Warnings: None

Between the Stars and the Sea

Chapter 14:

"Route 32; Violet City"

I tried to tell the construction foreman about the tricky tree standing at the side of the road, but he just laughed me off. "A Pokémon?" he scoffed. "I ain't never seen a Pokémon like that." And then he shouted at one of his crewmembers to get back to work, abandoning me at the edge of the still-yelling crowd with my jaw dropped clean to the muddy ground.

Sensing the futility of my situation, I spun on my heel and walked from the barrier keeping us back from the ruined road, heading the way I'd come down to the fork in the road—and then I veered south, toward Route 32 and the entrance to Union Cave at its end and Azalea on the other side.

Too bad for me, I didn't get as far as the entrance to that cave.

It wasn't the trainers who populated Route 32 (ones I vaguely recalled from the games) who stopped me in my tracks. I wasn't waylaid by a wild Pokémon, either, or challenged by the absentee Silver. The road was actually pretty wide at the top of Route 32, covered in an even coating of gravel and bordered on one side by a peaceful, sunny meadow and a picturesque bit of forest on the other. I walked down that stretch of road without issue, muttering to myself as Hotaru hopped along by my side. "Screw the Gym," I said under my breath. There was no sense fighting at the Gym if I could just walk around it, I reasoned, and head to the next town without making a potentially perilous pit stop. No. Much better, instead, to just head on to the cave and run through it, to Azalea, and then move on to Goldenrod where a friendly face waited—

I glanced up at the road ahead of me.

I stopped cold.

Down an incline past the sunny meadow and lovely forest, was… a gulch, I think? The road dipped low, bordered on either side by high cliff faces of golden stone, a sort of gully or rivulet in the landscape likely carved by years and years of erosion. Maybe a river had snaked through here once, carving a divot in the landscape that evidenced its ancient passing. The road narrowed as it dipped into the depression, only ten feet wide at its widest and still covered in a nice coat of crunchy gravel. I looked left and right, wondering if I could continue on my way without passing through this place, but the ground jutted steeply upward in both direction, cliffs rising long and high in either direction like a stone wall crafted by the hands of giants.

I could not continue forward without passing through the gulch.

I could not continue forward without passing him.

He stood in the middle of the road with his back to me, but even turned around, I knew precisely who he was. The Pokémon standing at-the-ready at his side gave the game away immediately. The human half of this duo stood with hands clasped behind his back, broad shoulders in their dark blue jacket squared as he stared off into the distance. I gulped when I realized who he was, taking a step backward—and my foot crunched over a particularly noisy spot of gravel.

He turned around.

Our eyes met. They held there for a minute. And then his eyes narrowed, sweeping over me with barely disguised disdain.

"You," said Officer Reynolds.

"Me," said I.

We stared one another down like a pair of cowboys facing off on the dusty avenue of a boomtown. His mustache undulated when the wind whipped by, but the gust didn't rock his surefooted stance. He just looked at me from under the brim of his police cap with a scowl, buttons on his uniform gleaming brilliant gold, until the Growlithe beside him loosed a rocky growl. Hotaru (who stood next to my bio-leg, pressing nearly up against it) bristled in response. The heat of her intensified, searing through the thin material of my tall sock.

Eventually I couldn't take the silence anymore. "What are you doing here?" I blurted. "I would've thought you'd gone back to… well. Wherever it is you're from."

His chin lifted, jaw hard and brimming with disdain. "None of your business." He lifted one commanding hand. "Turn around and go back to town. Now."

"You're not the boss of me," I snapped back—and ugh. I sounded like a teenager, didn't I? Composing myself, I cleared my throat and took a step forward. "I'm going to Azalea Town. Please let me—"

Before I could finish the Growlithe darted forward, hunkering low on the ground with another rumble of aggression, ready to pounce at the slightest provocation. I backpedaled, prosthetic slipping on the gravel; Hotaru streaked in front of me and took up a defensive stance, the spots on her back burning crimson. A thin, high whine issued from her throat like the warning call of a poisonous frog.

