Happy new year, everybody, and may this year be better than the last!


On the day Harry Teleported into Anistar, the Gym was closed.

Well, it wasn't quite closed. Rather, when Harry turned up at the Gym, the Gym Trainers inside were in the process of closing the Gym for the day, and the receptionist gave Harry a rather frosty glance.

"No challengers or bookings today," he informed Harry. "Come back tomorrow."

Harry was about to protest that he wasn't going to challenge the Gym – or at least, not yet. Someday he had to come back and get the Psychic Badge, but it definitely wasn't now. Before he could, however, Olympia appeared, an Alakazam following her as she talked to one of the Gym Trainers.

The Alakazam waved a spoon at Harry in greeting. Probably Verosis, then. The receptionist printed off a notice and stuck it to the front door, then flipped the sign to 'CLOSED'.

"Oh, hello," Olympia said. "You're the one we nearly Teleported into." The Gym Trainer next to her – Psychic class and probably an actual Psychic – looked curiously at him, then at Verosis, who bent one of his spoons. "I don't think I ever got your name, actually."

"It's Harry," Harry said. "Um, is this a bad time?"

"I wouldn't say bad timing," the Gym Trainer next to her said. "But it probably is a little inconvenient. November the first, out of all the days?"

Olympia frowned at him. "A reminder, Arthur, that you did not know its significance either when you first arrived." The Gym Trainer – Arthur – wilted under her stare.

Several other Gym Trainers began filing out of the Gym. Olympia considered Harry, then Arthur, then Verosis.

"I suppose you may as well come with us," she said. "Arthur can explain, as he kindly volunteered."

Harry had no recollection of Arthur volunteering, and evidently neither did Arthur, but neither of them were about to argue as Verosis and Olympia Teleported their way out of the Anistar Gym. Arthur regarded Harry thoughtfully for a moment, then shrugged.

"So you would be another Trainer with Psychic potential?" he asked. "Well, you're definitely the first to arrive on the first of November. The Gym's closing down, though, we can have this conversation outdoors." Harry followed him out of the Gym, where he locked the doors of the Gym. The notice the receptionist had stuck on the doors fluttered.

"How well do you know your legends?"

Harry had the feeling that Arthur probably wasn't referring the actual Legendaries, but rather to the entire body of myths surrounding them. And that the answer definitely wasn't a 'very personally'.

Most people probably wouldn't know the Legendaries personally, but know their myths well. Harry was just the exact opposite. "Some of it, but not really that well."

Arthur sighed. "They took it out of the school syllabuses about twenty years ago. It's a shame, really, but I suppose it's not quite as important nowadays. Tell me what you know about November the first. Anything, doesn't matter if it has relations to myths or not."

Harry thought about it. What was significant about November the first? "Er, it's the first day of winter?" he said. The temperature had been steadily dropping, not least because he was nearer to the Frost Cavern. "And – there used to be celebrations of this?"

Arthur nodded. "Maybe not so much celebrations, it's kind of hard to celebrate everything freezing over and going cold. But it was certainly a festival in its own right – to commemorate the fall of the sun, the rising darkness. The Sinnoh myths count today as one of the seven days Giratina is allowed into, or returns to, the Hall of Origin; that depends on your storyteller. The Distortion World greets the land of the living, and the dead walk the earth."

The dead walk the earth. Nothing ominous about that. "What about Ghost-types, though?"

Arthur grinned. "That's how the significance of November the first was discovered in the first place. Ghost-types became more powerful – Shadow Balls were larger, Curse was stronger, and so on. It's well recognised that Ghosts are shades of the dead, so technically you can argue that the dead walk the earth all the time. Except that Ghosts are shades, imprints of a past life that eventually develop into a personality of their own. The dead of tonight aren't imprints – I'd say they were the real, living thing, if they weren't dead."

Harry thought about Honedge. What would be the difference between the Honedge of today and the Honedge of a day that wasn't November the first? "So Anistar Gym closes because Ghost energy becomes even more dangerous against Psychics?"

