Chapter Text
I listened to my messages while everyone helped Jett look for her missing shoe. Professor Magnolia had gotten the mega energy data to compare it with Galar particles, and found enough similarities to concern her. When the Prism Tower protests hit the news, she decided she had to come over. She must have just gotten off the train and ran straight to Hotel Z to show up when she did.
Naveen found most of Jett's shoe. The heel had been snapped off. Jett decided she would ride her gogoat (recovered from fainting by Xerenas's light) until she could replace her footwear. We all headed to the police station together.
On the way, Emma walked next to Jett. "Since we're off the record, Jett, may I ask you something?"
Jett nodded. "Of course, my dear. What is it?"
"The thing AZ was blackmailing you about. Was it by any chance the daughter you gave up for adoption as an infant forty-three years ago?"
Jett stiffened up. Her gaze drifted away from Emma to stare straight ahead. "I have no idea what you're talking about."
"Almost six years ago, you hired my mentor, Looker, to track her down. You asked for the bad news first, and when he showed you her death certificate, you shut down. Didn't listen to anything else he had to tell you about her."
Jett's fingers clenched on her gogoat's leaves, causing the pokémon to cry out. "Even if that's true, there's no reason to bring it up now. She's dead. What more could be said?"
"She had a kid." Emma placed her hand over Jett's fist. "You're a grandma."
Jett looked at Emma with narrowed eyes. "Are you certain? Where is this child?"
"Right over there." Emma pointed at Taunie.
"Vinnie's little friend?" Jett shook her head. "That seems like such a terrible coincidence."
Taunie looked at Jett. "Not really. I first met Vinnie because I was trying to get through to you."
Vinnie wove through the group to Jett's side. "I tried for some time to tell you, but you refused to listen. 'They're just after my money,' you said, if you said anything at all. 'I've never had any kids, so how could I have a grandchild?' Taunie, Emma, and I had many meetings at Nouveau Café to strategise how to get through to you. After two years of failure, we gave up."
Jett shut her eyes. "When was this, again?"
"Taunie first contacted me about six months after Team Flare collapsed."
"I see." Jett loosened her grip on her gogoat's leaves. "Yet another thing I can blame myself for. Perhaps, had I been willing to listen, you would have motivated me to look for a younger artist to redecorate Prism Tower, and we wouldn't have gotten into this situation. As it stands, I may be facing charges for abetting AZ. Even if not, the bad press will force me to resign. However, in the meantime I should be able to slip you into a good position in Quasiartico."
Taunie shut one eye. "Um... I'll have to think about that."
We arrived at the police station. Soon after, Zygarde sensed AZ and left at extremespeed. It wanted nothing to do with him, and after seeing what he had done to a little over half of it, I didn't blame it. Naveen, Professor Magnolia, and Raven showed up, with Raven carrying AZ. Xerenas used its healing powers to treat Naveen, then galloped away. Even though several other people saw the act, nobody seemed to put together Naveen's head injury with the psychic attack we had all seen Canari receiving on the stream.
I was thrilled to meet the renowned professor Magnolia, but I didn't feel this was an appropriate time nor place to ask her about her work and whether her research into gigantamax might tie into my study of regional variants.
Most of the police force was at Prism Tower making sure the protesters were safe, acting within the law, and - now that their goal was achieved - getting home without incident.
The sleep powder's effects wore off, and AZ woke up. "I'm not dead after all. Again. Strange, how disappointed I am."
"From what I've heard, people aren't too fond of public executions nowadays." Raven dumped AZ into a chair.
One of the officers walked over. "Mr. AZ, come. We have some questions for you."
"First, I have a question for Raven, If I may." AZ looked at the officer. The officer nodded. AZ looked at Raven. "This mystery has been nagging at me for a while: a long time ago, I heard a rumour that the flower Ange tends originally sprouted from Princess Estellise's grave. Is there any truth to that? Any connection you may know of between my floette and the Children of the Full Moon?"
