war. Very passionately.”

May arched an eyebrow. “Really? You were late because you were listening to some bullshit about that?”

“Sorry,” Astra repeated.

May waited for a moment, before realizing that was all she was going to get. She peered at Astra oddly, then huffed.

“Well, whatever. Assholes like that don’t deserve the air they waste on spewing that shit. C’mon,” she said, turning to leave. “The gym is this way. We’ve seen some sights, now let’s go pick a fight!”

“Hold on,” Brendan said. “Maybe we could take a breather, first?”

May gave him a blank, incredulous stare. “Ah, yes.” she said, nodding slowly. “Because rumor-mongering just tuckers you out so much, doesn't it Brendan?”

Brendan sighed. “May...”

“I bet you worked so hard at sitting down and chatting with people, didn’t you?” she continued, her voice reminding Astra very strongly of when the hatchling caretakers were having particularly taxing days. “It must’ve been so exhausting—”

“May,” Brendan interrupted, shocking May into silence. “Astra didn’t take what they were saying too well. I just think we could take a few minutes to relax and—”

Astra closed her eyes, hands clenched tightly at her side. Was this about her? No. There was no need for this.

“I’m fine,” she interjected, walking past May. “Let’s go.”

She didn’t want to talk about it. She didn’t want to think about it. How could they possibly understand, anyway? With as much trouble as she had understanding them...it was for the best.

“Wh—Astra, I really think—” Brendan started.

“I said I’m fine, Brendan,” Astra bit out. She just wanted to get moving. Was that really so hard?

May watched on, frowning. She hesitated, then shrugged. “Let’s just take her word on it, man,” she said, patting Brendan on the shoulder. “Maybe some pitched combat will loosen her up, eh?”

“I really feel like we should talk about this,” he muttered, sullenly following along.

May squeezed his shoulder, shrugging minutely as they caught up to Astra. “We’ll have all night to chill out after we deliver that dumb letter. Nobody’s going anywhere.”

“Yeah, yeah...”

“Good.” May clapped her hands, rubbing them together with a big grin. “Now, what wacky rumors did you two get? I got some crackpot going on about how washed up cargo in someplace called Cinnabar is making Kanto’s computer systems go up in flames.”

Astra exhaled in relief. Finally, a good distraction. “Well, I found an entire group of people worshipping this pokemon called ‘Psyduck’.”

“They fucking what!?”

A faint smile crossed Astra’s face as she regaled May and Brendan with the bizarre antics of Randy’s fad-chasing group, their baffled faces a familiar—and hilarious—reprieve.

Inscrutable as her human friends were at times, Astra would be forever grateful to have them at her side.