Part 3 – The Crisis

The trip back to Abri seemed to go by in a blur on Couaf’s back. The yellow flowers quickly gave way to the forest, when the Furfrou reached the guidestones that villagers used to find the path to Abri through the Barrier, with the still-distorted shadows and sunlight on the ground indicating that word among Patron’s packmates hadn’t gotten around just yet. Maybe. Tigri admittedly hadn’t been looking all that closely in between monitoring her brother’s weakly rising and falling chest, and the ruddy fluid matting his fur. Before she knew it, the burrows and nests of Abri’s outskirts started to fill in again, with the Infirmary being the first of Abri’s structures to come into view. Unlike most of the village’s structures, it had been built with solid walls, and was deliberately positioned closer to the outskirts to be more quickly accessible by weak and injured Pokémon who stumbled into the village from outside.

Everything went by so fast after that. She and Stig barely made it into the door with Couaf before they were whisked into the backroom where Pelin the Delphox and Ernel the Leavanny were there to treat their wounds. Before she knew it, the two of them were lying in a set of straw nests set out on earthen ground in a backroom sheltered by a roof of twigs and branches. A few minutes later, Rouge joined them after Farel caught up and Pelin and Ernel alternated between the three of them to dress their wounds while Tigri’s ears would occasionally catch snippets of worrying chatter between the two healers.

Beyond that, Tigri had spent much of the time just staring off blankly and trying to come to terms with how all of this had happened. It wasn’t until she found herself chewing on the leftover pulp of an Oran Berry the Delphox used as a poultice as Ernel tended to Stig a few beds over to the left that Tigri realized just how much she’d been spacing out. Tigri turned her head up as a shadow fell over her and saw the Fire-type healer briefly glance off at Stig’s bed, before tapping her wooden wand against her free paw.

“Your teammates should be fine to go back home to rest by this evening, Espurr,” Pelin said. “Just don’t push yourselves for the next few days.”

Tigri supposed that ought to have been a relief to hear, except it wasn’t. A quick glance after hearing uneasy rustling from the straw bed to her right, reminded her why. Rouge was there, trying awkwardly to settle in with his wing still held in place with a splint. Pelin and Ernel had insisted that Rouge’s wound was just a bad sprain and Patron hadn’t actually broken any of the Fletchling’s bones, but it was still hard to look at.

She looked away as Pelin went over to tend to her Fletchling teammate, before the Espurr sank into her straw bedding with a low sigh.

“ Where on earth do we even go from here?”

She didn’t have an answer to the question lingering in her mind. Rouge was the Spotter for Team Aspirant, and until his sprain healed, he’d be grounded and unable to see much of anything from the air. Pelin and Ernel had insisted that as frightening as Patron’s attack had been, Stig’s wounds were mostly superficial and he’d be able to go back out into the field after a few days’ rest… except, it wouldn’t change anything about how they didn’t have a sled anymore. They would either need to somehow get a new one or else have to settle with bringing back whatever bits of salvage they could hold with their limbs or their minds’ powers. Something that was bound to wear them out with even half the normal loads they’d bring back to Abri.

And worse still was the threat that Patron had made before parting which dwarfed all of those troubles: that the Zoroark and his pack would no longer keep the Barrier up around Abri. Yes, Abri had remained hidden before without their help, but it had been a smaller village back then and things were going back to those bygone days at a time when a human was quite literally prowling its fringes.

Abri was supposed to be a haven from the dangers of the outside world. It was why she and Stig had sought it out once they’d first heard the stories about it after escaping the place with the harsh lights… so why did it feel like everything about it had been going wrong lately?

“Tigri, if you’re able to walk, could you get up and come along for a moment?”

Tigri looked up to see the Furfrou Brothers walking up with serious expressions. Couaf lingered at the doorway to the waiting room, while Farel went up and to the front of her bed and peered down. She felt a twinge of unease and saw Rouge turn his beak up worriedly as Farel gave a quiet nod of his head.

