"It's a secret!" He waggled a finger at her as they reached the mouth of a cave, vaguely shaped like a dragon. Not that the formation was uncommon in Meteor Falls, where ancient stones shifted and dragons reigned as kings. "It's a popular spot with the locals."

Still, his eye sparkles with delight as they hike upwards. He's passionate. It's like a hike from his youth, where he and other boys from Rustboro would try to find dragons, only to hitch a ride on a friendly Drampa for a ride home.

It's the expression of someone in their field with few regrets, even if this trip has a purpose beyond a mere hike.

The cave quickly darkened, only to be lit with glittering stones that sparkled like stars in the sky. The sound of running water filled their ears.

"You ever go on hikes, back in college?" She didn't strike him as the type. More of someone who blew up the chemistry lab. "Tons of good spots in Hoenn."

---

Absinthe Blackwood

"Yeah. I have this friend I grew up with back in Rustboro. Had a big thing for dragons." Roy Aker is a distant memory, like dust in the wind. In his place is an organization that despises him and a job that crushes him down. Chemistry is Absinthe's passion, and she practices it freely. "Must've been here a hundred times, just to play as heroes and dragons and go on adventures for buried treasure."

The treasures they found were meaningless. A shiny rock, a chunk of meteorite, commonplace in an environment where the sky bestows treasures openly allows humanity to pluck the leavings from the ground.

As the name implied, meteors fell here. Their leavings mark the walls with the echoes of other worlds.

"I ran a bit, but for me it was working with my hands." Her answer surprised him. He had her pegged as a lab rat, not a person who used exercise to work through their problems. The way she keeps up with him verifies her answer. "Cleared my mind like one of your stimulants."

He frowned. Was it the other way around?

Regardless, they rushing water eventually surrounds them as they reach a cavern with a shrine built into it. Chimes ring in the still cave air, and Dratini slither away into the depths as the duo approached.

"Pretty cool shrine, yeah? Draconids built it, back in the day. When the world was young and they prayed to their sky god to protect them."

He walks not towards it, but past it.

---

Absinthe Blackwood
CONTEXT

Old stone. Old wood. All perfectly preserved by the mantle of mankind in the hope that next generation will do the same. Then the next, then the next, then the next in a paradox spiral that continues into infinity.

There was a comforting feeling, Howard thought, in knowing that if his work was relevant enough, people would preserve it long after he was gone. An echo into millennia, long after the flesh had curdled and died and bones had turned into dust. Yet despite that, memories remained.

It seemed unfair to think that, when the woman besides him held tattered records of her own past.

"You still can." He smiled at her, a sly expression hid under the rim of his hat. "We can sit here for a while once we finish here."

Once he and Absinthe finished the task here. It wasn't required, but the admin liked to check on the treasure that lay dormant beneath the tranquil waters.

"You wanted that story, right? Here's a piece of it. There's a statue down there, left here by people even older than the Draconids. I can access it. It's not as scary as your baseball bat, but..." His voice trailed off, thoughtful and musing as he regarded the chemist. He unclipped the Pokeball and tossed it up and down. "...you'll see.

The ball clicked open, and everything froze as a colossal titan rose up like a slumbering mountain. Seven dots flashed in alien patterns, cutting through the hailstorm like a knife. In its center, a large violet mass puled through the automaton's Clear Body.

"This, my lovely chemist..." The admin's voice carried well over the snowstorm. "...is Regice."

---

Absinthe Blackwood

Thing. What a simple word. Vague. Everything was a thing. Everyone was a thing. There was little in this world that could not be quantified as a thing. Regice was, by all definitions, a thing.

Howard had thought as Absinthe had when he had been entrusted with this icebound construct. It was a tool. An artifact meant to be studied, a tool whose abilities were meant to further Team Rocket's aims and little more. It was a remnant of an era that had long since vanished from this world, and its creators along with it.