Arthur shook his head. "Not quite. Remember what I said about the dead walking the earth? Well, the opposite also applies; tonight is the night the living can wander into the Distortion World by accident, and when the barriers solidify again – let's just say that the living and the Distortion World don't really agree with one another. At the very least, Giratina would not be happy, and you really don't want the ruler of the dead and the undead to be unhappy. That would be bad. In the old days, everyone in the village would string up lanterns, and there'd be a lot of prayer, because while seeing your ancestors is fine, waking up to realise all your children have wandered into the other world is not. Very formal ceremony, lots of prayers and the like to every regional Legendary under the sun. Or the moon, I guess, if you're Alolan. Really depends who the regional Legendaries are – Hoenn sends theirs directly to Giratina because Groudon and Kyogre really don't have much influence over the dead. Nowadays the giant ceremonies for the entire towns are gone because the Legendaries don't show up as often and society is more secular and people don't really wander off into the Distortion World at night anymore – thank Arceus for that – but traditions stay, and Anistar continues to hang up lanterns to guide the living lost home." Harry had noticed the lanterns draped around each house and off the power lines, each one bright red, but he hadn't known that was what it was for.

"The Distortion World is otherworldly, and the Pokémon Types with powers that are less material and more otherworldly connect best to it. So, every year on November the first, the Anistar and Laverre Gyms close early in order to honour this day, this blurring between living and dead, and to carry out the rest of its traditions. If Kalos had a Ghost-type Gym, they'd join us. It's not held in the city itself though, because, well, the dead can be an uncomfortable topic to the living." Arthur shrugged. "It's mostly at night because in the daytime you would know if you accidentally entered the Distortion World, things are harder to see at night. There's likely an entire stack of books relating to it in the library. We meet at the sundial ten minutes before sundown."

Harry nodded along before the last sentence caught up to him. "Wait, what?"

Arthur raised an eyebrow. "Are you really not coming to an event that happens once in a year that you'll likely never be able to go to again because next year you'll be back to wandering around Kalos?"

He had, Harry realised, a very good point. This was practically a once-in-a-lifetime event, unless somehow he ended up as a Gym Trainer for the Laverre Gym. His face must have shown his thoughts, because Arthur grinned at him. "Thought so." Harry opened his mouth, and Arthur added, "No, you don't have to dress up or know special prayers, that's our job."

Harry closed his mouth.

"Right," Arthur said. "I'll see you ten minutes before sundown."

~OoOoOoO~

The nice thing about having a giant sundial in Anistar was that Harry knew exactly when ten minutes before sundown actually was.

Both the internet and his Pokémon had been decidedly unhelpful regarding November the first. Ralts and Honedge both knew there were traditions around it, but neither knew the specifics – though Honedge agreed that today was one of the (apparently few) days Giratina returned to the Hall of Origin. Though more by choice than because he is forbidden, he added. The land of spirits is often…busy.

The internet had directed him to a number of forums, and Harry closed all the tabs after reading through an entire nonsensical argument where the most profound point on the no side seemed to be "because the world would implode", and the best the yes side could do was say "because Legendaries". Hopefully he just wouldn't be asked to perform any traditions – Arthur had claimed that was more the Anistar Gym's job. But Harry was all too willing to spectate.

Ten minutes before sundown, he met the entire of Anistar Gym at the giant sundial, shadows stretching into darkness. The streetlights were dark; the red lanterns glowed in their place. Stars twinkled in the dusk.

Olympia introduced him to – in order – Melanie, Bridget, Louise, Diana, Gil, Ariel, Bertrand, Philip, and Arthur, the permanent Gym Trainers at Anistar Gym. Six were certified Psychics, three were Hex Maniacs, and Ariel was the second-in-command at Anistar Gym.

"Which basically means he's the one who has to come up with rosters," Philip said.

Ariel glowered at him. "It also means I could assign you the lunchtime shifts," he said, smiling dangerously. "Please don't think about the Little Mermaid," he added to Harry.

There was also Anna, who, like Harry, had exhibited enough signs of being a potential Psychic to warrant a stay at the Anistar Gym. She was older than Harry by two years, and also had four badges – the Iceberg, Fairy, Cliff and Rumble Badges. She'd arrived in August, and was probably leaving before the new year.

Harry desperately hoped he could remember all the names.

The two Pokémon out were Verosis and a Xatu that Harry recognised instantly, having starred in a number of eighth-badge challenges. Evangeline stared into the distance, her wings outstretched. Some stories had Xatu capable of seeing the future, caught in a permanent Future Sight. Evangeline was definitely eerie enough to be one of those Xatu.