“You’re not in trouble if that’s what you’re worried about,” Farel insisted. “I asked Rouge a few questions about your run-in in Longbloom Meadow on the way over and wanted to cross-check them with you. You know, standard procedure stuff for Officers.”

Really, this should’ve been the easiest thing in the world for Tigri, especially when the Furfrou Brothers had quite literally helped them into Abri back when the two were still working on a village Team. Except, she couldn’t shake that bubbling feeling of unease in her head when the power in her body felt like it was about to burst out. As it did during times when she felt stressed or overwhelmed. She looked over at Rouge to her right and then leftward at Stig as Ernel left his bedside, before turning back to the Furfrou looking down at her.

“Can’t this wait for another time?” Tigri asked. “I should really be here alongside my teammates.”

“It’ll take a couple of minutes at most,” Couaf said from the doorway. “You’ll be back here before you know it, and it’d probably be easier on Stig to keep things quiet so he can rest.”

Tigri supposed that the elder Furfrou did raise a fair point, and if whatever they had to say really was worrisome… maybe it was for the best that Rouge and Stig didn’t have to know about it right away. She got up and followed the Furfrou Brothers until they got to the waiting room at the very entrance to the Infirmary. There was a moment’s silence when they turned to face her and spoke up in a hushed tone.

“Try and answer us with your thoughts,” Couaf instructed. “Considering some of the questions we had for you, it’s probably for the best right now.”

A part of her wondered why they bothered to talk in such close quarters when she’d been able to get in snippets of conversation with her mind’s voice from further distances in the past…

Until it dawned on her that they really didn’t want others overhearing her, and the lowest risk of that happening was to use her mind’s voice up close where her powers would only need to be tapped sparingly, much like how the one her throat would while whispering.

Tigri stiffened up as the Furfrou studied their surroundings quickly and dutifully minded Pelin’s distance as she passed. After a moment to let the Delphox healer drift off, he leaned in towards her and spoke up in a hushed tone.

“To start with… what on earth happened out there, Tigri?”

Tigri breathed in sharply, and fought against the pressure in her head. She focused her thoughts on the Furfrou pair and then raised the voice in her mind for theirs to hear.

“My teammates and I were headed off back to the riverbank to try and find salvage to bring back to town. We had our sled stolen earlier on and were desperate just to have something to show for our efforts before coming back home.“

The Furfrou Brothers paused briefly as the voice in her mind spoke, only for them to ease as she continued on. It was probably just them getting used to her mind’s voice.

“By the Avalugg and his… partner, yes?” Farel asked.

“His human, yes. Why do you ask?“

“Do you have a description of what this partner looked like?”

Tigri hesitated. One of the things that she’d discovered since leaving the place with the harsh lights was that humans could shed and change their hides as they pleased, and did so quite regularly. Even if she described this human… would the two recognize him?

“Um… well, tall, and I think male? He was fairly stout for a human and had some sort of blue hide and white hair on his head.“

Couaf and Farel both stiffened up as their eyes widened in alarm. What on earth was going on here? The human hadn’t found any of them, so hadn’t the danger already passed?

“Couaf, that’s the same human that we spotted a couple of days ago during our rounds! Same hide and everything!” Farel whispered. “Why on earth would he come back?“

“I don’t know, but I doubt it’s for anything good. Especially if he’s not even trying to hide himself,” Couaf murmured. “We needed to tell Elder Gide about the situation with Patron anyways, so we might as well bring this up while we’re at it, too.”

Tigri looked on as Farel abruptly turned and ducked out of the door in a hurry, Couaf turned his head after his brother briefly and started turning after him only to suddenly catch himself. The elder Furfrou hesitated, before looking down at Tigri with a low sigh and nudging her back towards the Infirmary’s backroom.

“Just… let us worry about handling all of this and stay with your friends for now, alright?” he asked. “You should take things easy for the next few days. If Patron was serious about his pack stopping their Illusions, I doubt there’s going to be much movement in and out of Abri for a while.”

