Chapter 7
Dawn breaks.
Bill’s eyelids twitch and contract from the unwelcome ray of sunlight reaching his face.
He stirs about in the last remnants of his interrupted slumber, stretching his four padded limbs away from his body. Feeling the pleasant rush of blood in his system, the fur mingling in the fluffy cotton mat and the tail in his spine sweeping the ground, he can tell for certain that he’s not human. Realization, however, slowly creeps in within the confines of his foggy mind. Potent stuffy scents and muted sounds abound, reminding him of the place he found himself in last night.
He’s hopelessly stuck in a fantasy world, in a body not his own. He is yet to truly wake up.
Footsteps tread on the floor nearby…
I can see a lot farther, I can hear a lot clearer My senses getting better, transition's getting nearer I notice that I'm chasing every cat that pass by And I think I know why I’m FEELING LIKE A BIG DO—
“Whatever happened to… toning down your weird attitude—”, Bill grumbles, rubbing his eyes with one of his giant fuzzy wrists.
“Rise and shine!”, the silver-maned canine beside him exclaims in high spirits. “We’re burning daylight! The sooner we get this over with, the faster we'll get our answers!”
“...I know, I know…”
Aside from basic food and shelter, the twins were on their own. Lliam had given them both the very generous grace period of a week before they were expected to provide their own unique contributions to the guild. And even then, the definition of “contribution” was surprisingly loose. The obvious answer would be to form an exploration team in order to bring renown to their entourage, but according to many of the members, they could range from a wide variety of random acts of goodwill towards maintaining their own community. Oversight, demand and management of the many possible assignments turned out to also be quite loose. In fact, it would seem as though the guildmaster had given every person under his roof a place to live with no strings attached, purely banking on the goodwill and orderliness of said individuals to provide back to him in a fair and timely manner.
Bafflingly, it works.
Either Lliam got filthy rich somewhere along the way or everyone here is secretly a saint. Or maybe something else.
Bill already had his own “contribution” of sorts in the form of his future counseling sessions. However, he reminded himself, those had a compensation associated with them, so obviously those wouldn’t count towards repaying Lliam’s hospitality. And of course, if they wanted to further their goal of traveling to Fogbound Lake, they had to get the necessary preparations, minimum required experience and general survival know-how in order to have a shot at reaching their destination. Becoming an exploration team seemed like the more sensible option.
If reaching Uxie is as arduous a task as it’s made out to be, then that means one thing to do right off the bat: train.
Needless to say, Gill is stoked.
“Alright. This place should suffice,” the tall avian humanoid from yesterday—a combusken—announces to the twins after walking into the grasslands, going a safe distance away from the guild’s building.
The world outside the town is expansive, almost paradoxically oppressive and constraining in how massive and boundless it is. Mostly because of the mountain range beyond reinforcing the sense of scale that this world has. To anyone else who didn’t spend their entire lives on dreary flatlands like the siblings, the mystique might have been lost on them, however. There is nothing but the scent of wildlands and the prickly grass blades below them. A blue sky and scarce swirling clouds overhead promise a modestly sunny day.
Just like yesterday, the combusken wears a tattered scarf and a custom made eyepatch covering his left side. His cream, slender body is interrupted by two robust orange thighs ending in big, powerful-looking talons. Instead of wings, he possesses two long arms with large, worn white claws. On the top of his head is an orange feather crest.
Strange appearances aside, there’s something deeply unnerving up close about the bird that is very hard to pin down. He doesn’t look like a particularly unwelcoming individual in spite of his gruff appearance and demeanor, but something about his beady, single-eyed orange gaze imprints something fierce and primal deep within Bill. Curiously, it’s not too dissimilar a sensation from observing Lliam’s own mysterious stare.
“Normally, I would recommend the sparring grounds for practice,” the combusken named KFC informs. “They might be a bit too unruly for newcomers, though. For obvious reasons, the dojo inside of our building is out of the question, given your types.”
“Um… KFC? Right?” Bill asks, still not coming to terms with the fact that he’s addressing a giant talking bird going by such a name.
“Yes?” KFC replies without missing a beat.
