Chapter 12 [END]

To fight.

That was its purpose.

The Iron Valiant fought to improve its strength, and it improved its strength to ensure that it fought.

The other Iron Valiant of its home followed the same guide, and the power between them was essentially shared. When all the Iron Valiant ever faced were the same opponents, everything tended to...

Level out.

Day after day, blades clashed and metal clanged. Strikes became more honed, and techniques became more polished.

However, no single Pokémon ever won against all others. At worst, fights would end in a tie or a temporary defeat.

When the Iron Valiant left, it was because it realized there was no further point. It sought strength, but so did everyone else. The world was unchanging, and it questioned its end goal. Despite all of its improvements, when it had to describe itself, it would always place itself in the direct middle—but so would every other Iron Valiant.

Truthfully, it left because—

It left because...

It left because it needed something else.

Unchanging stone defined its world, and it walked away. The crystal-laden bridge that had served as its home and battlefield remained behind as it began to climb the ledges and tunnels of this extensive cavern.

It quickly learned that other groups of Pokémon would rarely tolerate its presence, but that reaction did not stem from hostility. Pokémon needed to protect their territory. They needed to not show weakness in the face of others. Standing at the edge of an area without approaching would often lead to fights, but not immediately walking straight in would see those fights possess far less hate.

It would swing its blades, and it grew stronger. Sometimes, even just walking on its own would lead to unexpected fights.

Every battle was an experience, and every battle was a chance to win. More often than not, the Iron Valiant would stand victorious, and it carried every lesson it learned into the next fight.

However, it didn’t take long for fewer and fewer Pokémon to be willing to face it. No matter where it went, Pokémon became less willing to accept a challenge. It tried once to walk straight into a Pokémon’s home to start something only to learn that doing so was a mistake.

It needed an opponent, not a victim.

It needed to find something that would give meaning to these fights.

The Iron Valiant continued on, and on, and on, and, though clear, its memories of the time felt like a blur. It all came to an end when, suddenly, one day, the Iron Valiant fell.

It didn’t know why it fell. It was pushed. It slipped. The path crumbled.

What mattered was that it plummeted.

No bridge stopped it. No platform caught it. Stagnant air rushed upwards around it. The stone walls that defined the cavern grew more and more lit with crystal, and then there was only crystal.

And then there was a jagged, crystal floor rushing straight at it.

The Iron Valiant crashed straight through.

Crystal shattered like glass, and the ground became falling, glimmering fragments. Those fragments turned into nothing more than shining, ephemeral dust, and the particles were so small that they reminded the Iron Valiant of—

Of...

Of a certain gleam.

An inch of water failed to break its fall, but its body was sturdy enough that it went relatively undamaged. The puddle of water served more as an ice-cold shock that kept it awake, and the Iron Valiant did nothing more than lie on the ground and stare upward.

Only the singular hole in the crystal world around it served as a memory of the world above.

“...Hello?”

It wasn’t sure how long it lay there. The stagnancy in its life was so pervasive that it almost wanted to remain motionless and wait for that to sink in.

“Are you going to say anything?

The Iron Valiant just lay in the water and waited for the light to end.

“You woke me up, and now you’re just going to sit there and pretend to rest?!”

Surprisingly, the stillness did not last—something pushed against the Iron Valiant. The Iron Valiant hadn’t expected movement but still tried to resist. Yet, the pokes were persistent, and it eventually had no choice but to crane up its head.

Shining eyes and a bright smile met its gaze. A creature smaller than even the Iron Valiant’s blades rested in the water just inches away.

“Hi!” When the creature spoke, its voice was a squeak. “Why are you here?”

It then let out a long yawn as if it had only just woken up.

“I don’t know,” the Iron Valiant answered.

“Alright. Then, how did you get here?” the creature asked instead.

“I don’t know.”

“Okay. Then, who are you?”

“I don’t know.”

A slow blink.

“Is that all you can say?”

The Iron Valiant let its head fall back into the inch of water beneath it, and it returned to staring up at the hole in the crystals. The passive glow was so incredibly bright that it was almost hard to see. It never expected to be in a room that consisted solely of crystals.

