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"Good morning, class!" Ms. Raifort pulled her glasses off and set them down in her lush, light black hair. She eyed her History students, who sat with their legs behind their desks, straight as poles, and admired their white uniforms with orange ties and striped, orange shorts. "Oh, aren't we missing someone?" Raifort wanted to know, after studying her students a little longer.
Nemona and Scarlet, who sat at the front of the class, exchanged looks with one another. Scarlet tucked her tight-covered legs under her chair and hid behind her brown curls, but they became caught in her glasses. Nemona, on the other hand, lifted her arm and said, "Arven promised he would be here today, Ms. Raifort."
"Well, I don't see him, now do I, Nemona?" Ms. Raifort questioned. She shook her head and closed her eyes. "I swear, it's like that boy's got his head in the clouds nowadays."
Scarlet and Nemona gulped when images of Area Zero and AI Sada filled their brains: the way Sada glitched when the time machine overthrew her, and Arven's face when she told him that his mother had loved him.
"Oh, come on," Ms. Raifort groaned, at the sight of Nemona and Scarlet's blank faces, "don't tell me you two have your heads in the clouds, too." She rested her palms over the papers on her desk and stared deeply into the two girls' eyes—past Scarlet's glasses. "What, do y'all need a sandwich to perk up?"
Right at the word "sandwich", one of the pokéballs on Scarlet's belt flashed open. Before the class knew it, Koraidon sat like a Mabosstiff in the aisle. He licked his lips, and his big, orange-yellow eyes searched the room for sandwiches. He almost knocked Nemona and Scarlet's desk over with the tire in his scarlet chest and silently whined, "Gias."
"Scarlet!" Ms. Raifort snapped. "How many times have I told you to not bring your Pokémon to class?"
"That's my fault," Nemona piped up before Scarlet could answer (she wasn't much of a talker). "We had a battle before we came here." Which was true. Now that Scarlet was a Champion-ranked trainer like Nemona, they spent way too much time battling one another, to Scarlet's exhaustion.
She wrapped her arms around Koraidon's powerful, scaly neck and buried her face in the feather-like features on his head.
Putting her hands together, Nemona said, "We'll do better, ma'am. Promise." One of her green-tinted bangs fell in front of her left, golden-brown eye, and she peered pleadingly into Ms. Raifort's face.
"Sigh," Ms. Raifort said out loud. "What am I going to do with you battle-crazy kids? Scarlet, it's okay for today, but if you bring your Pokémon to class again, I will have to send you to Director Clavell's office. Do you understand?"
Scarlet removed her head from Koraidon's and gave her a weak nod. "Yes, ma'am," she said in a low voice.
"Gias," Koraidon repeated, ashamed, but also disappointed that there were no sandwiches for him to munch on.
***
Poco Path. There was something about it that comforted Arven. Was it its lush, green grass, the view of the Paldean Sea sparkling under the sun's rays, or the fact that Poco's lab was where he grew up, without a mom or dad? Whatever it was, the lighthouse that was attached to the lab was always Arven's go-to place when he felt stressed, aside from the kitchen. He and Mabosstiff looked across the Paldean Sea. They kept an eye out for any incoming ships, and then they jogged to the other side of the lighthouse and studied Paldea's extensive nature: the white tips of Glaseado Mountain and Mesagoza just past Los Platos below.
Mabosstiff, Arven's Dark-type dog Pokémon, rubbed up against his leg and wagged his tail, with his favorite pokéball in his mouth.
Feeling him, Arven's eyes left Paldea's wilderness and settled in on his partner instead. "What is it, boy?" he asked. "Do you wanna play fetch?"
"Woof!" Mabosstiff replied, running in a few, quick circles.
While he did that, Arven took his hiking pack off his back and set it down next to his left pant leg and boot. He held his hand out to Mabosstiff and said, "Come on, boy. Give the ball to Arven now."
Obeying, Mabosstiff dropped the slimy ball into his partner's palm. A few drops of drool dripped onto Arven's violet jeans and tie, but Arven couldn't care less.
He pulled his arm behind his head and tossed the ball a few feet forward.
At once, Mabosstiff chased after it. He moved so fast that he slid on the lighthouse's red and white bricks before he managed to catch the ball.
While his partner played, Arven sat down and rested his back on the lighthouse's fence. He unzipped his knapsack and pulled out the Scarlet book. It had a black picture of Koraidon on it and a golden border that surrounded the Pokémon and book title.
Arven flipped to the first page. Nope, there was nothing there that could help him. He flipped to the next page, and the next, until he finally found the chapter about the herba mysticas that he tracked down with Scarlet to help Mabosstiff when he was ill not so long ago. "There has to be something about the time machine in here," Arven said to himself, right when Mabosstiff returned and lay down next to him. He knew there was; he just had to find whatever clues he could.
The journey down the lighthouse was a quiet one because Arven was so lost in his thoughts. The second he reached the base of the ladder, his Rotom Phone buzzed in his pocket and floated out of it.
"Hey, Arven!" Nemona said on the other line. "Where are you? Ms. Raifort is pitching a fit."
With his hand, Arven slapped the phone off to the side. He didn't feel like talking right now.
The Rotom Phone chased after him, but Arven whirled around and said, "Stop!" He scared poor Rotom so much that he instantly shut down, and Arven caught the lifeless phone. Instead of Nemona's voice in his head about Ms. Raifort pitching a fit, he heard his mother's—the few times she snapped at him when he didn't attend some of his elementary school classes. That was before she became obsessed with her dumb time machine.
Arven slipped the phone back into his pocket and removed Mabosstiff's ball from his own belt. "Come out, Mabosstiff," he said. "I need you."
Within seconds, Mabosstiff was by his heels, and he followed Arven into the lab. Even though Arven made sure he cleaned it every week, must and dust always seemed to find their way back into it. Dusty books fell from a few bookshelves, and the lab's computers on the other end of it booted up at the same time, revealing a topographic map of Paldea and the Great Crater. Arven studied them for a few minutes, and then he went into the kitchen to fix some sandwiches for him and Mabosstiff. They ate in silence in the musty, old lab—with no parents and no answers. How on Earth was Arven supposed to get his mom back now... unless he found another Ancient Pokémon?
***
Area Zero
Research Station No. 4
Three years earlier
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“Professor Sada, please. We can’t stay here,” AI Sada begged, right when Great Tusk (an ancient relative of Donphan) threw its large and powerful tusks into the station’s main computer. Sparks flew down from it like a cut wire, and a sizzling sound was heard.
Terrified by its power, Koraidon hopped down from the lab’s testing table and backed up to the wall. He curled into a ball and tried to hide in the shadows—behind pipes and machines that still stood.
Great Tusk faced him and hopped onto his powerful hind legs like a rearing Ponyta.
“Agia,” Koraidon said. A fire sprouted from the broken machines.
“Koraidon!” Professor Sada yelled. She released herself from AI Sada and sprinted for the Pokémon. “AI Sada, run!” she called over the shoulder of her lab coat. Her messy, blonde hair waved behind her like a cape.
“But, Professor,” AI Sada said.
With tears shimmering in her cyan eyes, Professor Sada replied, “Just take care of Koraidon for me. And Arven, too.”
Next to Professor Sada, Great Tusk curled into a ball and somersaulted toward Koraidon. The pink crystals on his spine and tusks shimmered like a Terastallized Pokémon.
Professor Sada held her hand out to Koraidon. “Koraidon!” she yelled again. And just like that, she threw herself between Koraidon and Great Tusk.
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