Shaun was bored. Powerfully, awfully bored.
After Buizel had left yesterday, the nurse had tended to him with vigor. Shaun was slightly worried that she had eavesdropped on their conversation yesterday, but if she had, she was showing no signs of having done so.
Shaun laid in bed, staring at the ceiling. Hmm, he could count the boards. He shook himself slightly. No, that would be arguably even more boring.
He slipped out of bed, stretched, and walked out into the reception area. It was dark and quiet. “The star child seems to have gone home already,” he muttered. That was his biggest concern: he didn’t want to get caught sneaking out. Again.
Looking towards the entrance, Shaun rolled his eyes. The doors had been shut. They sure didn’t trust him.
They were very sturdy things, probably about half as thick was Shaun was long. He wasn’t strong enough by half to try and push those things open, and he had a feeling that the doors opened noisily.
He walked back into the sick ward, slightly crestfallen. He’d wanted to look around the town he was in a little and maybe figure out where he was.
His gaze wandered up towards the window. It was a long skinny thing, spanning almost the entire length of the room. He thought he could faintly see stars outside, twinkling with amusement at his situation.
Shaun paused and took a closer look. The window was long and skinny, but just barely tall enough to possibly let him through. He grinned to himself. “Looks like escaping is back on the menu.”
He looked around the sick ward, his eyes catching on the table where the glass bottle had been. The nurse had come by and removed it when she had last been here, which was fine with Shaun’s idea.
He jumped onto the table, marveling at how easy it was. Wasn’t he sick? Ah, whatever. He turned and leapt onto the railing holding up the curtain to the left of his bed.
It was a slightly more tricky jump. His first try didn’t succeed, proceeding to dump him onto his bed unceremoniously with a soft whump, knocking the breath out of him. He laid back on the bed for a moment, contemplating. “Should I just go to sleep?” he muttered. He looked out the window where a gust of wind blew, promising of freedom and adventure. “Yeah right,” he chuckled.
It took another few attempts before he even managed to grab hold of and clamber up the rod supporting the curtain. He stood there for a moment, tail swaying to keep his balance. Now if he could just get through that window…
Shaun crouched and then sprang out the window.
He wasn’t expecting to clear the gap first try, but he was apparently more agile than he felt. He easily slipped through the window before belatedly realizing a problem.
I don’t have any way of slowing down, don’t I?
Shaun fell out of the window, landing in a bush that crackled loudly, as if complaining about his sudden arrival method. He laid there for a moment, breathing heavily. Ow. He pushed himself up and coughed, ignoring the scratching of the bush, and walked out onto the late night street.
There was hardly anyone out at this hour, but he still saw a few people roaming around, most likely on their way to a destination. Spots of light cast by lanterns dotted the pavement, illuminating the occasional monster- no, person walking underneath. Shaun shook himself. He really needed to figure out what was wrong with his brain.
He stealthily walked through the town, avoiding the lights, looking around. The town had a vastly different aura compared to what he remembered from 2 days ago. Here the town felt drowsy, with few to no light sources lighting up the area. The various shops and buildings were all darkened, with their inhabitants most likely asleep. Shaun looked up at the sky, trying to gauge the time. Probably around 10 PM, if he had to guess.
Eventually, he came across a town square of sorts. It was much brighter lit than the pathway down to the clinic, probably owing to the fact that there were more people roaming around. Shaun hung back, studying the signs on the various buildings.
One of the signs caught his eye. It had an open book with an unfamiliar writing made out of… footprints? Shaun blinked. Oh great, undiscovered language. Weighing his options, he decided to enter the building anyway.
Upon entering, Shaun was enveloped by the scent of paper, new and old, along with the faint smell of drying ink. To his left was a desk with a bored-looking brown duck behind it who seemed to be filling out forms with some sort of leek as a pen. It looked up as Shaun entered the building. “Welcome to the Island Village library,” it said with an undertone of exhaustion. “How may I help you today?”
“Oh, uh, I was just looking to read some books,” Shaun said nervously. “Is that fine?”
“I’m supposed to ask if you have a library card, but…” The duck waved a wing at him in dismissal. “I don’t care right now. Just don’t try to leave with any books without signing up for a library card first.”
