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As soon as their feet touch down on Sootopolis soil, they are recalling their Roaring Moon, and they are running. The gift of their patron allows Fern to cover the terrain at breathtaking speed. The lightning fire of synapses coming from within them and dancing along their heels in little sparks.[break][break]

"Find Cillian Quinn," they tell Tapu Koko as it hovers over their shoulder. "Follow Lugia's lead for now." It blinks at them curiously, almost as though it might refuse - and then heeds the request. The guardian spins through the air and then takes off toward the sound of Kyogre's bellows.[break][break]

But they do not go with their patron. They do not follow it into the din and rubble of the city at its breaking point.[break][break]

No, selfish as they are...The Charlatan goes home.[break][break]

This place they've carved out for themself alongside jayden cross. Their corner of the world, a respite from everything else. It's easy to feel regret now for allowing their bad feelings to simmer there in the past months. To let it swallow up the warmth they associate with the building. With the other person who lives within.[break][break]

And it is there that they hope to find him when coordinates on his location didn't follow their request.[break][break]

From the yard, they can see the water rising. It hasn't reached this level of the tiered slopes of the city. Not yet, anyway. And all they can do is hope that it stops before everything becomes submerged in the murky ocean.[break][break]

"Jayden?" They burst through the door with crisp efficiency, but it is their dragapult who greets them. Fern passes a hand over the flat expanse of Cecilia's head, quietly praising her for standing guard while the rest are out there attempting to batter back Kyogre. Or get the hell out of dodge. Or descend upon the tree. Or maybe all three back to back.[break][break]

They step away and leave her to it - knowing that if the water rises too high, she will escape and find them later. Fern trusts this. Knows it intuitively.[break][break]

So when they step away to look through the doorway again, it is to see a city descending into chaos. The feeling is thrilling. At a distance, they see a familiar peal of THUNDER and know that the pulse of electricity comes from Tapu Koko as it aids Lugia in attempting to push back against the rage of the Kyogre.[break][break]

And they know that they will be unable to linger long. But they still wait, just over the threshold of the home they've built. Just to see a face they wish they hadn't been so cold toward in the last few days.[break][break]

Just in case.[break][break]

