#wohohoho I'm thrilled to get this going again; this is like my fav part to work on

[occasionallygardevoir]

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Chapter 7 Hidden in the grass

I teleported after Lady Noir, following her steps closely. I already knew where she was taking me to, but one shouldn’t enter such a place uninvited, even if they had been there before. You’d never know who’s welcome or not.

We departed after I comfortably nested the little one in a basket, hiding her under my cape. Iyoh wasn’t home anymore since he had already left for work and I felt a bit bad on doing things behind his back, but as much as that was urgent, I didn’t want to occupy his head with worries; I’d be fine. And if something went wrong, I’m sure Lady would help me, after all.

She led the way gracefully floating ahead, however, her hasty movements made it clear she was in a rush. I couldn’t blame her; the fairy world was a secret between everyone of our kin - fairy Pokémon - but not all were knowledgeable about it, many of us weren’t born in there. Lady never talked to me in detail regarding that, but I was aware she had already dealt with non-fairy Pokémon which got stuck, and when she did so, I could notice how bleak her eyes were.

I didn’t know what I should fear, but if she looked like that, what happens to whoever gets stuck might be… dreadful.

Lost in my thoughts, I only noticed where we were when the surroundings finally caught my eye as recognizable: a beautiful glade lied ahead, and I couldn’t say it looked the same as to when I was around, but it had the same feeling to it. It was as pretty as ever, though.

In the middle of it, as always, there was a giant tree standing as the only one big enough to make us perk up our heads to see its top. Its branches where its leaves rested were abundant and home to some bird Pokémon’s nests. That was our destination.

…or maybe, it wasn’t; Lady kept moving onwards, ignoring completely the tree. Ahead, was a patch of really tall grass that we started crossing.

And then in the end, we found more patches of grass. I kept walking, always following her lead, only to find…

…even more patches of grass. I was about to ask Lady if that was right, when she stopped in the front of a bush. She moved some vines out of the way, revealing an entrance and signing for me to go ahead. I stepped in mildly confused, and she followed through, covering the entrance with the vines again once she was in. Ahead of us was a winding, long corridor that seemed to lead underground, judging by how dark it was ahead.

Lady got hold of a lantern that was hung nearby, and we started descending.

“Say, why did you move from the hollowed tree? It looks as fine as ever”, I asked, while we walked down the now dim lit tunnel.

“Indeed it is, but there have been much more nests lately. The Madame thought it was better to move from there instead of chasing everyone off. I’d say it’s a wise choice, since the patches of grass are really confusing to navigate through.”

That madame… I laughed to myself. She had a soft heart still, by the looks of it.

“Well, the tree’s entrance was easy to spot if one was really insistent on finding it, but isn’t this bush even easier to enter by accident?”

“I don’t think so. There’s someone holding up illusionary barriers now. If one doesn’t know the exact way to this bush, they’d fall into the illusion barriers and end up on the other side of the patches. It would look like to them as if they’d just crossed a really long patch of grass.”

“That sounds… really impressive.”

“You forgot how we roll, didn’t you, Angie?”

In the distance, I could spot some floating objects that glowed faintly; they became closer with each step we took further, and when we arrived at the end of the corridor, I could see they were actually a Lunatone and a Solrock, which both prevented us from passing. Ahead of them, was an entrance of a cave.

“Life granted by the sun; love overseen by the moon. We’ll dwell by you, so the eclipse will come soon”, Lady Noir chanted. The two Pokémon closed their eyes and seemed to nod in acceptance, letting her pass.

“You don’t know her since you’re new”, she pointed at me, “but she used to be our valuable intel provider. I’m accompanying her today though, so no worries.”

They nodded once more.

“Understood, mistress”, a faint voice reached both of us via psychic connection, and I tried to pinpoint which one of them said that.

Lady kept walking forward, so I hurriedly bowed down in thanks to both of the meteorite Pokémon, and quickly followed her in before I got lost. Glancing back, I could see they were back to their places, avoiding passage once again.

“Bodyguards?”

“More like ‘gatekeepers’, sounds fancier”, Lady remarked, lighting up her pipe again. I suppose she waited until we were underground so we wouldn’t be sniffed on our way. “They were a couple who fell from the sky, a… friend of mine asked me to take care of them.”

Her voice tone didn’t sound too convincing when she said the word “friend”.

“Since when does the mafia take in lost outsiders?”, I giggled briefly. That was really nice of the group, even if a bit unusual.

“We were in need of reliable gatekeepers anyway. They’ll promptly teleport away whoever tries to enter uninvited. Sometimes they go a bit overboard, sure”, Lady waved her pipe around, shrugging, “but accidents do happen.”

I debated with myself whether I’d like to know or not what she meant by “going overboard”, when my thought process was interrupted by a familiar voice.

“Oh, wow, wow”, a brown Liepard suddenly approached us, walking in a gallant manner. “How could I forget such a face. Ain’t I surprised, though!”

I stared at him for a while.

“Who are you, again?”, I asked, furrowing my brows.

“Ack!”, the Liepard sat on his hind paws and gestured dramatically, looking extremely offended. “How could you forget about me! Angie, I’m hurt!”

“Sorry, haha”, I said, laughing at his misery. “I couldn’t resist joshing you, Dazai.”

“I can forgive you if you give me a nice compliment, then”, he quirked up his brows, playful.

“This new tie of yours fits you really well, but I’m wondering why you kept the bandages after all this time.”

“It’s part of my charm~”

“Nice we stumbled upon you”, Lady said, addressing the Liepard. “Is Tales in here?”

“If you got something to talk to him, it’s just your luck! He has just arrived, he’s upstairs with Elk.”

“I see. Nice timing, thanks for the info. Let’s get moving, Angie.”

Lady Noir started walking again, and I promptly followed her.

“Enjoy your stay while you’re back, Ange!”, Dazai waved before turning his back and going back to minding his own business.

“I thought Dazai had quit too”, I observed. “Did he come back after I was gone?”

“Nah, he’s still a quitter. But there’s only so much the mafia can do, and one of these things isn’t keeping him out of here. He always finds a way in, the pesky bastard.”

The underground space where they now based in looked very alike to some of the Secret Bases I had already visited with my trainer, only it was a tad bigger. It could even compare to something done by humans, differently from the old one. I wonder how much of it they had dug all by themselves?

Reaching a set of small stairs, Lady simply teleported up while I climbed them. Setting foot on the upper floor the stairs led to, I could see a well groomed room; it had a bed, a table with a fruits basket on top of it, and some cushions on the ground. It was very dim lit just as the rest of the cave, with a lamp sitting on the table.

An Alakazam floated in the middle of the room, but he didn’t look like an ordinary Alakazam; he had multiple spoons and a long beard. His forehead was quite big on size and had some wrinkles on it, just like the ones below his closed eyes. There was a shiny red gem on his head.

Standing in the front of the Alakazam was a Lucario. As I approached, the Alakazam shuddered and murmured something I couldn’t hear. This made the Lucario turn to us, now seemingly aware of our presence.

“Tales, we need your help.”

I didn’t know who they both were, so I was glad Lady Noir went straight to the point.

[continue…]

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