Shaun nodded. “Understood.”
He walked further into the library and saw a wall of bookshelves, all crammed with books. Shaun was slightly staggered by how many books there were. There were also a few cushions dotting the library, presumably for sitting on. He wandered over to the nearest bookshelf, which was at least five times as tall as he was, and automatically tried to grab a book off the shelf with his hands.
His paw grazed the book, not even moving it. Shaun winced. Right, he didn’t have opposable thumbs anymore. He thought for a minute before shrugging and pulling the book out using his mouth.
This worked, and Shaun was able to extract the book from the shelf with no issues. Carefully righting the book into a position he thought was upright, he opened the book.
There were no letters in the book, only footprints. Lots and lots of footprints, all different shapes and sizes organized into neat rows. It looked like someone had tap-danced over the entire book and then published it. Shaun stared at it, entirely dismayed. He had hoped he’d at least be able to figure out where he was.
He struggled with putting the book back on the bookshelf, but after he was done he had an idea. He walked over to the tired duck, who was writing. “Hey, do you have any books with unreadable scripts?”
The duck looked over at him with exaggerated patience that belied impatience. “No. This is a library, not a museum.” After a moment, it blinked and cocked its head. “Actually, I think we do have a few in storage. Why do you ask?”
“I, uhh…” Shaun scrambled for an explanation. “I happen to be pretty good at deciphering unknown scripts!” He paused, unsure whether to embellish on the explanation or not.
The duck took advantage of the pause to raise an eyebrow. “Unown scripts, huh? Sure, I’ll bite.” He entered a door that Shaun hadn’t noticed was there and was gone for a few minutes. It returned with a stack of books in its arms and deposited them on the counter. “Here you go. Take your pick, I gotta put the rest back.”
Shaun blinked. There were seven different books he could choose from and he was struck by analysis paralysis. He selected one at random. “This one.”
The duck grunted and extracted the book from the pile, pushing it towards Shaun. “Here you go. Let us know if it has the keys to Arceus’ gate or something.” He picked up the stack of books and reentered the door to presumably rehouse the books again.
Shaun dragged the book over to where he saw a cushion earlier and sat down. He coughed from the exertion and opened the book.
Instead of footprints, the page was covered in runes. Lots and lots of runes. But something was familiar about them. He squinted and looked closer.
It was English. The letters were borderline unreadable, but for the first time since he got here, Shaun felt like he was making real progress. He started reading the strange letters, parsing the words in his head.
Seven humans will be summoned to defeat these threats. First with partners, then all together, they will prevent the end of all life on the planet. Shaun blinked. “Oh, a prophecy of doom. That’s fun.”
The duck, who had returned from depositing the books, startled and looked up. “What?”
Shaun ignored it and reread the passage carefully. Seven humans? Shaun looked up at the duck. “What do you know about humans?”
The duck had been staring at him, as if he wasn’t exactly believing his tired eyes. “Oh! Uh, well, they’re mythological creatures that stand about 6 feet tall. No one has ever seen one, and a lot of people don’t believe they exist, so they’re mostly thought of as a children’s fairy-type tale.”
Shaun stared at the duck for a moment, processing what he had just learnt in the past five minutes before slowly looking back at the book. “Toto, I don’t think we’re in Kansas anymore,” he muttered to himself.
He made a mental list of what he knew. He was a human in a new body. Check. He was in a place full of monsters that thought humans were of myth and folklore. Check. Doomsday prophecy in an ancient unreadable script that only he could read, claiming that seven humans would come together and save the world. Check.
He was sick and was only going to get sicker. Check.
Shaun didn’t know whether to start laughing hysterically or start crying, so he read further.
The brothers, the mother, the father, the sister, the infused, the one from the future, with no memory of their past, all will save this world. So our prophecy master has decreed.
The writing ended there. Shaun flipped to the next page and saw it filled with more script. The b others wi l be sep rated a first, and t en reu ite into a pow rful team. Th y will encount r those who ca ed a co mic ac ident and defe t th m w th pers vera ce a d co rage.
