He thought his bad luck had come to an end, however that was sadly not so…

“Cordy!” he yelped as he felt his Absol buckle under his weight as the noxious fumes of the battlefield wafted all around them. After he was unceremoniously tossed to the ground, he quickly recalled the Absol, not wishing to bring further harm down on her.

Now that he was back on his own two feet, he sighed.

“Now, what—” he sighed, before realizing that the two large Pokémon were duking it out in the distance, before the truth sank in that one of them was the so-called ‘light eater’, that he’d heard of in tales back home at Alola.

The rumored snatcher of brightness, said to supposedly live in the ‘space between worlds’ (now even that was a fantastical notion, even for someone like himself).

He had to slap himself a few times, before resigning himself to head in the direction where the two were battling it out—never mind if he was alone, with no Pokémon companion. Just as he’d made some headway, someone crossed paths with him, wielding a sword that looked suspiciously like—

“Sergei, is that you?!” he exclaimed, rushing over in time to see that the sword-wielding person that had been cut down was not the redhead he was looking for, however bore an uncanny resemblance.

For a few moments he felt his heart leap into his throat. Holy shit, where the fuck was the actual redhead—

“Fuck, fuck, fuck… don’t lose your head now!” he hissed, holding one hand to the side of his head before looking around and then seeing the ‘light eater’ again…

“Oh, fuck you.”

He then sent out his Gardevoir, who blinked at the carnage before pointing at the Necrozma.

“Hit it as best as you can!”

Thankfully he hadn’t done the ‘pop the Pokémon to giant-size’ amidst everyone throwing all their attacks in the chaos of the battle; it was literally now or never.

Crossing his fingers mentally, he then took a deep breath and Dynamaxed his Gardevoir, who suddenly popped to several sizes much larger than normal.

And off went the gigantic Gardevoir, throwing a Dazzling Gleam which transformed into a Max Starfall at the Necrozma… no way was he going to have that beast rampage back where they came from.

+ Absol gets knocked out! what is this luck?!
+ an NPC who looked suspiciously like sergei dachev gets cut down in front of him YIKES
+ swaps Absol for Gardevoir
+ Dynamaxing Gardevoir this round! Dazzling Gleam transforms into Max Starfall aimed at the Eternatus!
+ Jack is helping Necrozma
+ Jack is providing covering fire with his Tri-Attack tome
+ +20 timeskip FC is Van Hohenheim from Fullmetal Alchemist: Brotherhood (yes, the HOT one)

And in true hilarious fashion, his trip would come to an unexpected early end—if only because the sight of pink-colored smoke made him stop and do a double-take.

“Wha—?” he blinked as he saw the Koffing, but instead of it being purple it looked… strangely green? Okay that was weird.

(Look, in Jack’s defense he’s never seen a shiny Pokémon so there’s that.)

As if on cue, the moment the Koffing saw the Gardevoir, its body began ominously glowing—

“Are you kidding me?!” he yelped, ducking for cover. “Handle that threat, now!”

Just as the Koffing was about to troll big-time and use Explosion of all things, the Gardevoir was quick enough to snipe it out of the air with an equally-powerful burst of Psychic energy.

(At least that was one problem solved.)

Seeing that the Koffing hadn’t blown itself to bits, he then threw the last Safari Ball.

+ @tag
+ catch attempt on shiny Koffing!

The ‘Day of Reckoning’ had finally arrived.

Even though he only had four Pokémon going into what he guessed was the ‘endgame’ of everything, he didn’t regret it at all.

By this point he’d started a small collection of notes from across all the cities, and had found someone to ‘maintain’ it once they were gone—hopefully the beginnings of a library in Hammerlocke.

He’d made sure to collect all the tales he’d told, all the information about the surviving locations into several clearly-labelled notebooks. Hopefully his ‘apprentice’ would keep up the tradition of collecting tales and writing them down for posterity for the future.

(In a way, he hoped he’d rubbed off enough on the people living there.)

Never mind if he’d grown so much older… this was it.

Time to charge on ahead. Even if he didn’t have a Flying-type to carry him into battle, at least he had his Absol to ride on into the warzone.