Tigri watched as Couaf drifted off after his brother and retraced her steps back into the backroom with its piles of straw laid out. Rouge was there, settled in awkwardly with his wing still drooped over the side of his bedding. She flopped back down in her own straw pile and just laid there for a while, lying down and looking aside as the sounds of the Infirmary faded into the background.

She snapped back to attention after hearing a wince off to her left. She got up and realized that Pelin and Ernel were no longer there. Just how long had she been spacing out? She turned towards where the noise came from and Stig’s bedding shuffle, and her brother weakly stir and sit upright pawing at his eyes.

Her attention instantly went to his chest when he turned to face her. There was a blotch of gauzed silk over it that had been stained a dirty red color, a ‘bandage’ as Ernel had called it, to stop bleeding from cuts. Perhaps that was why the sight felt so uncomfortable to her since even if they looked very different, she and Stig were familiar with bandages from before arriving in Abri.

She fell quiet and looked away, fidgeting her ears against her head as she raised the voice in her throat with a quiet murmur.
“… Are you doing alright, Stig?”

“I mean, I could be doing worse, I suppose,” he said. “After all, even the tougher teams like Team Rapid wouldn’t be eager to get into a fight with Patron. I lived to tell the tale, didn’t I?”

… She supposed she ought to have been thankful for that, even if Stig’s attempt at making light of things wasn’t terribly reassuring. They had come here to Abri to flee the world outside, the world of humans, the world where the place with harsh lights had been.

And yet, here she was, watching her brother get hurt all over again and once again being unable to do anything about it.
“This was supposed to be a safe place…”

“Nowhere’s truly safe, Tigri. We already knew that before we set out for here,” he said. “If we weren’t living here in Abri, we’d be fending for ourselves in the wilds. At least here, we’re able to have a fighting chance together, and we have other friends to have our back.”

Tigri’s ears briefly fidgeted and she turned away. Yes, that was what had drawn them here to Abri, and even today, it had saved them in Longbloom Meadow. But how much longer would their friends’ help be enough?

Sometimes, it felt like they and the entire village were hanging by a thread. Abri had managed to persevere one way or another for untold years, enough so that it was sometimes hard to believe that the humans described in the stories about Lucario the Wanderer and Weavile the Runegiver shared a species with the ones they hid away from.

But at the same time, Abri hadn’t been immune to its share of disasters. Whenever the next one came… would they really manage to avoid getting swept up in it?

“Oh, my poor baby!”

Tigri and Stig turned at the sound of a sharp chirp and talons clacking against the ground, where there coming in from the waiting room was the Fletchinder from the Post Office—Brais, Rouge’s mother. She hurried over to her child’s side, craning her head down and nudging at the Fletchling as he shifted in his bedding and tweeted in protest.

“Mom, not in front of my teammates!” he protested. “Pelin said that it’s just a sprain, it’ll be fine!”

Tigri watched as the Fletchinder’s gaze fell on her and the Fire-type turned her head to face her. The Fletchinder postmaster gave out an accusing chirp and fanned a wing out with a sharp squawk.

“Tigri, how could you let this happen?” she demanded. “You and your brother insisted that you’d be able to keep Rouge safe while he was with you!”

Tigri wasn’t sure what to say back to that. It had always been explained that there were dangers as part of being on a Team that ventured into the world beyond Abri’s boundaries, but it was her job as Team Aspirant’s captain to try and gauge when she and her teammates were in too much danger and when to turn back. She wanted to explain what had happened out in Longbloom Meadow, except… she doubted it would accomplish anything other than to make Brais pull Rouge from Team Aspirant entirely.

She fumbled around with words in her mind to perfect before saying them with the voice in her throat, when a sharp knock rang out. She looked over, and much to her surprise, there were Orne and Nobi from Team Rapid at the threshold to the waiting room. The Greninja pulled a set of knuckles back from giving a rap at the doorframe with his knuckles as a grave expression lingered on his Rhyhorn teammate’s face.
“Sorry if we’re interrupting anything, but Elder Gide says there’s an urgent meeting at the town square in ten minutes,” the Rhyhorn said. “He said that everyone who’s able to make it needs to come.”