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Out of the corner of their eye, Fern saw a blur of orange and yellow plumage whiz past. Tendrils of electricity trailed in its wake, and they felt confident that this was the doing of their own darker Tapu Koko. There was little time to waste, then–[break][break]
Momentum propelled the man backward into the water as electricity coursed through him. Fern could feel the transfer, could sense the buzz of it through the conduit of their touch until he was out of reach as he dropped. Even then, though, they could sense it. The ripple of pain, and they paused–intrigued.[break][break]
What if they were to amplify it? It felt like the pain itself danced like sparks under their skin, something that would grow brighter if they gave charge to it. But just as quickly, the sensation dimmed. Later, they would understand that it was because he’d fallen too far. That the armor he wore shielded him from it.[break][break]
They leaned over the edge of the cliff to see his basculegion darting through the water, the leaguer slumped over its back.[break][break]
Fern grit his teeth. They did not care for the escape, and they turned toward their companion who had drifted back down to their side. “We should–” The desire to follow and finish what they’d started trailed off.[break][break]
In the distance, the glow of a behemoth rising from the ocean tide with power in its jaws distracted them.[break][break]
“We have bigger fish to fry, I think. Don’t you agree?” They moved, another pokeball unclipped from their belt as Meraxes burst from the ball. The seafoam Roaring Moon bellowed and Fern heaved themself up onto her sturdy back as Tapu Koko drifted alongside them.[break][break]
They reached out, ruffling the plume atop its head. “You did well, pigeon” they remarked, though it hardly needed praise from the likes of them. It took mild offense to the gesture, pincers clicking at them as if it would pinch them should they try to muss its feathering again.[break][break]
“We know who the superior one of you is,” they added, though something in their expression twisted coyly, “I didn’t know you had more tricks up your sleeve, you sneaky bird.” They extended their hand, palm up as sparks began to twist there. Tapu Koko’s own pincer stretched out to hover just above it, adding their own electricity to the mix–until a miniature (and largely harmless) ELECTRO BALL formed.[break][break]
A secret handshake of sorts between the two of them.[break][break]
Fern grinned as the warped, darkened spirit of Mele Mele’s stare lit with the same chaotic fervor. “Secrets or no, I thank you for the blessings you continue to bestow.” How far they had come, no?[break][break]
But there was no longer time to dawdle. The cliff face rumbled on impact, chunks of stone dropping and falling into the sea below. Meraxes rose into the air, sailing out over the water toward the ship and crew they’d left behind in their games.[break][break]
The crackle of their communicator sounded in their ear, the report left by jayden cross provoking a mingle of relief and further concern. It bode ill for the city if Rayquaza was there too. Panic clawed at their throat, but Fern swallowed it down. Tapping in, they sent out an update of their own:[break][break]
“Admin Delaney reporting in, whole and hale as to be expected!” Greater cheer than they felt, though they laughed breezily.[break][break]
“Glad to know that you and Bee are well. (BARNABY FINCH.) I should like to rally with you soon. Currently airborne–a league operative boarded our vessel and attempted to subdue the crew aboard. He seems to be in the possession of the Tapu Koko under League jurisdiction. I chased him from the boat, and between myself and Tapu Koko, we knocked both into the sea. Hopefully they’ve sustained enough injury to retreat, but I’m afraid I’ve lost track of them. Circling back toward the ship and Sootopolis now. Cross, where is your current position?”
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A soft laugh follows Temp’s remark–a smile of their own flitting across their lips. “Oh, don’t I know it. Edge lords, the whole lot of them.” They say this lovingly, of course. Lovingly![break][break]
There were certainly several ways that Fern had always felt a bit other than amid the upper echelons of Rocket. How nice it was, then, to suddenly feel that perhaps they were not the only one to feel as much. Then again, they’d never been too concerned about their place. They carved it out for themself no matter how different they were from the rest.[break][break]
Because they have always been dismissive of others’ judgment. In childhood, all the way ‘til now.[break][break]
“Hurt?” they echo, head tilting. “Well that’s unfortunate. I currently don’t feel pain in my gifts.” Actually, it is the opposite. They’re impervious to the electricity they wield, and from any source it ignites from.[break][break]
“Not any radical difference, I suppose. For the most part, when I use my abilities, I feel energized. Lively.” Chaotic, unwieldy. They do not add these aloud. But it is an exhilarating thing to feel so alive and unending. “The static sort of sticks around, though.” They point at their hair. Occasionally, strands lift, as though their head has been rubbed by a balloon.

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They would assume the labs to be more scrutinized than it presently is. Or perhaps they are on camera and someone is missing their cue. But it hardly matters to Fern. They didn’t exactly think their harebrained scheme through. They are simply here on a whim, and that whim is to pilfer and rummage through whatever they can find, while they are able to get away with it.[break][break]
Anything of relevance. On Ultra Space. Lesser Megalopolis. Any Tapu sighting.[break][break]
In truth, they probably will not fully comprehend whatever they see or read. They are not science-minded, and should not have come unprepared. But Fern is cagey and restless. It does not sit well with them that they might be inadequate for this task in some way. They are prone more and more to acting on those sudden whims if the ideas provoked excitement. A thrill.[break][break]
Tapu Koko darts back to their side in the darkened hall, snagging Fern’s attention. Blue eyes look back at it curiously, and their patron points a pincer at thin light that spills out from a cracked doorway at the far end of the corridor. Bingo? Their grin splits wide–bright in the low light.[break][break]
They slink closer and peer around the frame to spy the sleeping audino. They do not wish to flag the attention of the scientist absorbed in her work, so they dart into the unlit lab directly across the hall. For now, they would sneak, and if the opportunity presented itself. Then they would investigate.[break][break]
Wandering among the tables of equipment, Fern peers at different technologies and test tubes of gathered materials. All of it is met with bland fascination. They read the labels, looking for any familiar words that will link back to the stretch of Ultra Space they continue to be drawn to. A sudden clatter startles them and they nearly jump from their skin. Whirling, they fix a glare on a conspicuous Tapu Koko who has knocked into a display model of some sort.[break][break]
So much for subtlety. Waving wildly, they press against the wall, behind the door and cross their fingers that the woman tucked in her lab is too focused to have noticed the disturbance. And if not? Well then, they are determined to have the jump on her.