Lucky for us, Officer Reynolds wasn't interested in letting his Growlithe have a snack. He barked a command ("Heel, Guv!") and the Growlithe eased out of its pre-pounce, turning and padding to its trainer with one final parting growl full of violent promise. Hotaru peeped hotly back, her small stature not deterring her in the least.

Officer Reynolds wound his hand into the Growlithe's studded collar. "You're going back to Violet City, Miss Uehara," he said, eyes stony. "Do not try to argue."

I gaped at him. "You can't just—!"

"I can just, and I will just." He pointed at Hotaru, lips curling in a sneer. "You might have a rare Pokémon at your side, but you are an inexperienced trainer. Green. Wet behind the ears. Incompetent." He listed each descriptor with what can only be described as 'relish.' "The Route beyond this point teems with trainers spoiling for a fight. You are not ready to face them yet, I assure you."

"But how can you say that?" I protested. "You've never seen me battle!"

"No," he said with maddening calm. "But I know you haven't yet challenged the Violet City Gym."

He spoke with utter confidence, no hesitation marring his words at all, and that assurance had me blinking in surprise. "How do you know I haven't—?"

"I have my ways." He pinned me with a glare. "There is no use lying about it, I assure you."

We stared (well, I stared and he glared) at each other again in silence. I had no freakin' clue how he knew I'd avoided challenging the Violet Gym, and I got the sense from his hard demeanor that any attempts to ask would be met with outright refusal. But enough about that. How could I get around this guy? This seemed like the only way south, but maybe after dark he'd go back to town to sleep—

As if reading my intention in my face, his eyes hardened further. "I will not be leaving here any time soon, Miss Uehara. Funny business is not allowed."

"What're you gonna do, sleep here?" I quipped, and to my displeasure he pointed at the rucksack sitting propped against the gully's stone wall with a look that told me yes, that was indeed his intention, and I was an idiot for not spotting the rucksack sooner. Well, damn; homeboy was sure determined, much to my chagrin. I sighed and said, "OK, fine. So if I get the Badge, will you let me pass?"

Something bright flickered through his steely eyes—but as soon as I noticed that odd look play across his features, it vanished, covered beneath another of his looks of utter steel. "Maybe," was all he grunted in reply. "If I think you're strong enough."

My jaw dropped (it was doing that a lot these days) as my ire rose. Fists clenching at my sides, I spat, "You are a complete and utter—!"

But I bit back the insult before it could make it out of my mouth—mostly because pissing him off wouldn't be advantageous. No use asking for favors from a person you've insulted, right? Better play nice, at least for the time being, and see if I could get on his good side. He'd be more willing to bend the rules for me if I sucked up a little, was my thinking.

And besides. That odd look on his face had resembled relief for a second there, incomprehensible as that seemed. Relief that I'd agreed to his terms, maybe? Relief that I wouldn't be walking past him to challenge the trainers along the road? Maybe one. Maybe both. Maybe none. But as he turned from me, staring down the length of Route 32 again, I couldn't help but wonder if this was his annoyingly hard-ass way of keeping me safe. He wasn't letting me pass because of the strong trainers lying in wait, he'd claimed. He was warning me away from danger before I was ready to face it—and pointing me at a different kind of danger in the form of a Gym, which sucked a lot, but…

In short, Officer Reynolds was an asshole. That much had been made clear when he bullied and browbeat me back in Elm's office. But much the way other adults in this world cared for random kids, he too was looking out for me in his own annoying, hard-ass way. Like a drill sergeant who puts you through boot camp so you can survive the grueling nature of war later. And maybe I was wrong about all of that and just making excuses for the bastard, but something told me there was more to his behavior than met the eye.

Didn't make him any more likeable than he already wasn't, though.

"… fine. I'll think about trying to earn the Violet City Gym badge," I eventually told him, exasperated. "But can you at least tell me what you're doing out here, anyway?"

One eye glared over his broad shoulder. His blocky jaw barely moved when he spoke. "As stated, none of your business."

"… you're waiting around for Silver, aren't you?"

That question had been a shot on the dark, but to my surprise, I think that shot struck true. I said, hoping my shot in the dark struck true. Reynolds spun back toward me with a growl that matched his barrel-chested Growlithe's. "Watch your mouth, Miss Uehara," he rumbled. "I don't like it when people pry."

