CW: Mention of gun violence.

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“We need to talk about this, Kevin.”

That was how Isabel Tendai had broached the idea of doing an interview with a local news station in Wildebush. She’d addressed her husband, inviting him to sit around the kitchen table as they debated ways to bring as much attention to the case as possible.

“Well, we can’t look like suspects,” Kevin pointed out. 

Isabel gasped. “Why would they even think such a thing?” she all but yelled.

Her husband shrugged. “It’s just a fact, honey. Sometimes when things like this happen, the public’s first instinct is to see the family as the culprit. Not just that they ran away, either - they think we actually made them vanish.”

“No” Isabel mouthed. “No, no, no!”

It was about the most unjust thing possible, to think about how you can go from being a victim to a villain in the blink of an eye. It was so insane she wanted to scream, but she knew that would get her nowhere.

Kevin handed his wife a box of tissues. “Look, honey,” he said. “If they see us willingly doing interviews with the media, they’ll have no reason to suspect us. Because we didn’t do it, and if we had, we would hardly be likely to seek out the press first.”

He had a point, and Isabel could hardly argue with it. Indeed, she didn’t want to argue with it, considering what was at stake here.

Children will eventually lose their parents; that is just a fact of life. Nobody lives forever. But Isabel knew that sometimes, parents lost their children. And she was living that reality right now, in the small town of Wildebush. 

She’d lost Owen and Matty not to the endless gun violence that plagued the nation, but to something else. Precisely what, she didn’t know.

Maybe they did get shot, and their bodies are being kept in the woods somewhere.

Isabel dismissed that thought right away. Wildebush was a small town, yes, but it was not so remote that a pair of dead bodies could linger in the forest for more than a week.

But even that only ruled a possibility out. It did not get her any closer to finding her boys, possibly getting them back. So Isabel and her husband decided the next step was needed.

And so, on July 14, a holiday in a certain country on the other side of the Atlantic but hardly an occasion worth celebrating on this end of the pond, Mrs. Tendai found herself in the newsroom of a local MSNBC branch.

“Good afternoon, Mrs. Tendai” the reporter, a short woman with equally short red hair, said warmly as Isabel took a seat across from her.

“Afternoon,” Isabel replied grimly, feeling the tears fill her eyes.

The reporter sighed. “I know that this must be a very difficult thing for you to do. Losing two children at once…”.

“I haven’t lost them” Isabel insisted, as though saying this would make it true. “They’re still out there somewhere. I just know it.”

“Uh-huh” the reporter nodded. “Anyway, you know my name. It’s Erin Springville - you can just call me Erin. If any of these questions are too difficult for you, you don’t need to answer them.”

“Right,” Isabel replied tearfully. 

“And if you ever want to leave prior to the conclusion of our interview,” Erin continued, “you may do so with no penalty. This isn’t a courtroom.”

That hardly made Isabel feel better, because it added more pressure to stay in the newsroom. But she’d do whatever it took.

“Right.”

Erin leaned over onto the table. “I can’t imagine how difficult this must be for you. To lose a son…”.

“Two sons. And they’re not lost, they’re just missing!”

“Again, Mrs. Tendai, I know how hard this must be for you to say. You’re a very brave woman, you know that?”

“I’m not brave, I’m just doing what any mother would do” Isabel insisted. “Do you have any children, Erin?”

She nodded. “A son.”

“Well, I’m sure you know what it’s like to send him to school knowing what might happen. Even ignoring that risk, you always think about how your job is to protect him from everything.”

Erin nodded again. “He’s older than your sons - you’ve said they were eighteen and sixteen?”

“Yes,” Isabel replied curtly. “I thought that had already been reported?”

The morning after that Fourth of July parade, an article had run in the Wildebush Post about the case. It didn’t accuse the Tendai parents of any wrongdoing, but Isabel felt certain that the conspiracy theories would start before long. That’s how it always worked with cases like this.

