Depression was beginning to set in as Josh gently rode Janus across his Gym's concourse. Even after one month of rehab, his doctors had not authorized him to ride his big cat Pokémon. He could not lead his Pyroar brigade on Ranger rescues. He couldn't give Blitz the full appreciation the Shiny Luxray deserved. Most crushingly of all, he could not live his childhood dream.

He had the means to, but lacked the strength to.

As Josh felt his phone vibrate in his pocket, he gently tugged on the Espeon's reins. "Can you stop for a bit?" the Champion asked, his psychic steed obliging as Aleph the Type: Null ran ahead of them. Looking at his Caller ID, it was one of his best friends. "Hey, Zachary, what's up?" he asked, sounding slightly blue.

Josh nodded; he knew what his friend was talking about, just from his tone. It was traumatic, senseless, and led to Josh showing a violent side he thought he had long cast behind. "Mauville Hills is actually an apartment park on the north side of town. But if you want to meet north of my Gym in the foothills, I can. Where are you at?"

Once he had clarity on where Zachary was waiting for him, Josh would arrive astride his Espeon, Aleph the Type: Null bounding behind them. The first sign the psychic specialist would see of his entrance would be the glint of a RAINBOW FEATHER. The second, his psychic steed. The third, a friendly wave.

"Hey, Zachary. You sounded pretty serious. What's going on?" he inquired, wondering what was so secretive. He suspected it was just a vent about their Ultra Space detention, but it could have been something unrelated.

It was about their imprisonment, as Josh thought it might be. "I can't say I'm okay. Alive, yes. Okay, no," he sighed as he plucked the RAINBOW FEATHER from its pinned spot on his shirt. "The labor wasn't the most painful part, nor the beatings those three Pokémon inflicted upon me. It's been... being unable to do what I enjoy most." The Gym Leader rolled up his sleeve and revealed the bandages covering his left arm. "It doesn't hurt as badly as it did when I was in the hospital, but I still can't race like I once did. And being denied the chance to do that while I'm going through rehab... Zachary, that's what hurts me the most. I'm gonna be out for the rest of the racing season."

Holding the RAINBOW FEATHER's quill, the Gym Leader drew the Sign. From the ashes formed a monochrome Beast that was the embodiment of speed itself.



"Since I was a child, it was my dream to meet, befriend, and ride this Pokémon. And now, he's my friend... and I can't do that. And this leads into how I'm coping. It might help you, too. While I'm still in rehab... I'm going to start over. I'm going to have to relearn how to ride and race Pokémon from the ground up. And that's starting with keeping proper posture while your mount is standing still or walking. The very basics of the basics."

Zachary's rhetoric was something he had heard from many of his close friends. From Navy . From Andrea Vaneau . From many others. Josh, too, had a Pokémon healing him constantly while he was in the hospital. His Togekiss, Mastema, worked himself to exhaustion trying to keep his trainer as comfortable as possible. Even so, his injuries were just that severe. They had healed up over the course of weeks of care. Now, he had to relearn how to use his arm without straining it too much, which would be an even longer process than the physical recovery itself. Josh nuzzled and cuddled with Nyx out of comfort if the Hoothood allowed it.

Zachary was right. There was much more a Pokémon could do than serve as a steed. Pokémon were guardians. Friends. Sources of support for when their trainer needed it. They were partners, unified by a single, identical goal.

Swift purred loudly, Zachary perhaps able to feel bass-like vibrations moving outward from the monochrome feline. "He was... a parting gift from kyle lopez ," Josh answered, frowning when his friend expressed concerns about keeping the Beast a secret. "I only kept it a secret from you because I wanted to keep him under wraps until the war started. He was to be deployed as a secret weapon against Rocket. As you may have seen in Ultra Space, though. I was forced to use him early... and you know how information about a legendary Pokémon spreads."

The Raikou mirrored Josh's friendliness, the big cat sitting down and shifting his eyes among all of Zachary's Pokémon. He didn't look overly proud or haughty like a god would. He seemed to behave just like any of Josh's other Pokémon -- quite unusual for a noble and legendary creature like a Raikou!

"I learned that the hard way," Josh replied, the Beast stepping next to Janus and lowering his head to him so that the two could nuzzle one another. It may have been strange to see a legendary Pokémon behave in such a way, and may have tipped Zachary off that the Raikou was a construct -- an ashen memory, not a real Pokémon. Whatever emotional state Josh was in was mirrored in the Raikou. Swift was not the Raikou that died in the war. No, Swift was the Raikou that Josh imagined -- no, desired -- him to be: one of the friendliest gods imaginable among friends, yet one of the most savage when dealing with enemies.

He highly doubted a real god would let him saddle up on a whim, as much as he wanted to gallop, swim, and soar atop as many different legendary Pokémon as he could.

The presence of the Raikou paradox warmed Josh's heart. It seemed Zachary had love for Raikou, too, given how far he would have had to go out of his way to capture the Raging Bolt. "So you, too, have a Hoennian Raikou," Josh replied, referring to the Raging Bolt that way as he was unaware of the name the League had settled on, if any. "He's the spitting image of my own." All of a sudden, Aleph became aggressive around the Raging Bolt, as though he had found a worthy opponent to spar...

Unlike Zachary, Josh wasn't able to see through the psychic specialist's faked emotions. Thinking he was genuine, the Gym Leader upped the ante a bit. "I tell you what. When I'm feeling better in the fall, how about I take you across Hoenn's eastern half? The big loop from 118 to 123 and back to Mauville. On Swift's back." Josh reached toward the craning Raging Bolt and gave the paradox Pokémon a gentle scratch behind the ears if allowed. "I bet Hermes would have fun tethering to him and surfing, too."

The Gym Leader felt that Zachary would start begging if his wish wasn't granted, and didn't want to waste any of either of their time. "Just be careful with him, and don't complain if you feel a bunch of static." Were he to give the Beast a pet, he would get feedback: powerful vibrations coursing through him as Swift purred loudly.

In the meantime, the Type: Null demanded attention. He flashed his CRUSH CLAW toward Broly, as to challenge the Raging Bolt to a duel.

Josh guffawed at the idea of a race. "Against Swift? You know you're competing against the fastest land Pokémon in the world, right? I'm not going to stop you; I just wanted to set the expectation that it might not be a fair race." As much as he wished he could do that now, he couldn't. Not with his arm still banged up. "It'll be something to look forward to. They expect me to be done with rehab in November. Let's see if we can find a mild day then," he compromised with Zachary.

As he pet the Raging Bolt, Josh's hair stood on end from absorbing the electric paradox's vibrations. "It's the same feel as Swift purring... they really are regional variants of Raikou, aren't they..." he mused, still believing that the Raging Bolt was a 'Hoennian Raikou'.

Turning his head, he saw the Type: Null gearing for battle, the CRUSH CLAW gleaming in the sun. "Aleph, I know you want to battle, but not here!" Josh protested, the normal-type legendary backing down reluctantly. "Sorry... Aleph can get a little battle manic," the Champion apologized. "I'm still trying to understand him." Even after almost a year, they still didn't truly communicate using the same language...