The Teleport caught Harry by surprise. The previous Teleports he'd experienced were smooth transitions, places being replaced with other places. This one was more of a violent tug, and the streets of Anistar were suddenly replaced by forest.

Harry stumbled on landing, toppling into – Gil? Bertrand? who promptly toppled like a domino into probably Diana, before Verosis caught them all with a gentle Telekinesis. Harry looked to his left; what must have been the Laverre Gym Trainers were rising to their feet, exactly ten of them, a pair of Gardevoir next to them. He recognised one of them, the one with a starburst of a burn mark on their arm – Pierre, the Gardevoir that consistently appeared in eighth-badge challenges against Valerie.

He'd never seen Verosis in a Gym battle video, Harry suddenly realised. At least, not for the higher levels – and if Verosis and Evangeline could Teleport twelve people at once, then Verosis wouldn't belong anywhere but in the higher challenges. Harry filed that away as something to muse on later, and glanced to his right.

Oh.

They were inside a clearing, and two massive statues in grey stone towered above them. They were precise and impossibly lifelike, carved by a master sculptor. If the statue and the ones they mimicked were placed next to each other, Harry had the feeling they would be exactly the same height, too. There was a single Pokémon floating in front of the statues, a tiny Pumpkaboo with pale Will-O-Wisps circling it.

For a replica of the Life Pokémon, Xerneas' statue had extraordinarily sharp horns.

Pumpkaboo, the Pumpkaboo said plaintively. Pumpkaboo, kaboo, kaboo.

With a start, Harry realised that somehow, he couldn't understand this Pumpkaboo. It was profoundly unsettling. Kaboo, pump, kaboo.

A hush had settled over the clearing. The only colour Harry could describe the darkening sky with was Bluk-Berry-juice-purple. He had the sudden sensation that he was somehow falling, even though his feet were planted on the ground.

His mind conjured up a conversation that had taken place months ago. It would need an incredible power supply to smash through the barrier even in a weakened state.

Then how did people just – wander through on accident?

Was accidentally wandering through different from intentionally going through?

Or did Giratina just simply and randomly decide to let people through?

Kaboo, the Pumpkaboo said.

"You can hear it, can't you?" Arthur murmured quietly to him. "That's the other way the link to the Reverse World was discovered. Giratina really reverses everything. There's no barrier between the Pokémon languages and the human language in the Reverse World."

An Aromatherapy wafted across the clearing as Valerie knelt to place a single candle beside Xerneas' hoof. It suddenly came to Harry, why now he couldn't understand the Pumpkaboo, and yet Arthur – and everyone else in the clearing, apparently – could understand the Pumpkin Pokémon.

The Reverse World really did reverse everything, then.

And that meant the Bluk Berry sky wasn't actually the real sky, and that Harry was falling even though he was on flat ground, because –

From behind the statues, Giratina winked at him, gold bracelets emitting a light of their own in the purple air. Yes, Harry heard, barely audible. The Pumpkaboo's Will-O-Wisps trembled as Olympia took the other candle, no larger than a tea light, and stopped in front of Xerneas, but looking at the statue behind him.

Harry had never seen his père in Pokémon form, but he had no doubt the sculptor captured it perfectly. Xerneas had been crafted too perfectly in stone for him to doubt it. Yveltal towered over Xerneas; the sculptor had left the wings resting on the statue's sides, rather than having them fully outstretched. The statue gazed down with sapphires in place of eyes, serene – a protective pose, even, for the Destruction Pokémon, while Xerneas' sharp antlers gleamed in the light of Will-O-Wisp.

Valerie and Olympia stood in front of the statues. The Pumpkaboo twirled. Kaboo, pump, boo, it sang. The Will-O-Wisps flew off, tiny fireballs settling between the statues and lighting the grey stone in shades of blue. Harry could feel something electric – or perhaps just Psychic, utterly otherworldly – in the air.

He wouldn't have been surprised if the statues came to life, actually. Not one bit.

The two Gym Leaders held vigil there for what seemed like an eternity, and Harry watched for that eternity. Time and reality both suddenly seemed like irrelevant concepts. Perhaps Valerie and Olympia said some prayers. Perhaps they didn't. Did it matter? More Will-O-Wisps floated around the Pumpkaboo.

