It’s... It’s dark. I can’t see.

“Ninetales, light!” I shouted as quickly as I could.

Ninetales had trained far too long to let simple shadows cloak us like this. I needed her to provide light, to save us from whatever might have lurked within the Megamart. However, the pitch-black darkness that surrounded us remained unpierced, and I scrambled to dig through my pack and bring out my flashlight, which I quickly turned on.

“W-what?”

Ninetales was gone. There wasn’t even frost where she had just stood. I slammed my hand into my belt to check to see if her Pokéball was there—

But it was gone. Patting around, I couldn’t feel Mawile’s either, or most others’, for that matter.

I quickly tried the door behind me: a set of pure wood slabs that had slammed closed unlike anything that usually served as the entrance of a store. There was no glass, no sliding grooves, and there were not even faint beams of light peeking through between them.

There weren’t even handles that would provide a handhold. As it was, I was stuck, and I was alone.

My flashlight had been long neglected due to my reliance on my team. It’d been a while since I first got it, and the batteries had gone uncharged. The thin beam of light it provided flickered every so often as I panned it around the room. Rows and rows of tall shelves stretched out into the distance. Some contained old packages, some contained nothing at all.

I checked my belt again, heart pounding.

“Hold on, I have something.”

Despite my shaking hands, I was still able to push through and actually find there was one last ball there.

While the rest of my team’s Pokéballs had vanished, there was one left behind. Grabbing it, I quickly recognized that it was a Love Ball, and I tossed it forward to send out the sole Pokémon still with me.

“Vee!” Eevee yawned as he appeared on the floor.

Suddenly recognizing where he was, the small Pokémon blinked and looked around at the darkness around us. The only possible explanation I could think of for why he was still here was that he was a Normal Type immune to the Ghosts’ tricks.

“Eevee, we’re alone,” I told him, my voice shaky. “The door is locked behind us, and something or someone took everyone’s Pokéballs.”

He went stiff.

“We need to find everyone, push deeper, and, very importantly, we need to rescue Lillie too.”

His jaw clenched with nerves as he glanced all around him. With the low-power of my flashlight, the sparse bit of space we could see seemed to stretch off into darkness, thus looking as if it went on forever and ever. This building wasn’t just a normal mart but a Megamart, and its sheer size easily met that description.

Eevee shivered but still nodded and did his best to school his expression. I did the same, trying to calm down, myself. Neither of us wanted to be here, and neither of us wanted to deal with ghosts. Literally, we were both shaking in our boots. However, when it came to bringing in help, my role as a member of the Wandering Elite meant I was the help. There was simply no one else to call.

“L-let’s go,” I said.

I pretended not to notice how Eevee purposefully waited until I was practically on top of him before he moved forward. I couldn’t blame him for wanting to stick as close as possible to me. He was doing exactly what I would have done.

We cautiously inched forward, heading directly into the closest aisle we could reach. I used my flashlight to illuminate the area in front of us, but I occasionally checked the sparse shelves and found nothing of note.

The exterior walls of the building had shelves that stretched to the ceiling, but the interior aisles were more like the classic rows of a generic supermarket. They prevented me from seeing above them, which almost made it feel like we were heading down an alley, of sorts. Even now, it was chilly, and I could already feel goosebumps forming on my skin.

Eevee suddenly jumped. The unexpected action made me jump too.

“W-what is it?!” I asked in my panic.

His eyes darted around as if searching for something, so I began to look around too.

It only took a few seconds for me to find anything, but hearing what I heard made me freeze. It was a whisper—unintelligible—yet I swore I heard it say my name.

When I breathed out, mist formed in front of my mouth.

“Did you hear that?” I asked.

I tilted my flashlight down to make sure Eevee was still there. He nodded, and I began to rapidly move around the light to better search around.

I found nothing, but the voice started up again.

“H... hurts.”

Eevee practically looked like a puffball with just how on end all of his fur stood. His bright blue eyes were as wide as they went, and he was unerringly staring ahead.

Terrified of what he was seeing, I turned my flashlight his gaze’s way. When I did, I froze.

Hair down, outfit covered in dirt and grime, Lillie stood at the far end of this aisle, facing away.

“Lillie!” I shouted. I honestly should have kept my voice down.

“It... It hurts,” her voice whispered in my ear. “I’m so cold.”.

I took a step forward. Everything around me felt hazy. I was having trouble focusing, yet, I could see her perfectly clear.

