Chapter Text
“Is this thing working?” A video feed sizzles to life, and the exterior of a train station can be seen. It has two floors with plenty of windows on the front, walls painted a faint yellow that almost resembled cream, and two pillars holding up the balcony of the second floor while also encasing the big entrance to the station, double doors open and wide enough for two Snorlaxes to walk through at the same time side by side if they wanted to.
“Ok, it’s working now. Howdy y’all.” Uxie came into view, eyes closed as he held the camera telekinetically. “Today, our little group of ragtags is going to celebrate the first anniversary of all of us coming together, and I thought, ‘Hey, why not make a special something for all of us?’, and here I am now.”
“The name’s Trinox, though I’m trying Trinuxie for today, for obvious reasons-” he said as he pans the camera to show his whole body, ending up on his deadpan face, “-and today I’ll show y’all around our little group of ragtags, tell some tales about the many misadventures we’ve had together, and maybe throw some jokes in here and there as well.”
“This is the entrance to Gear Station, or at least I think that’s what it’s called. Ironically I can’t read those letters very well.” The top of the entrance is shown, where a placard shows the name of the structure. “I like learning languages at my own pace, sue me.”
“And now, papa-papa-papa-” Trinuxie chants while entering the place slowly and with the most fanfare a Pokémon one foot tall could make, “-Here we are! The interior of Gear Station!”
“Now, I know it’s pretty empty so far, but I woke up extra early so that I could record everything before the morning rush came in with all of their requests and ruined all of the best shots,” he says, showing off the interior of the place: a staircase leading towards the train platforms in the front behind some ticket stations, the left side of the place with a pair of shops and the right side containing a map of the different train routes and prices for each of them, as well as the rules for the Battle Train system, and an elevator next to them. In the distance beyond the stairs a column could be seen rising from the floor below the current one, rising to the top where a glass dome resides.
“This is how everything looks for now while it’s empty, but let me tell you, this place gets absolutely packed once the day begins and everyone comes rushing in and out of this place,” he speaks as he begins floating upwards little by little until he’s near the roof and showcases the second floor: stairs by the corners of the hall, hallways that are supported by columns, and different personnel stations . “Sometimes it’s tight enough that it resembles a pack of Wishiwashi, and now I should getdownwhydidIletmyselfgetsohighohmyArceusIwannagetdownnow.”
That last bit is said in a hurry as Trinuxie lowers himself to the ground and begins panting once he touches it, sound being picked up by the microphone of the camera as he tilted it to the side so he could focus himself in the shot. “Remind me *huff* to never *huff* ever *huff* do that again *huff*.” The heavy breathing continues for a few seconds until eventually the breathing of the Uxie stabilizes. “Arceus, I HATE heights, what I do for this little gift.”
“You called for Me?” Someone calls from above, and upon raising his head as well as the camera, into the frame comes none other than Arceus Themself, standing in front of the other Pokémon with Their head lowered, waiting for him to say anything and/or stand up by himself or with Their help.
“Oh, yeah, sorry Arceus, that was an expression,” Trinuxie said as he floated slightly above ground until he could meet the god eye to eye, even if he still had his own eyes closed. “Didn’t mean to call for you, though now that you’re here, do you want to make a longer appearance in the video?”
“No thanks. I know I’ll make another appearance, and I do not wish to appear more than necessary.”
“Got it boss, I’ll move in with the video then, see ya later.” He waves in front of the camera and then turns around, removing the mythical Pokémon from the frame, and moving along, barely letting a “We’ll see each other again soon” be heard.
“Ok y’all, now that we’ve explored the entrance of Gear Station, it is time for us all to explore the underground.” With that said, Trinuxie begins floating towards the stairs that lead to the heart of the place. Going down a few steps, the next floor becomes visible, with a giant circular hall with a big column that rises to the glass dome ceiling at its center, a bar-like desk surrounding the whole of it in place of where employees give out information and answer any questions anyone might have. With a total of nine different places to go from there, including the stairs upstairs, the soft light of the rising sun illuminates all of the walls decorated with many posters about the Battle Subway and many other events that one could enjoy in Nimbasa City. The shadow of the center pillar casts right next to the entrance where the camera-Pokémon is now floating.