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Though they relied on the light cast by the Xurkitree, curiosity ruled Fern’s movements. Their phone slipped from their pocket, they waved it outward–interested to see if the electronic glow of the meager light would do anything to penetrate the sheer dark that had crept up around them.[break][break]
“I have to wonder if it might be,” Fern replied thoughtfully, voice dropping to a low hum as their brows knit together in consideration. “Or at the very least, perhaps its influence.” They cast a sidelong gaze at Tapu Koko, only just able to make out the muted shades of orange in the murk. The rest of it blended with the shadow, making it far more difficult to follow.[break][break]
“I’m not sure if this is making darkness so much as the full absence of light.” Their hair tickled at their cheeks, ruffled by a sudden, unexpected breeze. Though Navitas remained bright, their phone began to flicker– the flashlight extinguished itself first and then the phone died entirely. “What in the world…” They turned it over in their hands, perplexed, before they were knocked by the same gust.[break][break]
Eyes wide, they staggered. The heels of their boots clacking against the pavement. “Och,” they complained, attempting to right themself before their gaze found Oscar. “I’ve never experienced that here. What d’you figure–what, what is it?” They broke off as they registered the obvious horror in his expression, and they looked back over their shoulder with wide eyes to see the twist of the umbral cyclone. The closer it got, the darker it grew.[break][break]
They did not have to be told twice. They picked the same direction as the other, but Fern’s feet seemed to kick up more speed. They rode the electric current they produced, blinking out of sight as they traveled far ahead of Oscar. One of their favored blessings of the Tapu in that particular moment. Within seconds they’d shot up a rusted old fire escape, “Hey! Over here!” They called down, frantic, as their eyes darted between Oscar, his Xurkitree, and the cyclone.[break][break]
From above, Tapu Koko pulled down a peal of THUNDER, the electricity near blinding in such pervasive dark. But the pitch just swallowed it up as it crackled and winked out again.

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Free of the burden of bearing a rider, Fern’s dragapult twisted through the air. Phantasmagoric and serpentine. She bared her teeth as she eyed the new contraption that stood in her way. It mattered little that her health had waned significantly—her aggression demanded relief. Her feral demeanor called for the violence of tearing through something, whether flesh or metal.[break][break]
She hissed, tucking into a dive again as another series of SHADOW RAVE rumbled up from the ground again. Umbral spikes erupting under the Iron Crown’s hooves. This time of earth and stone rather than water. They formed and volleyed upward with staggering speed in the seconds before the paradox’s own attack reached her.[break][break]
Medb shrieked, the slice of the TACHYON CUTTERS splitting through skin and scale. Dark blood oozed and glistened on the dark plum and lavender of her shadowed form and the dragapult clicked low in her throat as she dropped from the air down to the ground. Even as her consciousness ebbed, the angry creature thrashed, claws swiping out as though she might reach the Iron Crown and rend it to pieces.[break][break]
Fern grit their teeth at the sight—something protective rolling over them as they pulled her back into her ball for safe keeping. They were not so flippant, not with their dragons. Particularly the brood of dragapult they were so fond of. It would be dispiriting to return home with an empty ball. To present to jayden cross and Astlik both that her bonded companion would not be returning. That would be intolerable.[break][break]
No, they would not be leaving Medb to succumb to injury.[break][break]
But they would not be accepting defeat, either.[break][break]
The Tapus had followed to the bluffs, matching blow for blow in equal measure. So too, had either man managed to do much damage to the other. But Fern intended to change that.[break][break]
Teal eyes studied the movement of the man, waiting. And then they moved as though they were the lightning themselves—swift with speed as they reappeared in front of him, as if in a flash. No more than a blink. A wild grin broke loose as their palm planted flat against Thomas Benoit’s chest, just above his heart. It was true - Fern knew nothing of him. But that didn't matter.[break][break]
Above, the Ultra Space Tapu Koko conjured its own hail mary. The prongs of its pincers danced with electricity. Mingling with the burn of z-energy as they wielded its arms like twin sai. Bulkier, but still effectively piercing as it surged forward.[break][break]
All around them, the air hummed with static energy. It was like they could taste the pain that would come. Thick lick honey on their tongue. And how magnificent was that? That the boon offered by their patron would be so alight with the sort of life that burrowed down into every person. In every fiber of their beings?[break][break]
All humans—all entities felt pain. And now Thomas Benoit would feel more than most.[break][break]
As Tapu Koko unleased a forked PARALYSIS PARRY on the other, Fern’s head tilted. “It is a shame, you know,” they remarked, almost pleasant but not quite. "I would have let you return to the boat. Enact your vengeance.” They let the conjured lighting flow from their hand in what should have been a lethal dose.[break][break]
A quick jolt, pulsing and overwhelming. The crackle of a lightingbolt summoned to a rod, straight to the heart.[break][break]
“But I've changed my mind.”[break][break]