“Let’s go.”

Knowing that using that was going to be futile, he instead focused on the Absol’s horn, glowing with malevolent energy as she swung around violently with Night Slash—while he took aim at the nearest cluster of enemies and letting loose with the blight of a Tri-Attack from his magical ‘tome’.



+ Hammerlocke squad lesgo
+ Jack ended up starting the first ‘library’ in Hammerlocke, hopefully instilling a tradition to record information for posterity when they leave
+ it’s judgement day, binches
+ Absol used Night Slash on generic opposing hordes of noxious goopy monsters
+ Jack is providing covering fire with his Tri-Attack tome
+ +20 timeskip FC is Van Hohenheim from Fullmetal Alchemist: Brotherhood (yes, the HOT one)

What was his luck?

Not after the strange mouse-like Pokémon had run for it, something else came scampering into view—and right on time too because this was a Chespin! Taken by surprise, the little Grass-type then let loose with a Seed Bomb attack—not fun!

“Wha—hey!” he exclaimed as he raised his arms to protect himself; right then and there his Gardevoir popped in via a Teleport and crossed her arms at the misbehaving Pokémon in front of her.

“I know, right?! Help!” he continued as the barrage of Seed Bombs continued as he stepped back to better protect himself.

No less than a few moments later, the Gardevoir had used Psychic to literally pick up the Chespin and hold the poor thing upside-down, before being shaken, in mid-air, like a squeaky toy!

“Whoa,” he mouthed. “Okay, note to self, don’t make you angry, Emm,” he chuckled quietly as the Gardevoir continued to make the Chespin dizzy, before said Chespin was then tossed at his feet once she was done.

Without blinking, he dropped the second Safari Ball on the Grass-type.

+ @tag
+ catch attempt on Chespin!

There was something about… poison ivy that made him itch to all hell.

Was he allergic like most people were? Or was he like one of the .1% that was ‘immune’ to this?

Either way, his skin crawled as he watched his Mareanie literally screech and leap toward the strange-looking Pokémon—never mind that she’d used Venoshock in the process…

“Wait, what are you doing?! Arja!” he facepalmed as her Poison-type attack did absolutely nothing when it hit. “Use something else, don’t be a show-off!”

The Mareanie huffed, but growled and nodded as she switched tactics and used Liquidation instead!



+ @tag
+ mentioned poison ivy!

Thankfully the Mareanie stayed in the Safari Ball, so that was one problem down. He then bent down to pick it up, before realizing he was being watched…

“Emm, go handle it, will you?” he continued quietly as he slipped into another section of the undergrowth.

Never mind if the Morpeko was angry or anything, a Dazzling Gleam from the Gardevoir was enough to knock it aside as she then followed him in his search.

+ @tag
+ skipping Morpeko

And right on cue, the one Pokémon he was looking for—appeared.

Even the Mareanie was caught by surprise at his sudden appearance, in the middle of eating a Berry she’d found… uh-oh.

Shrieking, the dual-type then attempted to douse him in an Acidic Spray of noxious venom; he had a few seconds warning to roll the hell out of the way before the purple liquid landed in hissing, sticky globs all over the place.

“Yikes,” he hissed and without further ado tossed out his Gardevoir, who was surprised (not to mention dismayed) the moment she saw what she was going up against.

“S-sorry! But I know you can handle it!”

A sudden Venoshock came screaming their way, before the Gardevoir gracefully dodged it, and threw a rainbow-colored blob of Psychic, smacking the Mareanie dead-center in the face.

Another loud squeal came from the dual-type Pokémon and he quickly threw the first Safari Ball at it.

+ @tag
+ catch attempt on Mareanie!

He’d very nearly forgotten to swing by the Safari Zone—

Wait a second, this was his first time swinging by here, ever! Okay that was embarrassing.

(To be fair, there was no Safari Zone in Alola, so there was that.)

Once he’d gotten the three Safari Balls (and gotten through security) it was time for him to literally speed run the entire place.