Shaun stared at the page, dismayed. Whoever had written it had not taken very good care of the book. The words were distorted almost beyond readability, the ink bleeding and threatening to ooze off of the page.
The duck was still looking at him like he had grown two heads. “You really can read Unown script!”
“It’s just English,” he said, flipping to the next page. He let out a low hiss of dismay through his teeth.
The page had been almost burnt to a crisp. He could barely make out The sister through the blackened page. Flipping to the next one was a similar story. And the next one. And the next one.
Frustrated, he got to the last page. The infused will not have taken kindly to this world. They will single handedly give the world a second chance.
It ended there. Shaun stared at the page, frustrated with the lack of clarity. “What the hell does that mean?”
A clock struck the time somewhere. Shaun counted the chimes in his head. …8, 9, 10, 11.
The duck had been doing the same, and sighed with relief after the last chime. “Alright, sir, we’re closing up for the night.” It looked at him inquiringly. “Will you be back here tomorrow? My boss would love to meet you.”
Shaun thought of the clinic and realized he had no real way of getting back in. He winced. “Uh, maybe, but probably not.”
The duck shrugged. “It’s all the same to me.”
After a curt goodbye from the duck, Shaun left the library and started off towards the clinic. He carefully didn’t think about what he had just read, instead thinking about how he was going to get back into the clinic. He most likely couldn’t get back in the way he got out, so he’d have to find a different way.
As he approached the clinic, something felt wrong.
Shaun didn’t know what it was at first. The clinic was the same as ever, with the doorway peering into the vacant reception area. It was dead quiet, with the wind having stopped ages ago.
Shaun stopped dead as he realized what was wrong. The door was open.
Crap. Either the place was currently being robbed or already had been robbed, or it was a trap, and Chansey knew he had gotten out.
He thought back to his escape and grimaced. He certainly had made a lot of noise getting out, and he doubted he was the first one to pull something like this.
“Well,” Shaun muttered to himself. “I can either go in through the front door and risk my life, or I can go back in through the window.” The window seemed like the more appealing option at the moment.
He circled around the clinic to the window to survey the situation. It was bleak at best. The window was about 8 feet off the ground, with various shrubbery underneath. He looked around for anything to possibly push against the wall for a jump, but he saw nothing. Shaun let out a long-suffering sigh as he looked up at the night sky. Figures.
He walked back over to the front door and took a deep breath. Here goes nothing.
Setting foot over the threshold, he was fully expecting to be accosted at once. But it was quiet. No sudden flurry of movement, no noise, nothing. Shaun carefully sneaked into the sick ward. Hopefully he could just slip into bed and she wouldn’t notice a thing-
He turned a corner and saw Chansey standing there, arms folded. It was dark, so he could only really see vague outlines. But even in the dark, he knew she was mad.
“Sir,” she said with an air of irrepressible authority, “I believe that you were supposed to remain on strict bedrest, is that correct?”
Shaun bowed his head. “Yes, ma’am.” Might as well get this over with. He was already tired when he left the library, and the walk hadn’t helped.
“Then can you explain to me why you weren’t here when I got here twenty minutes ago?”
Shaun winced. She had been waiting here for twenty minutes? No wonder she was so mad. “I was bored and wanted to go outside.”
She sniffed. “That’s a poor excuse for jeopardizing your and others’ health.”
He didn’t respond. Way to make me feel like a heel.
After a moment, she sighed. “Look, I get that it’s boring to stay in a hospital bed all day and all night. But there’s a reason for it, and I’d expect you of all Pokemon to understand.”
He nodded, but being compared to a “Pokemon” caught him a little off-guard.
“If this behavior keeps up, then we’re going to have to do something about it,” she continued. “And I can guarantee that no one will like the result.” Shaun felt her gaze on him. “Do I make myself clear?”
“Crystal,” he replied miserably. No more late night walks, at least for a while.
“Good,” she said. “Now get into bed, it’s late.”
Shaun obliged, partially out of fear and mostly out of exhaustion. He slipped under the covers and felt drowsy immediately. He heard Chansey leave the room and shut the door behind her, and then he was asleep.