There's no rent in the Distortion World, Harry thought in a briefly lucid moment. Ghost flames flickered on Xerneas' antlers.

They stayed there until the sky began lightening. Harry went from being in freefall to being on solid ground. The candles had burnt down to nothing, and the statues were grey stone again. The Pumpkaboo hovered in the air.

Goodbye, goodbye, until next year, it laughed, and vanished into the woods.

It was nearly dawn, probably, which meant Harry had just stayed awake through the night. He couldn't have felt more refreshed if he tried. There was no tiredness at all, just a lightness that sang in his bones. Both Olympia and Valerie, on the other hand, looked exhausted.

But then again, Harry had just been watching. The two Gym Leaders had probably done something in front of the statues – just something Harry couldn't see. What did Mesprit say – on the metaphysical level?

"Here's a suggestion," Ariel said, when Verosis and Evangeline had Teleported them back and Olympia had vanished off, probably to snatch what sleep she could. "We all go to sleep."

"I couldn't possibly be more awake," Melanie complained.

"We all go to sleep and Melanie does paperwork," Ariel amended.

Harry found himself suppressing a smile as Melanie promptly declared her tiredness and left. Ariel glanced at the rest of the Gym Trainers, who apparently all decided to take his suggestion of sleeping after the threat of paperwork. He imagined the exchange that would have gone done if it was all done in a Pokémon simulator – one of those games they all played at some point in school, the kind that painstakingly told you what moves were effective in a mishmash of capitals.

Trainer Ariel used PAPERWORK!

It's super effective!

Gym Trainers FLED!

Ariel stared at him, one eyebrow raised. Harry had the sudden, horrifying reminder that Psychics could read minds. Well, the very skilled Psychics could. Anna glanced at him, then at Ariel, and promptly ran off, chasing the Gym Trainers.

"Um," Ariel said. "Wow. Okay. You probably need sleep, too. You're still in the Pokémon Centre, right? There should be a few rooms left in the Gym accommodation so we can move you out, since technically you're not on the Trainer circuit while you're here even if your Trainer ID still marks you as active. I'll poke around the house…later today," he said, glancing up at the sky. "If Philip's gone and shoved all his weird things in there we might need to get it cleaned out and invite a priest for blessings for good measure, but otherwise you should be able to move in relatively soon. We can talk about all the other aspects when it's not so early. That sound okay?"

"Yes, absolutely, great," Harry stammered out. He waved out a goodbye and sprinted back to the Pokémon Centre, his face burning with embarrassment.

He really needed to learn how to close off his thoughts.

~OoOoOoO~

Nov. 1st? Harry texted.

~OoOoOoO~

Sometimes Giratina is reckless and Arceus lets them, came the reply. The realms implode on meeting b/c power imbalance between the two. If Giratina visits reality, then Arceus must stay in the Distortion World. Would explain more but out of characters.

~OoOoOoO~

A week later, Harry had moved out of the Pokémon Centre into the house that was somehow big enough to house all the Anistar Gym Trainers, if not their personalities. "This used to be the laundry room," Gil told him. "We renovated it."

By which he means the walls were knocked down, his Meowstic contributed, spinning around. And the washing machine was removed, and they rearranged the pipes, repainted the room, and added your bunk bed. Oh, and they used a Solosis to mark out the window, then got the yoga practitioner to punch it out.

"Meowstic," Gil complained. Meowstic smirked, orange eyes glittering.

Harry dropped his Bag on the lower bunk bed. "It's great."

"Oh, thank goodness," Gil said, and promptly dragged Harry around in a whirlwind tour of the house.

"This is the kitchen, all the rules are on the fridge, and under no circumstance do you allow Bert to handle a saucepan, not even if you're dying from starvation, he'll burn the place down. There's a bathroom on every floor, this one's under the stairs, you're lucky you don't have to duck to get in because Melanie hits her head on this at least once a week, when she does, just look the other way. It's a four storey house – I know right, who even builds those and pretends it's not an apartment in disguise – and you, Anna, Arthur and Bridget are on first floor, then Melanie, Louise, Bertrand and I have the second, Philip and Diana take up the third floor because they're the ones whose stuff keeps spilling out, so they get an entire floor to keep their stuff and somehow it still gets down to us, who even knows what they collect anymore, and Ariel's on the fourth floor alone because, as he regularly screams down to us, a working environment is non-existent. He's actually great when he's not stressed, which is nearly never, but what can you do. Oh, and the meditation room is on the third floor, it's the only room without Philip and Diana's clutter, ever – you'll probably find one of them knocking on your door and then agree to hosting some of their things before the day is over. It's very soundproof, so we really hope you don't commit murder in there or something. Cool? Okay, I gotta run before Ariel commits verbal homicide after I turn up late, go make yourself at home." And with that, Gil had flown down the stairs, and the door slammed shut behind him.