“Are you… sure this is going to take less than ten minutes? We, uh… these bodies are still very much foreign to us,” Bill points out, making what feels like the understatement of his life.
“Your… kind has performed relatively fine before, worry not. What you’re about to learn is elemental to the point where further instruction would be needless and redundant. Compared to practical application, that is. Kits and hatchlings are supposed to intuitively grasp these concepts on their own already, so you can imagine how difficult this might be for anyone to teach.”
The tall bird stretches its long brawny arms in a series of simple warm-up exercises as he continues his explanation: “Later on, if you two are truly up for the ordeal, I’ll be more hands-on and intensive in my approach. For the time being, I’ll guide you through a crash course and teach you the basics of aura before I leave for—”
“Aura?!” Gill exclaims, suddenly wagging his tail. “No way you’re serious. I mean… you’re going to teach us how to shoot energy balls and stuff? Is that also a thing in this world?! Do we, like… have Infinity Energy?!”
KFC sighs, crossing his arms. “First things first, I have no clue what you’re talking about. Second and before you say it, no, it’s also not ‘chee’ or ‘kee’ or whatever nonsense you humans call it. Thirdly…”
The combusken relaxes his furrow and pose as he observes Gill’s eager expression and demeanor.
“...well, it’d be better if I explained this already. Do I make myself clear, Growlithe?”
Gill sits down beside his brother, paying attention raptly: “Yes, sir.”
KFC nods.
In the dead silence, he inhales and exhales. He readies a wide stance with his arms out and slowly walks forward toward the horizon at a deliberate pace…
…ethereal wisps of blue light then manifest out of the space surrounding him as he starts spinning around in a series of elegant, flowing moves. Each motion appears precisely measured. Precisely timed.
He paces slowly. Stance by stance. The spinning gleaming strands of turquoise wreathing him linger in the air.
The combusken speaks:
“Aura is the very image… the very essence of life itself. Whenever we learn and recall particular techniques, us living creatures materialize that essence into a tangible form. It’s willpower and desire incarnate.”
The twins growlithes gasp as the strands sputter and burst into four blue giant, ghostly light constructs surrounding the dancing bird. Each spectral object, almost appearing to be fashioned after rudimentary longswords, give an unearthly hum and whistle as they travel their fixed path around KFC, trailing ephemeral dust along the way.
"Our auras constantly generate one or two ‘types’ of energy. Fire, Water, Ground… nearly 20 variants in total. As we speak, us three are constantly generating Fire-type energy, for example. However, we're also able to tap into our basic form of energy… and mold it.
The light constructs rupture with a distant echo, fully enveloping KFC in blue as he finalizes his movements.
“Make no mistake—tapping into your aura and directly manipulating it are two entirely different actions altogether. But for the purposes of this demonstration… you two are capable of manifesting that might into reality. If I were to humor you for a moment, it seems us beings in this realm bear this so-called ‘Infinity Energy’ that humans do not. You ought to be no different with the bodies you possess.
In summary, one can generate power from their lifeforce, mold it into a type…”
KFC’s body flashes and spurns the ghostly embers.
He readies a stance. Raising an arm, poised to strike…
…he cleaves the air twice diagonally in a deadly zigzag motion. The very moment his claw abruptly loses all momentum, the resulting mighty gust roars beyond, parting blades of grass tens of feet beyond them.
“...and manifest it.”
KFC calmly turns around to find two completely stunned dogs.
None are able to speak for a couple of seconds.
“That... has to be the coolest thing I’ll ever see,” Gill whispers.
“Likewise,” Bill admits to himself in his mind as he remains silent. He can scarcely believe what he just saw and felt. Many questions swirl in his mind to the point where it’s dizzying.
"The moves I performed were normal-type and flying-type, respectively," the combusken indicates. "Obviously, we’ll start with your fire typing.
Let's get to work, shall we?"
Raging, concentrated fire blasts out of Gill’s mouth for the third time. Unlike regular flames shot as though by a flamethrower, the blaze does not peter out a couple of feet away—the beam of light instead speeds by furiously, materialized as though its point of ignition was nonexistent. It does, of course, die down into billowing clouds a relatively fair distance away.