“What happened?”

“You sent me here. Alone. It was too hard. Where... where were you? Why? Why would you do that to me?”

Despite my instincts screaming at me to back up, I couldn’t stop myself from moving closer and closer to where Lillie stood. Someone was shouting behind me, but I paid them no mind.

I moved to her quickly enough. I made my way down the aisle to the point where I was only a foot away from Lillie’s side.

“I’m sorry. I should have known better,” I said.

Lillie did not move. I reached forward to put my hand on her shoulder.

“Come on. Let’s get out of here. Once I find my team, we can—”

“No.”

I turned her around.

When she looked at me, she did not have a face.

I screamed, lost in the illusion. I wasn’t in the state of mind to give Eevee any orders, but he pushed through his fear to act without me. He conjured a pulsating Shadow Ball in front of his face that seemed to suck in what little light we had at our disposal. That attack sailed forward, right to where whatever this Lillie-thing was standing, and it pierced through and caused the image to dissolve away like some kind of haze.

I blinked several times over, rapidly coming to my senses. Realizing what had happened, I took several large, leaping steps back and held up my hand.

An... an illusion? But I touched it!

My head was pounding but I had at least recovered.

“This is too much,” I whispered.

I could hardly speak. With how hard my heart was beating, it felt like I couldn’t catch my breath.

Eevee did his best to send me a reassuring smile at the successful dismissal of whatever that ghostly apparition was, but I could tell he smiled more to reassure himself than anything else. I still sent him a thankful nod in return before I tried to take another step forward, but that was when the fact we were still in a ghosts’ abode reared its ugly head.

“LEAVE!”

Two more faceless images of Lillie formed floating above the shelves next to us. Her blond hair stood on its furthest end, and her arms were held out wide. The two images made her seem like some kind of unholy banshee, and forming in front of her empty face were almost perfect imitations of Eevee’s Shadow Ball from before.

With just Eevee here, we would only be able to block one of those attacks. He might have been immune to Ghost Type moves, but I certainly was not.

The solution came in an unexpected form: a rescue. In that moment, shadows burst from under one of the shelves to knock the second Shadow Ball to the side.

Eevee deflected the other one with a Shadow Ball of his own.

“What was that?!”

I was barely able to turn my head before I saw a claw half my height grab one of the images of Lillie and tear it aside, like a curtain. Behind it, the puppeteer was revealed: a Haunter, blinking in surprise.

Across from it, the other apparition of Lillie dissolved as the other one gave up the charade. A second Haunter appeared, but this one looked enraged.

“Eevee, get it to calm down with Charm then grab onto it with Bite!”

He lowered his head and growled, his eyes flashing pink, and the angry Haunter before him hesitated and paused where it was drawing back a hand.

Meanwhile, the source of the claw and the other Haunter engaged in a fight behind us.

Mimikyu—the same Mimikyu that brought us here—rose up from the floor like a spirit rising from its grave. I couldn’t see the tears in the cloth that would reveal his eyes, but I could tell he was mad.

His opposing Haunter managed to extend a fist for Shadow Punch, having no qualms to attack without a Charm. A fist separate from its body sailed forth, and Mimikyu’s claw lashed out to meet it head on.

Shadow Claw collided with Shadow Punch, the two attacks causing the air itself to be pushed back. As they fought, Eevee jumped up onto a shelf to leap in the air and Bite down on his Haunter where it floated.

“Now, Swift!” I shouted.

The Haunter was immune, of course, but, already injured from Bite, I was pretty sure it wasn’t in a state of mine to recognize that. It flailed in the air to try to shake Eevee off, but that just gave him the room to let stars leave from his wagging tail.

The component projectiles of Swift were bright and far too cheery to have them be comfortable to the Haunter. This was our trick; the move harmlessly passed through it, yet it still yelled and fled from the attack.

The Haunter rushed through the shelf, freely passing through it as it ran away and causing Eevee to smack into its side. He fell to the floor and wobbled from the impact, but he was at least still conscious at the end of the fight.

Meanwhile, with Mimikyu, its claw of darkness was now retracting, pulling back a jagged stick of wood from where it knocked the Haunter a full aisle away. At first, I was confused where it got the material for a Wood Hammer, but when it placed that part back on its back, I realized it had used its costume’s tail as a weapon.

Mimikyu turned to look at me. The holes in its cloth curved up in a mimicry of a smile now that it had won.