You'll get used to it, dear, the Chimecho said, tinkling on her way down. Meowstic slid down the banister, and Harry was alone on the third floor.

Well. Not alone, because there was a sleeping Solosis just floating off the floor, and an Unown watched him warily from the wall. In this house, Psychic Pokémon had as much presence as any of the Gym Trainers. They were quieter, but no less present.

Harry walked around the house again, deciding that there were, frankly, far too many stairs. He read over the rules stuck on the fridge and snorted; half were warnings that Ariel's takeout was Ariel's takeout and anyone else caught eating it would be made to take lunch hour for the Gym for the rest of the year, three were variants of 'do not let Bert near stove', and one was a dire threat made against anyone who touched Louise's ice cream. The only rule that was particularly relevant to Harry was the one that forbid Ghost or Dark type Pokémon from being released inside the house, and that wasn't entirely unexpected.

I can't imagine I'd have a healthy relationship with a large number of Psychic Pokémon at once, Honedge had told him dryly when he'd pointed it out as a possibility in the Pokémon Centre. It's perfectly fine.

Under that rule, in bright red, was the sentence this extends to hoopa and lunala too bc if you have them what are you even doing here go holiday in alola or smth. garden is fine.

And under that in lurid green was make your own judgement on inkay ffs you are all IN POSSESSION OF A SANE MIND (i think) so like do whatever.

Musharna hummed next to him, lightly bumping him into the fridge. They're not that insane.

No, they're more insane, Meowstic added, before bouncing out the window. Musharna blew out more pink smoke.

Harry climbed the stairs again, this time entering the meditation room. A sole Meditite was sitting on a blue mat; as he watched, it floated into the air, still in its sitting pose. There was a shelf on the left wall where a single candle burned; the other sources of light in the room came from a glittering chandelier in the far right corner, and a flickering fire between the statues of Uxie and Mesprit in the corners. Azelf was in the third corner, and the chandelier above the empty one. No windows.

Harry sat down on a mat and breathed slowly, watching the flames. The first lesson Olympia had given him was the attainment of a calm mind – in some ways identical to the Calm Mind move, minus the boost.

"It isn't quite calming down," Olympia had said, "though it can be used for that. It isn't thinking of nothing, or emptying your mind, either. Rather, you let your thoughts flow through your mind, give all of them their due, and then let them go. Dwell on all subjects, but do not contemplate them for too long."

It sounded simple, but when Harry had tried to practice it in his room in the Pokémon Centre, it either felt silly or he got distracted. It still felt silly, watching fake fire dance, but at least – probably – he wouldn't get distracted.

The Meditite opened one eye and glared.

…At this rate, he was definitely going to be a Trainer who stayed for a year and couldn't master Calm Mind.

~OoOoOoO~

"By the way," Bridget said during dinner, "I don't suppose you've put any thought into temporarily joining us as a Gym Trainer?"

Several heads swivelled towards Harry, the only non-Gym-Trainer in the room. Harry swallowed his mouthful of bouillabaisse. "Is that actually something I can apply for?"

Ariel shrugged. "The official rules state that you just have to fight on the challenger's level. There's nothing about qualifications – Indigo Plateau knows Ever Grande and Lily of the Valley would flip at the idea, they have a long history of local independence. Down to the regional and local levels, you trust the Gym Leader to do their job; part of that is selecting Gym Trainers. Gym Leaders that don't care for the areas they're in charge of are rare, and while – what's his face? The old Viridian one, Giovanni. Indigo's platform could be that they want to prevent him happening again, except trust has to go both ways and Indigo's own gym circuit might complain. So, long as Olympia agrees, you could become one. You'd just be on the roster forever to the fifth-badge challenges like Anna, since I can't let you guys go up against the higher ones."

