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[attr="class","skullbody"]There was nothing left for Isaac here. Any nostalgia he once felt in this situation had twisted and decayed away, just as the floristry itself had. At best, it was a reminder of a life that he'd once been a part of and could now never see again. At worst, it was proof that Team Rocket had literally become a blight upon the Hoenn region.[break][break]

There was nothing left for Isaac here. He'd already come to terms with that fact. And yet.[break][break]

In Isaac's conscious, waking mind, he'd put the Floristry behind him. However, in the darkness of his dreamscape, thoughts better left repressed had a way of following him. The cheek that Elisabeth Fiorelli had touched burned as painfully as the grudges that she had left in her wake. The first night, it was easy enough to dismiss. The second, it had been mildly irritating. By the end of the week, Isaac had turned away his Musharna's assistance, hoping that his own trauma would drown out the hateful whispers.[break][break]

When even that fog was broken through, Isaac knew it was time for a change of tactic.[break][break]

The Floristry was even more of a mess than it had been was the day Isaac had found it. The skeletal construction of the floristry continued to crack under its own weight, ribs shattered and spine sagging. The carpet of red, black, and orange continued to fester, smothering out any suggestion of green that may have once been present. Even the yellow dahlia that had once been left behind was now little more than a brown, dusty fossil of its former self.[break][break]

Surprisingly, Isaac wasn't alone. A man stood amongst the wreckage, his Maushold putting in admirable work as they tried to Tidy Up the place. Isaac's immediate thought was that it was futile. Even if they could pick up some litter, rot would overwhelm the space that had been left behind. Even if they somehow cancelled out some of the decay, Lis would surely return just to make it worse out of spite.[break][break]

"Don't bother. Figure it'll be 100 years before anything can grow here again."

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[attr="class","skullbody"]"Isaac," he said, giving the man's hand a shake. The grudges that the sight of this cottage stirred up in the back of his mind whispered for him to crush the man's hand, but he held their desires at bay. Stupid grudges. "I'd say it's good to meet you. But it's a shame it's under these circumstances."[break][break]

The man asked Isaac why he visited graves. It was as if Isaac hadn't tended to his beloved Aggron's weekly by this point. As if he wasn't already pre-emptively mourning the friends that Rocket would kill one way or another, either in body, heart, or spirit. As if his entire life, up until the past year, hadn't been that of a wandering ghost.[break][break]

"Lots of reasons," he said, casting a baleful eye over the ruins of the cottage. "To remember the better times. To pine for the ones they never got to share. To make sure, now that we know there's an afterlife, they'll be taken care of on the other side. To think about life, the universe, and everything in front of the only person they can be honest with."[break][break]

"A grave's a grave, though. This right here? This is a carcass."

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[attr="class","skullbody"]"I like that one. It's honest." Was it the fact that Elisabeth Fiorelli no longer ran a flower shop that Isaac was upset about? Fuck no. Was it the fact that ana fell was a big girl and could make her own choices? Of course not. It was the sudden, jarring loss of a life that he couldn't wait to begin when the shadow of war was finally purged from Hoenn. The symbol of what he was fighting for was now a twitching, cancer-ridden mess, festering worse and worse by the day.[break][break]

Kiryu's death, too, had been that painful mixture. The pain of seeing a loved one in agony, mixed with the knowledge that a part of himself had followed her to the grave. After half a year's worth of grieving and growing, he'd managed to heal. The best she could hope for was eternal, well-deserved rest.[break][break]

"It was. But you're not the one upsetting me." Isaac didn't care who poked around these ruins. After all, it was as he said. This wasn't a grave site, looted by tomb raiders and immaculately maintained. This was a carcass, put on display as a mockery of something that had once been loved. To meddle with this place wasn't to desecrate it. That part was already long finished.[break][break]

"I'd rather listen to your story. What brings you here?"

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[attr="class","skullbody"]The scars of urban decay had been separated from their natural counterparts. Isaac had to hand it to the Maushold. They were damn good at what they did. However, it felt like trying to fix a detonated building by painting the rubble. Would it amount to anything in the end?[break][break]

Callan asked if Isaac was upset because of who had done this. Was that the case? Was he angry at what she'd done? Or was he angry at what she'd become? Frankly, Isaac wasn't sure. All he knew was that his anger at either paled in comparison to what she represented. "It's complicated," he admitted. "But that's about the long and short of it."[break][break]

Was he close to Elisabeth? Isaac would've liked to have thought that he knew her, but she took great pleasure in disabusing him of that notion. "Not as well as I would've liked," he admitted, a touch of bitterness underlining his voice. "She's . . . a friend of a friend, let's say."[break][break]

To say that was beyond understatement. She was the goddess that lit up his beloved ana fell's life. If she said jump, Cygne wouldn't even need to ask how high. If she blazed a trail, Cygne would follow before even checking where it lead. If she was to burn down her old life and start a new, crueler one in its place?[break][break]

Well, now Isaac knew how quickly she'd provide the chemicals.[break][break]

For a while, he kept quiet, surveying the desolate landscape. His innermost thoughts swirled like a maelstrom, but their tempest failed to even ruffle the veil that his face had become. Nonetheless, the energy coming off of him was palpable. It only started to shift as his mind wandered to Callan's own reasons for being here.[break][break]

"You said something about a Gracedia earlier? Today might be your lucky day, then."

