Chapter 5: Within Lively Town

Atlas had taken them to the clothing district bordering the outskirts of Lively Town, ensuring Mebh would be thrilled for days to come. She could indulge herself in all the sheets of cloth, thread, silk, and as many needles as her heart desired. Whatever made her happy, Hiro supposed. It all seemed ridiculous to him.

Days earlier, Atlas mentioned paying for Mebh’s cooperation with a shopping spree, which Hiro had brushed off as little more than hyperbole. Three hours of shopping later and he was disabused of such thoughts.

Perhaps that was his fault. After the time he’d spent around Mebh these past few days, he should’ve known better.

Hiro could see why Mebh wanted all that cloth, at least when thinking from the perspective of thinking from the perspective of a craftsman passionate about their work. Any tailor would’ve been inspired by the district’s wares.

Hiro brushed his claw over the cloak Mebh had given him. The teal green fabric still glistened with the afterglow of his gratitude. The respect Hiro had for the Mimikyu kept him from voicing any complaints to ruin the moment. However, he could do little to hide the twitching of his tail feathers or the ice crystals speckling his fur as Atlas and the others dragged him into shop after shop.

Mebh hissed at the slightest provocation of the shopkeepers, earning nervous looks from them. In each shop, she’d spend a while appraising every sheet of fabric her dark tendrils could stretch towards. The ones that caught her fancy were gobbled in a flash into her costume. Even after gorging on so many sheets of fabric and articles of clothing, she remained small as ever.

Although Hiro had witnessed enough to call the pokemon world magical, did Mebh not push things beyond that? Hiro shot Atlas a glance and could see the shadow of mild concern in his eyes. That was a surprise. Mebh really was abnormal? Hiro scratched his elbow, scarcely knowing what to make of that.

The faces Mebh made at the shopkeepers was amusing for a time, but her shopping spree showed no end in sight. They’d be in the district till sundown at their pace. At the same time, impatience would get Hiro nowhere, he reminded himself. They were already in Lively Town where the specialist of the mind lived. Even if Mebh spent all day helping herself to various fabrics and garments, he’d still get to meet the Hatterene eventually.

At the same time, there was a part of Hiro that wanted Mebh’s spree to never end. He was so close to gaining answers about who he was and where he came from that his heart couldn’t help but tremble. Did he have brothers and sisters at home waiting for him? If so, how many? What did they look like when even their faces had been robbed from him, let alone the name of his home?

After wandering in the dark for over a week since Atlas first found him, the answers to learning who he was, where he’d come from, the people he once knew… all of them were now within reach of his claw tips.

He was going to remember everyone.

Mebh crawled up and bumped his leg. She hissed softly, and shifted her gaze to the left side of the road before moving past him towards another line of shops. The Sneasel brushed his cheek and lumbered after her. How much shopping was she going to do? They were taking forever. He huffed and let a cloud of mist trail from his mouth. That was it.

“Atlas,” Hiro blurted, tugging a claw on the Ampharos’ red cape.

Atlas cast him a curious glance, his eyes drawn to the frost on Hiro’s claws.

“Worry not lad, you’ll learn to control It with time.”

“No, I… What?” Hiro blinked, glanced down at his arms and saw ice on them. He frantically scraped it off before speaking up again. “Do you mind if I went on ahead to the Hatterene? I can meet back up with you two later.”

Atlas hummed and folded his arms in reply. Hiro waited patiently to hear response. His eyes strayed to the ground, and he was beginning to wonder if going to Ze’Mer was a good idea. The response came at last, snapping him from his thoughts.

“I suppose there’s nothing wrong with that.”

Before addressing Hiro further, Atlas waved Mebh over as the Mimikyu veered too far ahead of them in her excitement.

“You’re new to this town. Are you sure you can find your way around on your own?”

Hiro scoffed and slapped his claw over his chest. He briefly winced as their points struck him, but shook his head back insistently.

“I’m sure I can manage just fine.”

Atlas smiled, amused. “This may sound odd coming from me, but don’t say I didn’t warn you. You should at least take a look at this before going off.”