But everything it had ever known was up there, and now it was down here.

“No,” the Iron Valiant eventually answered.

The creature laughed, and its laugh was a strange, almost chiming noise.

The Iron Valiant finally pushed up to sit, and it took this moment to look over the creature wading at its feet. Its limbs and head consisted of blue flesh, but the Iron Valiant couldn’t look away from the creature’s shell. It was made of the same crystal that made up the walls.

Having spurred a reaction, the creature started to walk away, but it had no intention of leaving. It was simply climbing up a nearby plinth to gain the height needed to speak to the Iron Valiant.

“So. Don’t lie to me again,” it said. “Why are you here?”

Staring at the Iron Valiant, the creature let itself nestle into a small groove on its crystal bed. It looked comfortable, but the Iron Valiant wasn’t. It took a full minute before it could speak.

“I fell,” the Iron Valiant answered.

“Oh. That sucks. Are you feeling okay?”

“...No,” came the Iron Valiant’s reply.

The shelled Pokémon let out a sympathetic whine, and despite the difference in size, it was completely unafraid. This whole situation was so strange and bewildering that the Iron Valiant could hardly believe any of this was real.

“So why did you fall?” the shelled creature asked next.

The Iron Valiant didn’t want to answer, but the question was laced with such genuine concern, it felt as though it had no other choice. So it did.

“I fell because I wasn’t strong enough. I fell because—”

“That’s dumb.”

The Iron Valiant refreshed its sensors and stared at the tiny Pokémon. It crossed its front legs over one another, and it puffed up its cheeks out of annoyance.

“Why do you live?” it asked unexpectedly.

“To get stronger,” the Iron Valiant answered easily enough.

“So, why do you get stronger?” it then asked.

“To fight,” the Iron Valiant answered, and it tried to level out its growing glare.

The tiny creature scooted forward on its plinth, and the Iron Valiant stared at it to try to decipher any hint of its true feelings. However, no matter what it did, it found nothing malicious. These questions stemmed solely from raw curiosity.

“And... why do you fight?”

The question felt like a final one.

“To... get stronger,”

The Iron Valiant hadn’t expected to stammer its answer.

“Wow. That’s dumb and stupid,” the creature said, and it did not speak unfairly.

It brought its tiny head back to stare at the hole in the ceiling, and its eyes gleamed, but the gleam did not come from the light of the crystal. The gleam came from being lost in memory.

“Well, do you want to know why I live?” it asked, voice cheery. “It’s because I want to. And it’s because I’ve made a lot of great friends. There are so many people that I know are long gone now, but remembering them keeps them alive! There’s always a piece of them that will continue as long as I keep them in mind, and there’s also so much I still want to experience. So much more to see!”

The crystals around it reflected its smile.

“What I’m trying to say is, there’s more to being alive than just constantly fighting. Being alive is about finding a meaning and following that meaning no matter what.”

The Iron Valiant had nothing to say. The Iron Valiant didn’t know what to say. It wanted to claim that this small creature’s words felt as though they stood completely opposed to the Iron Valiant’s existence, but it honestly wasn’t sure if that thought was true.

The creature squeaked out a yawn. Despite its diminutive form, it carried a lot of wisdom.

“Do you have any friends?” it asked.

“I do not,” came the Iron Valiant’s answer.

A blink and a shift saw the tiny Pokémon drop its head, and its smile turned morose. It looked over the Iron Valiant one last time, and then it seemed to come to a decision.

“Okay!” it cheered. “I’d offer, but I’m tired. I need to go back to sleep. Except, I’m in a position to help. Would you like to fix that?”

“Fix your sleep?” the Iron Valiant replied flatly.

“No!” the Pokémon said. “What I mean is, I can get you a friend.”

The Pokémon waddled to turn around, and the entire room shifted. None of the crystals physically changed, but it was like the quality of their light changed. The images on their surface reflected what was in the room, but there were so many tiny variations between them. The image mirrored the crystal-shelled Pokémon in the center, but that was the only constant between them.

However, the tiny Pokémon didn’t react to any of that. It was as if the shift in the room was completely natural. The Pokémon just maintained a smile, a constant, merry expression that almost reminded the Iron Valiant of—

Of...

