Chapter 12: Infinity and Nothing

Infinity is a poorly understood math principle, in my opinion. The most simple interpretation of it is “endless,” and there’s a lot of truth to this interpretation, but the notion is messy. There are both an infinite amount of whole numbers, and there is an infinite amount of decimal numbers between zero and one. Yet, there are more numbers between zero and one than there are whole numbers – or at least a “greater amount”. They’re uncountably and countably infinite respectively – you’ll always know the next whole number, but what’s the first decimal number after 0?

Yet how can an infinite be “greater” when they’re all endless? Well, instead of “endless”, I think about infinity as “arbitrarily large”. The set of whole numbers is arbitrarily large, but the amount of decimal numbers is arbitrarily larger.

And what I witness above me is arbitrarily large.

A legion of alien monsters, like the one last floor, tower above me in an endless black sky. Their legs stretch out impossible distances in a perfect march towards the missing horizon. Their bony feet, larger than a continent, quake the ground and surge the shimmer with every step.

They extend so far, it’s as if I’m in a hall of mirrors. Their formation bends further down, best explained by light taking time to reach me.

Light from where, though? I have not seen any shadows since I plunged into the Mystery Dungeon. Perhaps the dungeon plays with light as it does with space? Either way, I count the discrepancy in seconds between the one above me and the furthest one I can still make out. Its march is three seconds behind. I crunch the numbers in my head: more than three times the distance from the Earth to the Moon, and there’s still more behind it.

I keep my head craned up high as I drift over to a corridor. It takes a splash right behind me that stops my enchantment. The grey alien from the last floor has fallen. Its sinewy limbs flail and kick up the water as it tries to grab onto something. Its unwieldy body makes it impossible, yet it never stops even as bubbles gurgle up from the pink.

I hurry up, pulling myself along the wall using the stone outcrops to keep balance. If that thing can follow me through floors, I can’t assume I can escape danger by going to a new floor anymore. I also can’t assume my aura will pick up every danger.

My heart sinks once I realize there are no auras on this floor, no matter how hard I tune my senses. How soon will it be before I run into one of those alien things around a corner? I shudder.

Yet, I navigate a couple more rooms and I don’t encounter anything. Navigating is the real danger instead. I fight a constant war to stay upright in the gushing liquid and all the walls are slick from shimmer oozing from cracks. I’m forced to be cautious and uncover each room one by one.

A surprise finds me in the next room. A large mash-up of voided machinery suspend in the middle of the room above the liquid. Dark wires droop from it while beams jut out at strange angles.

I can learn something from these voids I’ve been seeing. Learn what though? I grit my teeth and rack my brain about experiments to try. Touching it is an awful idea, but shooting it? I reach out and with shaky concentration and clumsy technique, a sphere spits out from my glove. It wobbles as it flies to its target and disappears without the splash it should have.

What about splashing shimmer on it? I let go of the wall and wade until I’m close. I dig my paws into the shimmer and toss some of it as high as I can. Drops land on the machine and drip down its contours, with no moisture sticking to the object.

Unsure what to make of it, I trudge back to the wall. I grab a pointy outcrop that dislodges as soon as weight is put on it, spewing forth a stream of shimmer. I fall forward, hug the wall, and scramble until I get a grip again. I take a long, deep breath.

The dislodged rock brushes my legs as it drifts. I pick it up. It might be long enough to reach the floating void.

I trudge back to the ominous object after I relax myself. I stretch my arm out with the rock in hand, quivering trying to fight the surging shimmer for balance. The dark surface makes depth perception difficult and although the tip looks like it’s burying inside the mass, there’s no pushback.

I get on my toes to reach a bit more. But I slip and I flail my arms around as I yelp. Thankfully, I manage to stay upright.

After exhaling to get my heartbeat back to normal, I twist the outcrop around. The end that touched it is sliced off, leaving an impossibly smooth surface. Nothing else about the stone stands out.

One last idea comes to mind. I toss the rest of the rock into the void. It doesn’t bounce off, wedge itself in, or shatter. It disappears.

Any matter that isn’t shimmer must disappear when it touches these voids, I theorize. Or even energy, like my aura sphere. Could this have something to do with Earth’s disappearance?

Or Kommo-o’s disappearance…?

I grab my helmet and shake the thought out of my mind, but it only grows to speculate how Kommo-o may have touched this stuff. Shut up, I tell myself before focusing on getting back to the wall and moving down a corridor. Kommo-o couldn’t have touched it on the way down, that’s nonsense. He has to be safe, looking for me somewhere in this dungeon. 

I have to find him. He needs me.

The intrusive thoughts recede after a few rooms, replaced with speculation on what the shimmer is. Nothing I come up with makes sense.

 Eventually, after much pondering and wandering, I find the final room. Fluid whirls and drains into what must be the stairs. It’s only a few steps away from the hallway exit, where I stand.

I glance back up at the marching titans one last time. The trickery of Palkia making this possible within the Moon is not only impressive but there’s something beautiful about it too. The immaculate uniformity of their march, their unblemished skin, even the thumping of their steps soothes me in its own way.

Looking up at them brings me back to when I was young. I would stare at the moon, my maw wide open in awe of its grandness above. The memory brings me back to Earth. The scents of rich mountain woods where I grew up are around. I remember the pull of gravity on me. My mother grabs my shoulder to ease me out of my trance.

It’s been so long since I saw her. I try to remember her face.

I can’t.

I look down at my scattered reflection in the waves. Once I was done university, I didn’t have time for friends or family due to all the studying, training, and work I did for space. My mother supported me at first but when she noticed me drifting away as time passed, she tried urging me to find a related line of work. Something that would let me still be with her. Said she didn’t want to lose me.

But I ended up cutting her out of my life instead so the guilt would bother me less. I couldn’t let it get in the way of joining the stars and discovering truths beyond Earth. I would have time for her again when I’m back, after all. At least, that was supposed to be the plan.

I look deep into my reflection. The person looking back at me ventured through where no Pokemon has gone before or even imagined. He broke ground, learning new knowledge just minutes ago. All my life has been for where I am now.

I would not have changed anything.

Besides, I have someone new to be with now, I just need to find him again. I reach for my comms button but a buzz interrupts me. No static or weird noises pass through my radio, just a deep, expressionless voice. The same one that talked to me last time. “Don’t. It’s trying to find you.”

I gawk. It wasn’t Kommo-o, who was that? How did it know what I was doing? I twist my body around to find who is watching me but the room is empty. There aren’t even other hallways nearby.

I turn to the only place remaining. A twisted statue as tall as me blocks the way out. Its shape narrows in the middle and curves outward on both ends. Many cracks weave through it, not making any discernable shape yet I can’t help but see the face of a Pokemon I’ve never seen. One with a broken, gaping jaw hanging down to the ground. It stares into me with empty yet shifting eyes.

“Don’t look away. Walk backward into the stairs. Now,” the voice over the radio says.

I do that, keeping my eyes on the twisting, malicious face. The current catches me and I drift down the stairs, plunging into to the next floor.