Tigri was pretty sure she already had an idea of what the meeting would be about. And she just knew tell that she wasn’t going to like what she would hear from it.

---

“Wow, they really did get the whole village here.”

Tigri shot an askew glance at Rouge, but it was hard to say that she wasn’t a bit surprised at the size of the gathering herself. Why, the crowd here had to be bigger than the ones from the Founding Day ceremonies of recent years! Achille and his parents from the General Store were present, as were all the other shopkeepers. Why, even Ron the Snorlax Sheriff was in the crowd and sleepily sitting up, a miracle in and of itself with how hard it was for the ‘mon to stay awake on his job!

A hushed silence fell as Elder Gide and Ticho, the Elder’s Farfetch’d assistant, approached from the eastern end of the square. They made their way down into the pit in the square’s center, where Elder Gide looked out over the surrounding audience and let out a low sigh.

“… I wish that I had better news to tell all of you. It just seems like one thing’s been happening after another lately.”
Uneasy murmurs began to filter about, before the Lind, the town’s Chesnaught Dojo Master made his way towards the front and gave a worried frown.

“Elder Gide, what’s going on?” the Chesnaught asked.

The Aegislash tensely fidgeted his tassel-like arms, before speaking up in a deliberate, serious tone.

“As some of you may already know, over the past couple of days, there have been sightings of humans in Longbloom Meadow not far from the village’s outskirts,” the Aegislash explained. “Earlier today, we received confirmation that those sightings were indeed of a real human. There is at least one we know of who’s been prowling around just north of our village for the past few days at minimum.”

Gasps and worried chatter filled the air as Tigri suddenly felt a lot smaller and more vulnerable. If the human they’d run into had been skulking around for that long, he was surely here for more than just some salvage. Uneasy murmurs began to filter around the square, as a few parents tucked their youngsters safely behind them. Achille shot an askew glance from one of the seats around the central pit, before getting up and raising his voice.

“Not that I don’t understand the concern, Elder Gide,” the Kecleon said. “But why did you call the entire village for this assembly? Abri has dealt with human sightings in the past, and they didn’t require this big of a response.”

Tigri stiffened up and saw Rouge set his beak on edge. Would Elder Gide reveal that it was because of her team that Patron ordered his pack to stop maintaining the Barrier? How on earth would everyone else take it?

She wasn’t sure if she wanted to know the answer to those questions.

There was a moment of silence as Elder Gide and Ticho traded looks with one another before the Aegislash spoke up with his spectral-sounding voice.

“That’s because earlier today, there was a dispute between Patron and some of Sheriff Ron’s officers,” Gide explained. “I’m sure you’re all aware, but relations between our village and his pack have been strained recently, and…”

“To be blunt, he’s told his pack to stop maintaining the Barrier that disguises the approach to Abri,” Ticho finished. “And it’s most likely going to be that way for the foreseeable future.”

Startled cries rang out afterwards as a few of the villagers got up to press Gide and Ticho for further answers while others wondered aloud how they were to go on with a human probing their village outskirts when the path into town was there for anyone to find. A few went back and forth about whether or not it was best to try and chase off the human while they could or if that was too risky when Elder Gide motioned with an arm for quiet. The chatter began to simmer down as the Ghost-type looked about his surroundings and continued on.

“In light of current events, all travel in and out of Abri is forbidden until further notice, barring exceptions that are explicitly approved by me,” the Aegislash explained. “Ticho and I will be focusing on trying to convince Patron’s pack to go back to maintaining the Barrier. In the event that proves unsuccessful, we will begin the process of organizing an excursion to try and find another Zoroark pack from the Mazewoods who’d be interested in trading our food for their Illusions.”

“Until then, we’ll do what we can to try and disguise the approaches to Abri and its fringes,” Ticho added. “We will put up some requests for tasks related to that later tonight on the Mission Board. Given the seriousness of our present situation, the rewards for those tasks’ swift completion will be more generous than normal.”