Anna's Chimecho twirled. "That's a good thing, because I get thrashed enough on the fifth-badge challenges," she said to Harry. Gil handed out soufflés. "Though it really does teach you a lot."

"Eastern Kalos follows the same challenge for fifth-badge runners," Arthur chipped in. "Two Pokémon on each side; the challenger has the right to choose between a double battle and a single battle. Challenger has to face two Gym Trainers separately. That's true for us and Laverre and Snowbelle, the other Gyms do their own thing. So, what do you think?"

There was only so much calm mind Harry could practice before he went into mad mind. "I'd love to."

The next day, Harry was formally approved, and Diana whisked him off into the AUTHORISED GYM PERSONNEL ONLY section of the Anistar Gym. "For someone with latent Psychic abilities, you sure attract the other side. I can't wait to see who chooses you."

Like the Santalune Gym, Anistar's off-duty Gym Pokémon mingled; a Chimecho hummed next to a sleeping Abra, and a Gothita danced around a still Sigilyph. The difference was that there was less noise, and that the enclosure seemed to be shrouded in night. "As a guideline, you're probably looking for a middle evolution," Diana said. "Come out when you're ready."

Overhead, a Lunatone glittered silver as it rotated around a Solrock. Woobat rustled on the ceiling, eerily similar to Zubat. A Natu hopped across the ground, pecking at an Exeggcute.

The minute Harry stepped into the enclosure, every Pokémon turned to look at him. Even the sleeping Abra tilted their faces. A Metagross floated out of the darkness, regarding him with fierce red eyes. Heralded, a Slowking said, jewel flashing.

Harry had the sense that all of Anistar Gym's off-duty Pokémon were having a silent telepathic conversation. It felt bizarrely similar to a test. He took a step forward.

What seemed like every single Pokémon reacted; wings rustled, Teleports flashed, and shuffling occurred. A path promptly opened in front of Harry, leading deeper into the room. He followed it, feeling as if there was a sea parting around him. A sea of Psychic-type Pokémon.

Somewhere along the way, Evangeline swooped down from the ceiling, trailing after him with an entire flock of Natu until –

The wide eyes and cheerful smile of an Inkay looked up at him. Evangeline swung up and away, the flock of Natu creating an updraft against Harry's back. You're like me, Inkay said, and then, before Harry could reply, I'll go with you! We'll be the best!

Harry couldn't help the smile. Inkay were considered living impossibilities, as strange as a Normal/Ghost or a Water/Fire Pokémon. Two opposing types, somehow united in one Pokémon. He wasn't sure if Inkay was strong enough to be useful for a fifth-badge matchup, but size and power were two different things.

Also, the Inkay was shiny.

Diana took one look at him, then at the Inkay in his arms, and collapsed laughing. So did the rest of the house, when he made it back. Inkay waved his tiny golden arms. Philip pointed at the fridge.

"You know, I never thought that addition would come in handy," he gasped out, sniggering. Harry rolled his eyes, taking out his Pokédex to scan Inkay.

"A Kirlia and an Inkay. Not a bad combination," Melanie mused. At Harry's startled look, she added, "Your Ralts is nearing the brink of evolution, probably the next few battles. You can tell by the extra splits in her dress, and she's a little too tall for your average Ralts now."

Harry couldn't have stopped a smile if he tried. "Ralts," he said, peering down over the back of the sofa, "that's amazing!"

Ralts bounced into his arms, nearly dislodging Inkay. Does that mean I get a poffin? As it turned out, Louise made excellent poffins – and Harry was almost certain Ralts was addicted to them. "Maybe when you actually evolve," he said, smiling.

The Pokédex whirred. Inkay, the Revolving Pokémon. Inkay flashes light-emitting spots on its body to drain the opponent of their will to fight. This allows it time to scuttle away and hide. This Inkay is male, and has the Ability Contrary. He knows Flash, Peck, Constrict, Reflect, Light Screen, Foul Play, Psywave, Trick Room, Hypnosis, Taunt, Topsy-Turvy, Switcheroo, Calm Mind, Toxic, Spite, Double Team, Psybeam, Payback, Superpower, Rock Slide and Dark Pulse.

Harry knew Gym Pokémon tended to have massive and varied movesets, given that Gyms had practically unlimited access to TMs, but he hadn't realised it was this kind of massive and varied. Inkay looked up at him. That is good?

