"A-one, a-two, a-one, two, three, four!"

Sound filled the auditorium faster than I could fire an arrow quill, and before I knew it our groove had likely reached the ears of Tapu Fini and her arts class upstairs. Now if there's one thing I could thank the humans for, it'd be the development of musical instruments. Yessir, with Tapu Koko up front conducting, me on tenor saxophone, a bright sophomore named Lurantis and a cool junior named Sandslash next to me on alto, senior Bewear on baritone sax, Passimian on trombone, Kommo-o and Trumbeak on trumpet, Ribombee on piano, Salazzle on acoustic guitar, Golisopod on bass, Minior on pitched percussion, and Midnight Lycanroc on his legendary drumset, it was hard not to see why we were renowned throughout Alola, and other regions too. ...Oh, alright, maybe we've only had a few gigs at Hau'oli City, but take my word for it: we were good, however small we were.

The trumpets' sound sailed over the rest of the band in a dazzling intro, then with a crash from Midnight we were off, just like that. The saxes passed the melody to Ribombee, quiet and elegant yet not dropping any of the prior excitement, who passed it back to us, Midnight ending the lick in another fill. With an ascend into a smooth, wondrous sequence carrying from the saxophones back to the trumpets, I stood for my miniature solo: two bars of the tenor's golden voice, soon accompanied by Kommo-o for two more, then back to Ribombee and the band repeated the whole thing over. It was a spectacle I could only describe as democratic, spontaneous, and never, never ordinary.

Alright, bit of a history lesson: the tune was that of night's Festival Plaza, a cyber-carnival created by the ancient human inventor Sophocles in his youth. While the machine itself had been lost to time, its joyous music lived on and had seen many an adaptation and arrangement by the greatest of Pokémon composers. Then, it was all up to jazz bands like us to do it justice, and I'd say we fulfilled that duty with flying colors.

The band reached the tune's climax, blasting out the melody loud as we could while still retaining its heavenly tone, Koko whipping around each instrument section in excited control. We hit the final chord dead-on, trying to hold back laughs and hoots of triumph as Midnight's and Golisopod's moving lines rose above our own sound. Then with one final crash, we cut off, only for a new noise to overtake the stage.

I felt it before I heard it: a buzzing that began barely audible, a sensation that made its way from my talons up through my shoulders, only to transform into a malevolent shriek of a thing upon reaching my ears, a devilishly wavering feedback so great it almost drove me deaf. Around me the band covered their ears madly, looking to and fro with wide eyes, a few screaming, others laughing. Only Koko was unfazed, somehow able to wildly crow over all the chaos:

"Sun and moon, Golisopod, grab the strings!"

After dumbly looking around for a moment, the Hard Scale Pokémon snatched up his bass's four strings and the noise dissipated at once, leaving the auditorium in dead silence save for the mild ringing in my ears, and the shocked, uneven breathing of the band. We stayed like that, all staring at Golisopod, for probably a good ten seconds before Midnight let out a howling cackle and nearly keeled over out of his seat. And before I knew it, the entire band was cracking up, even serious Passimian, mysterious Salazzle, and Golisopod himself.

"Alright, alright!" Koko called between his own bouts of laughter. Slowly he regained our attention. "There's a lot to like here...about Festival Plaza, I mean. Your fills have gotten a lot better, Lycanroc, but try to make 'em more interesting—more snare, I'd say. And trumpets, I can hardly hear you at..."

We wrote down each of his criticisms, still recovering from the bass incident. I lost control for a second, doubled over snickering and nearly brought a slash of Tentacool's ink down through my sheet music, but luckily I caught myself just in time and stifled another hoot.

"Nice. Take a break," Koko then ordered. "I'll meet you back in five."

The band dispersed, either to get water or talk with friends, most likely. With less caution than I probably should've had, I set my tenor sax down on my seat and flew to the back of the stage, where Midnight and Trumbeak waited.

"Decidueye," Midnight greeted quietly as he saw me approach. Despite his classic upbeat attitude still being present while he was playing, the Wolf Pokémon had been rather distant all week. Don't get me wrong, he was completely fine after he returned from his suspension, and for the succeeding half-month it was almost like nothing had even happened in the first place. But apparently something had happened recently that he wasn't all too keen on telling us about, so I didn't take the time to ask. "G'job, man."

"Thanks," I replied. "Reverse World with what Koko says about 'more snare'; those fills were immaculate!" Beside me, Trumbeak giggled a bit after checking to see if Koko had overheard my claim, which thankfully didn't seem to be the case. Midnight only looked down and sneered slightly, his grin more sad, if anything, than pumped or even embarrassed.

"Hey, Decidueye," Trumbeak piped in an attempt to change the subject, to which I happily obliged if it meant talking with her. "I know I'm not taking Kalosian like you or anything, but if you'd wanna do some history together a little later, maybe I could be of some help? Or something?"

I flushed. "Oh Arceus, would you? I've been trying to get a hold of Bulu after my classes for ages, but thanks to football starting up he's never around, and I'll be darned if I can ever figure out how to contact him on Koko's dumb computers, much less run out to the football field myself and risk getting trampled by those behemoths of Pokémon, all just to ask..." I realized Trumbeak was staring at me awkwardly, head cocked a bit, and my words dwindled off. Embarrassedly scratching the back of my grassy hood, I quickly hooted, "O-Of course I want to. That'd be great."

"Players don't bite, man," Passimian spoke up as he passed us, presumably having overheard my monologue. "Much less trample you. Wrestlers, it's a bit different. That Incineroar's a heck of a Pokémon, but you make him mad?" The Teamwork Pokémon chuckled to himself, took up his trombone and fell into his seat in front of us. "Just look what happened between him n' his girl."

