Chapter 17: Give Me Shelter

Come nightfall, some pokémon hit the pubs. Others curled up by the fire with a good book. A certain black-scaled charizard, however, had a different evening pastime: a glass of warm milk. Now made exponentially more effective thanks to the magical hot box machine.

Well, okay, technically it was called a microwave. But as far as Noctum was concerned, a tiny metal box that could spontaneously heat things up more evenly than his tail flame might as well have been magic.

So, the charizard lumbered down the narrow brick corridor in the servant’s quarters in search of the kitchen, praying it didn’t have other occupants. Every room in the brick building wasn’t designed with larger pokémon in mind. Noctum never thought himself that big, but there were too many times where he had to slide into a doorway so someone else could walk past him in the corridor. Baraz had it worse, of course, thanks to his bulky hindquarters. After a few days, the dracozolt took to staying in their shared bedroom and asking Noctum to get him things. Thank God he could fit through the window.

As Noctum rounded a corner and passed by framed, black and white photos of the school’s castle-like main building, he heard a hiss, followed by the sound of pottery shattering.

“You have got to be kidding me!”

Noctum didn’t recognize the voice.

“You’ve got some nerve, backstabber! Waltzing in here to ask for my help.” He sounded even more venomous with each passing word. Noctum realized he was yelling from the kitchen. “The only reason I’m stuck here is because of you. You hung me out to dry! Give me one good reason I shouldn’t do the same to you!”

Noctum clutched his shoulder belt. Perhaps it was best to skip the warm milk.

“Artie, please—”

The charziard’s tail crackled. That second voice was Seifer’s!

“Don’t ‘Artie’ me! I told you all I hadn’t the foggiest idea my parents smuggled goods for the Ryujin,” the first voice snarled. Curiosity got the better of Noctum. He crept forward, keeping his tail as far behind him as he could manage. The charizard approached anoter corner and poked his head out. Several meters down, he saw a sweaty Seifer on his knees, staring at the kitchen’s rusted, white tile floor. A milotic loomed over him, red sclera burning with intensity that made Noctum reflexively glance at his tail flame.

“I begged you to trust me,” Artie continued. “You were my sponsor. My teacher! And what did you do?”

Silence. The milotic jabbed Seifer’s horn with his tail fins. “Speak, damn it!”

“I stayed silent,” Seifer croaked.

“That’s right.” Artie’s tail fins slapped the floor with an audible splat. “You kept your mouth shut and I got expelled two months before graduation. My Radiant Guard dreams burned to cinders! My parents hauled off to heaven knows where.” The milotic turned his head. “I think Vortex only let me take this job because it gives him some perverse sense of glee seeing a milotic scrubbing dishes and living in some moldy servant shack.”

Noctum winced. The servant’s quarters weren’t luxurious by any means, but he hesitated to call them moldy. Though on closer inspection, Artie’s tan scales clearly had a layer of grime that subdued the sparkles Noctum would expect a milotic to have.

Seifer’s face scrunched up. “I made a mistake.”

“Yeah, well so did I.” Artie took a ribbon and shoved Seifer aside. “And that mistake was believing a snob like you could ever care about someone like me.”

“Artie, please.” The keldeo got to his feet as Artie slithered around him. “I need your help. You’re all I have!”

Artie stopped in the doorway. Noctum ducked his head back around the corner. “You should’ve thought about that before torching the bridge we had.”

“But—”

“Actions have consequences,” Artie hissed. “As far as I’m concerned, someone’s doing the kingdom a favor if they yanked that silver spoon out of your ass.”

Noctum flinched. Seifer was hardly the friendliest to him or Yuna, but the charizard wasn’t under the impression he was a bad person. Perhaps a bit stern and anchored in traditions, but there were worse folks out there. Like that druddigon pair who baited him into testing their bogus healing serum and then ditched him when he started puking up blood.

A red ribbon smacking the wall beside Noctum hurled him off of memory lane. He found Artie’s red eyes narrowing at him. “And just what are you doing, hmm? Didn’t realize eavesdropping was a custom in Aeon.”

“Kitchen conversations aren’t private,” Noctum retorted. He subconsciously brought his tail flame closer to his rear.

The milotic rolled his eyes. “… sure. Whatever. Well, if you’re looking for a good laugh, check out the dope in the kitchen. Not every day a Radiant Guard commander looks like he lost a fight with a blow-dryer.”