“Mimi! Mimikyu!” it squeaked.

It bounced over to stand in front of me and hopped up and down. It...

Does it want to be praised?

“G-good job?” I offered, my voice hoarse.

I was correct—Mimikyu literally shook with happiness. Eevee took this moment to approach.

Initially, Mimikyu was too overcome with elation to notice Eevee sniffing at him. Eevee first sniffed at the fake head, but when he realized it was just a Disguise, he sniffed at the base of the Pokémon, where Mimikyu’s true form lay.

In response, Mimikyu paused and made eye contact with Eevee. The two Pokémon stared at once another in the eye.

Mimikyu smiled. Eevee gave him a tentative smile right back. At that, Mimikyu extended his claw to grab and shake Eevee’s paw, and the fluffy Normal Type did his best to be receptive to Mimikyu’s presence.

“I... see. So you’re offering to help, huh?”

I did my best to not think about the horrors Mimikyu represented.

He smiled and nodded, unaware of my thoughts.

Alex, it’s friendly. You can’t treat it poorly just because it’s a Ghost Type.

Taking a deep breath, I forced myself to calm down once more. Schooling my expression was the easy part. The hard part was ensuring my panicked heartbeats slowed down.

“T-thank you,” I said as carefully as I could. “I’m going to give you a rundown of the situation.”

Mimikyu excitedly nodded his head.

I told him. I told him exactly what we were dealing with: missing Pokémon, missing Lillie, and, also, we lacked a way to escape.

Mimikyu was an intent listener, bringing out his claw once more to scratch the chin of his costume’s head and bouncing to make it look like it was nodding in thought. He closed his eyes, considering, and Eevee watched this entire series of fake actions with rapt attention.

“Kyu.” Mimikui snapped the fingers of his claw before pulling it back underneath his cloak.

He then began to waddle deeper down the aisle. Eevee and I exchanged a single look before we followed.

Things were different, now.

There was something about Mimikyu’s presence that changed how this entire place felt. My hair was no longer standing on its end, and the chill on my neck that I hadn’t even noticed until now was completely gone.

Instead, what had once felt like a haunted building now just felt... empty. Occasionally, Mimikyu would stop and glare at nothing at all, but then he would keep walking as if that hadn’t just happened.

“He’s, uh, kind of strong, isn’t he?” I whispered to Eevee.

Eevee nodded his head. His fur had gone down now that he was no longer as scared, and he kept watching Mimikyu in careful thought.

Mimikyu brought us all the way down the aisle without any further incident, then he looked both ways before giving a friendly wave to the corner of the building. When I flashed my light in that direction, all I saw were more empty shelves, and then Mimikyu continued to walk towards the back, where shops like these generally kept their stored supplies.

“I feel like I’m closing up shop after a long day of work,” I mused.

Eevee made a humming noise as if to agree.

A narrow hallway connected the main floor to the back, and it was short enough that my flashlight illuminated it pretty well. The only remaining darkness was the black in the distance. For once, there was no space for stuff to lurk at our sides.

This hallway stretched down into the distance, far past the normal length the hallway should have been. Moving through it, there was a turn, and we turned. A crossroads, and Mimikyu paused before choosing one of the directions. While the immediate space almost seemed calmed by Mimikyu’s presence, whenever we left one of those intersections, I still swore I saw eyes staring at us from the darkness.

But, whenever I blinked, they would be gone.

Eventually, the first sign that we were not alone finally showed up. There was a thump, and Mimikyu froze where he walked. Looking at him, for some reason, his eyes almost seemed to widen in both fear and shock.

“...Mimikyu?” I asked.

Another thump, this one much heavier. After it, a crash like dozens of items clattering to the ground.

Mimikyu started to rush forward. Both Eevee and I did not wait to follow.

Hallway after hallway we ran. This place felt like a maze. The sounds increased in both frequency and volume as we used them to guide us through the turns forward.

Thump. Thump. Thump.

We saw it soon enough—a door, one that actually had a handle. Mimikyu paused outside of it and adamantly pointed at it with his exposed claw, and I rushed forward and threw it open, not expecting what I saw.

“Bubble Beam!”

Lillie clutched Nebby in one hand as his eyes were snapped shut in intense focus. She had an old-fashioned lantern that hung on her side and partially lit up most of the room. Rusted shelves had collapsed and knocked expired items to the floor. On the ground in front of her, her Brionne, tired, let out a dense Bubble Beam that tore through the air of this storage room.

