"I didn't think I'd see you this soon after we parted ways, Brendan. It hasn't even been a week!" Zinnia noticed. "But then again, weirder things have happened."

I lazily rubbed a hand against the back of my neck. "I was trying to follow the instructions in your book, but I ended up attempting to feed it to the ocean, and May here pulled me into the Distortion World before I turned into a charcoal statue."

"Haha, I never saw that one coming!" Zinnia laughed. "I always knew you'd be the sand in the gears, and I almost considered not writing the book at all because of the fact. But that is exactly the purpose you serve! You're the key to putting our universe back in order."

"Hold on," I pinched the bridge of my nose. "You planned this all along?"

"Err… this isn't exactly planned, but it sure as hell isn't an accident either." Zinnia crossed her arms. "Remember the library metaphor? We temporarily skipped over some of the books on the shelf, but it's still the same shelf with the books from the same series. Some of the books got knocked off, but it's nothing we can't fix, right?" she turned towards May. "And you've been awfully quiet! Did my sudden entrance take your breath away?"

"It's not that. I'm just trying to see which Zinnia you are. It's been so long since I've last seen the one from my world, and I was kinda hoping it was you..." May mumbled, trying not to make eye contact.

"Don't worry, we'll find a way to bring her back, May." the woman patted May's head.

"I-I'm not a kid anymore, you know! I might even be older than you, given how long I've gone through this damn time loop!" she puffed out her cheeks.

"Cute as ever, aren't you?" Zinnia giggled. "Now, pay attention. Many years ago, my Omega Ruby counterpart failed to stop Professor Cozmo from teleporting the asteroid with a doohickey called the Link Cable, so she followed it, leading to her dreadful end in the Emerald timeline."

"That's the timeline you showed me, right? Where that Zinnia met Champion Wallace and created a place called Birth Island?"

"Right on the money, Brendan! Anyways, the Zinnia that died in Emerald caused a dimensional rift in the Distortion World, which is how I think our lovely May got herself trapped in a time loop when she tried to chase after her."

"So the Zinnia I met in my repetitions wasn't her, but the Zinnia that never travelled to the Distortion World in the first place!" May deduced.

She confirmed it, "It would be more accurate to call that Zinnia a placeholder, but that's correct." the shadowy creature behind her materialized, and she smiled. "Took me a while to find Giratina, but it was nothing more than just a couple of trips into Turnback Cave. I honestly had no idea you were in here, Brendan, but I had known a bit about May from my visions. I'm here to rescue the both of you."

"Will we be able to get out of here soon?" I asked.

"Of course we will, are you kidding?" Zinnia snorted. "But before we can do that, we need a game plan, mostly for fixing the mess caused by the dimensional rift and the time loops."

"How will we do that?"

Zinnia hopped onto Giratina's back, sitting down to think. "If May is living in a time loop, and we need to fix the other timelines…" she snapped her fingers. "I've got it! We need to complete the timeline!"

May scoffed, "How is that a solution to any of this?!"

"Think about it. Our timeline's never actually been completed before. I've only seen snippets of X and Y from the Non Mega Universe, and I assumed that it's the same ending across all timelines. But what if something different is meant to happen?"

"Are you serious?" May's eyes narrowed. "Nothing is going to change! I tried to change things, and look where it got me!"

"It sounds bizarre, but trust me, it's going to work." Zinnia gave May a meaningful look. "Won't you put faith in me, May?"

They exchanged glances, then after a brief moment, May surrendered. "Fine… I'm on board with you, but only because I have nothing left to lose. What's the next step?"

"We'll venture into our native X timeline by time travelling 13 years into the future. Once there, I'm going to leave you guys and remain on standby in this dimension, just in case something doesn't go as smoothly as I thought, and we'll try a different approach." she looked at the both of us. "I know that you two are capable of restoring order. If I didn't think you had it in you, I would've left this task to the X and Y protagonists. So why don't we finish this, once and for all?"

Zinnia offered her hand from her seat on Giratina's back. I was the first one to take it and join her.

"Come on, Swampert." I said over my shoulder. Without question, my partner followed me, happily bouncing to my side.

Zinnia directed her hand at May this time, not saying a word, but it seemed like May still had her doubts.

"I did say that I was on board with you… but I have only one question to ask." she looked up at the woman.