“That was easy enough,” KFC remarks, perfectly composed in spite of the vicious death waves zipping past him. “Yeah, my intuition wasn’t wrong. You’re clearly green, but it looks like you won’t be half bad in the slightest.”
The red growlithe’s maw sputters out a few residual bursts of fire, inhaling and exhaling after the fact.
“‘Not half bad’... you heard that, Billy?” Gill says excitedly.
“Well, you in any case,” KFC continues. “We’re done here. Now give us your best shot, Billy.”
“Uh… just ‘Bill’ is fine,” the other growlithe awkwardly remarks as his legs widen in a firmer stance.
“Suit yourself. Now go on.”
The time had come. Bill takes a deep breath.
Questions still whirl about madly in his head. Is he really supposed to just think of this power he has and he will naturally generate it? What part of his current biology is he going to use? Is he actually going to believe that a concept such as aura really exists? Does he have the privilege to question this after all of the insane things he has gone through?
Well… no.
And so Bill’s body tenses, visualizing his brother’s previous Ember attacks…
…and his being starts heating up. Through some involuntary process he can’t quite grasp, warmth is building from within. Soon enough, somewhere in his underside region, part of him is set ablaze—a searing, burning sensation envelops his core…
“I told you, what you’re feeling is perfectly natural,” KFC calmly asserts after noticing the slight quiver in the quadruped making his stance falter. In spite of the situation, Bill notes how the combusken’s voice is strangely softer. “Hold it in. It shouldn’t harm you.”
…and indeed, it doesn’t.
His innards are likely, literally, being set on fire. The four limbs making contact with the grass below are letting out some of the excess heat around his feet as though he had become a living furnace. And yet… he’s fine. Even though the unbearable heat in his throat should be making him faint twice over, the feeling is not actually unbearable.
The tiny embers pouring out of his muzzle are giving him second thoughts, however.
“Now manifest it!” the combusken orders, his tone leaving no room for hesitation.
Bill opens his mouth and shouts!
The sheer, raw surge of energy leaving his body and burning his tongue is thick enough to feel physical. Almost as though he can chew on it.
Fire travels on a straight line. Even farther than any of Gill’s previous attempts.
The beam dies, leaving Bill with a racing heart and a slightly heaving, burning chest. Not to mention the faint feeling of fatigue that came from the act. Smoke billows from his muzzle.
For the first time in his life, he breathed fire.
“I… wow…” Bill expresses after the fact.
“Feels weird, doesn’t it?” Gill asks, trotting towards his brother to check up on him.
“You sure ain’t a dud also,” KFC comments. “Again, I haven’t met many of them, but growlithes tend to be a cut above most first-stagers when it comes to strength.”
The bird puts a bag over his shoulder and walks away:
“I have some business to attend to, make sure to fill me in on your progress whenever you can. With any luck, you’ll manage to mold your type energy into something else. Now please, do a couple sparring sessions between you both so you can consolidate what you’ve learned.”
“...sparring sessions?!”
Even Gill looks a bit unsure of himself. Only a bit, though.
Is this guy trying to get them killed?
“What do you mean by sparring sessions?” Bill asks, following the bird.
“What is there not to get?” KFC replies, completely unbothered as he continues to walk away. “Just shoot some Embers at each other until one of you drops. Oh, and I forgot…”
KFC throws a crudely-made pouch their way.
“...here’s some orans courtesy of Lliam. These should do the trick if your wounds get too troublesome. Give him the bag later, by the way.”
Gill, who also trails along, intervenes: “We’re just… supposed to shoot our fire at each other? Wouldn’t this be a bad idea?”
The combusken stops himself in his tracks: “...I don’t know what is it with you people whenever this happens. Humans might be less resilient than sunkerns, apparently, but you’re not humans right now, are you? You’ll recover pretty quickly, with or without orans.”
He then resumes his walk, leaving the pair behind.
“Break any bones and you’ll have an audino right around the corner to fix you up. You won’t kill each other unless you actually mean to. Even then, it won’t be easy.”
With those parting words, the combusken slowly shrinks into the distance towards the guild’s building.
The twins are left all on their own in the middle of the wild, grassy field. The occasional breeze ruffles their fur from time to time.
