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Several things seemed to happen at once:[break][break]
But through it all, subtly at first, the wind picked up. Lashing across the ground and pushing at the ocean. No more than what might have felt like a gentle
TAILWIND.[break][break]
The
FRENZY PLANT that ripped up the ground beneath them choked on frost. Green tendrils halted and locked into place as they froze up. The gap between all of them shrank, driven to closer quarters by Peaches’ fury and protectiveness. More of those silver feathers whizzed by them, steered off course–whether by the wind or because of the beast’s unsteady hand, he wasn’t sure. It didn’t matter.[break][break]
Neon shouted, and though his Psyduck followed through with her cerebral
ZEN HEADBUTT, it stopped the gym leader short.[break][break]
Remember, lam! You did this. You deserve this.[break][break]
The words sunk in deeper than the cut of the silver knife that had whistled through the air. What was his fault? He didn’t know, and he did know. The answer: nothing was, but everything was. A matter of perspective.[break][break]
Artie swiveled from one opponent to the other. The more pressing threat of the fearow bore down on him. As
mint frost’s tangrowth sought to aid the situation, however, the decidueye found that he could make use of the flux of
GRASSY TERRAIN just as well. Empowered by the flourish, he leapt back with a flap of his wings as the
AERIAL ACE slashed outward at him.[break][break]
With a
LONG REACH in his feathered grip, light coagulated into a dense, sharp
SOLAR BLADE that crossed with the attack in a tumultuous parry against the fearow.[break][break]
Though distracted by the onslaught, Artichoke’s large, amber eyes caught movement in his periphery. A loud
HOOT attempted to snap Lam from the distraction of Neon’s words.[break][break]
He blinked, frown still evident on his face, as his eyes turned up toward
mint frost.
“Wh–”[break][break]
It was the wrong direction to have looked.[break][break]
In the next breath, before he could even finish his question, he felt the impact of a full, heavy body crashing into him at full tilt. He felt the impact, the hollowing sensation in his stomach and chest cavity as all of the air was pushed up and out of his lungs. The world became a blur of color. Gray sky mixing with ocean blue. That blur of dark green turning into a streak above him.[break][break]
Green.[break][break]
His mind spun–world shook up like marbles in a jar. Or the flakes in a snowglobe, not allowed to settle.[break][break]
Where was Peaches?[break][break]
He grappled with the Rocket who had knocked into him, trying to push away from the weight.
His fault.[break][break]
All that green.[break][break]
It clattered around in his head, noisy. Deafening.
His fault.[break][break]
Of course it was. That day in the deep sea. Ginger eviscerated by
Alexandra Briarwood’s shadowed gardevoir. His broken arm on the deck of a ship around Mirage Island.
Ikarus Rook’s distress at seeing him injured, his anger at Lam’s need to charge into this. Then the burns on his arms as he pushed Lam out of harm’s way in the shadow of Kyurem, in the cold and the storm. All of it, all that weight on his shoulders. All that responsibility–
his fault.[break][break]
That night on Mt. Chimney.
Green in a colorless world. A budding promise of spring in the white of winter and black remnants of a wildfire.[break][break]
“Why are you doing this?” he asked, voice low and wheezy as he struggled to free himself from the tangle of limbs that he and
raphael dos plumas had become. It was as simple as
why did you tackle me and as difficult as
what are you fighting for? why this hill? There was no distinction.
A matter of perspective.[break][break]
The deep cut on his arm sang with heat. That sort of wet, fiery pain that told you it was still weeping. A thick and heavy ooze. It made his fingers cold, but they still starfished–
open, closed. Fruitlessly reaching for the card up his sleeve, that
magical leaf tucked in his pocket.[break][break]
It would be his fault, if he couldn’t reach it. This descent on Mossdeep an impossible weight to carry. Irrational, and still Neon’s words rattled again between his ears. Then the words of
MATIAS SILPH in the aftermath groudon’s rampage. Virizion a streak of green as it paraded itself around its chosen sword-bearers as he wondered if he was truly a suitable person for the task.[break][break]
“ I think, lam, that you wear your insecurities on your sleeves, and that's what's clouding your judgment."[break][break]
His fault, not his fault. Two fold.[break][break]
But before he could reach the summoning piece, more green descended from the sky.
Different.[break][break]
Its judgment dropped like a hammer against
mint frost. Against
raphael dos plumas. Their Pokémon.[break][break]
In a whirl of wind and cloud, Tornadus descended. Arms unfurling from the tight twist bound at its chest to extend outward in summons. The weather folded to its will, a cold and harsh
BLEAKWIND STORM to separate the snare of people and Pokémon.[break][break]
A frigid and desperate sensation as angry gales rippled through fur and hair and clothes. Cutting through to bone and soul.[break][break]
Lam turned his eyes up to it as it watched him with an evaluating eye. Would this be his fault, too?
[break]