Yet it was so much more. It was a weapon that mankind would use to fell a god, something that would slip between Eternatus's ribs like a dagger and twist until the dragon fell to the ground, dead.

"Yeah. It won't be super elegant, but I lost Crumble's Pokeball behind the couch this morning. Couldn't get it out." It's hard to tell if the admin is joking. Those who know him better recognize him as a klutz. Those who know him differently recognize that the archaeologist often lies. This time, however, it is the truth. "So we'll improvise."

From the golem's raw power, 'improvise' translates to 'bringing a sledgehammer to bash in a carpentry nail'.

The water freezes immediately, the Dratini within swimming away to avoid the ensuing ice. A flash of the reddish-purple energy that Absinthe is now familiar with shatters the ice as it freezes, creating a path down to a strange effigy beneath the waves.

"You have no idea how this thing has vexed me over the past year." A deep sigh. He hops down into the lakebed and gestures for Absinthe to follow. "Come."

His face threatened to crust with ice as he gestured again. The cold didn't bother him. Not anymore.

It's like one of her memories. What harm can it cause if he hardly felt it?

---

Absinthe Blackwood

"Better me than another. There are people in Team Rocket that exist to further their own ends. Most of them, to be fair. Regice is wasted on me. Another might use it better to kill people and level entire cities, but when I use it, it's a minor annoyance."

It was not fully true. Regice had annihilated Dewford on its own before two avatars had stopped it with Howard's help. Its raw power was second to none. It oozed strength, especially when Dynamaxed. Howard used it well, but he also used it sparingly.

That was the weakness.

"It beat Eternatus. Stopped it from destroying the region, at least. It and four others. I'd like to see them unified. Together, they'll give it a solid fight. The records make me suspect that if they all work together, it will fall."

It's a desperate hope, but it's one that he prays to like a desperate mantra. What person would create such a work of art if it could not fell a god? The chemist is more logical. Her answer was likely to be less romantic and more practical. It was an answer the admin didn't want to hear.

Instead, he crossed over to effigy. He hadn't checked on it for a hot minute, but it lay dormant. He touched it and closed his eye. Regice followed suit, acting in synchronization with its trainer.

"Absinthe." His voice was quiet as he felt a flicker in the statue. "You know that feeling of creeping affection, when you know you shouldn't like something, but you eventually realize that you can't live without it?"

---

Absinthe Blackwood

The little people would win. They would all win.

There were those in this world who were not blessed with divine power or providence. There were people who simply lived their lives as Hoenn burned itself to ash. It was not right for gods to infringe upon this land of mortals and hail themselves as the true authority in the land.

"If I die, I die. As long as ordinary people keep living, it's worth it."

Yet who what were people to avatars? Men to deities? Kings to gods?

There was no part of this world that existed for humanity. It needed to be saved and Eternatus needed to die. Once Eternatus was dead, Howard's part in this war was over. There was nothing else for him to do. The great evil would be purged, and humanity could continue its scuffle.

Absinthe and others would simply need to fend for themselves, but they would not be crushed under the feet of gods that did not see them.

"How romantic." His voice is casual, yet it is clear that the admin is distracted as the statue lies dormant. It does not activate, nor does it resonate with power. "It's similar for me and Regice. When I got it, I didn't care. Now, I find myself needing it more and more."

To compete with people like Jayden or Barnaby or Fern or any of the other great trainers in Rocket. To evenly match any great threat that dared to besiege this world. Normal Pokémon were not enough. His Aerodactyl was not enough. He needed engines of war.

"I still don't know if I care about it. I should. It is my obligation to do so, but I just can't."

A vision of a world with unending land struck the admin's gaze. Not a drop of water in sight, not a hint of anything that can challenge a world where Groudon retained mastery over the land. This statue's golem was not in Hoenn.

Not this Hoenn.

Howard opened his eye. Regice's pattern flashed.

"Good." He turned to her. "It's still there."

---

Absinthe Blackwood