Artie slithered off, leaving Noctum to mouth “blow-dryer” to himself in confusion. He sincerely hoped that wasn’t some sort of adult instrument. Wait, what am I doing? It sounds like Seifer needs a hand. Noctum smacked his cheeks and walked around the corner. To his surprise, he found the haggard keldeo in the doorway.

“How much of that did you hear?” he asked.

Noctum tapped his claws nervously. “I, uh, think I came in around the part where he called you a backstabber.” He might not have known Seifer well, but it was still odd to see the Keldeo without his navy and lavender uniform. And his mane was totally disheveled. “Um, if you don’t mind my asking, what happened to you?”

Seifer glanced at the brick wall. “It’s… nothing that concerns you.”

“Right.” His tail flame shrank. He wasn’t Seifer’s servant. There was no reason for Noctum to butt in if the keldeo didn’t want him to. Still, he must have come here for a reason, right?

“It might not concern me, but you look like you need some help.” Noctum offered a smile. “Yuna is over at the Crowne Court, so I have some spare time. You did help her with that Qliphoth stuff, so it’s only right I should repay that.”

Seifer frowned. “That was my job.”

Noctum raised a brow. “Don’t you mean it is your job?”

Seifer’s horn sparked. His eyes darted back and forth. Noctum was on the right path. “And what happened to that uniform with all the shiny badges and ribbons on the sash?” The charizard tilted his head.

“Okay, fine.” Seifer’s shoulders sagged. “Her Eminence… dismissed me from my position.”

Silence. Noctum looked down at his feet. “… oh.” It was all he could manage. Still, the guy had to have family or something, right? Why come here? Noctum wanted to ask, but Seifer surprisingly beat him to the punch.

“I wasn’t born yesterday. I can see that skeptical look in your eyes,” the keldeo grumbled. “You’re wondering why I’m here. Why I didn’t go home to my family or a spouse.”

Noctum nodded guiltily, checking his tail flame to see if it had given him away.

“My family… reputation is everything to them.” Seifer turned away, looking ready to collapse onto his knees again. “They’ve served the Radiant Guard for generations. There hasn’t been so much as a single write-up about any of them.” He squeezed his eyes shut. “If I go home, they’ll learn what happened. They’ll disown me for sure.”

That was unreasonably harsh! It took a lot of willpower for Noctum not to press the matter, as it was clearly a sore spot for Seifer. “What about going to a hotel or something?”

“I can’t. Her Eminence froze my bank account,” Seifer replied. “I don’t carry money on me when I’m on duty.” He slouched forward. His horn rested against the kitchen doorway’s porcelain tiles. “I’m pretty much broke.”

Noctum’s temples throbbed. One moment, he was looking at Seifer. The next, he saw a small, black-scaled charmander standing by a dusty alleyway, looking up at a dumpster easily five times his size. His stomach knotted up.

No one deserves to be abandoned when they’re in trouble.

The charizard hesitantly stepped forward. “Do you want to stay with me and Baraz?” He extended his right hand. “We don’t exactly have a lot of space in our room, but we can use our blankets to make you a little nest on the floor.” He grinned sheepishly. “Neither of us use ours because the room gets pretty warm when we’re both in there.”

Seifer didn’t respond at first. The look on his face brought a wounded feral to mind. Noctum wanted to look away, but managed to hold eye contact. “You don’t have to make up your mind right now. We’re not going anywhere.”

“Why?” the keldeo whispered. “We’re not friends. We hardly know each other.”

“That’s true.” Noctum scratched his chin. “I guess you could say that I know what it’s like to feel like you have nowhere to go and no one to turn to.” He slowly stretched his left wing out. “Bahamut taught that one should never turn away from a chance to extend the kindness they’ve been shown to others.” Noctum draped his wing over Seifer’s back. The keldeo flinched, then stared wide-eyed at Noctum.

“I— That— You—” Seifer’s face reddened. He stood up straight and stepped out from under Noctum’s wing. “… thank you.”

A grin spread over Noctum’s black-scaled snout. “Great! Say, how do you feel about a glass of warm milk?”

The disgust on Seifer’s face was all the answer Noctum needed. His tail flame dimmed. “Ah, sorry. Forget I asked.”