“This here is the heart of Gear Station, the big hall that connects all of the lines of the whole region with everyone else, with each of the stairs leading to a different subway platform.” Trinuxie floated around, showing each of the tunnels leading towards a platform with the rails for each train in the middle, letting people get on or off on either side depending on the direction the train was taking. Alongside the entrances to each tunnel was a small sign pinned to the wall detailing the stations of each line as well as a kind of activity that one could take on each one.
“For now we’ll be going down this tunnel, the first one to the left once you go down the stairs from the main floor,” he says as he floats towards the entrance of the hall, already hearing some faraway voices, “well, it seems like we’re not alone here in the waking world, let’s see who’s here to accompany us, shall we?”
As the Uxie goes into the tunnel and onto the subway platform, a big green gelatinous cube starts to come into view, and next to it is a Carbink throwing some pieces of rubble into the green mass that was next to it, and watching it slowly but surely dissolve everything with bubbles forming in there and escaping through the top of its form.
“Howdy Pippin, say hi to the camera!” Trinuxie exclaims as he moves closer towards the pair, focusing for now on the Carbink that just now realized they are being watched.
“Hey there Trinox,” they said, turning back after smiling with their eyes to the camera so they could continue flinging random stuff into the Cube. “What are you doing?”
“I’m making a video to celebrate the first birthday of our little group of friends, what about you?” A rock gets thrown in, and instantly dissolves.
“Oh, I’m feeding Cube.” A few Pokécoins get thrown in, they last a few seconds longer, but still take a short time before being dissolved completely. “It’s my turn this week to feed them.”
“I take it you’re experimenting now, then?” A piece of cloth is tossed in, burning from one end to the other instead of being dissolved all at once.
“Nah, I just like watching things get digested.” A cog is received by Cube, eroding from the center outwards, some rust forming on the surface before the process begins in earnest. “It’s fun.”
“It sure is.” A wire with some rubber on it is thrown in, this one taking its sweet time being digested, only showing the bubbles of any dissolving material surrounding the plastic and not the metal wiring inside, at least not yet. “Welp, I’ll check up on the other tunnels to see if anyone else has woken up. See ya, Pippin.”
“For those who don’t know-” the Uxie began talking as he floated towards the main hall once again, “-Cube is a recently discovered and so far unique variant of Ditto, one that has that big gelatinous green cube form, and who lost the ability to transform in exchange for the ability to be able to digest anything they eat.”
“Cube sadly can’t talk to us, so we don’t know what pronouns to use for them, but we all vary from him to them. I’ve yet to see someone use her on them, but that might be on me not keeping a close eye on every little thing that happens here.” He continues floating, slowly panning the camera while keeping himself in the frame to show his surroundings, catching a pink blur in the corner of the frame next to the stairs. “Huh? Who’s that?”
Upon refocusing the camera to the stairs, another Pokémon can be seen, this time Mesprit, and from outside the frame to the left of the stairs comes an Archeops with a wrench in their mouth, a smile noticeable from afar pretty easily as shining stars faintly glow around his head.
“Thanks for the wrench, Din,” the Mesprit said as they grabbed it and began fiddling with the space right under the handrail.
“No problem Polsprit, do you need help with anything else?” The over enthusiastic Archeops rocks back and forth on his soles, wings and arms tucked comfortably at their sides.
“Not now, but I’d appreciate it if you stayed in case I need something else.”
“Howdy Din, howdy Polsprit,” Trinuxie salutes after getting close enough to be noticed by the excited Pokémon, “What are you doing here so early?”
“Hi Trinox! I’m helping Polsprit with something here!” Extending their wings, Din smiled and beamed as if a sun was behind their head shining on his face, which wasn’t so far off considering that they had the sun behind them.
“Hey Trinuxie, I’m trying to build a wheelchair escalator here so that anyone with difficulties with stairs can get up and down more easily,” the legendary replied while fiddling some more with the pieces at hand, putting some of them in the hole that was made and then touching them a little to test their firmness.
“Huh, neat. How would that work for Pokémon like Milotic, Seviper or Serperior that can’t float and don’t have legs?”
“Sadly, this won’t work for them. A ramp would be best, but I can’t make that right now.”
“Maybe they could slide down the handrails? You know, as skaters do when they Boardslide?”