Tigri sighed and looked away. That would’ve been just the break that she and the rest of Team Aspirant would’ve needed, especially since they weren’t going to be getting rewarded well for salvage-gathering missions anytime soon. Except with two out of three members not in a condition to take further missions, they couldn’t even manage that. She sighed and hung her head as a few lingering murmurs lingered among the villagers before she noticed Elder Gide wasn’t talking anymore. The Aegislash let his eye drift over the crowd, before looking aside with a tired shake of his blade.

“That will be all,” he said. “My apologies for any inconvenience the sudden summons may have caused you, just… be careful for a while. And remember that we’re all counting on you to do your parts to keep this sanctuary hidden.”

“Everyone’s worked so hard to get this village to where it is today,” the Farfetch’d added. “It’d be a tragedy if it all came crashing down from a careless mistake.”

An uneasy mood settled over the gathering as Gide and Ticho began to make their way out of the central pit. Tigri watched as the crowd began to thin out as well, as Pokémon began to drift away and back out into the surrounding village with a palpable feeling of unease in the air.

She turned to Rouge and nudged at him to come along when the fluttering of wings rang out and a blur of orange and gray came to a stop between them. His mother, who wore a sharp scowl on her face. Brais threw out a wing, and pulled her child aside with an impatient tweet.

“Come on, Rouge. We’re going home. Pelin and Ernel told me that you’ve been discharged from the Infirmary,” she said. “You’ve had enough of this ‘Team’ business for a while. You’re going to help me at the Post Office until your wing gets better, and for a good while afterwards, too.”

Tigri stiffened up as Rouge let out a startled tweet. Was- Was Brais talking about forcing Rouge off of Team Aspirant entirely? She hurried over to the Fletchinder and reflexively raised her voice in startled protest.

“Brais, what are you talking about?!” Tigri cried. “You encouraged Rouge to join Team Aspirant in the first place because you thought it’d help him grow stronger in case he ever got into a fi-!”

“Yes, and I thought that you and Stig would be able to keep him safe while doing those missions of yours,” the Fletchinder piped. “Clearly, I was mistaken.”

The Fletchling wrestled himself free and turned back towards his mother. Tigri always found it weird how the eyes of other Pokémon shifted so much along with their bodies, but just from the tone of his voice and the way he frantically beat out his uninjured wing, he must’ve realized the same thing she did:

That Team Aspirant was going to lose a teammate if they didn’t do something to change Brais’ mind fast.

“But mom! None of us knew that Patron was gonna-!”

“No buts! We’re going straight home where you can rest safely.”

Tigri watched as Rouge visibly hesitated and looked aside with his beak on edge. Just what on earth was she supposed to say back to that? Her eyes fell back on Rouge’s sling when she realized that whatever Brais thought of Rouge staying on Team Aspirant, that there was something about the Fletchinder’s demand that wasn’t possible for Rouge to make good on at the moment.

“Brais, isn’t your home a nest up in a tree?” Tigri asked. “How on earth is Rouge supposed to make it up there like this?”

The Fletchinder paused as the words left Tigri’s mouth and hesitated, uneasily looking down at her child’s wing. Tigri breathed in quietly and rehearsed a few words to herself with her mind’s voice. She kept them to herself before she raised the one in her throat and spoke up with the words that would determine the fate of Team Aspirant:

“I… understand that you’re not happy about everything that happened today,” she said. “But part of the duty of Pokémon on a team is to look out for each other during moments when things do go wrong.”

She turned towards the Fletchinder, averting her gaze slightly. Just in case her stare was off-putting like some others had told her hers and Stig’s were.

“The den that Stig and I share is at ground level and has enough space for a guest that’s Rouge’s size,” she explained. “I… can understand if you don’t want him staying there the entire time until his wing’s better… but won’t you let Stig and me have a chance to try and make things right for what happened out in Longbloom Meadow? To let him stay there tonight?”