Bullet Seeds, electricity, and pink energy beams shot toward the massive icicle above Team Bastion. But Yuna knew the attacks were nowhere near enough to repel Ahemait’s. She flew as fast as she could away from her teammates when a sudden, intense burst of heat sent her tumbling through the air. Yuna caught a brief glimpse of Reshiram hovering where the attack had been, blue eyes glowing and blue embers trailing around his tail engine.

“Wow. I didn’t think… I still had that in me.” Reshiram fanned himself with a wing.

Nikki smirked. “Nice to know your big mouth is good for more than just blowing hot air.”

Yuna would’ve chastised the toxtricity, but the roof they stood on trembled. Ahemait’s krookodile head appeared from the dusty air. It launched its tongue forward and latched onto Reshiram, who screamed and flailed about in a panic. In desperation, Yuna pressed her hands to her pendant and concentrated. Reshiram collapsed into streams of white and orange light that retreated into the Soul Dew.

Ahemait’s tongue shot back into its mouth with an audible snap. Its hollow eyes squeezed shut.

“Quickly, this way!”

Slowking had jumped to another roof, which held a wooden raft with two propellers attached. With Ahemait momentarily distracted, Team Bastion made its way onto the raft. Nikki looked down at the gray wooden planks and the worn, frayed rope tying them together. “You sure this thing can carry us?”

“Positive.” Slowking’s crown sparked blue. The propellers coughed and sputtered to life. Yuna barely had enough time to grab the rope before the raft flew off the building roof.

“Gah!” Chiaki dug his hook into the wood to keep from getting launched off the raft. Behind him, Icicle Spears threatened to bombard the raft and blow it out of the dusty air. With his tiny, chitinous feet wedged under the rope, Cid threw his hands up. A blue barrier materialized, but promptly shattered under the assault.

Fortunately, it bought the raft enough time. As it dropped toward a sandy road, the remaining Icicle Spears whizzed harmlessly overhead and struck the pointed glass dome of a tan, square building supported by white columns. Shattering glass filled Yuna’s ear frills. As the air raft rounded a bend to approach the building in question, however, purple distortion rippled through the building. The glass pieces hovered back into place. Within seconds, the dome looked good as new, save for a layer of frost mixed with sand.

Nikki blinked. “Did… did you guys see that?” She leaned over to wave a hand in front of Slowking’s face. “Yo, Cloaky. Do your buildings usually fix themselves?”

Slowking kept a straight face, focused on steering the raft along the dusty road. “Everything has fixed itself for as long as our city has been blanketed by night.”

“Oh, great. We found a planet that waxes poetic.” The toxtricity scowled. “Can I get this semester’s language arts credit from this?”

The raft whizzed by buildings that were mostly tan and white. The majority were squares or rectangles, but a few in the distance had prominent, pointed domes like the one from earlier. Yuna caught glimpses of flashy colors like gold and silver. But they were mostly obscured by ice and sand.

“You and your fluffy friend are not from here.” Slowking sounded confident. Yuna wondered whether to be honest or try to play it off, but Chiaki made that decision for her.

“You’re not surprised.”

Slowking nodded. “It seems we have much to discuss.”

Nikki groaned. “Oh, goody. Because a lecture is what I really wanted when I agreed to thi— ow!“

Chiaki recalled the Hooker, snorting. Yuna sighed and tightened her grip on the rope. She wanted to check on Reshiram, but was too focused on not getting left behind by the raft.

“What the hell is that giant thing?”

Nikki pointed to a massive bedrock plateau that stood a couple of hundred meters from where Slowking had stopped his air raft. The top layer of the plateau had clearly been carved. Yuna thought she saw a turtanator’s face; she recognized the zigzagging snout.

“It is the Aquardian Sphinx.” Slowking gestured for Team Bastion to follow him. “My ancestor of generations past led its construction. It pays tribute to the founder of our nation.”

“Nation?” Nikki scratched her head. “Isn’t this—”

Chiaki cupped Nikki’s mouth with his good hand, cutting her off. “What my smart-mouthed friend meant to ask was what you mean by your nation’s founder.”

Nikki wriggled free from Chiaki. “Ooh-la-la, so I’m on the friend’s list now, am I?” She wiggled her brows and grinned cheekily. “And I didn’t even have to buy you a coffee.”

Chiaki shoved Nikki’s head down. “… tch. I don’t drink coffee.”