Atlas fetched the Expedition Gadget from his cloak and drew Hiro’s eyes towards the map. Hiro observed that the layout of the city looked outright labyrinthine with winding paths, dead ends, and branching roads that seemed to all tangle together. That didn’t make him confident about his odds of finding this specialist of the mind. He found himself nodding idly to Atlas’ directions to Ze’Mer’s house as he tried to make sense of the map.

“Follow this path and you’ll find yourself there. You’ll have better luck finding her in her home at this hour,” Atlas explained.

“Thanks,” Hiro said, flicking his crest feather as he pulled away from the map. “I think I get the gist of things now. Do I just tell her that I came on your behalf when I get there?”

Atlas scratched his chin and creased his brow. “Anymon can use my name for all sorts of things. Ze’Mer will turn you away if you try to do that. It might help if you had something a bit more tangible to reassure her.”

The shimmering golden winged badge on Atlas’s chest reflected in Hiro’s eyes as he watched the Ampharos pluck it right off and drop it in his claws. Hiro flicked his feather and gave a wary frown as he met Atlas’ eyes.

“Should you be giving me this? It looks important.” He pulled the hem of his capelet off his arm and prodded his claw on the badge. “And expensive.”

“Show this to Ze’Mer, and she’ll listen to you,” Atlas said simply.

Hiro clenched the badge in his paws, he grabbed his tail feathers in place the moment they started wagging.

“If you insist,” he said with a faked cough. “Thank you. I’ll return it right after this.”

There was still a skeptical glint in Atlas’ eyes. He ultimately relented, pulled the gadget back under his cloak with a sigh.

“Very well then. Meet us at the Expedition Society later. It’s that one over there.”

Atlas led Hiro’s eyes toward a large building in the distance, standing at the highest point of Lively Town. From where Hiro stood, it was little more than a purple and yellow blot.

“And if you get lost, just ask any mon with a badge to help.” Atlas patted him twice on the shoulder and grinned. “Off you go now, lad.”

Hiro rubbed at his shoulder, kicked a foot on the ground and glanced towards the nearest corner. He stopped to wave Mebh goodbye. She hissed at him, though this time, it was a gentle one. She mimicked his waving gesture and Hiro smiled once more before heading off.

……

He should have listened to Atlas.

The few hours Hiro spent in Aery Cliff district did little to prepare him for what Lively Town had in store with its mind numbing layout. He’d entered the mouth of the beast that was this town, and by the time he realized just what an ordeal he’d blundered into, it had snapped its jaws shut around him.

Lively Town hustled and bustled with the energy of a never-ending carnival. The town had buildings that stretched up high, small houses built atop bigger houses built atop bigger houses still. Roads zigzagged and snaked up and down hills and buildings, sometimes through structures. He even passed what appeared to be a water fountain pouring from thin air into a pool below where a group of water types leisured in. And those were just the things his mind dared try to comprehend. For one so new to Lively Town, the discordance crushed Hiro under its binds. From what vague memories he had, a solid hunch told him nothing in his world looked anything like this.

Pokemon crowded the streets everywhere he looked, chattering amongst themselves, loitering about and flocking to spontaneous street ‘jousts’ that always attracted a small crowd of spectators. The last one he passed by gave him a glimpse of a pink hammer-wielding Pokemon locked in battle against a fiery reptilian with cannons for hands.

Hiro’s tail quivered and he kept his head low, his heart pounding in his chest as if were trying to break free. He kept to the side of the road under the shadows of buildings towering over him. Just as it had been with the map, even the signboards and arrows meant to guide Hiro through the town seemed to make little sense. He’d always find the signboards twisted this way and that. Some would even point right back down the path he’d come through. Most of them presented him with glyphs and symbols he’d never seen in his life nor could he ever hope to understand.

After wandering aimlessly for another half hour, he came by a corner with a few food stalls. A thought sprang to his mind to approach a friendly-looking Lairon he spotted by a berry selling vendor and seek directions to find his way around the tangled streets.

Hiro steeled himself and took a breath. He approached with a nervous smile, ears folded back as he spoke up.

“Hey, excuse me. I’m a bit new here and I think I’m lost,” Hiro said. “I need to go to Hatter’s Focus. Can you tell me the way there?”

The Lairon spared him a glance and boredly waved a forepaw back in reply.

“Oh, the glittery witch’s house? Go up the down there, behind the crunched egg tunnel, hop on over three flakes to the right, cycle back and climb up the hoolaboo. That should get you there.”

