Cynthia wished she could say that after making their plan, they followed through on it the very same day. That they simply packed their things, bid mommy Lopunny farewell, and marched out of the forest without a second thought.

  But two days had passed since they decided to follow the river, and they were still stuck here.

  Because, unfortunately, a little something called reality, with an added dash of common sense, had other ideas.

  Entering the forest and getting this far had been, for the most part, quite easy. Sure, there were a few hiccups along the way, not to mention the fact that she wasn’t supposed to wander this deep, but reaching this place hadn’t been that difficult.

  As they started planning their trip it had slowly dawned on Cynthia that getting out of here might be a slightly bigger task.

  Before setting out on her journey between cities, Cynthia always made sure to overpack. It was one of those pieces of advice her grandmother had given her that she had, in fact, taken to heart.

  To always bring more food than you think you’ll need.

  This time she had brought over a week's worth for a trip that was supposed to take a couple of days. Unfortunately, even overpacking couldn't prepare her for actually needing over a week's worth of food for what should have been a quick jaunt. Though, honestly, if you ran out of even the supplements your Pokémon needed to maximize their training, calling it overpacking might've been generous.

  She glanced down into her bowl, at the last of her rations… the ones she’d bought by accident ages ago and then promptly let rot.

  Well, not rot, they were dehydrated after all, so it wasn’t like they could. But they were still, without a doubt, the most unappetizing meals among the many long-storage food options she had carried into the forest.

  If she had any other choice, she wouldn’t even touch the stuff, but desperate times called for desperate measures.

  Still, her eyes drifted longingly to her backpack and the waterproof section, where the last of her precious sweets were stashed away, saved for emergencies. This situation was pretty dire… but maybe not emergency candy dire.

  At least not when Mystery Boy was right next to her, that would lead to her having to share the last of her sweets.

  “This is freaking amazing,” Mystery Boy said suddenly.

  She glanced over to see him devouring the last of his food. Well, devouring might’ve been an exaggeration, he ate slowly, methodically, but it was the spirit of the thing.

  Every spoon was filled to the brim, and compared to what she was doing?

  She might as well have been poking the food.

  For a moment she just stared, not quite believing her eyes.

  No, she hadn’t given him the Curry, or some of the other similar looking bags. The greyish colour was unmistakable.

  It was still Professor Oak’s Super Gruel.

  Crazy.

  Wrinkling her nose, she felt her gaze flicking to her backpack once more before she forcefully looked away. No. She had to be strong. Candy was for emergencies. Times where she had lost all hope and needed the boost.

  Like… like if she stumbled over that colony of Dustox again.

  And she had to jump into the river... again.

  Cynthia absentmindedly shoved another spoonful of the tasteless mush into her mouth and immediately regretted it.

  Still, she carefully managed to guide the food-containing-all-the-nutrients-you-needed down her throat before her eyes locked onto Mystery Boy.

  She stabbed her spoon into the bowl with more force than strictly necessary, sending a few greyish blobs flying. “How are you actually enjoying this?”

  He paused, looking over to her only half eaten bowl, and then down to his almost empty one.

  He shrugged. “I mean it’s not great, but when all you’ve eaten for three months are Oran Berries, anything different tastes like heaven by comparison. I swear those things made me think I hated eating.”

  Cynthia almost wanted to argue, about a second away from throwing a meaningful look at Queenie and Rei, both looking more than satisfied with said Oran Berries.

  Then she paused and actually thought about what he was saying.

  Professor Oak’s Super Gruel might have been one of mankind's great mistakes, a foolish attempt to create a single product that gave a person every nutrient they needed in a day.

  But Oran Berries?

  They were older than mankind’s mistakes.

  They were a truly primordial evil in comparison.

  She knew that intimately.

  When she was younger, she’d thought they looked delicious… right up until she’d taken a bite out of one meant for her grandmother’s Chingling. Just the thought of the taste… she shuddered, feeling the phantom taste of smooth bitterness crawl up her tongue.

  Mystery Boy gave her a look of sympathy, and she couldn’t help but share a commiserating glance with him.