He knew he had to pick up the pace, because he already had his eye on at least one, if not two of the Pokémon in the place—

One of them being a Mareanie!

+ @tag
+ why did we start late, AGAIN?

This was the inevitable problem when one was a lorekeeper:

Your best weapon will also be your worst enemy.

In his case it was his memories. Though proud of himself he was at remembering things much more than most, fact of the matter was that time was still an insidious thing. By this point he already had ten, already starting on the eleventh notebook full of written down things he can recall about Hoenn, and Alola, just so he doesn’t forget (and fall victim to his own weakness).

He gazed at the redhead, and sighed.

“Do you think there’s an end to this?” he began quietly, patting down the last of the earth from the makeshift graves they had to dig to bury Hammerlocke’s dead. He’d insisted on having all the kids he watched grow up buried close to each other—since they were all orphans, like how he was back… home.

“I want to believe we’re going home. I really, truly, honestly want to.”

He knew how terrified the remaining children were, however it was up to him to keep their collective spirits up. It was also at this point, he realized—he’d run out of yarns to spin and entertain everyone else with.

For that, he needed new material.

In the time between, he would spend time looking deeper into the portents, the warnings—the stars in the sky. Were they changing? What was going on?

He couldn’t help but visit the statue seemingly sculpting itself out of the rock that had appeared. It looked like—it was starting to look like the strange creature they’d met… where, again?

Argh, what was going on?

---

Five more years. later.

The moment he’d heard word of the poison receding, an idea formed in his mind. The problem here was that he had no Flying-type Pokémon, so he would have to risk using his Absol to get from place to place—at least he had an alternate option.

(This also served another purpose—to gather more stories and tales from the other cities so he could being back more content to the new generation of Hammerlocke kids waiting for him.)

First, to Ballonlea, then to Circhester—and then down to Motostoke.

The smart thing about his travels was that, upon arrival to each and every location he would send out his Gardevoir and have her ‘memorize’ the locations so that he could easily travel back to the respective locations without having to make an extended day trip.

(Now if that wasn’t a big brain move on Jack’s part he didn’t know what else would be.)

Once he’d finally returned to Hammerlocke, he set to work—filling up another three notebooks each—one for each of the other cities he’d visited—and setting those all to memory as well.

---

Last time jump of five more years.

With a late-game training arc involving Dynamax and what crazy energies that could be harnessed, he wondered—would this all be enough? Was there even a chance of them making it back home?

“You know… I thought about something else, again,” he confided with Sergei.

“Do you think… if on the off-chance we get back home… do I like, have an actual chance with you? Outside of this little ‘world’ we’re currently trapped in?”

The ‘dawn of the final day’ was looming on the horizon as it was.




+ Hammerlocke squad lesgo
+ sergei dachev mostly
+ sometimes being a lorekeeper is also a bane: not even he is immune to the passage of time
+ once everyone is free to visit the other cities, Jack goes on a world tour to collect the stories of Ballonlea, Circhester and Motostoke before returning to Hammerlocke and writing them all down for posterity
+ he also has a late-game Dynamax training montage along with everyone else
+ on the final night before battle breaks, he asked the redhead a few things
+ his weapon is a tome that shoots off Tri-Attack
+ +20 timeskip FC is Van Hohenheim from Fullmetal Alchemist: Brotherhood (yes, the HOT one)

Why was his luck the absolute worst?!

He cringed as he felt the—wait, how the hell was that even possible didn’t Dark trump over Psychic when it came to the typing chart—

“What?!” he exclaimed as he watched another one of his more powerful companions, Lonq, bow under the fury.

“What—how—did you… did you see that?!” he exclaimed in the redhead’s direction, the utter disbelief of it all.

(At least in the end the damned thing goes down. Good riddance.)

“Geez.”

He sighed. When would his shit luck end?!

---

One month later.

The writing appeared on the walls of the city. Of course people would be fucking freaked out. Not Jack, though. He realized, somehow, that… these words, they meant something.

Taking some time from each day to visit the wall proper, he jots down the words and shares the findings with the rest of Hammerlocke—specifically, made the words known the most to Zev Harcourt and kyle lopez, kings of the city they now called ‘home’.