However, the attack didn’t quite reach her opponent. The ground itself was torn open by shadows as a stream of darkness blasted upwards to disintegrate the bubbles in the air. When the Phantom Force faded, their foe was made clear, and looking at it almost made me feel sick.

It was another Mimikyu—not the one at my side, but one that was much, much larger. At first, I was pretty sure that this was a Totem Pokémon, except it looked “off” enough that I struggled to make out what I was looking at.

It had the same basic shape as any Mimikyu, consisting of a creature of darkness covered by cloth with a fake Pikachu head on top. However, where the actual creature itself had doubled in every dimension, the fake Pikachu head had remained the same, default size. The end result was that the creature looked bloated and obese. There was something about the difference in proportions that made me look utterly grotesque.

Paused at the sight of Lillie’s foe, both Eevee and I were stuck just past the door, taking it all in. Mimikyu, however, shouted something in what felt like an attempt to get the Totem to stop, but it just responded by pulling out a claw and jabbing it into the ground.

Something grabbed my hand. Mimikyu jumped up and pulled me forward, yelling at Eevee to move as well. In the spot we just were, a massive claw swiped up from the floor in an attack.

“Alex! You’re here!” Lillie shouted. She looked over to me in surprise.

“I was wrong. This isn’t the Trial site. But if the Totem is here... Lillie, I think I sent you into its nest.”

Her face was hard and expressionless. She glanced between me and the Totem Pokémon she fought. Off in the corner of the room, I swore I saw some of the darkness try to push forward, but Nebby strained, and it was pushed back.

“And when I came in,” I continued. “Something took my Pokéballs.”

“I know,” Lillie said, gaining a grimace. “It took some of mine, too.”

I looked over, back to the Totem. Its true face was hidden, but there was something about its eyes that made me think that it smirked. Bouncing out of a shadow on the ground were my and Lillie’s Pokéballs, sailing over the head of the Totem Mimikyu and sinking back into the floor in a taunt.

“We have to beat it to get them back?” I grumbled, forcing myself to feel annoyance rather than fear.

“Yeah. But I don’t think we can do it on our own. Can you help?”

I glanced to Eevee, who was ready to fight. As for Mimikyu, he was looking between both us and our opponent nervously. He still moved to stand in front of me, and I could tell he was going to assist, too.

“We’ll help,” I declared.

She smiled, but the Totem Pokémon just looked annoyed.

Seeing we now outnumber it, the Totem was intent on evening the odds. A harsh screech left wherever its mouth was as the cloth around its body literally shook from the force.

There, besides it, leaving the ground, was a new Pokémon entering the field. The Totem had called for help, and, with that call came a snickering Gengar.

It held up its hands and bounced in the air, but I did notice how it glanced at the Totem then immediately looked away. The Totem Mimikyu withdrew an overly large, clawed hand of shadow to point forward, and Gengar rushed right at us, following the command.

“We’ll take care of Gengar! Hold the Totem off in the meantime, you two!” I shouted.

Mimikyu moved next to the tired Brionne, and Lillie nodded.

“Got it!”

Eevee might have been weaker than the average Gengar, but given that he was a Normal Type, he would at least be immune to its strongest moves.

As the two Mimikyu in the room began exchanging attacks of pure shadow, our friendly one being supported by Brionne, the Gengar lifted up a fist and set it alight, setting up a surprise Fire Punch as it rushed towards Eevee.

He flashed with Baby-Doll Eyes, a long practiced move that came out faster than Charm, and Gengar’s attack lost a bit of the ferocity behind it.

That moment of hesitation was all Eevee needed. He jumped up right at the ghost to let his teeth bite down on Gengar's head. The Ghost Type, vulnerable to the Dark Type Bite, let out a horrible scream, then it began to try to tear Eevee away.

He was pushed off of it to the ground, and I shouted for another attack.

“Shadow Ball!”

Gengar patted where Eevee bit it like it was recovering from a burn, and that gave Eevee even more time to conjure his move on the ground. Gengar saw it coming, however, and its natural grin curved up even wider as it formed a Shadow Ball of its own within a hand.

Unfortunately, as it was a powerful Ghost Type, this attack came out much more easily for it than for Eevee. A sphere the size of a marble inflated to a foot-ball size when it was tossed through the air. Eevee’s own Shadow Ball was simply blasted away.