  “I see you too have had to endure the horror.” He said slowly, playing up a shudder, his face painfully grave.

  “Truly, it was a crime most foul that was committed against me,” Cynthia intoned, her face deadly serious. “Deceiving my young heart with its blue, plump and delicious-looking appearance.”

  Mystery Boy blinked, clearly not expecting her to play along.

  Then his face lit up, eyes wide with excitement. “Aha! I knew you thought I was funny!”

  He beamed, practically glowing with delight, and Cynthia couldn’t help but roll her eyes. He looked like a child who’d just won a prize.

  “I already regret saying anything.”

  He just smiled at her, and she looked away, not wanting to see the smug creep into his grin. Instead, her gaze wandered once more to her bag.

  “You keep staring pretty intensely at your bag.”

  Cynthia froze.

  Then she smiled naturally.

  Raised a single eyebrow.

  And casually replied, “What are you talking about?”

  Nailed it.

  Mystery Boy just stared at her, his face blank, like he couldn’t believe what he was seeing.

  “You should never consider going into acting. Don’t even think about it.”

  Cynthia flushed.

  “I should just leave you here.” She hissed.

  He raised a finger, and she glared at it.

  It slowly fell, and he gave her a quick smile, before his eyes desperately started scanning the room. His eyes landed on Rei, and she almost see the lightbulb go off over his head.

  “Soooo, did you notice your Riolu helping Rei learn Ice Punch earlier today?”

  Smooth, Cynthia thought, but she still opened her mouth. After all, him changing the topic helped her as much as him.

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  “I did, I honestly didn’t think she would get it that fast.”

  Or at all, She added internally.

  It wasn’t a dig on the Rabbit Pokémon, it was just a cold observation.

  Buneary weren’t exactly known for their variety in battle. They were nimble and fast, sure, but their moves were... straightforward. Mostly normal type attacks, with the occasional Fighting type move, nothing too fancy.

  Among normal types?

  They were almost infamous for their inability to quickly learn a lot of the moves one would expect, elemental punches among them.

  “Really? You saw how close she was like two days ago, right?”

  Cynthia blinked. Her first instinct was to snap back at his teasing, of course Rei had been trying, but she hadn’t been actually close.

  Then she realized... he sounded genuinely surprised.

  For a second, they just stared at each other.

  ‘What.’

  On most things Pokémon, he seemed to be insanely knowledgeable.

  Without a hint he had managed to guess every move Queenie knew and even figured that one of the moves they were currently working on was Dragon Claw. More than that, after watching her Riolu struggle against a local Wormadam’s Protect, he had somehow taught him to use Feint.

  In a single afternoon.

  Moves didn’t just… happen like that. The only ones that came that easily were so instinctual they were practically built into a Pokémon’s DNA, like Tackle, Scratch, or Ember. And she had poured over every book on the Riolu line and never even heard of such a thing.

  She wasn’t going to lie, after that she had actually thought he might have been some kind of prodigy before losing his memories. But then he’d say stuff like this, and she’d have to wonder if he’d ever trained a Pokémon in his life.

  To anyone who understood Type Energy, Rei hadn’t even been close to mastering Ice Punch. Sure, she’d managed to channel Ice-type energy, a step many struggled with, but that was only the beginning. If that was all it took, then Normal-types could learn every move in existence.

  What Rei had tried when punching the boulder?

  It was like setting her hand on fire and calling it Fire Punch.

  It wasn’t close, but it would look close to a casual observer… to someone who hadn’t actually learned how type energy functioned.

  It brought up a million questions about him, just as his knowledge always did.

  Where would you even end up with knowledge as lopsided as his? The things he knew... they were so weird. Like someone who could do algebra but couldn’t handle basic addition. It honestly made her reconsider her thought from yesterday.

  That he might be from the ancient past or something.

  She’d dismissed it as nonsense, a byproduct of thinking of those ancient carvings she found for too long.

  But now...

  She remembered her grandmother’s history books, the ones describing how people in Hisui used to live in fear of Pokémon. If he was from a time like that, his knowledge might make some sense. They might have carefully studied what moves a Pokémon knew in the wild, so they could survive an encounter.