Some would allege that she and Kevin had been abusive towards their sons, or that the boys were faking their deaths for attention, or even that Owen and Matty Tendai had never existed at all. Or, for that matter, some combination of the three, as incoherent as such a theory would rapidly become. Indeed, while Isabel hadn’t exactly become a pariah around town, it did seem as though the people of Wildebush were giving her a wider berth than usual lately.

“It was,” Erin said, bringing Isabel back to Earth. “But not everything is public knowledge.”

“When I saw they were missing…” Isabel began. “My mind just ran to the worst, but the biggest thing…I’d failed as a parent. As a mother. I’m supposed to make sure no harm comes for Owen and Matty, right?”

Erin did not respond. She didn’t need to.

“Well, they were missing! It was like they were just snatched out of their beds! And I was powerless to stop it!”

Erin reached out a hand, presumably to massage Isabel’s shoulder, but Mrs. Tendai wasn’t having it.

“Please don’t” Isabel protested.

“Sorry,” Erin replied. “Just wanted to help if I could. But I guess I’ll leave you plenty of personal space.”

“Thanks.”

“Anyway, ever since your interview with Officer Gloria, you haven’t made any statements to the media. Is that correct?”

Isabel nodded. Ever since that talk with Officer Gloria at the July 4 parade, Isabel had been waiting with bated breath for an update from the local police department. She’d sit by the phone for hours at a time, hoping against hope that it would ring with more information. 

But as the hours passed, and one, two, three days turned into ten, hope was lost altogether. If the police knew anything more than she did, they certainly weren’t loosening their lips.

So she’d sat in one of the family’s aging armchairs, a cup of tea in one hand and a hot water bottle in the other, sipping every so often but not enjoying the tea at all. And this had gone on until she had worked up the courage to take the initiative and give this interview.

“Is there any reason why you didn’t?”

“Because I hadn’t processed everything yet!” Isabel insisted. “I was too shocked, and quite frankly not brave enough, but that’s honestly none of your business!”

Erin flinched at her interviewee’s suddenly harsh tone. “I’m sorry for asking that question. It’s just that in the interest of journalistic integrity, we have to.”

I’ll stay here as long as it takes to get the message out. Anything for Owen and Matty.

“It’s okay,” Isabel said. “Well, not okay - they’re still missing.”

It was then that Isabel glanced at her watch and noticed that if she stayed much longer, she might be late for her book group. (Yes, book group was hardly the highest priority for her right now, but Mrs. Tendai still found herself needing the company of her friends more than ever.)

“I don’t have much time left,” Isabel admitted. “I’ve got my book group soon.”

“That’s okay, that’s okay” Erin replied. “I’ll give you one last question: As the subject of the biggest Wildebush news story in a while, what will you say to the public? What’s your pitch?”

Mrs. Tendai narrowed her eyes. “My pitch goes out to all the mothers in Wildebush: If they were your children, wouldn’t you want to leave no stone unturned? Or would you want the town to give up on finding them? 

“Of course not! You’d beg and plead for the local government to use all the resources it had, because there’s nothing more important to you than your children. That’s exactly how it is for me, so please…walk a mile in my shoes.”

“Beautifully put, Mrs. Tendai” Erin remarked. “And I sincerely hope that you’ll be reunited with Owen and Matty soon enough.”

Isabel didn’t pay that remark any mind. That’s what they all said, but they didn’t understand. No mother could truly mean it unless they had experienced such an event.

In any case, she needed to get to her book group, so Mrs. Tendai got in her car and drove away. (Of course, she was just a little more preoccupied than she normally was while driving - she might as well have been under the influence, so it was hardly safe for her to operate a motor vehicle at this time.)

More than once, she made a wrong turn and had to pull into someone else’s driveway. When this happened, Isabel’s breath caught in her throat as she sincerely hoped that the neighbor either wouldn’t notice or wouldn’t mind.