My brow rose. "That's not a 'no.'"

"And it's most certainly not a 'yes,' either." He lashed out a hand again, gesturing up the road. "What are you, a detective? Get back to town. I'm busy."

Guv the Growlithe, sensing its master's ire, bared its wicked teeth and snarled. Hotaru greeted the snarl with a burbling chirp of her own, trying her best to sound aggressive in spite of her nature, size, and all around adorableness. At the collective posturing of all the people and Pokémon present, I couldn't help but sigh. Again. So much jaw-dropping and sighing today, my word…

"Fine. Be that way." I dipped a frilly bow—mostly as a joke, because I sure as hell didn't actually feel like bowing at this dude. "Have a nice day, sir!"

Reynolds glared and harrumphed before smartly turning his back on me. "It's Offi-sir to you, Miss Uehara," he said, and as I walked dejectedly toward Violet City, I heard Guv give a bark of warning at my retreating back.

Sprout Tower loomed above Violet City like some watchful guardian. The deep purple tiles of its many tiered roofs glittered in the sun like lava rock, facets catching the light even at a distance. The architecture of the monolith reminded me of a Buddhist temple, all curling eaves and peaked roof lines, but as far as I could tell, Buddhism did not exist in this world. So many things from my old world did not exist here—and yet, there were echoes. Strange, twisted echoes of my world's architecture, food, culture existed here without explanation or logical progression. Those remnants, inexplicable as they were, had bothered me when I first became Hoshiko. They'd nagged at my logical perception like an aching tooth, and the more I tried to explain them away, the more they seemed to nag. Eventually I had to stop pinpointing them entirely for the sake of my mental health.

That's why I tried not to wonder about the origin of the French-named parfaits in this world as I dug into one, eagerly slipping a spoon down through the clean, pretty layers of yogurt, berries, and diced fruit. I just enjoyed my first bite, savoring the taste as well as the cool breeze drifting across the café's sunny porch. I sat at a small metal table with clawed feet, shaded beneath a colorful umbrella patterned with leaping Magikarp, and watched as my Pokémon ate from a few shallow bowls placed on the ground near me. The café, it turned out, served both Pokémon and people, and many of the tables on the large porch seated a mix of both.

My Bellsprout and Kakuna didn't eat, oddly enough—or not so oddly at all considering Yoroi didn't have a mouth to speak of and Taiki was a literal living plant who furled out his leaves (he was a he, my Pokedex said) and absorbed sunshine for nourishment, eyes closed and contented as he lay on the warm flagstones in the sun. Hotaru's food, specially formulated for fire types, looked like a hearty root stew of some sort, burnished red liquid enveloping chunks of rough-cut vegetables, and Hibiki picked from a bowl of mixed nuts and berries with gusto. Between bites the Pokémon chattered at each other, getting acquainted after finally being released from their Balls at the same time.

It looked like they were having fun.

Me, though? Not so much.

The first few bites of parfait were sweet and tangy and delicious, but I only managed to choke down one or two before I lost my appetite. I nudged berries and fruit through the white yogurt, staining it rainbow colors, and just watched as Taiki and Hotaru played a game of rolling the almost-cylindrical Yoroi between them like a game of earthbound catch, or maybe soccer with liberal use of hands or hand-like appendages (Taiki with his myriad vines made description complicated). Yoroi laughed like a crunching leaf as his irregular, lumpy body veered off course across the cobblestone ground and they had to give chase. Sighing, I voiced a half-hearted command to stick close to the table, but they appeared not to hear, and I didn't have the heart to try again.

A few moments later, Hibiki's pudgy face poked over the edge of the table, framed on either side by her small paws. Our eyes met; her ears twitched; she levered herself atop the table with the help of her large tail, balancing on it with her short arms crossed over her wide chest. Her head cocked to one side, eyes narrow as she looked me over. Even without human features, her concern was obvious.

For a minute I pondered if talking to a Pokémon would make me look unhinged, but then I sighed and decided I didn't really care. "Something tells me that Officer Reynolds is gonna sit there in that gulch for days, waiting for Silver to come by," I told her, keeping my voice low.