"That's – that's excellent," Harry said, looking down at Inkay. "Wow. I can't wait to see you in battle."

"Chances are you won't have to. Wait, that is," Louise said. "Did we mention that Ariel is terrifyingly efficient and that you'll be on the roster tomorrow?"

~OoOoOoO~

Hearing about terrifying efficiency, Harry learned, was completely and utterly different from experiencing it firsthand. By the end of the week, Harry's shifts were planned out all the way to the Winter Festival, covering every single pre-booked fifth-badge challenge, as well a smattering of random hours. There was a four-day break with no shifts and a weekend where Harry seemed to literally have every single shift. He would bet all his money – well, maybe not all of it – that Future Sight had told Ariel those hours were when more fifth-badge challenges would turn up.

In training, Inkay and Ralts made up a startlingly efficient team; Inkay stalled and deflected and sent status moves in every direction, while Ralts snapped off Confusion and Dazzling Gleam. Teleport and Heal Pulse helped in making them difficult to take down together in a double battle. And Ralts was starting to learn the beginnings of the far more powerful sibling of Confusion, Psychic, with the aid of Anistar's TMs.

In fact, Harry had been allowed to freely use Anistar's TM collection for all his Pokémon, not just Inkay and Ralts, and Anistar had a lot of TMs. There was the hard cap of no more than four TMs used on a Pokémon in a fortnight – any more, the developers cautioned, might prove dangerous to the Pokémon – but four was more than enough for Harry for now. He had the entirety of his stay in Anistar to make use of them, after all, and some weren't entirely useful anyway.

Inkay pretty much came with all the Anistar TMs already, but Harry and Ralts wasted no time in learning Safeguard, Will-O-Wisp and Shadow Ball, on top of Psychic, from the TMs. Honedge went for Protect, Substitute and Rock Slide, while Fletchinder gleefully began practice on Taunt, Will-O-Wisp and U-turn – even though, according to Houndour, she was more than capable of Taunt anyway.

Fletchinder, needless to say, did not take that well at all.

Houndour learned Sunny Day, Solar Beam, Shadow Ball and – out of all things – Dream Eater. Harry supposed that, if Inkay could land the notoriously inaccurate and difficult Hypnosis, Dream Eater would be quite dangerous. Lanturn scored with Ice Beam, Substitute, Dazzling Gleam and Surf, much to the horror of Vibrava; an Ice Beam very nearly froze him head-on, and Ralts had had to Teleport him out of the way. Vibrava only chose to learn Toxic and Solar Beam; in his defence, Anistar's selection of TMs were aimed at Psychics and general damage to round out secondary types, not Ground/Dragon Pokémon.

Harry had a feeling Solar Beam was just so that Vibrava could feel somewhat less scared of Lanturn, especially now that she had Ice Beam.

He quickly learned that Ralts and Inkay were weak in single battles, where Ralts didn't have the full support of Inkay's array of moves and Inkay didn't have Ralts' power and range. Even with Contrary, there was only so much Superpower could do. Unfortunately, that tended to be the type most challengers asked for.

In double battles, however – well, that was a different story.

His first double battle was with a girl from Cyllage, who bore the Cliff, Rumble, Bug and Iceberg Badges. A Fennekin had been her starter; Ralts and Inkay faced off against a Braixen and another Houndour.

Braixen and Houndour were not a bad combination. They were fast, they had fairly decent coverage – this wasn't, after all, a Water or Ground-type Gym – and both were resistant to Psychic and at least neutral against Fairy, one of the most common coverage types for Psychics.

Unfortunately, Harry had Trick Room.

Ralts flashed a Dazzling Gleam into the Houndour's eyes, while Inkay cheerfully whaled on the poor Houndour with Superpower. Both were lightning fast under Trick Room, while Houndour and Braixen were abominably slow. Given that they were both much faster than Harry, usually, it must have been even worse than that under-honey feeling he'd gotten from the Dusknoir's Trick Room in Coumarine.

It was one-sided before Inkay, fully-powered thanks to Superpower, had unleashed a devastating Rock Slide on top of their heads. At least Braixen had managed a Flamethrower, though it melted away in front of Ralts' Light Screen.

