The tavern on Island Village was a busy place around the weekends. Quite a few Pokemon stopped by to chat with their fellow villagers, catch up on news, and generally unwind after a long day’s work.
There were lots of occupied tables, and arguably more occupied chairs scattered around the building, with a long counter lining the back wall. There were stools at the counter, but no one liked to sit on them except for when every other table was full. Luckily, it wasn’t the end of the week just yet, so they were empty, as usual.
Ampharos walked into the wooden building amidst the chatter of other patrons. He was a regular, so no one paid him much mind as he strolled up to the barkeep, a Simipour. “Evening, Simipour,” he said.
“Oh, good evening, Ampharos,” Simipour smoothly replied. “I assume you’re here on… business, tonight?”
Ampharos nodded curtly. “Meeting.”
“Thought so. Give me just a moment…” Simipour drifted off into the back, where he spent a moment mixing something together before bringing it back. “This evening’s special cocktail. You know the drill.”
Ampharos took the drink and politely nodded. “Thank you.” He didn’t particularly wish to engage Simipour in conversation any more than he had to.
He purposefully wandered into a secluded area of the bar where there was no reason to go, and set down his glass on a plate that looked like it had been there since the tavern was first opened. After a second, a wooden panel retracted into the floor, revealing a set of stairs. Ampharos picked up the glass again before descending the stairway, the panel silently clicking shut behind him.
Down the stairs and around a turn was the meeting room. It was a relatively simple affair, with wooden paneled walls and a smoothed stone floor and a clock quietly tracking time on the wall. In the middle of the room stood a round table with 7 chairs surrounding it, with 4 currently taken by other Pokemon. Ampharos slipped into one of the chairs with the ease of a long-held tradition.
“Ah, here’s the Keeper,” the Master announced. “We’re only missing the Archivist and the Secretary.”
“You know, it’d be a heck of a lot easier if you just used names,” the Organizer, who sitting next to him, complained. “All these titles are hard to remember.”
The Master smiled. “I suppose.”
“Sir, must we wait for the last two Pokemon to show up?” the Enforcer chimed in irritably. “We’ve all got important news to share tonight, and we can just catch up the other two later.”
Ampharos wanted to raise an eyebrow. “You do remember what happened when we started a meeting without Audino, right?”
A collective shudder washed over the room. “Yes,” the Enforcer replied sourly. He didn’t say anything else, Ampharos noted with amusement.
A minute or so later, the Secretary walked into the room, followed by the Archivist. “Speak of the devil and she shall appear,” the Gardener muttered.
“Did you say something, Mr. Tropius?” the Secretary asked brightly.
He shook his leafy head. “No, ma’am.” This brought faint smiles to the faces of all the Pokemon present as the new arrivals sat down.
“Alright, let’s get down to brass tacks,” the Organizer said. “I assume you’re all aware of the Time Gear situation?”
They all nodded gravely.
“We made a disturbing discovery yesterday: it’s gone missing.”
This caused a small uproar in the room. Voices of outrage and fear echoed throughout the room.
“It wasn’t stolen.” The Organizer’s voice cut through the noise as clear as a bell. “If you haven’t noticed, time hasn’t yet stopped.”
Silence. Ampharos faintly heard the noise of the patrons upstairs enjoying their evening, unaware that the lifeblood of the island had gone missing.
The Organizer looked around the room, satisfied. “You may remember the tipoff we got earlier this month about a possible theft of the Time Gear. We’ve come to the conclusion that it was not stolen, or else time on Fifty Island would’ve stopped completely. It is still somewhere on the island.”
The room broke into mutters and whispers. “Sir,” the Enforcer spoke up, “How is this possible?”
“We don’t know,” the Master stated gravely. “We should thank Arceus’ stars that we’re not frozen in time as we speak.”
There was a moment of silence. Ampharos studied the liquid in his glass, debating whether or not he should drink it. It shimmered with violets and scarlets, like some kind of oil on the surface of pavement. He decided against it and set the glass down with a quiet clink. “Are there any side effects from the Gear missing?” he asked.