“Guys? Can we, y’know, be polite to the person who saved our scales?” Yuna gestured in Slowking’s direction. There was also the fact that they were total strangers to this place. But Yuna was also a stranger to Radiance, so it was probably easier for her to think that way.

“It’s not a problem.” Slowking reached up and lowered the hood of his tattered purple cloak. He turned to showcase a gold gemstone in the middle of his crown. “I am Razim, the king of Aquardah.” He pointed up to the Sphinx’s mighty, rocky head. “That is my ancestor, Turtankhamun.”

Nikki sniggered. “Bless you.”

“Is that really his name?” Yuna looked between Razim and the Sphinx.

Razim chuckled. “Of course not. His name was Khamun. We just combined it with the species name.” He paused. “Well, I didn’t do that. That would be another of my ancestors. I hear she was bad with names.”

“Fascinating.” Cid stroked his chitinous chin. “It’s quite an architectural sight. How was it constructed?”

Yuna thought she saw sparkles in Cid’s eyes. He might not have been regretting the decision to come after all. But the last thing she wanted was tangents. They were on a timetable. “Err, sorry. Could you give us the brief version about this city?”

“Yes, but we should keep moving to the palace.”

Team Bastion followed Razim past the Sphinx. Past smooth rock ledges sloping down toward ground level. Like everything else, patches of ice coated the rock. A few ice shards jutted out from them. Chiaki rubbed his good hand against his hook and blew into it.

“I don’t suppose this palace of yours has any heat, does it?”

“It is warmer in there.” Razim quickened his pace. Yuna was surprised a slowking could move that quickly. Perhaps the naming convention was a stereotype?

Not far from the back of the Sphinx sat what Yuna assumed was the palace. There were remnants of a stone wall. Ice balls replaced the majority of it. A few hundred meters behind the crumbling wall was a large square building. Yuna wasn’t sure if it was naturally tan or its original colors had faded in the face of sandstorms. Like some of the other buildings, there were multiple golden domes atop the building, each topped with needle-like points.

The closer the team got, however, the clearer it was that things were off. Sheets of metal sat over large segments of the front wall. Ends of giant metal bolts jutted out like the warts on a seismitoad’s body. The palace door was also missing, replaced by giant metal slabs with interlocking steel beams along the edges.

Reshiram’s presence finally stirred in the back of Yuna’s head. “Ugh. I get storm shelter vibes from this.”

Yuna couldn’t say it was unfamiliar. Aeon had similar structures, only using lava-retardant shielding instead of metal. And it was volcanic eruptions that worried them, not storms. Not that they didn’t have an abundance of those, too.

“Jeez. Some home environment you live in.”

We make do, Yuna replied. In front of her, the metal slabs sank into the ground. Grating screeches made her gills shrivel.

“I apologize for the noise. Though the buildings repair themselves, our barricades were rusted from the start.” Razim stepped forward and raised his right hand. “En sabah Khamun.”

Yuna glanced at her teammates, but only got shrugs in response. “Don’t you think it strange that we could understand him perfectly before he said that?” Reshiram asked. “I think it’s strange. If this is meant to be another planet, we shouldn’t understand him at all, right? Unless Bahamut taught language based on this planet, but the odds of that seem ridiculously tiny. Like, a joltik compared to my size levels of tiny.”

Honestly, I’m chalking it up to Qliphoth strangeness, Yuna said. Besides, they had seen far weirder things. This subject was tame by comparison.

“Come, guests.” Razim waved the team after him. Team Bastion walked through the opening. No sooner did they finish entering than the metal slabs rose out from the ground once again. Huge iron bars crisscrossed over them.

For a few seconds, the room was pitch black. Then a half dozen orange torches flared to life, revealing a large room that stretched several hundred meters back. The floor was marble, but scuffed enough to look like the sand mounds Team Bastion just left behind. There were scattered patchwork carpets and blankets housing various fire, ground, and water-types. Many were huddled around clay plates and trays with… well, Yuna honestly wasn’t sure if she could call what they had food.

There were loafs of bread and piles of mush that lacked any distinct colors. She sniffed the air, and smelled nothing but aged stone. Her gut squirmed.

“Another crop of lost souls, my king?” A lombre approached the slowking. His lily pad headpiece had multiple holes in it, like a leaf nibbled away by a tiny caterpie.

“I’m afraid so, Faisal.” Razim bowed his head. “And please, you know I’d rather be called Razim.”