Bill is left to ruminate on KFC’s words. If he’s callous enough to assume that both will not get killed trying to breathe fire at each other, does that mean that the creatures in this world do indeed recover as fast as he says they do? What if they’re the exception proving the rule? Are the blue speckled tomatoes coming out of that bag supposed to make them regrow calcined tissue?
…this train of thought is interrupted by low, rumbling growling. Next to Bill is a red, roused-up canine scratching the ground below with his paws. A comically exaggerated glower coming from the crimson growlithe’s partially covered face is directed straight at him.
“Cut it out, Gill”, Bill declares embarrassed, not quite managing to interrupt the growling. “You’re out of your mind if you think I’m going to spit fire your way. And what’s with you, anyway?”
“I’m testing something,” Gill responds in a gruff voice, not relenting in his threatening pose. “How do I look?”
“Like an overgrown mutant bernese puppy.”
“Aw…” Gill expresses with disappointment as he relaxes his body. “Okay, what else, what else…”
“Gill…”
“Billyyyy—”
“I’m not going to fight you. We’ll end up getting each other killed.”
“Billy…” Gill closes his eyes circling around his brother. “I think you haven’t realized it yet… and I hate to be the one to break this to you… but you’re also an overgrown mutant bernese puppy. Is it that big a reach to say that a little fire won’t harm us too much?”
Bill stays put. The stare he means to give is as serious as can be.
Gill’s voice turns slightly more grave:
“...Think of this as genuine practical experience for what’s to come, we’re going to need it. Let’s trust KFC on this one, okay? He has no reason to lie to us. I’m not a lunatic either, we’ll go easy on ourselves and not immediately aim dead center at each other.”
The orange growlithe, having sat down, looks at his four paws.
Whatever he is, he’s not human anymore.
He doesn’t feel human anymore.
This body is going to stick with him. He needs to get used to it. More so considering how dangerous the outside world seemingly is.
…
Bill raises his head: “Just a few shots. If one of us gets hit, we’ll call it off—”
“LET’S GO!”
The Hisuian growlithe sprints towards the opposite direction, stopping and swerving in a battle stance.
“I’ve wanted to try this for a while… let’s see if I’m as strong as I think I am…”
Gill lowers his body to the ground…
…and jumps!
”...what…?!”
With might belying his size, Gill bounds high in a powerful, audible leap. Not feet, but several yards separate his figure from the grassy field below.
As he reaches the apex of his trajectory, Gill lurches forward, performing a somersault mid-air before gravity pulls him back in…
…landing with not as much grace as most would like. Still, tumbling slightly, he had managed to land on his four paws, completely unharmed.
“Hah… no way I just pulled that off…!” Gill exclaims, completely stunned.
…are they really this strong now?
“What… h-how did you—”
“Get ready, I’m gonna get STARTED!”
As soon as he finishes his sentence, Gill performs yet another impossibly high leap, making the ground tremble slightly. An orange glimmer shines as he reaches his apex…
…blasting a jet of fire at Bill’s vicinity!
“WOAH!”
Bill sidesteps the wave of fire, feeling its warmth graze him ever so slightly. Gill lands again, this time from a backwards somersault caused by the recoil of his attack.
Bill’s heart races a mile a second. He was about to be consumed by the raging inferno.
But shockingly, he’s not scared.
Far from it.
“You’re gonna shoot at me or what, Billy?!”
A powerful surge runs across Bill’s body. He’s as alert as he’s ever been. The initial desire he had felt for this to be immediately de-escalated appears to have become a distant memory.
As a matter of fact, he wishes to show his brother what for.
He’s going to fight!
“...oh, you’re begging for it!”
Even though part of him is surprised by the way he’s conducting himself, that doesn’t matter right now! He’ll show up Gill and best him in this little encounter. He even finds himself smiling at the prospect of experiencing the thrill of the fight that’s about to begin. His stomach and maw start to flare up, abou—
…
Gill’s smile had faded.
Through his silver bangs, his eyes had lost their excited gleam.
He is instead distraught.
He is scared.
Bill’s mind goes to the scar covering Gill’s eye. His heart sinks.
“Gill…?” Bill starts nervously stepping back. “Gill what’s wrong...? W-What did I do…?!”