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[attr="class","skullbody"]Callan opted not to ask more. For a second, Isaac was worried that he'd gotten the wrong idea. Sighing, he shook his head. "Ugh, I'm sorry. It's not you," he said. "I just . . . some things are better off forgotten, you know?"[break][break]

It was probably a bad idea for Isaac to even come here in the first place. However, despite making peace with the fact that what this land represented was dead and buried, he found himself drawn back like a moth to flame. Perhaps that, too, was the nature of grief. There were days where it was easy to say that he was leaving the past behind. There were days where old pains flared up as if they were fresh and new. Being fully healed took more than willpower. It was a process, and one that rushing would only hurt more.[break][break]

Luckily, the past wasn't simply an old scar to be forgotten. It was also a record to learn from. Were it not for what Isaac had learned here, his own Gracedia would have never bloomed so beautifully. Now he could take that knowledge and pass it onwards.[break][break]

"My own Gracedia's growing not too far from here," Isaac said. "I've been tending to the land around it for the last few months now, and it should be ready to bloom soon. I'm no expert or anything, but I can at least show you how its coming along."[break][break]

For the first time since this conversation started, Isaac was smiling.

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[attr="class","skullbody"]Was there a secret? Frankly, Isaac wasn't sure. He didn't do anything particularly differently. At the same time, he'd done everything and anything he could think of in order to help the flower grow.[break][break]

"It's the weirdest thing," Isaac said, shrugging. "I'd taken someone close to me to try and find the perfect spot. But we never actually got around to planting the seed. She . . . fell back into some bad memories, and we left before exploring much deeper. I kinda figured that was that."[break][break]

"Imagine my surprise when I come back and see a little sprout blooming."[break][break]

Perhaps Eris Halla had been the right person to take to the Petalburg Woods after all, despite his initial guilt at doing so. Perhaps it was their gratitude in having each other's back that had given the seed the first push it needed to start growing.[break][break]

"Seed must've fallen out of my pocket when we were leaving," Isaac figured with a shrug. "Far from the perfect spot I was looking for. But, hey, if it grows, it grows, right? So I tended to the plant best I could. And that included tending to the spot around it. The land. The other plants. Any Pokemon passing through."[break][break]

Far from the wasteland that Isaac and Callan were walking away from, the land he lead Callan towards was an idyllic and fertile grove. The Gracedia that had once been its centerpiece was long gone, but already the shoots of new, more local plants were starting to pop up in its face. The trees were lush and full, fruits and flowers scattered about their surface. The grasses were a thick, elegant carpet. Wild Pokemon passed through without a care in the world, all too happy to consider the grove part of their own territory. Even now, the sweet aromas from Springtide Storms past lingered in the air, pink wisps drifting through the branches.[break][break]

"Guess I'm grateful for the fact that even someone like me can make an impact."

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[attr="class","skullbody"]Isaac froze. For a man that had seemed so lost and listless earlier, Callan's wisdom now was staggering. Just who was supposed to be leading who, here?[break][break]

It was so true, though. To so many people, were black and white. Either they were good all the time, or they were rotten to the core. The former either disappointed or used their sway to get away with murder. The latter were scorned and shunned no matter how hard they tried to change, or embraced the role that society had forced onto them.[break][break]

In either case, there was no growth. There was no change. Only slow death inside of a sterile box.[break][break]

Melody Miro may have no longer been Callan's friend, but she would always be his hero. "She's been under a lot of stress lately," Isaac pointed out, surprised at how quickly he jumped to the defense of a person he had so many misgivings about. "Probably. I mean, wouldn't anyone where she's at?"[break][break]

The thankless job of propagandist for an organization hellbent on shooting itself in the foot. A member of the region's Elite 4. The pressure of celebrity, thrust onto her by a mother willing to torture her into perfection. That was stressful enough in the best of times, and with the shadow of a cosmically major win for Rocket hanging over the region?[break][break]

"Maybe you two should talk. Just 'cause things aren't great between you now, it doesn't mean they always have to be."[break][break]

Maybe he should apologize to her, too. But something told him she wouldn't to see hide or hair of him as things were now.[break][break]

But Callan's takeaway here wasn't himself. It was that Isaac's kindness had already made an impact, no matter what he thought about himself. "Thank you," was all he could manage to say, thousands of layers of mixed emotions tucked between just two soft words. "I try my best. And that's the best any of us can do, isn't it?"[break][break]

He didn't try alone, either. Zephyrus the Dragonite flew overhead, another Springtide Storm following in his wake to keep the grove rejuvenated. Regulus the Ceruledge used his burning blades to slice down a dying tree and reduce it to nutrient rich ash. Sectonia the Vespiquen guided the bugs of the forest towards the most fitting trees for feeding and habitation. Alone, Isaac could never do this. Surrounded by his Pokemon, some of which had outright started dwelling here, he'd moved mountains.[break][break]

Maybe the world would be a better place if everyone decided to just try.

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