The lombre nodded. “Right. And what of our own people?”

Razim glanced around the room until he spotted a krokorok wrapped in a tattered purple blanket. A sandile sat on either side of her. Faisal looked between the family and Razim. “You found Ahmad?”

Razim bowed his head once again. “For a few fleeting moments, before Ahemait took him. That is when I stumbled across these lost souls.” He gestured to Team Bastion.

The color drained from Faisal’s face. “I see.” He slowly turned around to look at Krokorok and her children.

“I suppose I should tell her,” Razim said. Faisal stuck an arm out.

“Do not burden yourself, my ki— err, friend. I shall break the bad news.” The lombre brushed some sand of his head and walked toward the family. Razim turned his attention back to Team Bastion.

“I’m sure you want answers,” the slowking said, his crown’s golden gem glinting from the torch light. “There are others who have come before you. Showed up in our nation with no explanation how they ended up here. Utterly confused. We have taken them in, however…” His voice trailed off. He looked toward the room’s back right corner. A dusty red curtain obscured most of a doorway Yuna assumed led deeper into the palace.

“Lemme guess. That big, freaky jigsaw puzzle took ’em all?” Nikki quirked a brow, then rolled her eyes when Razim nodded. “Delightful.”

Suddenly, the krokorok Razim was talking about wailed. She threw herself onto Faisal, knocking the lombre flat on his back in the process. Her sandile children looked similarly tearful.

“Has that thing always been terrorizing the place?” Chiaki had turned away from the scene. He was staring at one of the metal patches overlying the wall, trying to ignore any onlookers. The grovyle was clearly trying to hide his fake arm. His expression remained unreadable, however.

Do you think we ought to tell him about the Needle? Yuna wondered. Maybe he’ll be more cooperative.

“I wish it were that easy. But we don’t even know if these people realize they’re actually dead,” Reshiram replied. “Creepy, isn’t it? You guys are very much alive, but you’re walking amongst people who had their homes and souls taken by Eternatus.”

Wouldn’t that technically make them alive? Yuna countered.

Reshiram sighed. “I wish. Bahamut told us those who are absorbed by Eternatus can never leave the Qliphoth. An otherworldly force will always pull them back in.”

Yuna blinked. Then why have we been able to move back and forth between Etherium and the Qliphoth? And how could I take you with me?

“Look alive, Yuna.”

Yuna snapped to attention and saw her teammates halfway across the room. “Sorry!” She hastily floated after them. By the time she caught up, they stood on one side of a long table. Razim was opposite them, pointing to the leftmost side of a scroll he had rolled out. There was a watercolor drawing of rich, grassy fields and glimmering lakes.

“The planet wasn’t always like this.” The slowking moved his claw to a drawing filled with brown swirls. Twisters, from Yuna’s perspective. “About three centuries before I became king, dust storms ravaged the planet. They were ruthless. Crops were wiped out. Water sources dried up. The landscape changed into harsh desert in a matter of moons.”

Razim’s thumb tapped a drawing of a turtanator with a golden outline around him. “Khamun united the fires, waters, and grounds who had segregated themselves in a blind panic during the onset of the storms. Together, they combined their abilities to construct a special barrier that kept the sandstorm at bay.”

He walked his claw and thumb across the scroll, settling on scribbles of thatched huts and tents made from cloth. “Under Khamun’s guidance, they built a new community.”

“The beginnings of Aquardah.” Cid bobbed his bulbous head. “I see. And in the years that followed, your nation grew quite a bit.”

“Correct.” Razim managed a fleeting smile, which faded when he looked to his left. Yuna followed his gaze and immediately tensed.

Four golden wings. Two crystal legs. A star-shaped, seven-pointed head with multicolored, mismatched eyes. And a crystal chassis with three prominent spikes. She’d seen countless pictures of this. But there were always soft, angelic blue hues surrounding it. Here… black and purple brushstrokes spread out from the painting. Tendrils?

I don’t understand. Yuna blinked hard. The painting was still there. She wasn’t imagining it. That’s… Bahamut? Was this one of the planets he had visited before creating Etherium?

“What’s this thing?” Nikki pointed at Bahamut’s drawing. Yuna tensed again when Razim’s expression darkened.

“… that is Isfet, the bringer of chaos. And the reason why our city is stuck like this.”