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Thomas Benoit[break]
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The spray of the AQUA JET pelted Medb’s hide and she shrieked, battered back by the force of it. But Fern still had plenty to say.[break][break]
“Good,” he replied, probably unexpectedly so, “they are not to be controlled.” Other Pokémon, perhaps, but they did not presume that they could ever control this one. Much like Tapu Koko did not control them.[break][break]
“But it does not seem to heed your advice much, either, partner that it apparently is.” Their head tilted, smile sharpening. “Perhaps it is taking cues. You draw out one another’s rage.”[break][break]
He had seen the brutality on the boat. How close the man had drawn to severing the tether of that grunt’s hold on life. “Both of you one breath away from doing the unthinkable. Why not just do it? Indulge the dark passenger.”[break][break]
It would be unsurprising. Did he and Tapu Koko not provoke chaos from one another much the same?[break][break]
As NATURE’S MADNESS whipped around them, colliding from each Tapu, Fern laughed. The storm worsened, and his dragapult wavered in the air again—struggling to weather the lash of wind and rain with the hits she’d endured.[break][break]
She could drop him right now. Aggressive as she’d become, Fern wouldn’t be terribly surprised. Medb hissed, ruby eyes fixing on the basculegion below once more. Over the rumbles of thunder and the howl of the gale, Fern heard the man call out. “Follow them,” Fern barked, and Medb’s tail lashed furiously, but she dove after them.[break][break]
“Do not let them go!” Not that they needed to tell their patron as much. Naturally, their Tapu Koko did the same. Not content to leave the game at a dissatisfactory end. Peals of THUNDER summoned down, trying to strike the Hoennian Tapu Koko from the sky.[break][break]
Fern seized on the lightning, compelling it to strike the water not far from where the Leaguer drifted near the cliff. They rolled off their dragapult’s back—just waiting for the moment to dart in close once his feet touched solid ground.