Raven shook his head. "I have no idea. All I can say, right after the Adephagos, back when we weren't sure what the blastia had resurrected into, that blue floette was in Rita's house. The pokémon had to have come from a blastia that Rita had modified. I assumed the blue form became a subspecies." Raven scratched his chin. "I guess they're called variants now? Whatever. Are you saying she's just one individual who's been around all this time?"
I gaped. This could potentially be the missing piece I was looking for to understand regional variants: were the blastia that became pokémon modified in different ways in different places, and those changes carried over when they were resurrected? But what was this about resurrecting blastia into pokémon in the first place? I needed more information. But even if I interrogated Raven, my colleagues would likely dismiss any theory based on the claims of one person who, if I could draw anything from the way he spoke to AZ, must be thousands of years old. An answer to the question of regional variants seemed so close, yet so far away.
"Rita Mordio. That woman did so much. Indeed, Ange is immortal and the only blue floette that exists. She has now rejected me. I hope you, or whoever she chooses to be her next companion, will treat her well." AZ stood up. "Alright, officer, I'm ready to answer whatever questions you may have."
The officer led AZ into a back room. AZ had no troubles walking without his cane, and ducked through the doorway. Another officer closed the door and told us that there was not enough personnel to conduct multiple interviews simultaneously, but that they wanted to get statements from the rest of us as soon as they could. While they were busy doing whatever they felt was necessary to do with AZ, the rest of us hung out in the front office.
A strange light surrounded Raven, and when it faded, his armour was gone, leaving just an ordinary purple shirt and jeans. The bow he was carrying looked dark and rusted instead of golden and bejewelled. He had a few stray hairs coming off of his chin, like he had done a bad job shaving.
I asked Professor Magnolia how she and Raven had figured out what was happening on the rooftop. She explained that she had been watching Canari's stream like just about everyone else, and that Raven had somehow spotted AZ on the rooftop as soon as they walked into Hotel Z's courtyard. Before I could ask her why she was at Hotel Z in the first place, she got excited about seeing a meganium in real life and went to examine Heartbreak. He was embarrassed by the attention. Lida asked Raven about his pokémon. He explained that he wasn't a trainer and that Tsarissima the tsareena was actually the professor's.
Tarragon came to the police station 'in Canari's stead', and when Lida asked him about 'that streamer', he claimed that Canari was too exhausted after streaming for three days straight and was asleep.
Emma studied Raven. "You said 'back in the day' to AZ like you've also been around longer than modern society. Could you explain that?"
"Well, yeah, we're both older than a human has any right to be." Raven scratched the back of his head. "I kinda got stuck in a cave with a bunch of muna and musharna which kept me in a magical coma for the past four centuries or so. It was only recently that mine workers broke into the cavern and archaeologists woke me up."
Taunie rubbed her chin. "Is it true that AZ is three thousand years old?"
Raven shrugged. "Far as I know. He's older than me, that's for sure."
Professor Magnolia rested her chin on her hand and her elbow in her other hand. "You've repeatedly told me that the Darkest Day event two hundred and fifty years ago was after you were trapped in that coma. But you mentioned having met AZ-slash-Duke during an Adephagos. What's the real story? Why are you hiding things?"
Raven looked towards the back rooms, where AZ was presumably telling his side of the story to the police. "Actually, is it normal for people to be open about immortality nowadays? I mean, last I heard, people were being persecuted for livin' longer than a natural human lifespan."
"You're saying you're immortal?" Emma narrowed her eyes. "Because that's what it sounds like to me."
"It wasn't just the Sleeping Beauty Effect that kept me goin' while I was out cold. Yeah, I slept through the third Adephagos. But I was already callin' myself an old man when I helped turn back the second Adephagos." Raven held up his bow. "This bow's not quite that old. Rita was one of the original Brave Vesperia members. It wasn't until after the Adephagos that she created what is now the 'Rusted' set of equipment."
"We're going to have to go back over everything you've told me and figure out when it actually happened so that I can have a more accurate timeline." Professor Magnolia shook her head. "This'll be a lot of work."