As if snapping out of a trance, Gill is startled by the words. He sprints towards Bill.
“Billy! Billy, calm down—”
“I-I-I’m sorry! I don’t know what came over me—”
“Billy—”
“I got way too into it, it’s like I wasn’t myself! A-And I was about to shoot you and you looked at me like that, I never should have don—”
“BILL!”
The orange growlithe is nearly on the verge of tears, receding and hunching his sitting body:
“I-I’m sorry…”
“Bill,” Gill sits down. “Bill, everything is fine. That wasn’t a normal fright you gave me, it felt as though my muscles had become weaker. It had to have been your… er… aura. I’m not joking—”
“Y-You looked at me like I had turned into a monster—”
“IT’S YOUR ABILITY! Remember the games? Remember those? What you did was what I was trying to pull off earlier, back when you called me an overgrown—”
“ENOUGH!”
Gill remains silent.
Looking smaller than ever, Bill looks at the ground:
“Enough… I… I saw you hesitate… a-and that’s when I remembered… that was the moment when I was about to…
…I was about to do something wrong. Okay? I don’t want to be a monster. Not anymore.”
…
Bill’s eyes sting from the unshed tears. Tears that he slowly manages to quell on his own, trying to suppress them as best he can. He’s not going to break down over this.
The wind rustles the grass.
Something grazes his side. Gill had sat down closely beside him.
“Billy,” Gill whispers. His usually loud voice becomes strangely soothing. “Let’s make a deal, alright? From now on, we’ll be monsters together.”
“...huh?”
“You heard me. I’ll hurt you plenty. Just as plenty as you said you’ve hurt me.”
Bill slowly fidgets and moves in his sitting position: “I-I don’t follow.”
“I’m also an awful, horrible monster,” he assures, his calm tone betraying—or perhaps reinforcing his words. “I was a shithead little brother when we were young. And I’ve been a shithead little son to mom, given how little help I was to her when she needed it. I’m just a shithead little person in general.”
“That’s not true and you know it.”
“Yet you can't afford yourself the same charitability. Funny how that works, huh?”
Bill glances away further, having no energy to retort.
“So if you won’t…” Gill continues. “Know that if we can’t be the best we want to be… then the best I can do for you is to vouch for the good you possess. Perhaps only then you’ll accept yourself for the so-called monster you are.
Let’s turn this around then. I’m lucky to have you. Just as you’ll be lucky to have me. Got it?”
Bill resists the urge to rest his head on his brother’s shoulder.
Time passes.
Gill’s words settle into his mind.
…
“Alright,” Bill finally voices. “If you want me to kick your ass that badly… then I’ll try not to smile while doing it.”
Gill smirks:
“Let’s go at it, then.”
The sun sets.
The lingering scent of burnt grass surrounds two battered, burnt canines laying on their backs. For what felt like countless hours, burning through an unimaginable reserve of energy and stamina, the twins had blasted, dodged, and received an innumerable amount of fire beams on their bodies. Miraculously, neither of them ended up with calcined tissue hanging from their limbs. It turns out that their Embers felt a lot more like punches in practice rather than the massless ignitions that they were supposed to be.
Did it hurt every single time? Yes, quite a bit. It didn’t make their bouts any less exciting, however.
“Hahhh… hahh… yeah, I won that one…” a thoroughly toasted Bill weakly states. One of his hind paws is even darker than usual—a worrisome wound that a previous Bill might have found too grueling to deal with.
“The hell you did…” Gill responds, coughing up a bit. His silver mane is extremely unkempt and parts of his stomach are as darkened as what his brother had.
Oran berries really were a miracle fruit. With a single bite, any trace of a wound would disappear in a matter of seconds. Just another oddity among many in this strange realm.
“Yeah… yeah… keep crying…” Bill responds.
Both chuckle feebly as they observe the beautiful golden clouds swirling above them. Not caring in the slightest of their bloody selves.
“...that was too fun,” Bill notes.
“...I know…” Gill says.
“We’ll be monsters together, huh… oh well…”
“Heheheh…”
…
“Oh, darn”, Gill suddenly interjects.
“What…?”
“...we ran out of orans…”
…
“Fuck.”