The Organizer pointed at him. “Fantastic question. Short answer: we don’t know. Longer answer; we have theories that time will act abnormal until the Gear is returned to its rightful spot on the island, but it’s been gone only slightly less than a week, so we don’t know if that kind of thing will be noticeable.”
“Ah, so there’s no real use in worrying about it then,” said the Gardener pragmatically. “We do have mons searching for it, yeah?”
“We will after this meeting,” the Organizer said, pointedly looking at the Enforcer. The Enforcer didn’t look too happy, but he nodded. “I’ll get my mons on it as soon as I physically can,” he said begrudgingly.
“Alright, that’s my piece for the meeting.” The Organizer sat back in his chair. “Sucks that it had to be the first thing on the agenda tonight, but whatever,” he muttered.
The Master looked around the table. “Any other things we should know about?”
Ampharos cleared his throat. “My son has been having some… interesting encounters lately.”
“More bullying?” the Enforcer asked sarcastically.
“Shockingly, no,” said Ampharos. “He found a sick Shinx in the woods and took it to the clinic.”
This garnered him everyone’s full attention. “Go on,” the Organizer said.
“I don’t have all the details, alas, but I do know that Buizel found a Shinx in Deep Woods and took him to the clinic because he was showing illness symptoms.” Ampharos tapped his chin in recollection. “The really odd stuff didn’t happen until today. Cleffa asked Buizel back to the clinic because apparently the Shinx had got out, even though they had locked up last night.”
“Ah, I ‘spose this is where I come in,” the Archivist spoke up. “Farfetch’d told me that a Shinx had come in and asked for ‘unknown scripts’, which he thought meant ‘Unown scripts’. He obligingly pulled out some o’ them ancient manuscripts that y’all keep findin’, and the Shinx was able to read them.”
The room broke into murmurs. “Mr. Fearow, I hate to tell you, but that’s quite literally impossible,” the Secretary cut in. “There is no way in the Distortion Realm that some random Shinx was able to just ‘read’ an untranslatable script.”
“Oh, I didn’ believe it at first either. But Farfetch’d said he saw the Shinx reading it clear as day. Claimed it was ‘just English’. Even asked what a human was.”
Ampharos nodded. “You certainly believe it enough to send all your manuscripts home with my son, apparently.”
The Archivist showed his best approximation of a grin that you could get on a beak. “I’m a bit of a gamblin’ mon, Keeper. If they come back translated, then we have a little miracle on our hands.”
“We certainly would,” The Secretary muttered. She turned to Ampharos. “Back to you, Keeper.”
“Thank you. The second thing is that my son saw a message written in Unown cast out of perspective while picking up the manuscripts.”
There was a stunned silence. “Come again?” the Enforcer asked.
Ampharos slid the piece of paper across the table for everymon to see. They all leaned forward to look intently at the paper, which had the same strange runes that Ampharos had seen earlier that day in the ancient manuscripts Buizel had brought home. “Uncanny,” the Organizer breathed. “This is the clearest Unown I have ever seen.” He looked up at Ampharos. “And your son says he saw this ‘cast out of perspective’?”
Ampharos nodded. “Didn’t quite believe it myself before he pulled out the piece of paper. I’m honestly more amazed that he had the presence of mind to write it down.”
The Secretary looked keenly at Ampharos. “Has this happened before?”
He shook his head. “Not that I’m aware of. Seems like it only just happened today. It’s not like him to keep information from us like that.”
“I see,” she said, returning to studying the paper. After a moment, she slid the paper back to Ampharos, causing the other Pokemon in the room to recline back in their chairs. “See if you can get this odd Shinx to translate it. It might tell us something about what’s happening.”
Ampharos took the paper back and stowed it away. “I get the feeling that’s what Buizel was planning to do. He seemed pretty intent on getting it translated, himself.” He looked up at the clock on the wall. “Ah, I’d better get going. Need to start my work at the lighthouse in a few minutes.”
The other Pokemon in the room politely bid him farewell as he left the room. There was a moment’s silence after he left, unbroken even by the ticking of the clock.
“This island gets stranger by the hour,” said the Master finally. “I don’t know what to make of any of this.”
“None of us do, Lucario,” said the Organizer, shaking his head. “None of us do.”