"Hey, don't make a big deal out of this, please." Raven put his hands up. "Some of those archaeologists wanna poke and prod me enough without any of them tryin' to figure out why or how I'm immortal. I already get interrogated enough as-is."
Taunie asked, "If you don't mind one more question, is immortality really as boring as AZ makes it sound?"
"Who knows? I haven't gotten bored yet, but I ain't as old as him." Raven laughed. "He's about the only one I can say that about. Sheesh. Anyways, I don't know if it's 'cause I missed a couple centuries, but I've been really busy tryin' to catch up with all this new-fangled technology stuff. It's been an uphill battle, as the professor can attest; I've never been good at this sciency stuff."
"Don't remind me." Professor Magnolia rolled her eyes. "He has crashed my computers in so many ways that I didn't even know were possible."
I cocked my head to the side. "Would you happen to know what AZ did that he's been regretting for the past three thousand years? He's complained about regret a lot, but never said what."
"Guy's been beatin' himself up over something for three thousand years? Now that's dedication. I mean, I've done a lot of stupid things, but I don't even remember most of 'em. Nah, I have no idea. Maybe it was his plan to hold back the Adephagos by killin' all of humanity and tryin' to recreate the Vesparia Blastia?" Raven shook his head. "But if it was that, he wouldn't've tried to do the same thing by killin' Xerenas-Yvetal. Maybe it was savin' Yuri's butt just to get Dein Nomos back."
"Dein Nomos?" I jumped up. Would Raven confirm AZ's story about the sword? "I've heard the name before. What exactly was it?"
"Dein Nomos was a sword with some magical properties. Or I don't know what they'd call it today. The earliest known TM, maybe. Legend had it that only kings of the Empire could use it. It was thought to have been lost even before my time, but Duke loaned it to Yuri in the lead-up to what we're now calling the Second Adeph.. I guess Second Darkest Day. Still a terrible mistranslation. I wonder if the old guy still has it after all these centuries." Raven looked at Naveen. "You seen any swords at his place, by any chance?"
Naveen shook his head. "We'll have to look when we get back."
I put my hand on Philomena's pokéball. He loved new moves. "You said Dein Nomos was a TM? What move did it teach?"
"Guardian field. You know, when it was said only kings could use Dein Nomos, I wonder if that saying was about the TM part. Duke wielded the sword when he tried to stop us at the top of... " Raven frowned. "Whatever that place was called. I forget. He never used Guardian field, though, but Yuri did. And Yuri eventually married into royalty and became king. But he wasn't anybody yet when he mastered the arte. On second thought, that explanation doesn't make sense. It was probably just a bunch of hooey to make the sword even more special than it actually was."
"Guardian field. That's what AZ said when my Dein Nomos - my aegislash - used that weird move to protect Zygarde." I looked around the group. "Is it a normal part of an aegislash's move pool?"
Nobody had heard of guardian field, though both Professor Magnolia and one of the officers suggested I was thinking of King's Shield. I assured them I was not, and even had Dein Nomos the aegislash demonstrate the move to prove it. Raven confirmed that she indeed used guardian field.
---
Once everyone finished telling the police what they knew about AZ and how much or little involvement they had in the events leading up to his assault on Yvetal, word came that some of the more aggressive protesters had gone to Quasartico's headquarters to make trouble. Jett and Vinnie decided they had best stay at the police station to avoid the crowds and develop a media plan. Team MZ plus Professor Magnolia and her assistant headed back to Hotel Z to investigate the mystery of whether Dein Nomos the sword was somewhere in the building.
On the front desk, there was a stack of papers. Taunie picked it up and gasped. "It starts, 'I, AZ, hereby declare that, should anything happen to me while life as we currently know it still exists, I will my estate, including Hotel Z, to Urbain/Taunie Elroy (I do not know which is his/her legal name).'"
We all gathered around to listen. The document, signed and notarised, went on to explain exactly what constituted 'anything' for putting the document into effect. AZ's arrest qualified as a trigger. It went on to explain the current state of the hotel and what he had lined up to improve it when Taunie took over.