Unlike most, though, his memory is much more accommodating—such is the work of a lorekeeper—and he can recite them from memory within weeks on command, or when anyone else asked for them.

(But of course he keeps a note of this in the notebook, as well. Just a page over from the tapestry sketches he’d made.)

“What do you make of this?” he asked the redhead. Practically the only person he hung out with, for the moment. “It’s ominous, but… you know. Since we’re stuck here. I think it’s best we unravel what this all means as soon as possible.”

And to the words that appeared in that ominous poison, he can’t help but crack a laugh.

“What a way to be subtle, too. Reminds me of that ‘the Chamber of Secrets’ has been opened crap,” he added with a quiet chuckle.

---

One year later.

Strange, terrifying, humongous Pokémon come and attack their walls time and again. The biggest huff he’d made was when a gigantic Gengar appeared, its mouth seemingly leading to Hell.

“Yikes,” he cringed as his Absol, Cordy, came back—battle-weary but victorious—in helping take the damned thing down. Had she not been extremely lucky, well, things would’ve gone from bad to worse. “Good work, girl.”

However, it was the citizenry that he noticed needed calming the most, and so he began devoting his extra free time with the Hammerlocke kids, spinning them extremely tall, absolutely fantastical tales of Alola—the region he once called home—of how they came from ‘beyond the sky’, and were here to save them all from whatever ruin was coming.

After every siege it was the same. He would go around, whistle and call the kids to follow him, and put on a one-man show—even changing his voice here and there to match the ‘voices’ of the characters in his ‘stories’.

At first, the kids would stare at him dumbfounded. The more he would persist, though, he would eventually get through to them…

---

Five years. later.

By now he would always keep the kids busy while their parents were off to war, training alongside those who arrived to the city—honestly, he was thankful his memory was as sharp as it was, because he’d started noticing that the others—those who’d come with him to the city—were… forgetting(?) where they’d really come from.

It was mostly his tales of Alola, and by now Hoenn—to the natives of Hammerlocke, ‘Alola’ and ‘Hoenn’ were places beyond the sky they knew—and this man, this strange, blonde-haired man continued to regale them with stories and one-man shows of what he knew.

It was like… they’d reverted back to the old, literally, where lore was passed down orally and not written. Orally, committed to memory…

On one such night, he would brush his hair aside and look over at Sergei—the stable presence amidst all this chaos.

“I… I’ve been wanting to ask you… something, you know. For some time now. Would you… would you humor me?”

---

Ten. years. later.

It was at this point he sort of made the connection of the ‘Black Knight’ to one of the so-called ‘scourges’ that lived beyond the space of Alola… the way the two shared a resemblance, of how light vanished at their so-called ‘presence’…

Most of the kids he’d originally told his tales to have grown up. But unfortunately, at Necrozma’s arrival, swathes of the dead would greet them—and amongst the many—most of the kids he’d watched grow up.

Shit.

Still, he had to keep everyone’s spirits up. He would then begin spinning the ‘tales of the dead’, ones that he’d always keep in reserve—but now felt much more appropriate in the moment. Helping the people of Hammerlocke understand that ‘death’ was not to be abhorred, but to be honored. To celebrate the victorious, of how they fought valiantly, how they gave it their all.

He then realized that he would inevitably have to join them once more—but how? He wondered how Sergei would fight, but knowing himself, he would…

Finding Amor Rose was no easy matter—he even insisted on watching how his ‘weapon’ was made, no funny business there—and out of every single attack that existed, he chose Tri-Attack.


Why that? Because of the infinite possibilities that came when that attack was thrown. Flames, frost or thunder? Who knew?



+ Hammerlocke squad lesgo
+ sergei dachev mostly, with additional mentions up above
+ being a lorekeeper came in handy, apparently, strong memory yo!
+ the years fly by and he grows into the role of being the storyteller to the Hammerlocke kids
+ Mage / Bard days here we go!
+ his weapon is a tome that shoots off Tri-Attack!
+ +10 timeskip FC is Luocha from Honkai: Star Rail