Not since the recovery of Dill himself have I been happier to hear the Nurse Joy jingle coming from the front desk. Minerva bounces off the couch before I can, Ten flaps right over my head, while Fang and Hycanith both spring up after Minerva and press themselves against the counter. When Fang's up on his back legs, swinging his tail like he plans to hurt someone with it, he's high enough to reach the Nurse himself, but she can't hear a single word coming out of his mouth.

"Ohboyohboyohboyohboy," Fang says, tongue lolling, "Where is he? Is he behind the counter? I can't see him. Is he okay? Is this someone else's Nurse Joy jingle?"

"Fang, calm down. This is us- we're the only people in the Pokemon Center right now." I tell him, pushing his snout off the counter. He falls back onto all fours with a clatter, big red eyes still attentive and tail still going at it. I apologize to the flustered Nurse Joy, "Sorry. My Pokemon tend to be a little excitable."

Nurse Joy grins all the way out to her perfect braids. "I prefer vivacious, don't you? Happy Pokemon are healthy Pokemon, and healthy Pokemon make the best battlers. Speaking of healthy Pokemon, we're happy to announce that Reginae's made a full recovery. As long as you keep that bandage on the side of his neck and go easy on him for the next week, he should be back in sparring shape in no time."

In my head, I'm already formulating strategies with which to take on the water route between us and Cinnibar without our Grass-type, but I reply, "Erm, thanks," and Nurse Joy beams again like I've told an irresistably charming joke. She slides me the Poke Ball, which I throw against the floor, and Reginae comes out looking frazzled.

He has a large bandage across his neck, secured by gauze, and the bottom of his head bears a nasty bruise as well, but his flower is also looking vibrant. "Ashley," he asks, "have you been taking care of my succulents?"

"Yes," I lie, wondering if Celebi can revive plants from the dead. I'm not saying that they are dead, since succulents can likely go for a while without water... or light... but if they are, I'm going to be dead.

Luckily, when a skeptical Reginae opens up the bag and Fang levitates the succulents out, they all look scuffed up but alive. Reginae casts me a rueful glare and then gets to watering them, with Fang to assist with juggling out the tiny plants.

"So," Minerva asks, "Now that that's over, can we get back to the plan?"

"I don't have one."

"Eh, what?"

"We had no idea when Reginae was going to recover, and I don't do long-term plans. The universe hates me and it hates elaborate plans even more, so I figured if I didn't make any, the universe couldn't screw me over." I say. Thirteen year old Ashley might have been embarrassing by all accounts, but that's one philosophy of hers I'll defend to my deathbed.

"Then can we go get cream?" asks Fang.

"Waste of time."

"Having fun and boosting morale isn't wasting time, Minerva. Plus, I'm hungry and I have a sweet tooth." Fang replies, licking his chops.

"Are we taking a breather?" Reginae asks, "Hear me out here... let's go to the museum."

"No." says Minerva.

"I read all about it from the Pokemon Center brochures." Reginae says, and with a winning, all-too-innocent smile, he adds, "They have ice cream."

Ten minutes and one very lopsided vote later, we're en route to the museum. The admissions desk lets my Pokemon through without so much as a second glance, which strikes me as odd.

Guess they don't have many incidents around here, I say.

No, most everything here is Pokemon-proof. Reginae replies, They tote that in the brochure too. The crime rate in Kanto is also astronomically low, at least since the defeat of Team Rocket.

We enter out into a rotunda with eight different branches, with a display of several legendaries dueling in the middle. The three legendary birds of Kanto flash their brilliant plumage and shoot beams suspended in midair at each other, frozen in time.

"Woah," Reginae says, "So, where do you want to go?"

"I'll be in the gift shop, strategizing." Minerva informs me. "With some ice cream, since Fang is a baby in a grown Umbreon's body."

"I don't know why you feel the need to personally offend me every time you open your mouth, but it's really unnecessary." Fang peeps up from near the back of the group. "Remember who has the money, here. I know you have a fondness for strawberry. It would be a shame if I was to buy two chocolates instead."

"One for you and one for you?" Minerva says, sorely wishing she had eyebrows to raise.

"One for each of my stomachs. I have two more stomachs than you have hearts, Minerva."

"Please stop squabbling and go get food." I tell them both, pointing them towards the gift shop. If worst comes to worst, I can replace things in the gift shop. The museum? Not so much.

Do I get disqualified from the game if I go bankrupt? Today's not a great day to find out.

"I suppose we could go that way," Ten says, raising a wing towards a branch of the facility labelled The Seas. Hycanith, Reginae, and I follow and are immersed in deep blue as we enter the room. The walls are the color of the ocean, and they ripple with light from electronic displays spread across them. A Wailord skeleton hangs over the ceiling, fins spread as if to swim the waters, and below are many displays with all varieties of rare and exotic preserved Pokemon. There are even a few live specimens with their trainers.

I meander through the galleries, more for my Pokemons' benefit than my own. Hycanith keeps pointing things out to Reginae, while Ten is perusing the place at his own leisure. Something finally catches my eye when I reach the back to the exhibit, where two stones lie side by side. The shapes are organic, but this can't be a living Pokemon of any kind...

Dome fossil and Helix fossil replica. Please touch. say the plaques. I run my hand along the bumpy back of the latter. It chills me to the bone to touch it.

"Beautiful, aren't they?" asks an older man with graying hair. "They used to have real fossils, but many of the specimens for these two varieties were stolen during the time of Team Rocket. Funny, they had a particular tendency to take these 'uns..."