"What would that be?"

"Why do you always stay on the sidelines? Isn't there anything more helpful you can do?"

Zinnia lowered her hand, sighing, "I've asked myself those exact same questions many times before. And the answer is always the same; I'm just not destined to be a hero." she ran her hand along Giratina's neck. "I've come to terms with myself since then, and I'm alright with being your guide. It's the path I've chosen for myself."

May nodded approvingly. "I understand." it was her turn to offer her hand. "Take me where I need to go."

Zinnia pulled her up, and Giratina opened a portal into the world that had been waiting on the other side…

12.09.15

Monday

"You're free to go now, Celebi." Zinnia said upon the release of the small green Pokémon. "Thank you for your help."

The Time Travel Pokémon chirped merrily in reply, and flew away into the forest.

I carefully climbed down from Giratina's back, helping Swampert get his feet on the ground. Once he was there, he sniffed around the grass, excitedly taking in the fresh scent of the forest.

"Where are we? We appear to be in an area completely different from Hoenn, Brendan!" he barked.

I took out my Pokénav, and thankfully, it had regained signal. The system took a minute to update the date and time, as well as our current location. "My Pokénav says that we're in a region called… Kalos." I announced.

"Would you look at that? I never would've guessed that Andre's homeland was Kalos." Zinnia commented. "Oh, wait, his name is Lysandre now. My mistake."

May stepped onto the earth, crouching down to feel the soil between her fingers. "We're actually here early. Precisely a month before the X timeline officially begins."

I checked my Pokénav again to see that her observation was correct. "You can tell just by looking at the grass?"

"Not the grass. The flowers. Asters don't bloom until October." May pointed out.

There was a drop in the mood when she said that. It was so intense, that Swampert looked up and cocked his head at May, even though he didn't know exactly why the mood changed.

"... I should get going." Zinnia said. "If you need me, send Gengar to come fetch me."

She jumped back into the Distortion World with Giratina, and the portal behind her disappeared, leaving no trace of her previous presence.

May got up from the ground. "Why did she leave in such a hurry? That was so unlike her."

I glanced over at her, setting a hand on her shoulder. "You probably didn't mean to, but mentioning the name Aster must have reminded her of her deceased loved one. We both know that you were just talking about the flowers… but maybe she still hasn't overcome her loss."

I still haven't, I wanted to add, but I could tell that she knew that already.

May's eyes widened in realization. "That was really inconsiderate of me." she clutched a lock of her hair. "I should've remembered about that, but I said it so mindlessly! I want to apologize to her now."

"Don't beat yourself up over it. Like I said before, she knows it wasn't your intention." I reassured her.

"If you say so…" May frowned.

Inspecting the map on my Pokénav, I read that the nearest town was one called Kiloude City. "Why don't we go find something to eat? Hopefully, we're not too out of touch with civilization."

"Do you speak Kalosian?" May asked as we walked together.

"No." I stated. "Do you?"

"Never learned it."

"Then how are we going to talk to anyone?!" I clamoured.

"Gotcha." May snickered. "We won't have to worry about that. The people here are bilingual."

"So you wanted to give me a heart attack for no reason? Harsh." I muttered.

"Maybe she's just trying to get you ready for the harshness of the people that live here." Swampert propounded.

"That's not really the case. The people here are nice." then, she added, "For the most part."

"What's that supposed to mean?"

Our walk through the woods was filled with random chatter about the foreign environment we were in, along with some of Swampert's humourous input.

Night was beginning to fall as we approached the outskirts of Kiloude. There was a solitary inn right on the edge of the side road, and we decided to lodge in there.

When we checked in, the innkeeper advised us to share an economy room because space was limited, and generously included a free breakfast and dinner deal as compensation for our troubles.

After eating a hearty, much-needed meal, May and I headed to our room to turn in for the night.

"I'm taking the couch." May decided. "I don't feel like fighting over sleeping arrangements."

I looked over at her as I removed my bag. "Are you sure? I was going to offer the bed to you."

"Bed's too soft for my liking." she explained. "It's all yours."

"Sounds good to me." pacing towards the bathroom, I said, "If you don't mind, I'll take a shower first. You can just hang out or whatever. It's all cool."

"Sure thing. I'll go after you're done."