The Lairon finished, and shifted his weight to resume the conversation he was having with a smoky shelled Wartortle. They’d already forgotten the Sneasel still standing there.

Hiro tilted his head. “What?”

When the Lairon repeated those same directions again, Hiro turned around and made himself scarce. He did not ask for further directions afterwards.

…..

A growl whirred in Hiro’s throat, followed by a hiss as he pulled his capelet around him. Even if he wanted to crawl back to Atlas and Mebh, he couldn’t. The cacophony of sounds and cocktail of scents in the air muddled his still learning ears and nose. The path back to Aery Cliff was lost to him, and the path ahead would lead him nowhere closer to where he wanted to go. Hiro had no idea where he was. He sighed and marched on, ears drooping all the while. How could he have made such a blunder? He’d spoken so boldly about finding his way to Ze’Mer fine on his own.

Up ahead, a bridge overlooking a steady stream peeked out at the end of an alleyway. A part of Hiro’s soul felt comforted in seeing a mundane bridge made of stone—even in this strange world, there were some things that still felt familiar. He scraped his claw on the bridge parapet while he walked over it, stopping at the point above the river. The city stretched before him in all its fantastical multicolored glory. He lingered and leaned with his back against the bridge, sliding to the ground with the saddest meow he’d ever made so far.

And almost as soon as he did so, Hiro’s ears shot upright at the sound of a suppressed snicker.

He shot a glance at the other side of the bridge to find a small green Pokemon peeking over, black beady eyes meeting his before the Pokemon quickly hid away. A Roselia, his mind announced. Hiro’s eyes narrowed into a squint after Roselia peeked over at him again. Did they need something from him?

Hiro waved his claw in greeting. “Hey.”

Roselia blinked, as though snapped out of a trance. They shot a glance to their left and right, then back at Hiro, before smiling awkwardly and cupping flowers over their chest. From how they acted, Hiro assumed they must’ve been a girl.

“Hello, Sneasel. Are you all by yourself?” she asked in a voice soft and delicate that Hiro’s heart almost fluttered. Something black and smooth hid in the cusps of those vibrant petals, which made Hiro quirk a brow.

An answer didn’t immediately come to Hiro, his mind still fixed on whatever it was Roselia held in her flower. But that short pause proved long enough for the Roselia to squirm and begin to ramble on.

“I hate to be a bother, but I saw you wandering about and thought you seemed a bit lost. I wasn’t really sure whether you were or not, so I followed along and you just sat there looking mopey, so I figured I should just make sure you were okay and…” Roselia kept going and going, his face growing greener with each passing moment. How could anyone say so much in a single breath?

“Calm down, I’m not lost,” Hiro cut in. He sighed and groaned. “This town just makes my head spin from how noisy and err… crowded it is, but I’ll figure my way out.” A few seconds of silence went by, and his expression stranded. “Sounds stupid, right? probably.”

Roselia tilted his head to the side, nearly toppling over before righting himself up.

“It’s not stupid though? At least I don’t think that it is…” she said, her face once again hidden behind flowers.

Hiro flicked an ear and huffed out a breath. He eyed Roselia closer and a glimmer of familiarity crossed his mind. His lips parting slowly as he voiced a thought.

“Hey, you were there at the café when we were having breakfast, weren’t you?”

Roselia leapt on the spot and looked as if she’d shrunk by half her size.

“Err, maybe…?”

Hiro sprang to his feet and walked up to Roselia, his pupils drawn to narrow slits and a claw pointing down.

“You definitely were.” He squinted, his pupils expanding. “I definitely saw that same bow poking out behind the counter before.”

“You did?” Roselia shied away from the very sharp claw pointing at the bow on her middle horn.

Hiro widened his eyes slightly. He didn’t mean to scare her so he lowered his arms, almost hiding them behind his back.

“Yeah I… it caught my eye a little. I think it’s a nice bow.” Hiro’s tail feathers flickered to the side and he shifted his foot on the dirt.

“I’m Hiro by the way.” And in a whisper added, “At least I think I am.”

Roselia stepped closer to Hiro, eyes sparkling in awe. “You have a name…”

Hiro narrowed his eyes back at Roselia, who caught herself and backed away a step then another. An awkward veil hung in the air. Why did everyone react so oddly to him having a name?