Thankfully, he was immune to the attack that continued into him, but he still grit his teeth from the pressure it caused.

Shadow Ball isn’t going to work. Against Gengar, it knows enough that the Swift trick won’t work, either.

I glanced to the side. Brionne was trying to slow down the Totem Mimikyu with Icy Wind. Unfortunately, it could sink into the ground and change positions with quick uses of Shadow Sneak. Our Mimikyu was forced to use Shadow Claw as pure defense.

As I turned back to Eevee, Gengar flexed its arms, both hands lighting up with two different types of energy. One gained a noticeable layer of frost while the other began to crackle with lightning; it prepared an Ice Punch and Thunder Punch respectively.

Eevee stood off against it, but, as it stood, our options against Ghost Types were limited to mostly just Shadow Ball. I was hesitant to call for a close-ranged Bite again after seeing how many punches were at Gengar’s disposal. As effective as Shadow Ball was, Gengar had demonstrated how that move was worthless against it.

“Hey, Eevee?” I called out. “I don’t suppose you’ve been working on some kind of secret move that could be useful here?”

A pause. Eevee cringed. Not flinched, but cringed.

Narrowing my eyes, I noticed the barest of embarrassed blushes peek through his fur.

“Now’s not the time to be embarrassed. Now’s the time to battle! Come on, Eevee! I believe in you! Show me what you got!”

He still was somewhat hesitant to follow the order, but my voice did seem to reaffirm him. Across from him, still floating in the air, the Gengar snickered, then it rushed forward with both hands forward.

Eevee didn’t act, and I was an instant from calling for a dodge when he finally countered.

His secret move? He stood up on his hind legs and let himself fall forward with his paws lit up with their own ice and lightning respectively. The two sets of identical punches clashed and sparked between them. Gengar was forced back out of surprise.

“Was that... Ice and Thunder Punch?”

To be clear, those moves were physically impossible for Eevee as a species. They didn’t have fists, they had paws.

In my confusion, I could only watch as Gengar snarled and began to build up Dark Type energy for a new move. Eevee saw it charging up the attack and rushed forward with Quick Attack.

My confusion only deepened as I struggled to process what he was planning. When Gengar released the Dark Pulse—Eevee suffering the attack—he was right there and ready to release a Dark Pulse of his own.

That let me put the pieces together.

“You couldn’t learn any other Fairy Type moves, so you figured out Copycat to mimic the others, huh?” I asked.

My answer came from a blush on Eevee’s face so bright red that it tinted his fur. He then proceeded to use the move, releasing a Dark Pulse right in Gengar’s face.

It was unfortunate for his opponent, as while Dark Pulse was a decent choice against an opponent immune to Ghost Type moves, it wasn’t a good choice against a Pokémon that can imitate it. Eevee used Copycat to take in the energy of Gengar’s attack, duplicate and coral it into his own, and then release it into a super effective attack.

Gengar was sent flying back, suffering greatly from the super effective move, until it interrupted the other match. A Disarming Voice from Brionne caught it in the air, but it did resist the attack thanks to its secondary Poison Type and landed on the floor right next to the Totem Mimikyu.

On the floor, it rubbed its head, dazed, and it looked around as mostly everyone paused. Seeing that everyone was staring at it, it blinked then looked upwards at what was besides it.

Totem Mimikyu was there, its base staring forward. However, it shifted ever so slightly to get that undersized head to flop over, lolling to the side in such a way to stare at Gengar straight on.

I’d never seen a Ghost Type shiver like that before. Even then, the wild Gengar glanced between us and the Totem Pokémon before seemingly coming to an understanding this was not a place it wanted to be in. It scrambled backwards over the ground, straight into a nearby wall. Instead of clattering against it, Gengar passed all the way through and disappeared, completely leaving the fight.

“Lillie!” I shouted. “Eevee knows Copycat!”

Her face scrunched up in thought.

“...Yeah?”

“Use your strongest move!”

At that, her eyes went wide in realization, and for the first time since we entered the room, she gained a confident grin.

“Brionne! We’re trying it! Use Hydro Pump!”

The move wasn’t used immediately; Brionne looked up, surprised but elated at the command. She took a deep breath and pushed her fins off the ground to stand and balance on her singular tail. From there, her mouth opened up as if preparing for a song, but instead of any melodic sound coming out, a rumbling left her throat.

Eevee watched that intently, moving closer to better imitate the move with Copycat, and the Totem Mimikyu saw it coming and tried to sink into the ground.