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“Well that is certainly fine with me! I would hate to have an incapable opponent,” they chirped back, unbothered by his attempt to irritate.[break][break]
And in the next breath, the man tried to reason with his Hoennian companion. It seemed a sweet effort, really. Quaint.[break][break]
Fern had long learned that bartering with Tapu Koko to be a largely futile endeavor. There were tricks, yes, but in the end it would only ever do as it pleased. Just as he would only do as he pleased. And in this, they came to agreement. It synced their minds to lean into the unpredictability that built them.[break][break]
But the Hoennian Tapu Koko did not seem to share the same sort of bond.[break][break]
The storm was coalescing around them, building with Kyogre’s fury, but Fern was fixated on the flow of power that spread through them. It was not unlike the rush that had come with their first connection with their Tapu Koko. They remembered the thrill, the bloom of humming electricity in their bones.[break][break]
They were inextricably linked, he and his spirited friend.[break][break]
And when Tapu Koko thrummed with power, so too did The Charlatan.[break][break]
“It seems angrier than the last time we encountered it,” Fern called down to the man, “are you certain that you truly have any measure of control with Tapu Koko?” Their lips curled in a sneer. Around them, the air seemed to hum with the static of building electricity.[break][break]
The charge sparked at their palms, bright light that gathered from the thick of the storm. Rain began to patter against the water, clinging to their clothes and hair.[break][break]
The SCALE SHOT hit his dragapult square in the center of her belly, and Medb shrieked her as her soft spot took the impact. Her hissing curdled into something aggressive and despite her spurring to stay airborne, the shadowed dragapult tilted into a sharp dive toward the offending basculegion. The violet glow of a DRAGON RUSH collected in her snarling jaws, dragging across the water and splitting it like an angry wound on the colliding path to man and fish.[break][break]
Fern grinned, as they veered away. But just for that moment—drawn close in impact—they met Thomas Benoit’s eye as they continued their thought, “I do not think that you do.” The dragapult pulled upward again, but she sagged in the air. their hands had reached for him to apply their skill, but in the pace of the moment, they missed their chance. it slipped through their fingers with a snap and crackle of sparks.[break][break]
Kyogre's storm grew more intense. Above them, the darkened Tapu Koko turned back when the other refused to give chase.[break][break]

Stymied in its fun, their patron sulked—body twisting and pincered arms thrashing outward before snapping its birdlike mask together. The tumult of the natural world around them fed into its power. Thunder and lightning and all of NATURE’S MADNESS lashing out at its reluctant playmate.


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“I think I simply had the luck of the draw on that,” they remarked, an amused scoff following as their eyes followed the darting pace of Tapu Koko. “It is rather playful and tricky—which seems to make it a bit more receptive to nicknames.”[break][break]
A brow rose, though, as they grinned. “Perhaps you should try, and see what she does.” Always worth seeing what happens, no?[break][break]
In all honesty, they were rather glad that time and experience hadn’t warped the bond between patron and avatar. They had grown rather fond of Tapu Koko—something they hadn’t fully expected to happen when they first agreed to its blessing.[break][break]
And it was something like pride that took over their expression as they watched the little imp grow quicker and more difficult to catch. It spun through the air, careful to dart away from the Iron Crown as it attempted to track its movements.[break][break]
When the slash of its SACRED SWORD swung down, one of its shield arms came up to meet the blow. And with the other pincer, it fired a charged ELECTRO BALL at the mechanical beast.[break][break]
“I suppose that can have its drawbacks, as much as its benefits,” they mused. “I do not have much experience with the mechanical paradoxes, admittedly. But my Roaring Moon can be rather stubborn when she sets to it.”

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“True,” they hummed, though their voice lacked its usual mischief, “better to expect the unexpected, I suppose.”[break][break]
They regarded one another with a certain degree of removal. Though Fern respected Elisabeth Fiorelli, they would’ve never claimed to be particularly close to the underboss. They were not intimate friends. But they were not antagonistic to one another, either, and at that particular moment, that counted for something.[break][break]
When she failed to remark or correct them on the lack of formality, Fern raised a brow, but said nothing. It would seem that they were equally as exhausted, or perhaps absorbed with their own thoughts.[break][break]
A dry laugh slipped free. “I’ll take your word for it, though…” Their eyes lingered on the pot, something wistful drifting across their expression. “I am out of tea leaves. So I must make due.”[break][break]
They would need the bitterness, if they rummaged up something sweet in the cupboards. They pulled open one, lifting on their toes to peer into the far back for any sort of sweets stash.[break][break]
“As ever,” Fern answered without looking back. “Or…something to that effect, yes.” Their way of saying, no, not quite, actually.

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Elisabeth Fiorelli

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