Well. That was comedically unhelpful. June sighed, “It does matter, though. If it flips the speed game, then we can be proactive in dealing with it.”

Was Annalise upset about… That? In the Giant Chasm? Or was it about her old boyfriend? June had those moments, with her own thing. Every once in a while the memory or pain of it was a little stronger than normal, and it sapped the life out of her bones like a Xurkitree (stupid name, honestly) the electricity of a power plant. Entirely understandable.

Or was it a third, more mysterious thing? Regardless, might be best to leave her alone about it.

“I’ll write it down as a ‘maybe’ and we can figure it out along the way,” June put a question mark next to the move in her notebook. “My gut’s telling me it’s at least worth a shot.”

She stretched her arms and leaned back. That way, she could take a peek outside, past the dusty blue tarp. In the distance, she saw the start of a strong storm. Lighting rained down like, well, rain. A distant Power Plant, roughly the size of her thumb, withstood the cascade excellently.

“Say, didn’t you tell me you fought it a while back? What did you guys use then, to deal with it?”

Long shot, because she also thought she remembered Annalise saying they ate shit, but anything was better than nothing. Just need to get a leg up, any leg at all, and they’d be in the clear. “Oh, I saw this one move, Soak, can change a Pokémon’s type to Water. Think there’s anything big enough to use that on it?”

---

annalise henderson

June flinched back as soon as Annalise raised her voice. The sudden movement rocked her water bottle, which tumbled off the small platform and rolled just out of reach. She tried to reach for it as Annalise dug into her, but the sudden flare of pain in her side stopped her in her tracks. Guess she had to settle for her rough, worn-down fingernails for any sense of comfort.

So it was about the Giant Chasm plus the third, more mysterious thing.

“Look, I’ll be the first to admit our first attempt was, well, not exactly good,” she kept her eyes firmly down on her notebook, with its scribbles and incoherent ramblings. “And, well the fight at that hole in the ground wasn’t our best either.”

That was putting it lightly. She still felt guilty of that particular mess (as much as she could for a surprise attack caused by Rocket, anyway). “But those were just… bad timing. Yea. As long as we prepare for the next fight, we’ll stand a chance.”

“See, look,” she turned her notebook around before Annalise could get another word out. There were some side-doodles, notably of a very fucked-up representation of a Mega-Garchomp and a big Regieleki with a frowny face where its dots should’ve been. She pointed to it with the chewed end of her pencil, “Ground is immune to Electric moves. So if we throw enough of those at it, and hit it hard enough, we should be fine. Plus, if we can inhibit its moves or power some other way, even better.”

She’d done her homework this time around. As much time as she could force herself to stare down into the book that made her yawn or staring at strategy wikis was put into this. And even if it wasn’t amazing, she had time to improve upon it. There wouldn't be a second monumental disaster. There couldn't be. 

“Besides, I made a promise to D–... someone very important to me,” her mouth dipped slightly, and her voice softer. “I-I-I have to do this. I need to."

---

annalise henderson

“You think I don’t know that?”

June’s eyes slowly came up, to meet Annalise’s own. Even if hers held guilt and regret, they were no less intense than the Head Ranger’s own. It was these emotions that kept her silent during Annalise’s own explosion, but they would not keep her silent forever. It wasn't in her system to do so.

“I fucked up, okay? Is that what you want?” She pushed herself out of the chair, careful to not twist too hard. For naught, as pain shot up her side. Her teeth gritted, but she kept on. “Not a day’s gone by where I haven’t thought about how fucking awful that was. How reckless I was.”

No matter how many times she tried to convince herself, the thought of ‘that one guy was going to try and kill you anyway’ was more of an excuse than a reason for her actions. Hindsight was twenty-twenty.

“I’m sorry.”

“But don’t think for a single damn second that I was going to let you die,” she stuck her finger into the Ranger’s chest, “because I’d rather die myself than let someone I care even remotely about die because of what I did.”

“Besides,” she limped past Annalise, to the edge of their safe zone. To the edge of the storm. Lightning crackled down from the sky, relentless. It raged against the poor, poor ground for daring to exist in the same realm as it. For all it's sins. But it takes the brunt of the force without a single hint of defiance. It knows its place.

Yet the rocky peaks reached for ever more.

“My promise…” a deep, heavy, tired, exhausted, depressed, sad sigh came out. She could do this. “My half of the promise died two years back.”

---

annalise henderson

If Annalise could confide in her about her boyfriend and her personal struggles, then it was only right for June to do the same. Even if they weren’t on the same level, it wasn’t a competition. Grief was grief, and pain was pain. She deserved to know the real reason why she wanted to push through danger and death for some lofty, impossible goal.