  But they probably wouldn’t know too much about how to train Pokémon, since they didn’t have Pokémon.

  “So, you didn’t think she would master it?” He asked.

  Cynthia snapped back to the present, shoving those wild ideas out of her head. They were ridiculous anyway.

  “It’s nothing against Rei, but Buneary just fundamentally struggle with most Type Energies that aren’t Normal or Fighti-”

  …..

  Cynthia replayed their farewell in her mind, the tearful, heartfelt exchange between Myst and Lopunny. The way he promised to take care of Rei, and how Rei had said goodbye to each of her younger siblings before hugging her mother tightly.

  She thought about what she’d do once they were out of this forest, about showing her grandmother the pictures she’d taken.

  None of it could distract her from the burning frustration she felt as she watched Myst strolling ahead, whistling some horribly off-tune, jaunty song.

  “Buneary aren’t supposed to learn the elemental punches that easily. Plenty of people have tried, and it usually takes years. I thought you were joking when you said she knew all of them,” Cynthia said, unable to hold back her irritation.

  “A bet’s a bet,” Myst said, walking along the riverbank with a spring in his step as he took in the scenery. “You were the one who said ‘no way.’”

  Cynthia glared at his back, her backpack feeling like it weighed a million tons. Stuffed with Sitrus Berries and dried meat, it was far heavier than she’d anticipated. Then again, she hadn’t anticipated carrying all of it. Originally, they were supposed to split the load, a little under half going into his makeshift backpack.

  Then he just had to challenge her to a bet.

  “You’ve only trained Rei for, what, half a year? How did you even teach her all of them?”

  “At most half a year, I didn’t exactly have a calendar out here,” he corrected with a chuckle. “And what can I say? She’s just a genius, I guess.”

  At his words, Rei let out a sound of pure smugness. Cynthia glanced over at their Pokémon. Riolu trailed behind Rei like a hopeless puppy, stumbling over his own feet as he yipped in eager agreement.

  Normally, she might’ve teased Riolu about speedrunning his way into a painfully obvious crush, but right now?

  She glared at Rei, whose adorable face was still contorted into a smug, self-satisfied grin. It was infuriating how she could barely muster up any anger looking at that face. Rei’s wide eyes sparkled with innocent mischief, and her tiny nose twitched with barely concealed pride.

  Cynthia grumbled under her breath. As much as Rei’s adorability shielded her from outright wrath, it didn’t mean she was feeling any particular fondness for the Buneary either right now. And to think that before all this, she’d actually felt sorry for the little rabbit.

  When Myst had first asked Rei to perform Fire Punch and Thunder Punch, she had looked on the verge of tears, her paws trembling as she prepared to attack the tree stump Myst had pointed out. Cynthia had been ready to step in, to tell Myst that he was pushing his Pokémon too hard.

  To help her out, Cynthia had even raised the stakes, upping her share of the supplies from three-quarters to the full amount, just to prove that he shouldn’t push his Pokémon to do something they couldn’t do.

  Then she had gone ahead and instantly fired off Fire Punch, Thunder Punch and Ice Punch in rapid succession.

  Looking gleeful while doing so.

  “Some Pokémon have moves they’re just unnaturally talented in. It’s rare, but not unheard of, like a Nidoran learning Confusion or a Ralts learning Shadow Sneak. But learning three moves outside of what they normally learn in just a couple of months? That’s impossible.” She spat out the last words, feeling acutely robbed. She had seen his confidence, but she had read articles on the topic in scientific journals.

  So how come she lost?

  Myst slowed his pace and turned to face her, eyebrows raised. “Wait, you don’t know why some Pokémon can learn those moves?”

  Cynthia’s glare intensified. “What do you mean, I don’t know? Nobody does! Some Pokémon just pick up certain moves faster than others. Most trainers have to spend ages teaching a Ralts how to use Shadow Sneak, while a few lucky ones learn it in a couple of months.”

  Myst tilted his head, as if the answer were obvious. “It’s because it’s an Egg Move.”

