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“Aw, that’s so cute!” Nemona said, looking across the wooden bridge to the log cabin at its end. A ring of flowers decorated its door, and the cabin’s thatched roof was held in place by large, Kudzu vines. An overgrowth of trees surrounded it. They provided the cabin with both sun and shade.
Sada glanced at Nemona and asked, “You like it? I found it when I got here. Come. Follow me.” She, Penny, Scarlet, and Nemona crossed the bridge with no issues, but Koraidon was a different story.
He saw its small size compared to his and froze in his tracks. Koraidon sniffed the bridge and tapped it a few times. It creaked under his paw.
“Come on, Koraidon. You can do it,” Nemona encouraged.
Miraidon merely rolled his eyes and switched to his battle form so he could float. He floated past Koraidon and snickered at him.
“Aw, come on, man,” Koraidon complained.
“Dang, what a showoff,” Penny said, glancing at Miraidon who reached the other side of the bridge and returned to his low-power mode.
Sada placed her hand to her ear and said to her robot, “It looks like Koraidon and Miraidon are still having some territorial struggles.”
“Do what?” Penny inquired, a little confused.
“Nothing,” Sada answered, lowering her hand.
Scarlet had an idea. She tapped Arven’s shoulder and pointed at his backpack.
“Oh, a sandwich. That’s perfect!” he realized. Arven unzipped his pack and pulled out a ham and cheese sandwich. He handed it to Scarlet.
She held the sandwich out to Koraidon and said, “Here, boy.” She shook it a few times.
At the sight of the sandwich, Koraidon licked his lips. He touched the bridge a few more times, and then he scurried across it, light on his feet. The bridge creaked under him, but it didn’t break.
Miraidon growled. Without warning, he rushed to Scarlet and Koraidon and snatched the sandwich out of Scarlet’s hand.
“Hey!” she yelled.
Miraidon swallowed the sandwich in one gulp. Chuckling deep in his throat, he pushed Koraidon with his shoulder.
Koraidon head-butted him in return and roared, “Agias!”
Noticing that Scarlet was about to get caught in the middle of a nasty brawl, AI Sada pulled her out of the way and came between Koraidon and Miraidon. She didn’t feel anger, but she did say, “Stop. Both of you,” to the two Pokémon. A blow from Miraidon’s tail that was meant for Koraidon smacked her in the leg, but Sada didn’t even flinch; although, her leg did twitch a little with the impact.
“Mom!” Arven said. He started for her, but Penny stopped him.
“She’s okay, Arven,” she said.
Arven freed himself. “But, Penny, Miraidon’s tail hurts.”
“Your mom doesn’t feel pain,” Penny explained.
“Of course she does!” argued Arven. He hurried to Sada and asked, “Are you okay, Mom?” He reached for her leg, to check it, but Sada’s robot booted up again.
“Human presence detected. Switching to attack mode.”
“Stop, Mom!” Arven snapped, grabbing Sada’s wrist before she could free her Master Ball again. “I know you don’t want to do this. Do not let that robot control you.”
Sada’s wrist shook under his touch, but it wasn’t long until it calmed down. Her eyes did not glow cyan; rather, they met Arven’s, and she whispered, “I’m sorry.”—her catchphrase. Something clutched at her tummy. Was this an emotion she felt? If it was, then it succeeded in making her feel sick.
Sada could not remember the last time a human touched her, if any. She could not even remember the last time she lifted her hand and clutched a human’s shoulder, but she did with Arven—and it felt wonderful.
“Let’s go into my house,” Sada said in a low voice. “Be brave, Sada. Be brave,” she repeated in her head. With those words, she led the kids and Pokémon into her cabin.
It was nothing more than one story and one giant room that had a kitchen, a living room with wooden chairs, and Sada’s bed propped up against the wall, parallel to the kitchen.
Nemona, Scarlet, Arven, and Penny plopped down on a few of the living room’s chairs and faced the stone fireplace.
Penny removed her Rotom Phone from her pocket and pulled up an app she used with her computers back home—to help identify them. She pointed it at Sada and waited patiently.
The Professor hustled into the kitchen and said, “I’m sure you kids are hungry. I don’t have much, but I do have enough to make some sandwiches.” Since she was an AI, she rarely ate. However, Sada tried her best to have everything set before Arven and his friends reached her, like a good mother.
She removed some bread from the cabinet above the kitchen bar and placed it on its face. Aside from it, she also gathered some lettuce and meat from the faucet-free sink and a knife from the drawer under it.
Sada tried to cut the lettuce, but the knife slipped from her grasp and stabbed her hand. Her tough, AI skin didn’t break, but the knife did fall onto the floor.
“Dang it,” Sada whispered to herself. Oh, this was so embarrassing! That was the best word Sada could find for the situation.
Celebi gestured Arven off his chair and into the kitchen. It pointed at Sada and ordered, “Bi.”
“Okay, okay,” Arven replied, smiling slightly. He reached down and picked up the knife from the floor. “Let me help you, Mom. After all, Mabosstiff and I are sandwich experts.” He stood next to Sada and showed her the proper way to cut lettuce.
While Arven and Sada prepped everything, something popped up on Penny’s phone.
She nudged Nemona and Scarlet and said, “Check this out.” A picture of Sada appeared on her phone’s screen. It showed her robot appearance—bald with no skin: just wires, sparks, etc.—compared to the one Arven and his friends saw.
Penny pointed at a cloud of information that popped up in between Sada’s robot look and her usual one. She spoke in a whisper, because she didn’t want Arven to hear, and explained, “AI Sada is controlled by a computer called Infrared.”
“Infrared?” Nemona asked, intrigued. She carefully studied the diagram on Penny’s phone.
“According to this,” said Penny, “Infrared’s power is weakened whenever the AI has human contact. Sada has not received any since coming here… until now.”
“Makes sense,” Nemona agreed, nodding. “I mean, how many humans are on Paldea thousands of years ago? I would think that since Arven is Sada’s son, it’s a double whammy on Infrared.” Oh, man! Oh, man! Nemona could taste another epic adventure on her tongue! “All right, how can we help, Penny?” she instantly asked.
“I’m working on it,” Penny admitted, “but I think what’s happening is that AI Sada wants to be the mother Arven never had growing up. However, she can’t do it alone—not with Infrared controlling her.”
“That means she probably summoned Celebi,” Nemona guessed, “knowing that with its powers and Miraidon’s combined, they could bring us here.”
Realization washed across Scarlet’s face. She checked in on Sada and Arven and observed, “Sada just wants to be human. Right, Koraidon? Koraidon?”
Koraidon was not next to Scarlet. Still upset about the sandwich earlier, he sat like a dog in the kitchen and sniffed the sandwiches Arven and Sada made.
Miraidon huffed and pushed open the cabin’s back door, revealing a brook and garden in the backyard. Mumbling to himself, he walked in circles in front of the brook and lay down.
While he rested, he studied the swaying treetops in the thicket and the Magikarp leaping out of the stream’s clear water.
Crack! At the sound of a stick breaking, Miraidon sat straight up. He studied the overgrown woods and growled when a shadow appeared deep within it. “Agias!” he finally roared, at the sight of something that looked a little like Sada’s Slither Wing.
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