Hiro waved his claw dismissively as he spoke.

“Look, Miss, is it really all that strange to have a…” Hiro’s words trailed off when Roselia’s eyes widened like plates, petals curling inward, face flushing greener than her leaves. A rusty shelled Bisharp walked past them on the bridge, and yet Roselia still stood frozen like a statue even after they’d crossed. What had come over her? Hiro pulled his ears back and raised a steady paw forward. Roselia flinched and quickly composed herself.

“N-not everymon has a name. Call me just Roselia! A-and I’m a boy… now,” Roselia blurted, and muttered something else under his breath that Hiro was too stunned to pick up on. He’d been so sure about Roselia that the revelation hit him like a mallet to the face.

The Sneasel drew back his paw over his chest. He mouthed an apology and squirmed inwardly with embarrassment. Right. A Pokemon’s voice told one little at times about who it belonged to, as he’d learned from personal experience. Just a few days ago he’d met a Walrein mother who had the voice of a squeaking rabbit while her Spheal child sounded like a dying old man.

Hiro snapped out of his own stupor, and caught Roselia’s wavering gaze dancing along at the bricks lining the bridge wall. Hiro brushed his cheek with the flat end of his claw, cleared his throat and then spoke up to clear the awkward air, “Right. Uhm… You followed me all the way out here from the café, didn’t you? Did you need something from me?”

Roselia flinched, snapping his gaze at Hiro as though he’d woken up from a horrible dream.

“That’s… that’s not it. Well it is, but err…” Roselia hurried over, virid vines stretching from his roses, presenting a black thread ball to Hiro. “One of your companions forgot this when you came over. I-I’m just here to return it.”

Hiro eyed the vines closely, almost mesmerized by them as they slithered like tiny snakes. He plucked the silk ball like a fruit out of the vines, fiddling with it in his paws as a name came to mind.

“Right. This is Mebh’s.”

Hiro scratched his cheek and shot Roselia a glance. Aery Cliff was nowhere near where they were, and Hiro had been going in circles in the city for what felt like hours further away from the cafe. No, it had been hours. Had Roselia been following him the whole time?

“You didn’t have to come all the way here to return it. I’m pretty sure Mebh has more than enough where these come from.” And that wasn’t even getting into how she was surely still gorging herself on clothing store wares as they spoke.

Roselia’s lips curled in a faint smile, his eyes fixed to Hiro’s. Did he still want something else from him? Before Hiro could wander his mind for a clue, Roselia straightened his arms and backed away again.

“Well err… that’s all then! Sorry for disturbing you. I know you Delvers have very busy lives…”

Delvers? Hiro tilted his head slightly and didn’t recognize the term. Roselia flailed his roses, spilling pollen to the air as he quickened his pace back the way he’d come from.

While Roselia sped off, a sinking feeling spread out from his chest down to his toes. He still didn’t have the slightest idea of where he was or how to get to Ze’Mer. If he just left Roselia to dart off like this, he’d be straight back to being lost and alone without any sense of direction.

He moved without thinking.

Hiro overtook the flower pokemon in a trail of white, his eyes narrowed to slits as he blocked the path forward.

Roselia stiffened and spread his arms wide, acting on the instinct to appear as a harmless shrub. Upon seeing the fright in Roselia’s eyes, Hiro flattened his ears to his head, and paced back a step. He twiddled his claws and tried to explain himself, except his words kept evading him like startled antelopes on a field.

“Listen… I’m sorry about scaring you like that. But there’s something I need your help with. I actually am lost right now. Very lost.” Hiro exhaled a sigh, and barely held back the distressed mewl rising up his throat. “If it’s alright with you, can you help me find the place called ‘Hatter’s Focus’?”

He mewled anyway that time, and a part of his soul died inside from embarrassment. Roselia regarded him with a curious look in his beady black eyes. His arms relaxed as he cupped his roses over his face.

“Hatter’s Focus? Why are you going there? You seem fine…?”

Hiro quirked a brow and the flower mon cupped his roses over his mouth. The Grass-type averted his eyes and gave off a scent of lemons. That earned a raised brow, but before Hiro could even ask Roselia spoke again.