I looked at Taunie. "What do you think? Do you want Hotel Z?"
Taunie squinted at documents. "I've been working here long enough that I think I can do everything I need to. Maybe I'll take a business course while the remodels are in progress. Taking over here feels a lot more comfortable than accepting Jett's offer, though."
"Jett was offering you something?" Naveen shook his bangs out of his face. "What? When?"
Taunie explained Jett's offer. "It's basically the nepotism package. I'm sure somebody who's worked for Quasartico has earned the position that Jett's offering me, and won't get it if I come in."
"This old man's been standing around too long." Raven rubbed his back. "Is there somewhere we could sit?"
"Over there." Taunie picked up the papers and led the way to the meeting-slash-dining room. Once everyone was settled, she went back to reading the paperwork from AZ.
AZ had repurposed the third and fourth floors of Hotel Z into his laboratory where he had collected the mega energy from Ange, developed and produced the power cores he had discharged to force pokémon into rogue mega evolution, and designed the modifications to let the ancient Terca Lumiens shield generator to run on Ange's mega energy. These spaces would need to be remodelled back into guest rooms, and he had prepared a contract with Racine Construction to do the work. He asked that the equipment for siphoning off Ange's energy be moved into the employees-only section, and hoped that researchers from Marco Cosmos could be brought in to develop a way to safely turn the mega energy into useable energy. If I chose to remain in Kalos, or at Taunie's discretion, additional the space could be retained as a laboratory for visiting scientists to perform basic experiments with hotel equipment during their stay.
The fifth floor had a ballroom with a small stage that hadn't been used in close to five centuries. The remodelling contract included repairs and reinforcements that would allow people and pokémon to perform. AZ had prepared a contract to hire Lida and her pokémon as dancers to provide live entertainment as soon as the repairs were complete, should she choose.
"Oh my - is he sure? Does he really think I'm ready to go onto a real stage? I know my team and I have improved a lot recently, but I mean, it's not like I've auditioned for this. In fact, I've been so busy with Team MZ and this whole rogue mega situation, I've been missing sessions with my dance class."
"It says right here, 'her practices in the courtyard have proven to me that she is capable of captivating an audience.'" Taunie pointed.
Lida looked over Taunie's shoulder, then squealed. I wasn't sure whether to compare the noise to metal sound or screech, but surely one of my defensive stats had been sharply lowered.
In order for the hotel to run legally, it needed a staircase that connected to all the floors. Two already existed, one in the back rooms where nobody but AZ had been, and the other hidden behind a false wall right next to the elevator. Several Team MZ pokémon volunteered to do the demolition. The staircase was exactly as AZ's paperwork described, plus a thick layer of dust.
The curtains and bedding was nearly as old as everything else in the hotel. AZ had a contract for Naveen to make custom Hotel Z replacements 'in your signature style, to bring the hotel into the modern era'.
Naveen shook his head. "I do apparel, not upholstery."
"Come on, Naveen. You did that massive flag. Surely that's pretty similar to doing curtains and bedspreads, right?"
"That was one flag. Not a hotel's worth of identically-styled everything."
"Who says they have to be identical? He said 'your style', not 'mass-produced'. If you want, you can do something unique for..." Taunie flipped to the next page. "...how many rooms are there, anyways?"
"That'd be a lot of sewing." Naveen smirked. "I wonder how many kilometers of seams? I guess there's only one way to find out."
The last page had all the information AZ had been withholding that Taunie needed to set up a website and online booking.
We all went behind the front desk and into the back rooms. We soon located a sword, hanging on a wall, that Raven identified as Dein Nomos. I asked my aegislash if this is how she had learned guardian field. She bobbed an affirmative.
After going up the stairs and peering into the third floor, we all decided to leave off exploring the labs until the police could look at them, in case they wanted to use DNA to be sure that AZ was the only one who had been in there.
Everyone was exhausted from our early morning. Taunie gave Raven and Professor Magnolia the last two rooms on the second floor, fixed us all (except Naveen, who got his sandwich) his signature croissant curry, and we went to bed early.