Brais hesitated for a moment, before hopping aside and shaking her head as she spread her wings.

“… Fine, but I’m serious about Rouge working at the Post Office,” she said. “I expect you and Stig to bring Rouge over there first thing tomorrow.”

The Fletchinder took wing and flew off from the square as Tigri watched after her. The Espurr sighed and looked over at Rouge. He was staring at the ground, with his eyes seemingly as blank as her own.

“What do we do now?” he asked.

“Get Stig from the Infirmary and go home,” the Espurr sighed. “There’s not much else we can do right now.”

---

Tigri didn’t know whether it was because of her injuries or the general mood, but the trip back to her den felt longer than normal that night. Not even Pelin and Ernel’s reassurance after coming to fetch Stig that he was well enough to go home and the cuts under his bandages would seal up enough for them to come off the following morning were enough to her spirits. By the time they returned to the earthen den, the sun had already started to set and the moon and stars had begun to peek through the treetops.

Their bedding had grown a bit stale and Tigri had been dreading dealing with it since there was surely not enough time to throw it out and set a new batch, let alone with Stig wounded to the point where he couldn’t do much other than just sit or lie down to rest. Except, Rouge insisted for some reason that their accommodations wouldn’t be an issue as long as there was enough open space in front of the den and some sticks to go around.

She humored the Fletchling and set about clearing out the musky old bedding and shoving it towards the den entrance as she started to spread out new bedding for the three of them. Much to her surprise, when she finished and made her way back out, the clot of dried grasses and leaves she’d dragged out was gone, and she smelled smoke.

Tigri warily made her way outside of the den, where she found Rouge and Stig sitting around a small fire set out in the dirt patch in front of the den. She briefly wondered how on earth the sudden fire had started, only to catch the Fletchling blowing embers at the twig pile and Stig focusing and dropped clumps of their spent bedding with his mind’s power for kindling.

“Told you it would be worth it,” Rouge chirped. “It would’ve been nice to do this without the sprained wing, but at least you two are warmer at the moment, aren’t you?”

Tigri turned away, she didn’t know what to say back to that. Or at least nothing that would preserve the Fletchling’s mood. There was a lingering silence before Stig turned over to Rouge with a gentle paw at his good wing.

“Rouge, remind me… Did you already check up on your bedding?” Stig asked. “Tigri and I don’t exactly have feathers or wings, so we’re not sure if the way we normally set our bedding out will be comfortable for you.”

The Fletchling titled his head, before giving an uneasy ruffle of his feathers.

“I actually didn’t and just assumed that you’d have a nest like mine, but on the ground,” he said. “Why? Are your nests different?”

… Why on earth would he assume their bedding would be anything like his? Rouge’s normal nest was in a tree, for crying out loud! Tigri couldn’t help but stare at Rouge after his comment, and Stig apparently couldn’t help himself either. There was an awkward silence, before the Fire-type gave a flustered tweet and turned away from the fire.

“Uh… Give me a moment, I’ll go and check.”

Rouge ducked off and made his way past the den’s entrance and out of Tigri’s line of sight. She watched after him briefly, when a wince came from beside the fire. She glanced back as Stig pawed at his chest where Ernel’s silken bandages were as an ugly streak was still visible on its surface. Stig remained silent for a moment, before turning aside blankly to gaze into the fire himself. There was something eerie and dangerous about its appearance, but at the same time, there was a comforting warmth to it.

Sorta like the world just outside of Abri’s fringes.

“Is something the matter, Tigri?”

Tigri remained silent at first. At a time like this, Rouge or some other Pokémon might narrow their eyes, but doing so had always felt unnatural to her. And her feelings got across fine enough through one or the other voice that she had. Stig waited quietly on her to answer for a moment before he broke the silence with his mind’s voice.

“Well, aside from the obvious that we’ve all had a long day and that I feel kinda terrible right now.“

She lowered her head, wrestling with one thought and the next to try and put forward. Maybe it made sense to start with the question that had been nagging her since arriving at the Infirmary, especially since she still didn’t know how to answer it herself.