“O-oh, of course that’s none of my business, whatever’s wrong with you that is! The building’s not far from here really. Erm…” Roselia glanced between Hiro and the path behind him, contemplating what to do. Under his breath he grumbled, “I’m sure Steenee won’t mind me taking a while since she put me up to this.”

Hiro blinked twice. “Steenee?”

Roselia breathed a gasp.

“No one! Well not no one no one. Erm…” Roselia scurried off, stopped when he remembered Hiro, whirled around and beckoned the sneasel over with a flower. “Please, just follow me this way. We’ll be there faster than a latias’ message.”

Hiro didn’t have the slightest clue what that meant, but he nonetheless smiled. Roselia struck him as odd, but now he could finally go through the mind bending maze of Lively Town. The best part was that he didn’t have to do it alone.

…..

Around the bends and down cobblestone paths, a blue and pink house stood out, and was shaped like a head wearing a hat whose dome-like head reflected glittering light off its walls. A chimney stretched over the roof and tapered to a point where a long tube snaked out of and whirled down to a lumpy hand-like structure that rested beside the building.

Hiro gasped in awe. They modeled the building after not just any hat, but a witch’s hat, at least based on what vague echoes he could recall of what they were supposed to look like.

The building itself sat snugly in the middle of an intersection where it made the mundane buildings surrounding it look drab by comparison. They all seemed to have an odd and unnatural air—the one on the side looked like a purple coral plucked right out of a reef—but the witch’s building stood out because nothing else looked quite like it.

Instinct whispered in Hiro’s ear like a temptress begging him to run his claws against those smooth walls. How high could he climb? Could he zip across to the coral-like building if he jumped from the tip of the hat?

Hiro forced his eyes shut and shook his head. Not again. To distract his half-feral mind, he filled his head with attempts at deducing whatever complicated processes must’ve been needed to craft such a building. How did it even hold itself together?

“This is the place,” Roselia muttered..

Hiro snapped out of his idle thoughts and paused in his tracks, his eyes following the Roselia’s. There was a teardrop shaped wooden door with a plaque at the top which beckoned them forward. He found more of those strange symbols carved into the plaque on the door as they approached the building.

“Hatter’s Focus,” mouthed Roselia as he read the symbols. A smile flicked the edge of his lips. “Yeah, this is the place.”

Hiro nodded idly to himself; eyes fixed to the name plaque Roselia read. He’d handwaved the runic symbols in the expedition gadget as an odd quirk of the device, dismissed the letters on the town posts as being decorative symbols at most, but now… he couldn’t deny the reality in front of him any longer. Those symbols were writing, and the Sneasel was about as literate as a newborn infant in this world.

Just another problem to add to the pile, like feeding coal to a steadily building fire. He’d solve them all. One thing at a time, before it burned him down to the marrow.

Air rushed to Hiro’s lungs as he took a deep breath, a puff of mist streaming from his mouth as he exhaled. He clenched his claws and stared firmly at the door. With luck, he’d be able to solve his inability to read along with his memories once he went into that workshop.

“H-hey, is something wrong?” Roselia finally found the courage to ask.

Hiro’s gaze drew to him and waved his claw as if that’d cast all worries adrift to the wind. “It’s nothing.”

Roselia didn’t say more afterwards, so Hiro took the lead in walking over to the door, giving a few solid knocks with the back of his claw. First came silence, then a metallic click from the other side.

The door creaked open and a pale white skinned pokemon peeked through. It was a Kirlia whose green pig tails had been dyed black and decorated with glitter. Looking at them reminded Hiro of nights he’d spent stargazing on their journey to Lively Town.

Kirlia cleared his throat and pulled his shawl behind his shoulder.

“Can I help you, Sneasel?” he asked.

Caught staring, Hiro quickly averted his eyes and blushed. Atlas never mentioned anything about a Kirlia and in that moment he’d completely forgotten the golden badge. Said Kirlia’s attention wandered down to the golden badge Hiro had in his left claw.

“That badge, I recognize it. Isn’t that Atlas’?” the Kirlia observed, locked eyes with Hiro. “He sent you?”

Hiro answered with a nod and straightened his back. “I’m looking for Ze’Mer. Is she here?”

Kirlia appraised the Sneasel in front of him. He made a quick judgement and stepped aside for him to enter as the door opened wide on its own. “She’s around. Come inside.”