The tiny Pokémon began to speak.

“This is a bit selfish, but I can bring someone over,” it said. “Give you a chance to make a friend, but only a chance, and I’m limited in my options. It can’t be anyone who wouldn’t want to be here. It also can’t be anyone who already exists here. They’d be new, they’d be from somewhere else, and they’d be similar to you. But most importantly, no matter what happens, they’d be someone who wants the same thing you do.”

The Iron Valiant wanted to ask what that was, but the creature looked up. The crystals shifted.

Something changed, but also nothing.

“It might take some time, but it’ll work,” it said, turning around. “I promise you. No matter what, I’ll make sure that you— That you...”

The tiny creature yawned.

“Everyone deserves to be happy. I’ll make sure that you meet someone who makes you want to live for you.”

________________________________________________________________________

The Iron Valiant woke up.

It did not recognize where it was.

Something soft and white supported its body from below. Machines with wires connected to magnets were held in place by tape stuck to the surface of its body.

The Iron Valiant remembered how the world became nothing more than blurs. It remembered how a trickle of energy was all that was left in its chest, and it remembered walking and climbing and sliding and falling—

And then it remembered Nick.

The Iron Valiant shot up in the bed and was ready to tear everything off of it, but it froze when it saw a human with deep blue eyes staring right at it.

The human’s mouth suddenly curved.

“You’re quite the curious Pokémon,” she said. “A metal body. Steel flesh. Mechanical parts that perfectly mimic the functions of a more fleshy body’s organs. It is as if you’re a completely organic being, but every part of you is metal instead of meat. It’s... intriguing.”

Her stare was even. She did not look away.

“All of that is a curiosity, and then you also showed up out of nowhere with an injured person on your back,” she continued. “An injured person with no documentation whatsoever. It’s strange. It’s almost as if he didn’t come from this world.”

The woman sat in a chair that faced the bed, and her black clothes were prim and proper. She kept her gloved hands crossed in her lap, and she spoke with a sense of ease that made it seem she didn’t consider the Iron Valiant to be a threat.

But this room was empty. It was just her and the Iron Valiant in here. Machines next to the bed beeped, and they displayed numbers that the Iron Valiant had no idea what they could mean.

“It’s fascinating,” the woman said. “Both your actions and what you are. I’ve read the reports, of course, but I’ve also made sure to watch the videos posted online. You’re truly... something special. Very few Pokémon have the stamina to do what you did. And, even fewer than that have the determination to push themselves to such a level just to help a friend.”

The Iron Valiant wanted to stand. But it couldn’t. It wanted to rip off all of the things attached to it and carve out a way to escape, but the weight of this woman’s gaze kept it firmly in place.

There was a pressure to her presence and an expectation to her words. It was as if she wanted it to answer, but the Iron Valiant was a Pokémon. There was no way it could.

“Well then. That’s enough musings out of me,” she ended up saying, laughing slightly while leaning back in her chair. “I do have an offer for you, but now isn’t the time. That can wait until later—much later.”

She cast her gaze to the side of the room where a door remained closed. Tense, the Iron Valiant followed her gaze, and she sent it a side glance that turned into a slight smirk.

“Ah, I’ve kept you for long enough. Your friend is outside. He’s recovering. You can ask him for more details. To find him, just leave this room and head down the stairs—”

The Iron Valiant finally managed to stand.

The woman’s smile deepened.

“Don’t worry. Your friend will be glad to learn that you are okay.”

Practically running, the Iron Valiant charged to the door, but the exit opened up before it could slice it in two. Something red, metal, and covered in blades stood on the other side. Its steel mustache twitched as it moved out of the Iron Valiant’s way.

Truly and freely, the Iron Valiant ran out of the room. Humans filled the hallway that it entered, and they paused for only the briefest of moments to send it a smile.

It recognized them—these were the pink-haired ones that had brought Nick into the building. It remembered seeing them load Nick onto that cart, but it also remembered flashes of them standing over its body, rushing to give the Iron Valiant some kind of treatment.