Her head cocked further.

"Oh." I forgot she didn't know who that was. "Silver is the guy who stole a Pokémon from a friend of mine. The Pokémon was Hotaru's friend."

At that, Hibiki's eyes narrowed further. She punched one fist into her other paw, a clear declaration of aggression if I'd ever seen one. The aggressive act on such a cute creature only made her seem cuter; I reached out and petted her head, gratified when her eyes closed and she relaxed again with a burble of contentment.

"It's OK," I murmured. "We'll try to figure that out the next time we run into him. But for the time being, we have another hurdle to navigate."

I glanced across the patio; Hotaru and Taiki had rolled Yoroi all the way over to the edge of the patio and were making their way back. Some of the people eating there looked on and smiled, giggling at their antics with good humor. I, meanwhile, couldn't help but chew on my lower lip. Between my team of four we had normal, fire, bug and grass types. And that wasn't good.

The Gym in this city, if I remembered correctly, boasted a leader who specialized in flying types.

Bugs were weak to flying. Fire, grass and normal types did no special damage at all.

Without a Pokémon with a type advantage, winning wouldn't be easy—and surviving wasn't a guarantee.

Eyes still on Hotaru and Taiki, I told Hibiki: "With Reynolds in the way, it looks like we have to face down that Gym." A beat passed. "Or we can just sit here for two weeks or something until he gives up and goes home, but… I don't know." I leaned my forehead on my hands and groaned, fingers threading through my hair. "I don't know what I'd do with myself, sitting on my ass for weeks," I said. "I'm supposed to travel from town to town on this Journey and go home when I've seen the world, but… I just feel directionless." My head sank lower, elbows sliding forward across the table. "I don't much want to face the Gyms. But what else can I do, really?"

This whole thing was basically a farce, when you got right down to it. I had been forced out of my home and told to… wander? To just aimlessly roam from town to town, desperately looking for purpose? That was sort of the point of a Journey, admittedly, to help kids find what they want to do with their lives, but to just send young adults on a blind ramble through the better part of a continent with no guidance or goal beyond risking the lives of sentient creatures in pointless battles I didn't even want to—!

A warm little paw touched the top of my head. Hibiki had hopped close, peering down into my distraught face with a scowl. We held each other's gazes for a minute after I looked up, silent, until she lifted her paw from my head—and proceeded to give me a series of little slaps across the face, alternating between cheeks, hands smacking at my face with little pops of paw-pads on skin. Knocking sense into me, I supposed. It didn't hurt. When she rocked backward onto her tail with a harrumph that said she had buffeted me to her satisfaction, I couldn't keep from smiling.

"Well. Thanks for that, I think." I ruffled her head again, scratching behind one of her long ears. "I suppose we could just go train in the woods and then try to pass through the gym with pure muscle, but—"

One of the café's metal chairs scraped across the patio behind me, legs ringing bell-like against stone. "Yessiree bob, I do think that's the case!" came a reedy voice. "Why, he's never even boxed the thing, and you know what that means."

Hibiki's brows rose (if such a thing is possible for a Sentret) and she listed to one side on her tail. I turned, following her gaze to a table not too far away across the patio. Three men occupied a table beneath a colorful umbrella a few feet away; they were older, maybe in their 60s, nicely but shabbily dressed in various coats and slacks and denim pants. One wore a straw hat; he leaned forward and tapped the table with a fingertip, looking between his two companions with a conspiratorial smirk.

"He knows that as soon as he boxes that Pokémon, the Government'll get wind of what he's done," said Mr. Straw Hat. "Boxhackers can fudge the Mandate, but they never get past the sensors on the storage system, that's for dang sure."

One of the others (who wore a small red flower in the front pocket of his yellow shirt) frowned. "But do you really think he'd violate the First Encounter Mandate like that? He knows as well as we do why it was instituted."

"Sure, but you know the rumors—that they might relax catch restrictions soon for common evolution lines soon, or they'll relax it in areas where Pokémon populations have bounced back." Mr. Straw Hat shrugged and laughed. "He heard the rumors and figured, what's the harm in catching another Pokémon from that Route if they're just gonna relax restrictions soon, anyway?"