“What are we supposed to do now, Stig?“

He turned to face her as the fire crackled beside them, before shaking his head and giving a quiet sigh as his thoughts re-entered her mind.

“Lick our wounds and try again when we’re feeling better? I’m not really sure what you’re getting at-“

“Stig, we’re probably going to have to find a new teammate after this.”

That time, the words came out of the voice in her mouth. As they tended to when she didn’t have the focus to project her thoughts to others. Times when she was stressed or at her wits’ end…

Times like right now.

“First we were worried about just having enough food after the harvests, and now we have to worry about Abri potentially getting discovered and destroyed,” she said. “Just what are we supposed to do about any of that?!”

She trailed off and sat down, slouching forward as she turned her gaze back to the fire.

“I… know that we set up Team Aspirant because we wanted to help other Pokémon who needed it like we did,” she murmured. “But all of this is so much bigger than anything we can handle. If we can’t even take care of ourselves, how on earth are we supposed to make a difference for anything?”

Nothing reached her ears or her mind aside from the quiet crackling of the fire. She sighed and slouched forward, when she felt a paw at her shoulder. Tigri looked up, and saw Stig’s eyes were looking into her. Wide and alert as always, but he nudged at her like he had on those days when they first fled.

“I don’t know, Tigri. But whatever’s ahead of us, we’ll face it the same way we faced everything since we left the place with the harsh lights,” he said. “Together.”

Tigri fell quiet as her mind turned back to their journey since then. To their harried escape from the place with the harsh lights through darkened rooms with unnatural walls and out into blinding sunlight. To the time they spent drifting the fields and wilderness ever southwards in search of the haven they’d heard stories about. To the way she kept urging Stig forward through the Mazewoods even when all seemed lost until Couaf and Farel found them and brought them to the village.

Even their escape from the human and the way they held out against Patron until they were rescued earlier today. All of it had only been possible because they and Rouge were there for each other and didn’t give in.

“Stig? The bedding you were talking about seems fine to me!”

Tigri snapped to attention at the sound of chirps coming from the den, as a quick glance revealed Rouge walking up. He paused and traded looks between her and Stig, before giving an uneasy shuffle of his good wing.

“Uh… was I interrupting something?”

Tigri hesitated, unsure what the best thing to say back to him was. After a few brief moments wrestling with the words in her mind, she decided that it didn’t matter.

What really mattered most was that they were all there as a team. Together.

She stood up and motioned with a paw at the Fletchling to come near.

“No, not at all. Come and join us by the fire you made,” Tigri said. “It really does feel nice, and I suppose we can’t take it for granted that we’ll be able to enjoy it so often in the future. Maybe we could trade stories we’ve heard? I heard that Pelin does that with her kits sometimes.”

Rouge lingered for a moment, before coming over and settling in beside them. Soon enough, they were talking again, and even laughing at a few points as they traded tales from their encounters around Abri and with its townsfolk. Tales of things like the latest scrap at Lind’s Dojo or idle gossip Rouge had overheard from his mother dealing with customers at the Post Office’s counter.

There was still a part of her which was still worried after the stories and the fire died down and they headed back off to the den for sleep. But at the same time, there was a calmness that she hadn’t felt in recent days as she grew convinced that whatever the future held, she wasn’t alone.

---

Tigri rested better than she expected. There were no nightmares that night, and the den felt a bit warmer than usual, probably from Rouge’s body heat. She dreamed of the day that the Furfrou Brothers had first brought them into Abri, and how awed and overjoyed they had been to discover that there was a place for Pokémon just like them who didn’t belong either among humans or in the wilds. Even if the other villagers had a difficult time seeing it from their expressions, it was a happy day for them. The happiest they had been in a long while.

“Tigri…”

But of course, like all days, it had to end eventually. Tigri stirred as paws nudged at her side, and she opened her eyes to see Stig looking down at her. The bandages that had been over his chest were gone, with the only remaining signs of them being a few lingering silken strands and a pair of ruddy streaks on his chest that could occasionally be seen as the fur over them shifted.