Atlas’ name clearly carried a lot of power for things to have gone so smoothly. Kirlia didn’t even demand an explanation for who he was, nor probe him with questions he’d struggle to answer.

Hiro paused for a moment, relief seeping into his bones as he exhaled. He cast his flowery companion a glance. “Are you coming with, Roselia?”

Roselia parted his lips as if to answer, looked between the building and the path outside, and decided to follow them in after a sigh.

A velvet blue carpet welcomed them inside Ze’Mer’s abode. Hiro thought the inside would look much like the outside—clad in walls of pink and blue—but instead, he found dark purple walls the moment he stepped in. He looked to the wall to his right and almost jumped in fright. A green creature resembling a fly trap stared back at him. It’d been a sculpture juggling torches, each one hovering still in the air, frozen in time just like the green sculpture.

“Wait here,” Kirlia said, his back facing them as he gestured at the assortment of furniture in the waiting room.

They shuffled inside, Hiro taking a stool for himself while Roselia nestled on a small pillow not much bigger than himself. Hiro wandered his gaze about the room of starry posters, ornate shelves, and a chandelier that hung from above which filled the room with a soft warm glow.

Kirlia drew everyone’s gaze to a door arched with interlaced patterns of blue and purple. Hiro scratched an itch on his neck and idly wondered what waited behind the door. Faint voices whispered from beneath, Hiro’s ears flicking each time they tickled him.

Kirlia’s gaze drifted to the door as well. Everyone went quiet, and the air grew still enough that one could hear a pin drop.

Hiro quirked a brow at the unusual silence until he heard Roselia whisper a question, ‘Telepathy?’

Before Hiro could ask what Roselia meant, Kirlia nodded all by himself, brushed a hand over his shawl and stood perfectly still. A breath’s pause later, the other door creaked open and a pokemon with a body of blue and pink walked out. They towered over them as they approached the living room, a shadow always cast over her features by her witch-like hat and flowy blue hair. With how tall they were, Hiro shifted uncomfortably, pointedly reminded of how small he truly was as a Sneasel.

That aside, he had a hunch that this was who he was looking for: Ze’Mer the Hatterene. Her appearance wasn’t any less striking than Kirlia’s. Her dark eyes seemed to glimmer like a starlit sky. The underside of her hat was dyed in dark paint and glitter, which ran down her face like a waterfall forming a veil.

“Atlas sent somemon to me?” Ze’Mer asked, with a voice so gentle it could calm a stampede of antelopes. Her gaze hovered over the room and found Hiro and Roselia. “So, which one of you is the one he wanted me to see?”

“Pardon me, Master.” Kirlia clapped his hands, vanished and reappeared beside Ze’Mer, earning him curious glances from the others. “It would be the Sneasel.”

Hiro shot to his feet, flicked his tail feathers and clenched the nervous tremor in his claws. He called upon courage like rekindling a dying flame and drew a breath.

“My name is Hiro. Atlas said you could help me,” Hiro said, taking a step towards her.

“‘Hiro’… I see.” Ze’Mer and Kirlia exchanged glances. “So you’re named.”

Hiro’s ear flicked and he came to a pause. Were names really that much of a big deal to them? A part of him began to wonder if he should start hiding that he had one at all, but the cat was out of the bag now.

“Very well. Come with me, I’d like to hear more about your situation and then we can commence with proper treatment,” Ze’Mer said, gesturing her tentacle hand to the door behind her.

Hiro’s heart quickened as he eyed that door. Could he uncover his forgotten life by walking into it? Kirlia stayed by the door as Hiro followed Ze’Mer inside, and the Sneasel spared a moment to glance at Roselia.

“Oh, I dragged you into this, didn’t I?” Hiro mumbled apologetically.

Roselia averted his eyes and chuckled. “It’s alright. I can just wait here. My shift’s already over and how long would a session with Ze’Mer take anyways?”

“You don’t really have to, you know…?”

“But wouldn’t you get lost again if I go…?”

Hiro’s cheeks warmed and his ears drooped, to which Roselia hid his face behind roses and chuckled. Hiro smiled in turn. He supposed there wasn’t much else to say. He shared one last glance with Roselia and Kirlia and followed Ze’Mer into the other room.