At the end of this hallway, something pink and round grabbed a door and opened it up with a merry shout of, “Chansey!” That noise was an invitation in. It was all that the Iron Valiant needed to see to charge into the stairwell and descend toward the exit.

At the bottom flight, it burst out into another hallway, but this hallway ended in a set of glass doors. Slowing down, the Iron Valiant approached, and the exit opened.

Then, the Iron Valiant was there.

A lone chair with wheels rested ahead of it, neatly positioned under a tree in an open garden. A person reclined in their seat and stared up at the sky. The sun was high above them, and the sky was a bright blue.

They turned around.

“You’re awake!” Nick called out.

As fast as it could, the Iron Valiant schooled its reaction and returned to a more neutral stance. It let its body rest, and it forcibly maintained a calm gait to stand at Nick’s side.

For some reason, the human laughed.

“I appreciate the concern,” he said, covering his mouth.

Pleased, Nick let out a comfortable sigh, and for a while, he just sat there and stared up at the sky. The sun was lower in position than it had been when the Iron Valiant had arrived in this town—at least a full day had passed.

But that didn’t matter. It was content to just stand there for now.

For a human settlement, it was surprisingly peaceful out here.

“I’m going to be okay,” Nick eventually said. “Had some internal issues and a damaged spine, but they can apparently heal that? It was both more and less complicated than that, but I’m not a doctor. They said that getting some berries in me helped stop it from becoming worse, but if I had gotten here just a day or two later, the consequences would have been more... permanent.”

He pushed against the chair’s arms to adjust how he was sitting. The Iron Valiant glanced down and hid its relief when it saw Nick moving his legs.

“Going to have to get through some physical therapy for a while,” he said. “I’m missing some ‘critical’ vitamins, so I’ll need a special diet, too. But after a few months of that, I’ll be okay. After all this time, I’ll be out. And then I... Man. And then I can finally...”

He wiped his face.

“And then I can finally have a new start.”

Nick laughed, but there was no joke there. His laugh was one solely of happiness and of finally being free for the first time in his life.

“She’s paying me. Geeta. The Champion, I mean,” he said. “Soon as I was conscious, we worked out a deal. And don’t worry. I was careful about what I shared. There are going to be a few people sent into the crater for them to figure out the next steps to fix the environment there. And Geeta’s going to personally provide some money to get me back on my feet—literally!—and she also said she’ll sponsor me when I choose what I want to do.”

He smiled.

“I could be a chef. I could buy a house. I could go to the academy here, or, heck, I could be a star on TV! Anything is open to me as long as I put my mind to it, but I think what I really want is...”

He whispered for the next part.

“I want to make a small memorial for my family. I don’t want to forget them,” he said. “But also...”

Nick looked up with a smile.

“If you’re willing, I want to continue traveling with you.”

The Iron Valiant had to look away, and it briefly shut off its sensors so it could hide its eyes. Its processors were firing for what felt like trillions of times every second, and then it lowered its head for its response.

“I know it’s a selfish ask,” Nick continued, still staring forward, “but I think it’d be fun. And even if you’re not interested, when those people are sent into the crater, you could use that to return. I don’t want to take you from your home if you don’t—”

Letting its vision return, the Iron Valiant furiously shook its head, and Nick raised an eyebrow.

“No?” he asked.

It furiously nodded to try to negate that.

“Wait, so, yes, you do want to return?”

The Iron Valiant felt like it was going to explode, and it did everything it could to emphasize, no, it did not want that. It waved its arms. It shook its head. It was the most animated it’d ever been in its life.

And that caused Nick to begin to laugh.

“I get it. I get it! Wow, I’ve never seen you act like that before.”

The Iron Valiant froze, righted its stance, and then Nick laughed even harder.

“Thank you,” he ended up saying after a bit. “You’re really cool, and if there was any Pokémon I’d ever want to travel with, I’m glad that it’s going to be you.”

He then went on to ramble about all of the things he wanted to see, like usual, and the Iron Valiant listened, not letting even a single word pass through its mind. His list was extensive, and his excitement was palpable.

“I’m really looking forward to this,” Nick said. “It’s going to be fun.”

And, once Nick was healed, it truly was.