“It’s sunrise. Brais is expecting us to bring Rouge over to the Post Office right now.”

Tigri pawed at her eyes and sat up in her bed of dried grasses when she looked past her brother and saw Rouge already waiting for them at the mouth of the den. Right, she was back in reality now, where Team Aspirant had their Spotter benched from a wing injury.

And for all she knew, the few nights ahead while Rouge was still grounded and unable to fly up to his nest would be the last they’d spend together as Team Aspirant.

Tigri fought back a pulse in her head and brushed those uncomfortable thoughts aside. She trudged out of the den and stretched her limbs amidst the morning sun and dew. All that remained of their fire from the night before was a small pile of cinders and ashes, which she brushed off into the grass with a small nudge of her mind’s power. There was a moment of silence between the three before Rouge broke it with a quiet twitter.

“So… I guess this is it for now?” he asked. “We just go to the Post Office and then we meet again after mom’s work is done for the day?”

Tigri wasn’t sure if there was anything else they could do aside from that. It wasn’t as if deliberately making Rouge late for work would endear them with Brais when she was already probably leaning towards pulling him off their Team after he healed. The Espurr looked off down the lane and hesitated when Stig piped up.

“Why don’t we see what’s there for morning missions before we drop Rouge off?” he suggested. “The Mission Board should be on the way over to the Post Office anyways. And who knows? If Brais doesn’t mind it, maybe she’ll let us help her with her work with those messages she needs to send out.”

Tigri didn’t know what the likelihood of that would be, but she supposed it was worth trying. And if they really didn’t have anything better to do all day, maybe they could hang around the square and talk with Rouge during breaks. Brais was bound to give him plenty of those with his wing still sprained, right?

“I suppose that it’s at least worth trying,” she said. “Though I’m not holding my breath on us having a whole lot to do today. I’m not sure if Ticho could find enough stuff for all of Abri’s teams to do just inside the village if he tried.”

Tigri shuffled ahead and made her way northward with her teammates. The normal burrows and nests amongst the trees with their mail posts and mats went by, and then the undergrowth lining the path started giving way to the huts and pavilions which were built around the central square.

Much to her surprise, the lanes feeding into it were already busy with Pokémon, who all seemed to be gathered together and looking on at something further off towards its northern end.

“Look, I know that we didn’t exactly get off on the right foot yesterday, but this is serious!”

Tigri blinked at the sound of a yipping voice coming off from the northern path into the square, followed by a chorus of low grumbles. It wasn’t Patron’s voice, but there was still something about it which was uncomfortably familiar.

“Are those the Zoroark that Patron came with yesterday?” Stig asked. “What on earth is going on?”

Tigri turned and tried to see past the Pokémon ahead, except they were all too tall to get a good look. She cast a glance to her side and noticed the crude step stool set in front of Achille and his family’s General Store for shorter customers. She clambered onto it, and she stooped to help Rouge and Stig up before looking out over the square.

With the extra height, they could make out a gathering clustered on the north side of the Dojo’s pit, with Elder Gide and Ticho down on the right side of the battlefield sporting guarded expressions. On the side opposite of the Aegislash and Farfetch’d, sure enough, were the two Zoroark that Patron brought into town the day before to try and bully the villagers. Except, Patron wasn’t there with them, and there was a shaken-looking Zorua with them instead.

“Wait a minute, a Zorua?” Rouge wondered to himself. “Since when did Patron and his pack ever bring them along when trying to shake us down?”

“After how ‘welcoming’ you were yesterday, I’m shocked that you two expected a positive reception,” Ticho scoffed. “Why on earth are you here anyway? Since it obviously wasn’t to come and cast Illusions.”

There was a moment’s pause before the female Zoroark of the pair stepped forward and explained herself.

“It’s Patron,” she said. “The human that’s been roaming the meadows north of these woods snatched him.”