"Primarina?" Trumbeak whispered, suddenly having lost her color. Passimian said no more.

"Sun and moon," Midnight growled all of a sudden, voice low and angry, but also wrought with what almost sounded like fear. "I don't wanna hear that cat's name again long as I live."

Curious (and ignorant...plenty, plenty ignorant), I asked, "Why not? What happened?"

Midnight looked up at me with a scary intensity that I thought might melt me, and snarled, "He doesn't have a brain, much less a heart! He hears things, full story or not, true or not, and just acts on 'em how he sees fit, even if it means..." The Wolf Pokémon turned his gaze toward the stagelights high above us, and, surprisingly not blinded, muttered his next words more to himself than Trumbeak or me or even Passimian. "And I can't tell nobody, lest he'll..."

"Midnight, what's this about?" Trumbeak demanded, fluttering her wings anxiously. "Did something happen to you and Incineroar? To Primarina?!"

Midnight brought his eyes back down to Trumbeak, his expression softening immediately. He sighed, quietly and calmly replying, "No, no, she—she's fine. I'm fine, it's...it's just..."

"Alright, alright! Get back to your chairs, we've got a lot of work to do!" The shrill voice of Tapu Koko sliced through any previous tension, and nearly made me jump out of my feathers. Midnight, however, looked more relieved than anything else as the jazz band began to take shape once again: Golisopod heaved his bass off the floor, Salazzle slinked back into the strap of her guitar, and Sandslash motioned for me to rejoin the sax section, which, after one more nervous glance at Trumbeak and especially Midnight, I trepidly did.

The next notes I put through my tenor were automated, almost emotionless, as my mind wandered to the worst of possibilities, the most curious of ideas. I put less spirit into my solos and didn't heed any of Koko's critiques; the only things in my head at that point were Midnight and Trumbeak, Primarina and Passimian and...Incineroar...

—————

Trumbeak patiently waited for me outside the auditorium's entrance once jazz had ended, and I happily caught up with her after the last few grueling steps of putting my sax away. The first rays of evening were just beginning to tint the Verdant Cavern orange, soon to reach the clearing and the school and the vegetated cliffs behind it. All around us Pokémon were beginning to retire to their dormitories for studying or sleep, and I would've joined them...but I had a lot on my mind.

"What do you think Midnight was talking about back there?" I asked as soon as I met up with Trumbeak. Together we started walking towards the main building, and I made sure to stay quiet as a wave of students carelessly passed us.

"You think I know?" my girlfriend quickly retorted. "Incineroar must've done something, I just...sun and moon, I hope Primarina's okay."

"Incineroar did always seem like bad news..." I contemplated, thinking back to the term's first day. "From the looks of it, he has the entirety of Hau'oli City on its clawtips! Frankly, I'm surprised him and Primarina were able to stay together so long without one of 'em getting killed."

"Don't say that!" Trumbeak's voice cracked a bit, and a wave of regret hit me. "I've always trusted Primarina's judgement when it came to partners, I've always looked up to her and Incineroar as a couple. They just seemed so happy together, so successful, so perfect..." Her dazzling blue-and-black eyes met mine more dead-on then one of my arrow quills, and her next words sent shivers through my feathers: "And it's because of them—because of her—that I could work up the courage to get to know you."

That sobered me, made me think and ponder and think some more until long after we had left the warm dusk behind and entered the common. Rather than dwell on Trumbeak's chilling reflection, I tried desperately to focus on the question at hand: What made Incineroar do what he did to Primarina, whatever it was? And what was it Midnight said? Something about the guy acting on things without the full story...and how does Midnight know about any of this in the first place? Unless...hold on a second...

It wasn't until we had reached the far side of the common, perched on the clean wooded floor and laid our history supplies before us to study that I spoke up again, and with great thoughtfulness: "What if it had something to do with reunion-night?"

"You mean when Midnight..." Trumbeak began, only to stop as I nodded my head vigorously, really not wanting to once again hear about the outcome of the twins' and my stupid idea.

"So maybe Incineroar caught word of what had happened; Primarina told him, probably, and then...then he..." My beak continued to move, but it felt like my vocal chords had just dropped into my talons as I came to a terrifying conclusion. "Oh, Arceus. You don't think he's done anything to Midnight, do you? I mean, after hearing about what Midnight did—"

"He didn't look hurt at jazz!" Trumbeak said under her breath, with an air of impatience. "But that still doesn't explain what happened to Primarina!" She sighed in an effort to calm herself, and not accidentally squawk out to attract the attention of the still-steady flow of API-goers that Incineroar luckily wasn't among. "Look, as huge as this whole thing is, we shouldn't draw conclusions or act on anything until we know exactly what's happened. Otherwise we'll just keep going in circles like this, and nothing will be definitively answered. It probably isn't much of anything anyways, so we just shouldn't worry so much about it...yet, anyway. Agreed?"

I took a sigh of my own, processing her words. She was right. She seemed to always be right. Acting on things we didn't have the full picture of...it made us no better than how Midnight seemed to think of Incineroar, after all. "Yeah. Agreed."

"Alright." The edges of Trumbeak's beak formed an affectionate smile as she began flipping through the pages of her history book, coming to rest on a page about Alolan human nobility. She sighed exasperatedly, looked at me, and said casually, "Y'know...the real reason I wanted you to study with me is because I'm a Slowpoke at history."

I had to smile at that.