“That might work for the lightest Pokémon like Dratini and Dragonair, but I’m not sure about the rest of them. So far the elevator is the best option for them, but then again, that’s not the most open space to be inside of.”
“What about a rope to slide up and down from?”
“Again, not sure they would resist the heavier Pokémon.”
“Could you hand me a screwdriver, Din, please?” Polsprit asks while extending one of their hands, and with a military salute, the Archeops runs away in search of the item.
“Is he aware that the toolbox is right here?”
“Not really, but I appreciate his enthusiasm anyways.”
“How long until he notices that the toolbox is here?”
“I’d give him about 5 minutes, he was pretty determined to find it.”
“Do you want me to give it to you?”
“Nah, I’ll wait for him, I have time.”
“Got it, Do you want to say anything in the video I’m making?”
Polsprit looks directly into the camera, face in the most deadpan expression possible, and says with the most flat voice possible for a being of emotion, “be gay, do crime.”
The camera shook instantly and nothing could be focused as both Pokémon began laughing and snorting at that, floating and rotating around while shaking and trying to control their breathing. Finally, after a few seconds, their breathing starts to stabilize, and just as the camera refocuses on the stairs beside the pair of lake guardians, another voice is heard.
“Found it!” Din’s voice rings and, after a single second, the camera shakes again as Trinuxie laughs out loud once more, breath coming in hard as Polsprit contains their own laughter as well.
“Din, thank you, but that isn’t a screwdriver.”
“It isn’t?”
“That’s… That’s a Figy Berry…” Sharp inhalations could be heard underneath the rambunctious laughter of Trinuxie, clearly denoting that the pink blur that appears sometimes in the feed is trying to contain its laughter from the multicolored blob that also sometimes appears in the frame with a berry in claw.
“Oh… *Nom*” and with that sound all pandemonium breaks loose as Polsprit joins in the laughter once more, the sound of Din’s chewing on the berry making both guardians recoil with laughter.
Once again, the laughter calms down, and the camera lifts to point at an Archeops licking his lips after successfully eating the berry in a few bites, looking at the pair of legendary Pokémon with his head tilted. “What’s a screwdriver anyways?”
“A screwdriver is a tool used to turn screws, they look like metal tubes with a handle on one end and a shaped end on the other side, more often than not looking like a cross or a pallet, or sometimes a star,” Trinuxie answers from outside the frame.
“In our case, the screwdriver I need is in the toolbox here by our side.” Polsprit compliments, pointing to the box that was in the middle of the group.
“Got it!” answers Din with a smile on his face, letting his own tongue out a little at the same time, and then bowing down to ruminate in the toolbox, pushing out anything that wasn’t remotely similar to a screwdriver, until he eventually finds something and takes it out. “Found it! Again!”
“... That’s a chisel. Why do we have a chisel?” the camera-Pokémon asks the other legendary, tilting the camera a little as it pans from the tool to them.
“Well, some Pokémon here enjoy carving stuff, and I’m pretty sure we have at least one of us who likes to build stuff as well, they did a miniature Joltik figurine already after all.”
“So… not this one?”
“No, screwdrivers are thinner in the metal part, but you’re very close, only a few other things are still in the toolbox.”
“Got it.” And the chisel is thrown backwards with a little spin, after which a thump can be heard. Both Polsprit and Trinuxe look at the source of the sound, and the camera pans instantly to the wall at the other side of them, where the chisel is embedded into the wall, sharp end buried a few inches into it. Gulps can be heard from both of them as they slowly turn back to the Archeops before them, camera still following Trinuxie’s sight as it finally lands on him, who finally found the correct tool and hands it with a brilliant smile to the Mesprit.
“Thanks…” They received it without any fanfare, voice a little small and calm.
“You’re welcome.” Once again the smiling face seems to create imaginary stars around it.
“Well… I’ll be going now… see ya.” And the Uxie leaves the area, turning around and floating away without waiting for a farewell.
“That was scary, if Din can hit that hard, I’m sure that would hurt me. I shudder what that would do to the rest of the Lake Guardians.” The camera shudders a little as he shivers upon thinking of any scenario that would lead to that happening. “Anyways, let’s distract myself from that and go check out the rest of the tunnels, alright everyone?”