aiko's otter den

we are built to love - Bam keeps the pokeball beside him.

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He remembers Alola.

Most people in Paldea just know the Ultra Beasts as a weird phenomenon that happened ‘over there somewhere’. Wangnan says it outright, and Bam never corrects him. He doesn’t know how.

What he knows is this: He’s always been a weak, sickly child.

His little brother and sister were full of energy, and ran circles around him from a young age in the Postwick wheat fields. Even Rachel could outpace him.

(Except in the Slumbering Weald, where he could run and run and always know his way home, but he doesn’t touch things in there anymore,)

Alola’s air was warm and tropical, laced with Z-Light and driven by the zeal for battle. They had gone to visit Mt Hokulani and then Poni Island, perhaps to use a mudbray and then a mudsdale for him to walk.

Then the sky had opened like a cut and they had come out.

Bam presses the pokeball to his forehead as he wipes down Miraidon’s cool, steel body. The dragon rolls on its back, tongue lolling out like a content stoutland. “You love the polishing huh, Rak-ssi?” he says with a laugh.

“Gi-as.” says motorcycle whacks the ground threateningly.

He knows Rak won’t do anything, he never does. He’s just a big goofy baby who loves sandwiches and chocolate and polishing. And sometimes bananas.

Still, the clang of metal makes Bam’s mind fall back to the stomping of four legs and hundreds of eyes.

The pokeball shakes in his hand. “Ssh, Lulu,” he murmurs. “I’m all right.”

He’s not all right. He’s just no longer in a bed, burned over most of his body. He’s just no longer dealing with rock shards in his skin. He’s stopped coughing as much.

He’s not all right, but he’s better than Hwaryun, who lost an eye, or Khun, who lost a whole parent. His family loves him and he can go home whenever.

But he is not all right.

He remembers the hero, who had watched the stones fall, a true, lonely, bitter Kahuna who had saved him anyway, as he himself had poured all his strength and life and power and love into his little riolu who suddenly got bigger and bigger and stronger and —

— Broke —

Lulu pops out of her pokeball and presses both her scarred, torn up paws on him and Bam thinks of —

The AI who had lied to his son and said he loved him.

The Team Star children who accepted Hwaryun with her missing eye and Rachel because of her nerves and —

Wangnan who had just wanted someone to look him in the eye —

“’M fine,” he mumbles. “’M fine, i’m fine i’m fine.”

Rak snorts and Lulu holds him tighter.

He had been a sickly child once.

After that run-in with the Ultra Beasts, the air in Galar had never bothered him again.

Instead it was giant pokemon, stomping everything and running amok in fear.

Bam’s nightmares got worse and worse and worse and Lulu didn’t get better.

Paldea was supposed to be for the better.

Bam coughs.

It should be better. He should be fine. He is fine. He is.

Rak leans his steel head on Bam and Bam loves and breaks and he can’t move. All he can do is hear everyone dying and everything coming closer and Lulu, little baby Lulu crying in pain and bleeding from her knees and promising to protect him and —

Lulu nuzzles his ear and wipes his tears and Bam gasps for air and he tries and he tries —

“Viole.”

Bam coughs and kicks out.

“Don’t do that.”

Hwaryun. Why is she here, is she okay, are they bullying her, are they hurting her again—

“No one is bullying me, breathe.”

He’s breathing, he’s trying but there’s nothing.

She tugs him free of Lulu, whose panic is making him panic, whose hurt is making him hurt and it’s awful, he’s making a mistake somewhere.

“What color’s my shirt?”

Bam forces his eyes open. “Black.”

“What do you hear?”

“Wind,” he murmurs. His heartbeat starts to slow. “Blood in my ears. Whistling. Rak’s tail.”

“What do you taste?”

“Blood,” he says without hesitation.

“Spit it out.”

He turns his head right and does. She hands him a water bottle and he rinses his mouth and breathes in and out, slowly, carefully. Like he might die.

Finally, Bam rolls from his blood spit and winces. “Thanks.”

“What are cousins for?”

He laughs. It hurts. “I’m sorry. Think I just got overwhelmed.”

“It’d be weird if you were normal about it.” She sits down on his free side and tugs Rak from bathing her face. “Have you talked about it with them?”

“They’ll pity me.” Or baby him, or make it sound so big and awesome, which is honestly worse. He’s not a baby or a hero or important. He’s just a person.

“Probably. Khun puts you on this grand pedestal.”

Bam laughs. “He’s very nice.”

“He’s in love with you.”

Bam feels his ears burn. “Mm.” He isn’t sure how to feel about that. He never knows. It drives him so warm to the tips of his fingers and cold in his bones.

“You should continue down your path,” she says, as Esperance winds his way into her lap. “Wherever it goes.”

Bam hums. He doesn’t know where that is. But it’s better than nothing.

He’s still alive. He should focus on that. Being fine will come later.