I nod. It seems an odd thing to steal (what can you do with a dead Pokemon, anyways...?) but I wouldn't put it past those crooks. The rest of the team catches up with me and Hycanith points me to the next room.

Myths and Legends.

Now this I can get into. The next room is dazzling, with golden artifacts and huge, sweeping displays everywhere. Dozens of ancient cultures peer in at me from every corner, with heroes of old standing by Legendary Pokemon.

I read through the Johto mythos, which says little that I didn't know already, but it's also incredible to see the thousand year old depictions of kitsune and the Burned Tower. The three kitsune who were trapped in the tower and became the legendary beasts (I'll have to ask Suicune about that one), Ho-Oh's rainbow plumage, Lugia stirring the oceans and causing the storms that were said to last for months- it's all here.

I venture over to some of the other regions and begin to read. One display showcases a model of what appears at first to be a huge flower, but the petals are made of glass. As I watch, the flower peels down to reveal a cannon too complex to be anything of that time period, or this world.

The Flower of Death, or Fleur De La Mort, was a massive weapon created by an unknown man who lived several thousand years ago in the region now known as Kalos... originally intended to give life to the dead, it also possessed the power to bring an end to life as we know it.

The illustrations littered around the display, though primitive, depict renditions by artists of the time of the destruction caused by the machine when it did go off. I would argue that life as we know it hasn't exactly ended, but it must've taken centuries to repair from this. There are razed landscapes, levelled forests, and even mountains reduced to little more than hills.

The civilian devestation is the most affecting part of the grim college. Standing in the foreground of the explosion in one picture are a Typhlosion and Ampharos, watching as the world around them is razed by the great torrent of light. I know I'm making things up at this point, but I can't help but see Bronze and Lilly. I wonder where "off the timeline" is anyways... if they're trainers, could they be in another region in their other world?

I didn't ask any follow up questions. At first I was caught up in the moment, and by the time I could formulate any kind of rational thought the moment was over. What I wouldn't give to live that over... well, there's a lot of moments I'd love to live over (either Blackthorn of the gym battles come to mind), but I've learned a lot about second chances.

There's always a catch.

The display goes on to talk about how the war ended and how the man who fired off the weapon disappeared altogether. There's even a stray mention of how the energy created by this weapon was later harnessed by the ancient 'Goldeneyes' (a now thought to be extinct group) to make the first mega stones, relics which have now become legends themselves, but that's around when I decide that most of the information here may be less than accurate.

Not saying I'm not quite the legend, or that I don't feel ancient despite being fifteen (or almost seventeen, depending on what chronology you're on), but they didn't really nail the part about us being extinct.

Instead, I trace my way back to the picture of the Ampharos and the Typhlosion, standing on the verge of annihilation, and run my fingers along them.

"We're about ready to go," Ten tells me, popping into the exhibit. "Minerva's making a show in the History exhibit, we had to restrain her with- nevermind. Are you quite alright?"

"Just thinking about someone." I tell him. "No big deal."

***

Minerva wakes us up fifteen minutes before sunrise the next day, eager to get going. I look around the room to see all the supplies are already arranged on the couch opposite me, swung up into place.

"Well, you didn't think I'd just sit around and wait, did you...?" Minerva asks. She takes a granola bar from my bag in her mouth and drops it onto the bed. "Get ready to go, because I'm not wasting another second."

I pick up the granola bar, peel back the silver wrapper, and take a bite. The grains are almost sickly sweet, but nonetheless they're good nutrition. I slip my sweatshirt on. It's a perfect replica of my old green hoodie I left New Bark with, picked up in an outlet store near Cianwood. I'm feel stupid to admit I feel safer wearing it. "Guess I'm ready, then." I say. "Team?"

Four pairs of curious eyes turn my way and we file out of the hotel and into the streets of Pewter at dawn. The streetlights cast a dim glow over the silver roads and beige sidewalks. People in their early thirties pull up to their jobs in small, sleek cars. The whole city gleams with comforting warmth, and when we exit into the suburbs and the forests beyond that, the chill is noticeable at once.

Pokemon rustle in the darkness. They're kinder company to my team, who are already bracing for their next fight, but the breakneck pace they're keeping and the early wake-up makes me wish we had more time to dawdle in the cities. The forest grows thicker around us, the trees spreading themselves across the sky, and soon we're immersed in near total darkness. The dawn light that shines through the branches is sparse. Fang shivers by my side.

Minerva asks him, "Have you seen anything? I've got to fight something- no better way to wake up in the morning."

Hycanith responds by swinging her bone through the air. It hits a Kakuna in the head and circles back. I check the Pokegear and find she's received a meager five experience points.

"You're not going to get much of a fight here," I sigh. "Sorry, Minerva. If the going's easy, we might be able to cut the journey time in half."

"Wait." Reginae, who has already managed to wander off from the rest of the group, stares down an oak tree. "This isn't right," He turns back to us, his face dappled a dozen shades of green by the canopy overhead.

"What? It's a tree. In a forest." Fang says. "I don't think you can get any more 'right' than that."

"Look at the lines, there." Reginae says.

"Don't all trees have lines?" Minerva asks.

"No, those aren't random lines in the bark, they're purposeful scars. Some predatory Pokemon is defending its territory." Reginae informs Minerva, taking care to crane his neck over so they're level. "This is the type of thing you would know if you were paying attention at the museum instead of trying to get yourself thrown out."

Minerva scoffs, sticking her toothy grin right into Reginae's face. "Better stick close to us, then. If it's any kind of predator, it'll come for you first."