Our Mimikyu didn’t let that happen.

With the Hydro Pump charging, he rushed forward, sinking into the ground much quicker than his larger version in a fast-paced Shadow Sneak. He emerged right next to the Totem Pokémon and jabbed his claw into its shadow after it. It latched into something within the darkness of the floor, and he began to pull.

Eevee’s mimicry of the Hydro Pump now began to build as well, and the Totem Mimikyu was pulled upwards like a fish out of a lake.

“Now!” Lillie and I shouted. “Hydro Pump!”

Both Eevee and Brionne unleashed their attacks.

Two spinning, churning, powerful Water Type moves twisted through the air and combined, sailing right into where the Totem Pokémon was held in place and blasting it with all the force they could conjure.

The splash was loud enough to hear, and water covered the floor. For a second, the light on Lillie’s waist flickered, but when it restabilized, the outcome was clear:

That dual-Hydro Pump had knocked out the Totem Pokémon.

Our Mimikyu remained cautious, but when the bulbous Totem didn’t move, he let out a sigh. Lillie laughed and held up an arm—the other was still holding the straining Nebby—and she cheered out of victory.

“Good job, Eevee. You too, Mimikyu,” I said.

Tears formed in Mimikyu’s eyes at that. Without even a moment’s notice, he left the Totem’s side to rush through the air and jump to my chest.

He blubbered uncontrollably at my words, continuing to rub against me. The sheer level of affection the Ghost Type was giving me made me pause, but, after everything else, I couldn’t exactly pretend he wasn’t here, couldn’t I?

Cautiously, I ignored the feel of his ice-cold claw on my side and patted Mimikyu on his back.

“You’re really reliable,” I said.

His nuzzling and crying just became heavier. On the floor, Eevee looked exceedingly jealous.

With the Totem Mimikyu fainted, one more thing became clear in the room. Where its shadows lurked and flexed around it, items had “floated up” to appear on the ground.

Some were innocuous—colorful rocks and stones—while others were a bit more uncomfortable—worn dolls and stuffed toys. Mixed between them were other items, but, more important, I saw our Pokéballs.

Patting Mimikyu again, I grabbed his sides and ignored how his body squirmed unnaturally under my grip and began to walk forward to retrieve our teams. However, of course it wasn’t that easy.

Lillie’s light flickered once again.

“Um, Alex?” she said.

I didn’t get a chance to respond before Nebby let out a cry.

I hadn’t put the clues together for why he had been focusing so much, but his eyes flashed blue before he fell into unconsciousness, exhausted of all his power.

The sight made both Lillie and I go pale. Nebby was a ball of boundless energy. If he had just been knocked out here, it was not good news.

A cold breeze returned to caress the back of my neck, and it felt like all of my hair was standing on its ends. Eevee went completely and utterly still, and my head snapped towards where the Totem Mimikyu was.

The fainted Pokémon was gone.

Darkness crept into this room, pushing through the walls and speaking with innumerable, unintelligible whispers. No longer able to move to our Pokéballs, I took a step back, fearfully moving to Lillie’s side.

I could see them. I could see the things lurking in the darkness.

There were too many of them. Countless of them. Dozens and dozens of piercing, red eyes.

“Alex, if this is it, I want to apologize,” Lillie said.

“I’m sorry I sent you in here,” I said before she could.

“I know. It’s fine. But...” she bit her lip. “Sometimes I steal berries from your pack to give to your Pokémon to make them like me more.”

“What?! You could have just asked!” I yelled.

“I know! I’m sorry!”

Mimikyu let out a cry that felt like a desperate request to get the ghosts to stop. They didn’t listen, and in seconds, Lillie and I were completely consumed by howling, silent darkness.

Time passed.

Something poked me in the face.

I groaned.

A second time, something poked my cheek.

I swiped my hand towards whatever was jabbing me only for it to move through warm air. I paused, considering the implications of that, and after a third and final poke, I snapped my eyes open, now wide awake.

I was on the ground, outside the old, abandoned Megamart. More importantly, there was a pair of deep purple eyes staring down at me from inches away.

I screamed.

“Ehehehe! I can see what Mimikyu meant now!”

As I did my best to scramble away, the unfamiliar girl pulled her head back, laughing. Not too far away from me, Lillie groaned as she woke up as well.

I checked my waist. All my Pokémon were there.