The next double battle he'd had was against a Super-Size Gourgeist and a Greninja, Trick Room and Superpower felled the Greninja; the Gourgeist was tougher, using Trick-or-Treat to add a Ghost weakness for Shadow Sneak, as well as close-ranged Bullet Seeds and even a Flamethrower. But Reflect absorbed most of the damage, and Inkay was already boosted from Superpower; he and Ralts used a combination of Flash and Dazzling Gleam to force away the shadows for Shadow Sneak, before Foul Play smashed Gourgeist to the ground.

"They aren't even evolved yet," the challenger complained. Harry just grinned – and then Ralts glowed, and a Kirlia stepped out of evolution as if saying, what was that about evolution? directly to the challenger.

Louise even made Ralts – now Kirlia – a full batch of poffins to celebrate. Surprisingly – or rather, not so surprisingly – the four days following Kirlia's evolution also made up the four-day break from his shifts.

He spent those four days alternating between practising Olympia's techniques – Harry was now in the stage of constructing what she'd called a mind palace, though so far Verosis had deemed all his efforts "hopeless and easily breakable" – and spending time with his other Pokémon. The garden – or what Melanie referred to as "that place out back with too many weeds" – doubled as a training grounds for non-Psychic Pokémon when the Gym was in use, and was also Honedge's newest playground. Harry had been amused to discover that Honedge had returned to haunting (significantly less luxuriant) gardens; Honedge found it equally amusing.

Lanturn had decided to join the Goldeen school in the local water fountain, spraying Bubble Beams along with water jets. Fletchinder, Houndour and Vibrava stayed in the overgrown garden; Vibrava put out accidental fires with creative use of Earth Power.

Between challenging Gym challengers – and wasn't that a tongue-twister – and practicing Psychic techniques with Kirlia and Inkay and everyone he happened upon in the meditation room, the days flew by, each one seemingly busier than the last. He graduated, somehow, past the mind palace of sorting new memories into designing a different place, to store and categorise old memories.

"A place familiar to you, a place you can retreat to at will, a place you know well," Olympia had explained. "This will be the place you stage your defence against those who try reading your mind. It can be as simple as the meditation room or as complex as a fortress; your mind is near-limitless and can adapt the normal defences into the most suitable defence for the place you create. But that only works if you know the place, if you know how it works and where things go – otherwise, you may as well build a fortress."

For Harry, that was the living room where his père used to read him stories, with Honchkrow puffed up on an armchair nearby. He couldn't remember it perfectly – who ever knew how many bricks supported the mantelpiece? – but he knew it well, and Evangeline had snuck into his dreams to tell him that was what mattered anyway.

He'd woken up with a headache, after that unadvertised night invasion.

There was, he had to admit, a few long moments when he considered making his place the Lumiose Badlands, because surely whoever wanted to read his mind would leave after seeing the Lumiose Badlands. Harry certainly knew the dust and the wind well. Except then they might report him insane, because who in the right mind put their memories into the Lumiose Badlands?

December vanished in the blink of an eye, and then, before Harry knew it, the golden lamp-lights were flung across Anistar's rooftops in preparation for the Winter Festival, he was doing last-minute gift shopping, and his final shift before the new year rang in swept by. "Yes, you can take Inkay for the holidays, he's practically yours for as long as you're with Anistar Gym," Ariel said, before Harry even opened his mouth.

Harry actually hadn't considered where he would go for the holidays – out of Anistar, definitely, but nowhere specific; it would probably take the entire Winter Festival to make back to Vaniville. He pondered it as the last battle wrapped up (singles, loss, Kirlia taken down by a living – dead? – Trevenant) and he recalled her.

"Oi, Harry!" Bertrand called; he, unfortunately, had landed the role of receptionist on the last day. Harry had spent only a single day as receptionist, but it was more than enough time to learn that customer service was hard. Being receptionist on the last day was probably nothing short of nightmarish. "There's someone asking for you!"

Baffled, Harry warped back into the lobby.

There was someone perched on one of the armchairs, a Honchkrow gripping the cushions next to him. After a moment of mutual staring, he said, "Wow, Harry, you really have grown taller."

Harry could have groaned. He was too busy flying across the floor and launching himself forward into the fierce hug.

"Père!"


Inkay are some of the most adorable Pokémon around and I will fight anybody who disagree. How can you possibly not love a tiny baby squid who can also Contrary + Superpower + Foul Play much larger Pokémon into submission?