"I dunno, Barkley," said the third man. He wore a pair of thick glasses, which he pushed up his nose with a fingertip. "That's quite a risk."

Barley (AKA Mr. Straw Hat) scoffed. "A risk of what, a fine?" Another laugh followed, derisive but good-natured. "You know the Government doesn't fund jails these days. Spends all its money on the Pokémon Centers and the League, restitution after starting that mess of a War." This time he slapped the table outright. "Nah, I'm telling you boys—his Mareep got crushed in that accident, so he got in touch with a Boxhacker for a bootlegged Ball to dodge the auto-registration and just caught a new one, easy as you please!"

I sat up straighter and muttered, "A Mareep?"

They didn't hear me. The man with the glasses stroked his fuzzy chin. "Well… I guess it's possible," he relented after a time.

"Hard to say for sure," agreed the man with the flower in his pocket, and he stroked his chin, too. "I guess Mareeps all look the same to me."

"You just gotta look close," said Barkley with a sage nod. "His new one has more rings on its tail than the last, I'm telling you!"

"Excuse me, sirs?"

They glanced up as my shadow fell over them. I felt as surprised as they looked, scrambling out of my chair and walking over to boldly, but the mention of that Mareep—

"Why, hello missy!" Barkley said when he recovered. He tipped his hat, eyeing Hibiki sitting on the table behind me. At the sight of her, his eyes lit up. "By the looks of things, you must be a young Trainer on a Journey; is that right?"

"It is. But I was wondering—"

"Lovely work you have there," said the man with the glasses. He nodded at my feet. "Flames are a nice touch."

For a second I didn't quite clock what he was talking about—but oh. Of course. My prosthetic and its decorative accoutrements. I smiled at him on reflex and voiced a quick thanks.

"Doctor Malkin's work?" he said.

That comment threw me for even more of a loop than the former. "You know him?" I said, blinking in surprise.

The man with the glasses grinned, but rather than reply, he just reached into his pocket and pulled forth a Poké Ball. A Machoke appeared after he thumbed the button on the Ball, humanoid creature a little shorter than me but at least ten times more muscular. It had smooth, blue-grey skin with vivid red striations on its arms, a row of rigid grey fins atop its skull, and a round, flat face that would have looked passably human if not for its brilliant scarlet eyes and the tusks jutting from its mouth. Although I'd seen a Machoke before (a small squad of them had packed up my house when we first moved away from Goldenrod) the sight of this one made my eyes bug.

Its left thigh ended just above where its knee would have been, and below the end of this residual limb, a gleaming silver prosthetic supported the Pokémon's weight.

The man with the glasses chuckled at my reaction and reached for the knee of his pants. He pulled at the fabric, revealing under it the shank of a metal prosthetic of his own. I looked between trainer and Pokémon with my mouth open, though my expression slowly morphed into a smile after a moment or two elapsed.

"Thanks to Malkin, me and ol' Grapple here are a matching set," said the man with the glasses. "I'd know Malkin's work anywhere."

"That's awesome." I'd seen a few Pokémon with Malkin's work before, but only near or inside his clinic in Goldenrod; to meet someone with one 'in the wild,' so to speak, was an unexpected pleasure. I extended a hand toward the man with the glasses. "My name's Hoshiko."

He took my hand and shook. "Greg."

I shook Grapple's hand for good measure, earning a grunt and a smile from the beefy Pokémon. "Greg and Grapple. Great names." I scratched the back of my neck and looked at Barkley in his straw hat. "But, hey. Sorry to butt in and sorry I eavesdropped, but did you say your friend caught a Mareep near here?"

"Why, I did!" he said with a sunny beam. "And if we're reading it right, he might have even caught two." He eyed me over. "You have a Pokédex?"

"Yeah."

"Pity they didn't give our friend one. Much harder to make an illegal catch with one of those in your pocket." He shook his head, twisting sideways in his seat with another smile. "But enough about that. You want a Mareep, you head south on Route 32. They're everywhere over there."