“What happened?” I asked.

The girl watched me as she twisted back and forth in place, causing her patchwork dress to sway with each move.

“You two had the bright idea to enter the Totem Pokémon’s main nest. Ghost Types don’t take kindly to uninvited guests,” she said.

Lillie finally opened her eyes all the way and blinked several times at the girl.

“Oh! It’s you! You helped me find the book I needed in Malie Library!”

“Glad to help, Princess,” the girl easily replied.

Finally recognizing her, my eyes widened in realization. Not having any reason to hide it, I went ahead and said her name.

“You’re Acerola, Trial Captain, Ghost Type specialist, and one of the candidates for Alola’s Elite Four.”

She gained a bright grin at the words I said.

“Elite Four candidate? Really? I thought I was only up for a position in a Gym!”

Acerola snickered again at that, and I rubbed my head out of frustration.

I feel like I just woke up from an awful sleep. How much of that was real, and how much of that was just an illusion?

The Ghost Type trainer began to pace around us as both Lillie and I shakily stood up. Acerola held her hands behind her and leaned forward as if she was trying to look at us more intently than before.

“Normally, people go to the actual Trial site to fight the Totem Pokémon. We have an entire haunted forest set up to the north. It’s the north, you know? Not the south. They’re both around these ruins, but they’re in completely opposite directions!”

“I know. I messed up,” I said.

The girl laughed again and waved a hand.

“It doesn’t matter. It all worked out in the end. Check your pockets! I’m sure you’ve earned at least something from your victory.”

I could feel just how pained my expression was as I reached in. Behind me, Lillie let out a gasp as we both clutched whatever was inside.

Pulling it out, the objects were obvious enough: purple crystals with the faintest symbol of the Ghost Type within.

The sight made me rub my head. This was the second time a Ghost had slipped something into my possession without me knowing, the first being a TM all the way back in Sea Mauville. That was what jump-started my fear of the Ghost Type in the first place.

“The Ghost Type Z-Crystal,” I said with a groan.

Lillie just seemed satisfied with a smile. Meanwhile, I knew I’d have nightmares about this whole event for weeks (if not, months) to come.

“You know, you were never in any danger. I kept an eye on you the entire time you were in there,” Acerola said.

“Please don’t say that,” I sighed. I had never seen her.

She just snickered again in response.

“You should leave here before it turns to night. But, there is one last duty you have to do,” the girl said.

Lillie looked at her and said, “What is it?” I blinked and waited for Acerola to elaborate.

She didn’t, merely stepping to the side. Behind her was Mimikyu, the same one that led us here and helped us out, looking up at me nervously.

“If you don’t like Ghost Types, you really should have watched what you said,” Acerola said, resuming her walk with her feet kicking high up in the air. “Many Mimikyu struggle with confidence issues. To compliment one so directly as you did? Naughty, naughty. That wasn’t very nice.”

I rolled my eyes.

“I meant what I said. Mimikyu has the potential to be incredibly strong in battle. And...” I made eye contact with the Pokémon on the ground. I sucked in a nervous breath.

Come on, Alex. Just because you’re scared doesn’t mean you should pull a Chance and abandon him.

“And I’d love to have Mimikyu on my team,” I finally finished.

I wasn’t lying—I really did think that. Mimikyu was strong, his species was capable of a lot of tricks in battle, and there was already a connection between us. My hesitation came purely from my hesitance regarding the Ghost Type. Phoebe had ruined the Type for me back in Hoenn, but I was fine with Banetter, and I could be fine with Mimikyu, too.

It was that mindset that made me dislike the Type—the fact that their tricks always felt like they had malicious undertones of sorts. But, I knew I could grow to appreciate the Type. I liked Banette, after all.

With my thoughts and words concluded, I looked down at Mimikyu once again. It hadn’t moved where it was standing, staring up at me with dark moisture pouring down its lower face.

Acerola moved behind it and lightly nudged it forward with a foot.

“Go,” she said.

“Come here,” I added.

Mimikyu no longer waited. It jumped through the air and face-planted into my chest.

Lillie laughed as I sighed and lightly hugged Mimikyu back. He was blubbering against me out of both relief and joy.

I didn’t really expect this to happen so quickly, but it seemed my team was full once again. Somehow, after everything that happened, Mimikyu was now part of my team, and Lillie had completed a version of Alola’s Ghost Type Trial—though, it was a bit more tense than it should have been.