As I rubbed the shampoo into my hair and lathered soap on my body, I thought about how things were going in Hoenn and if all the people on my contacts list are still around.

I was most worried about my parents. Did they think that I'm still on vacation? Or had I simply disappeared?

Cutting the water, I slipped a spare pair of shorts on and draped a towel over my bare shoulders. I stepped out of the bathroom after drying off, and when I opened the door, I found May giving Swampert a thick slice of ham that she sneaked in from the dinner table.

"He's such a glutton." she mumbled. "I wonder if he'll grow to the same size as his Mega Evolution if we keep feeding him?"

I laughed, "Then we wouldn't need a Mega Stone to evolve him at all!"

"I was actually working towards that." he burbled coolly. "I look way cooler when I'm buff!"

"You're a very handsome boy, no matter how you look." May smiled at him, caressing his fins.

He lowered his torso, as if bowing to her."Thank you, thank you, m'lady."

"My pleasure." she got up from the couch to take her shower, and locked the door behind her.

I sat down on the bed, removing the towel from my shoulders and giving my hair one last drying session. Swampert hopped on next to me, beaming constantly.

"How are you liking Kalos so far, bud?" I questioned him.

"The grass is very pretty, and it smells like wilderness." Swampert rolled over. "Though, I do prefer the saltiness of Hoenn's air, Kalos is alright with me."

I chuckled, "That's good to hear." I fell back on the bed to face the ceiling. "We haven't really had a chance to talk like this, with all the craziness going on, huh?"

"Guess not." Swampert agreed. "But I don't mind. I still feel like we've gotten closer just by travelling on foot together. Don't you?"

"Yeah…" I trailed off, until another thought crossed my mind. "Hey, Swampert?"

"Uh-huh?"

I cleared my throat before saying, "Am I too emotional?"

He was quiet for a moment, but his reply came soon, "You can be. But there's nothing wrong with expressing it, as long as you do it in a way that's healthy for you. Different people have different needs, after all. Why do you ask? Is there something that's bothering you?"

"I was just thinking about what Cyrus said to me the day before we met the Omega Ruby May." I breathed. "That I let my emotions get the best of me too often."

"Oh, I see." he wagged his tail as he gave his response. "Do you think that what he said is true?"

"I know it's true. That's why it bothers me."

"Then let's start there. Why does showing your emotions bother you?"

"I don't have a problem with showing my emotions; I've cried in front of people before. I have a problem with telling others how I feel, and why."

"Why do you have a problem with that?"

"I don't want people to think that I'm feeling emotional over something trivial. If I did that, I'd feel like I was telling them how I feel just to get their approval. But talking to you about it is different, somehow. You don't make me feel that way."

"That makes me happy. I'm here for you, because we've both gone through the same thing, and we only have each other for support." he grinned wistfully.

"But you seem to be handling May's death way better than I am."

"It's because I have you now. I lost my owner, but she trusted you enough to take care of me, and that's enough for me. I'm still sad over her death, and I wish it didn't have to happen, but if it weren't for her, I would've never have gotten close to you."

I pursed my lips in thought. "You're right… I've only been thinking about how it affected me. I haven't thought about what came out of it at all." I rubbed Swampert's belly. "Thank you for helping me realize that."

I didn't need to avenge May's death or justify the things I was feeling.

I just needed to move forward, with my new partner at my side, no matter what the future may bring.

That was all.

The bathroom door swung open, and May walked out in her pyjamas with a towel on her head.

"You're still awake?" she questioned, surprised. "You could've gone to sleep if you wanted to."

"I was just reflecting." I told her. "It's something I like to do after a long day."

"It's good to unwind. Now make sure you rest up, because tomorrow is the big day." she adjusted herself on the couch. "Good night, Brendan."

"Good night, May." I said as I turned off the lights.

Swampert curled up at my feet, and I was reminded that I didn't get here alone.

It's my turn to save the world.

Author's Note: I have several thoughts about these last two chapters.

Since the start, I had intentionally written Brendan to be a circular character in the sense that he never seems to emotionally overcome anything, and finally letting him let go of the past that was haunting him was very satisfying to write. I wanted to convey that because of his flaws, he can be quite illogical and dishonest. I always thought unreliable narrators were more interesting than their philosophically perfect, trustworthy counterparts.

I'm sorry if it took too long to get here, but at least it's over with now.