Before leaving Frostleaf Town, Jun made two final stops.
First, he went to find Bounsweet.
The little Pokémon greeted him enthusiastically and immediately offered up several more leaves, which Jun accepted before leaving behind another bag of Pokémon food as thanks.
Afterward, he visited Frostleaf Public Hospital, hoping to see An.
The girl had been seriously ill, but she’d also taken an immediate liking to Ralts, and Jun had wanted to check on her before leaving town.
She was already gone.
According to the hospital staff, An’s mother had discharged her and taken her elsewhere, most likely to a larger city with better medical facilities.
The League sent Jun an update around the same time.
Their people had lost track of the black-robed man.
Jun wasn’t particularly surprised.
Anyone cautious enough to hide his identity, attack inside a Pokémon Center, and retreat the instant things went badly was unlikely to let himself be caught easily.
Knowing that someone like that was now watching him wasn’t comforting, but staying in Frostleaf forever wasn’t realistic either.
Trainers had to worry about more than wild Pokémon; sometimes people were the more dangerous problem.
If Jun refused to leave the League’s protection every time someone threatened him, he might as well give up on traveling altogether.
Besides, he had Marnie.
Unfortunately, Marnie had opinions about his ability to travel.
“You seriously planned to travel like this?” Her unimpressed voice carried through the forest several hours outside Frostleaf Town.
Jun was standing with Marnie’s Pokémon Egg cradled against his chest, his scarf wrapped around it for warmth.
Marnie sighed and held out a hand.
“Give me your backpack.” Jun surrendered it without argument.
She spread a blanket beside a large tree, sat down carefully, and pulled a sewing kit from her shoulder bag.
The backpack itself wasn’t damaged.
The problem was that Jun had somehow agreed to become Marnie’s dedicated Egg caretaker without preparing anywhere safe to actually carry the Egg.
Walking all the way to Wedgehurst with it in his arms wasn’t exactly practical.
Jun’s backpack had cost his predecessor quite a bit and could hold far more than its size suggested, but that didn’t make tossing a fragile Pokémon Egg in with the rest of his belongings a good idea.
One hard impact against something inside could turn a minor inconvenience into a disaster.
So Marnie had taken it upon herself to sew a padded compartment into the bag.
Jun checked the route on his phone again.
If the weather held and nothing delayed them, Wedgehurst was still roughly three days away.
Around them, the Pokémon had settled into the break far more comfortably than either Trainer.
Morpeko raced through the snow, leaving a trail of tiny pawprints behind it until it plunged face-first into a drift and vanished completely except for its ears.
A moment later, it burst back out and continued playing as though nothing had happened.
Purrloin rested beside Marnie with its eyes closed, looking far too elegant for camping in the snow.
Whenever flakes landed on its coat, its curled tail lazily swept them away.
The newborn had curled up beside Purrloin and was already asleep.
Nurse Joy had told Jun that Pokémon this young needed an enormous amount of rest, and eighteen hours of sleep in a day wasn’t unusual for her.
Ralts sat on Jun’s shoulder, absentmindedly winding a strand of his hair around one finger.
Jun borrowed another blanket from Marnie and draped it over Purrloin and the newborn before sitting down nearby.
He lifted Ralts from his shoulder, opened his research notebook, and resumed the writing exercises they’d been using to improve her control over Confusion.
“Let’s try a new one today.
Purrloin.” “Purr?” Hearing its name, Purrloin lifted its head and glanced over.
Once it realized nobody actually wanted anything from it, it used its tail to pull the blanket slightly higher, licked one paw, and settled back down.
Jun wrote the word once for Ralts to copy.
The pen rose under a faint blue glow.
Morpeko eventually abandoned the snow and climbed onto Jun’s shoulder to watch.
Its eyes widened when Ralts began moving the pen without touching it.
“Mor?” Morpeko closed its eyes and concentrated so hard that its entire face scrunched up, apparently trying to will the pen into moving through sheer determination.
Nothing happened.
After several seconds, Morpeko opened one eye, accepted that Psychic powers weren’t going to spontaneously appear, and immediately lost interest.
It pulled a few seeds from its pocket, ate them, then curled around Jun’s neck and fell asleep against his shoulder.
Jun watched Ralts continue writing.
Her fine control over Confusion had improved considerably.
If she kept progressing at this rate, writing exercises probably wouldn’t challenge her much longer.
Another month at most, and Jun would need to find a more demanding way to train precision.
Beside Marnie, the newborn shifted in her sleep and rested her head against Purrloin’s side.
“Purr!” Purrloin jolted awake and stared down at the tiny Pokémon now using its warm belly as a pillow.
Marnie reached over and scratched gently behind Purrloin’s ear, then pulled the blanket back over the newborn where it had slipped away.
Purrloin’s ears drooped in resignation.
Between its Trainer asking and the offender being a baby, apparently there was no dignity-preserving way to complain.
The forest gradually fell quiet again.
Snow drifted lazily through the branches while Jun and Marnie rested against the same enormous tree, Purrloin and the newborn asleep between them.
The only regular sound was the soft scratch of Ralts’s pen moving across paper.
For once, nobody was being attacked, chased, hospitalized, or threatened.
A pale beam of sunlight slipped through the branches and warmed the small patch where they’d stopped.
Ralts finished the exercise Jun had given her—writing Purrloin twenty times—and looked up for approval.
Jun was asleep.
His head had tilted slightly to one side, resting against Morpeko where it had curled around his shoulder.
Ralts stared.
That was supposed to be her spot.
She puffed out her cheeks and looked at the sleeping Morpeko with growing suspicion.
She had only just dealt with one obnoxious bird trying to take her place, and now an electric rodent had moved in while she was busy training.
Her gaze shifted toward Marnie.
Marnie was still sewing.
Their eyes met.
Marnie looked at Ralts, then at Jun, then quietly raised one hand and beckoned her over.
Ralts blinked before floating across with Confusion.
Marnie caught her gently and settled her against her chest.
“Want to leave your mark on something Jun uses every day?” “Ra?” Ralts glanced toward Jun, clearly uncertain what Marnie meant, but nodded anyway.
Marnie’s voice remained perfectly calm.
“And would you like to get better at using Confusion while you’re doing it?” That question was much easier.
“Ral!” “Good.” Marnie placed the needle and thread in front of her and began showing Ralts how to guide them with Confusion.
By the time the sun began setting, warm orange light had spread through Dappled Grove.
Jun examined the finished compartment inside his backpack.
The padded black pouch now had a small embroidered pattern worked into the fabric.
He smiled.
“Impressive.
I knew you were good at everything.” “Thank Ralts,” Marnie replied.
Ralts had already wrapped both arms around Jun’s neck with the satisfied air of someone claiming full credit.
After spending so long controlling the needle and thread, however, she was visibly exhausted and soon closed her eyes against his shoulder.
Jun stroked her hair.
Marnie folded her arms.
“And don’t get too comfortable.
Dappled Grove at night is considerably less pleasant than it looks right now.
If you fall asleep again when you’re supposed to be watching the camp—” “I know, I know.” Jun smiled at her.
“I’ll take first watch tonight.” [End of chapter]