The hopeful bubble in my chest popped. "Oh, damn," I said (the three men exchanged a look, perhaps wondering if it was OK for them to let me curse). "I don't think I can go that way. There's this police officer keeping a lookout near that gully, gulch, whatchamacallit, and he won't let me go through and—"

"Oh, that's no trouble," said Greg. "Plenty of Mareep live just north of that canyon."

"There's a meadow where they congregate," said the last man, whose name I still hadn't caught. "Lots of Mareep runnin' around out there, I'm tellin' ya."

And the hope-bubble returned, swelling even larger. I'd passed a meadow before meeting Reynolds. I knew exactly what they were talking about! Grinning, I backpedaled over to my table and whistled for my Pokémon, grabbing my backpack and recalling the team into their Balls one by one. I left Hotaru out and motioned for her to follow as I approached the three men again, incapable of hiding my grin. To them I said, "You don't realize it, but you guys might've just saved my bacon."

Greg's face screwed up. "Saved your what, now?"

"Oh. Uh. Nevermind." Bacon didn't exactly exist in this world, presence of Spoink in other regions notwithstanding. Still grinning, I walked backwards off the patio café and waved, calling, "Anyway, what I mean to say is thanks! But I gotta go; see ya!"

"Oh, so soon?" lamented the man with the flower in his pocket.

"We're here every day, kiddo, if you need anything!" said Barkley.

"So come back and see us before you leave town, all right?" called Greg, and his Machoke gave a bellow of agreement for good measure.

After shouting an agreement to return, it was all I could do not to sprint back to Route 32. Only the dull pain in my residual limb kept me from pelting back to the meadow north of the canyon, reminding me to pace myself and not take this Journey quite so fast. The Mareep would be there, I told myself, whether I got to the meadow in two minutes or two days—but even so, I walked probably faster than I should have toward Route 32, eyes eager and trained ahead. A Mareep, after all, could make or break my attempt at conquering the Violet City Gym—but as I reached the fork in the road outside of Violet, something occurred to me that slowed my impatient steps at once.

Surely there would be more types of Pokémon that just Mareep in that meadow.

Given the strict nature of the First Encounter Mandate, what were the odds of catching my most desired Pokémon on the first try?

I tried not to think about those odds as I headed south at the fork. Before I knew it, and perhaps before I was ready, I found myself standing at the edge of the sunny meadow, its tall grass dyed golden in the afternoon sun. A wind wafted by, sending my hair into my face, but as I stared into the depths of the field before me, I didn't move to brush the hair away.

Quite a lot rode on this next catch, by my estimations.

I could only hope that fate, which had already foiled me once today, cooperated with my plans this second time around.

NOTES:

Ah, Officer Reynolds. The protagonist of Gold/Silver meets a few police officers during their travels, so I thought I'd expand their role into what you see here.

So, I needed to find a reason to keep Hoshiko in town and to make her challenge the Gym despite her misgivings. The game blocks you from continuing if you don't get a badge, but given Hoshiko's reluctance to try for one, I'm having to engineer reasons to keep her corralled in this town. Hope this was believable.

I also think the League Challenge in the context of the games is SUPER weakly explained. Like, beyond a personal ambition to succeed at battling, there's no real motivation to challenge it (especially if your Pokémon are at risk of death in said challenges)? There's no real motivation to make kids travel from town to town on a Journey other than the dictation of custom? Giving the reluctant Hoshiko motivation to travel is probably the most difficult part of this fic. But since so many other Nuzlockes have main characters who are eager to battle and who really want to challenge the gyms, it's a personal challenge for me to work with Hoshiko's reluctance and make it make sense. Sorry for rambling, but I wanted to talk about that for a minute.

Also: Somehow this story has accrued 100 followers; WHAT?! Some of you I haven't heard from yet, so if you want to introduce yourself or make a remark about the story, I'd love to make your acquaintance and hear what you think! Thanks so much for following and for supporting this story even in silence. Means a lot to know you're interested!

And many, many thanks to those who chimed in last week with their amazing comments. YOU ROCK MY SOCKS! Fanfic MVPs, that's you! Very grateful to you, EasilyAmused93, Dusky Raptor, KadinaruDess, disenchanted love, C S Stars and frankieu!