  Cynthia opened her mouth to argue, to tell him to shut up and stop pretending to know more than he did. But she recognized that tone, had already heard it all too many times.

  She gritted her teeth. “And what, exactly, is an Egg Move?”

  Myst shrugged. “You know how certain Pokémon can breed across species?”

  Cynthia nodded slowly.

  “Well, take Rei, for example. Her mom’s a Lopunny, but her dad was a Hitmonchan. He knew the elemental punches, so when Rei was born, she inherited some of his talent.”

  Cynthia wanted to call it nonsense, wanted to laugh in his face.

  She really did.

  If it were that simple, surely someone would’ve figured it out by now. And yet… the logic was there. It didn’t sound completely impossible.

  In fact…

  She thought back to the scientific journal her grandmother had sent her, written by a former student of Professor Oak. It had been about evolution, and while she hadn’t read the entire thing, she remembered skimming the summary and the bullet points that outlined the key topics.

  One of them had been labelled “Egg Moves.”

  She stopped.

  ‘What.’

  “Myst… do you think you are from Johto?” She asked.

  Myst stopped and threw her a weird look. “Are you talking to me?”

  She nodded, feeling a little like she was dreaming.

  It didn’t line up... or, well, it didn’t line up well.

  According to Lopunny and Rei, Myst had been stuck in the forest for almost half a year. This paper had been published two months ago, and even then it had only reached Sinnoh right before she had started her journey to Eterna city.

  “Okay, first of all, when did I become Myst? Second of all, I don’t think so, but honestly, I have no ide-” He stopped mid-sentence, his eyes narrowing. “And you’re not listening.”

  No, she was drawing too many hasty conclusions. Just because the names lined up didn’t mean they were talking about the same thing.

  There was nothing saying he was right about this.

  “Are you that tired? Because if you want, I can take my half of the food. It was honestly just a joke, I didn’t think you’d actually carry all of it. Like, honestly, carrying it for four hours is more than enough.”

  At the same time, he had been right about almost everything so far. If his knowledge on the topic came from before his amnesia, at least.

  Said things that were probably wrong?

  Sure, but nothing she could confirm.

  What did that mean?

  “Cynthia, anybody in there? We kinda need to get a move on. I didn’t say anything earlier because we were keeping pace, but this area isn’t fantastic for sitting around.”

  The most likely explanation was suddenly that he was connected to that student of Oak. Maybe he was one of the student’s pupils?

  “Rei, why are your ears twitching and Riolu why are you staring into the forest?”

  It would make some sense, he was about the right age, and his knowledge seemed to be almost entirely theoretical. If he was someone who skipped his journey to go straight into research, it wasn’t impossible for him to apprentice under Oak’s student.

  “Actually, neither of you answer that, I already know.”

  There was just one problem with the entire theory.

  It only fit some of his quirks.

  “You-” Cynthia started.

  Her instincts warned before anything else.

  She snapped her gaze up towards the forest, just to see a white blur fly towards her.

  “Double Kick!”

  “Force palm!”

  She reacted instantly.

  Their voices still mixed together.

  That didn’t stop their Pokémon.

  Rei moved first, her brown body a blur as her ears lit up. She deflected the incoming Slash with one ear before smashing her other into the attacker’s face. It was sent flying, right into Riolu’s open palm.

  BOOM!

  The white blur rocketed backwards, crashing through the underbrush with a thundering impact. Trees shook, leaves raining down as branches snapped from the sheer force of the blow.

  “Welcome back to the real world, princess. Maybe don’t zone out while we’re walking through hostile territory next time, yeah?” Myst said, his shoulders tense as he scanned the clearing.

  Dozens of white figures slowly made their appearance known, all of them having gotten there without making a sound.

  “I thought the local Vigoroth population was near the border of the forest,” Cynthia whispered, releasing Queenie, who appeared with a roar.

  Myst’s lips curled into a wry smile. “You thought there was just one tribe?”

  “Point, you think we can run?” Cynthia asked, moving her hair out of her eyes.

  “I mean we definitely can, the river is right there you know?”

  She glanced at the river, then at the way it was flowing straight back to where she’d washed up three days ago.

  “No.”