Especially if it put Annalise through the wringer too. But where to start?

“Y’know how kids say stupid shit? Just make stuff up?” She crossed her arms gingerly. “I did it all the time. Like how I’d make a car go a million kilometers a second, or fly into space, or make a machine that’d clean the house. Never did it, but my… my Dad loved it, I guess. Thought it was cute. And it made him happy, so I just kept on doing it.”

“But one day, I said I’d catch the fastest Pokémon alive. That was before I even got my first, but he latched on to it? I guess? Always kept bringing it up, even when I grew out of that phase. Always asking me how the ‘search was going’ or ‘if I’d seen something faster than a Ninjask yet’. Hell, I think he said something about it at my graduation.”

“But then he– he…” A deep breath, calm and steady against the storm. The sky exploded from thousands of streaks of lightning. Despite the massive stimulus in front of her, June’s mind had never been more razor-sharp focused than before, yet for all the wrong reasons. It only took a short lull in the chaos for her to find the strength. To push it past the lump in her throat.

“He died.”

The words were as alien to her as the world they stood in, and the lightning was infinitely quieter. Charged air nipped at her skin, and her nerves shivered against the cold. It bounced uselessly against her. Was this how the rock felt? Alone against the torrent of inescapable power?

"Funny," she smiled sadly into the distance, "how I thought it was so, stupid. Childish. Yet I'm... here."

---

annalise henderson

“Not like you knew,” she said with a lump in her throat. “Not like I share this with… anyone, really.”

“I-I just…” June stopped the words before they became something incoherent, a mix between a confession and sob. She afforded herself one solid sigh, a moment, before she continued her explanation. “I don’t know what else to do.”

“Remember how you talked about moving on, our second time here? How we haven’t figured it out?” She focused on the light fingertips on her shoulder, unsure of if she should pull away or lean in. “I can’t do it, Annalise. I don’t know if it’s just because he’s gone, or because he cared about it a lot, or whatever. The last thing I want is to be stuck in the past. It hurts– you know how it is.”

The past wasn’t meant to be lived in. From those who stare out the window and reminisce to the ones nailed down by some traumatic event, they were trapped in a hell few could relate to. Even worse was when they were left behind as well, stranded in a time long gone. June had been stranded by her father’s killer, and Annalise by Rocket itself.

All they had were those stuck there with them.

“It’s why my half of it is gone. Probably longer than two years, now that I think about it. But… my ability to show it to him did. It’s weird, I don’t know.”

“And it’s why I have to keep going,” she concluded. Nothing made sense, but it didn’t need to. It just had to work. “If you don’t want to help me, then… I understand. It’s dangerous. You know it as well as I do. Hell, if you don’t want to work with me at all, then so be it. But I promise you, with all my being– I won’t let you get hurt by my actions again. Not now, not ever.”

---

annalise henderson

“I…”

June could never promise that. She knew it, and maybe Annalise knew it too. Whether because of their line of work, the task at hand, or the unpredictability that was Hoenn– her safety was never guaranteed. Neither of their safeties were. So why did Annalise say she’d be fine no matter what?

Maybe that was the trust speaking. To make the other feel less anxious. It’s all she could guess, and she’d just have to live with the little white lie. The other option was to ignore it, but she’d rather actually die than lose one of the few people that knew what it was like to be stuck in the past. In a way, they both propped each other up. If one fell, so might the other.

“I’ll do my best. It’s all I can promise.”

And when the ranger said she’d stick along, some weight left her shoulders and she slumped back into Annalise’s hug. She came in here expecting this to be the last time they ever hung out together. "And... thanks. Seriously."

It was nice to be wrong sometimes. Like how Annalise was wrong about the storm being near the end.

For about ten seconds, sure, the crackle of lighting left the immediate area, and electricity ceased its horrid torrent. Yet there were a few oddities left behind. Like the electrical static that lingered well after the lightning ceased. It arced between rocks and cables to form a mesh of yellow power. But that didn’t get her to open her lips in surprise, in absolute shock (no pun intended).

No, it’s when a yellow orb, familiar but massively shrunk down, showed up to the scene. It flew across the area, like an electron, from one point of interest to another. Faster than light, and faster than sound.

Regieleki. June’s legs shifted forward, but stopped themselves. Annalise’s grip was one reason, and their conversation was another. But it was mostly the serenity of the scene that kept her in check. How strangely naturalistic, to see it act like a normal Pokémon. Curious. Intelligent. On the hunt for something. “Annalise… don't freak out. But... it's here.”

---

annalise henderson