When she finally arrived at the book group’s location for the month (the home of her friend Mary Gorrister), Isabel saw the time on the car’s dashboard and learned she was several minutes late.

Well, great. Just great. Hopefully they’ll forgive me for that - they have to, right? They all know what I’m going through.

As soon as Isabel crossed the threshold of Mrs. Gorrister’s home, the latter woman appeared out of nowhere, arms held out in order to embrace her grieving friend.

“I heard what happened” Mrs. Gorrister said unnecessarily, though tears filled her eyes. “I’m really, really sorry about that, Isabel.”

“Don’t be sorry” Mrs. Tendai replied curtly. “It wasn’t your fault.” That I know of.

A second later Isabel felt tempted to slap herself upside the head. Just because she was experiencing inner turmoil didn’t give her the right to doubt her friend like that. If “thoughtcrime” was real, not just some figment of Orwell’s imagination, she’d be locked up for life for that.

“That doesn’t mean I can’t apologize” Mrs. Gorrister responded quietly. “Now, the others are all in the living room - did you bring your book with you?”

“Uh…” Isabel trailed off, realizing that she had not, in fact, brought her copy of the novel they’d been reading. She had read the text, of course, but she’d been so absentminded that morning, nothing mattering beside the interview, that she’d forgotten such a small thing. Her brain had been a sieve today.

“That’s okay” Mrs. Gorrister replied. “I understand.”

“No, you don’t!” Isabel all but shrieked. “You don’t know what it’s like to be one of those parents whose kids are never coming home!”

“I know,” Mrs. Gorrister told Mrs. Tendai. “Those gun control ads tear me up, but I get it - you can’t understand until it touches you. And thus, you don’t want to understand.”

Isabel nodded with a sniffle. 

“Would you like a box of tissues?” 

Isabel nodded again, and Mrs. Gorrister went over to the kitchen to retrieve the requested item. While she was away, Isabel made her way to the living room, where six other women sat in a circle, all chatting about something or other over cheese, crackers, and glasses of wine.

The chatter ceased completely as soon as Isabel entered the room. 

Right away, the women (whom Isabel knew well - after all, she talked to them outside the group too), glanced at the one who had just joined their midst. None of them were talking.

“Just say something already!” Isabel shouted. “I’m sick of this awkward silence!”

“What happened - it’s horrible” Mrs. Devon, also known as the “cat lady”, said. “I really can’t imagine what it’s like. Are you okay, Isabel?”

“Of course I’m not okay. How about your children vanish abruptly and don’t appear for over a week, and then you see if you’re doing okay?”

“Right” Mrs. Devon replied, wiping sweat off her brow.

Isabel took her spot in the circle. She saw that she was the only one in the group who had not brought her copy of Mad Honey by Jodi Picoult and Jennifer Finney Boylan, and right away knew that this set her apart from the others. After all, most of the other seven women in the group had children, and none of them had yet disappeared.

Mrs. Tendai cast her gaze around the room. In no particular order, the other women in the group were named Mrs. Collins (who was always deeply concerned about something, though never concerned enough to do anything about it), Mrs. Coventry (whose husband was a big-bucks lawyer who belonged to an elite country club), Mrs. Finch (whose husband was a nerd about aviation in World War II), Mrs. Kirkland (who worked as a writer for a local travel agency), and last but not least Mrs. Wexford (who owned a small landscaping business in Wildebush.)

Their faces all betrayed sympathy, but Isabel couldn’t help but wonder if they truly were sorry, or if they were just playing along because that’s what they were supposed to do as her friends. Was there even a difference?

“Really, I don’t want to talk about it anymore” Mrs.Tendai stated. “I think we should focus on what we came here to do - that’s to analyze modern literature.”

“Fair enough” Mrs. Coventry replied, tying her hair into a bun. “We’re all here for you, though, if you need us.”

“What I really need,” Isabel said, “is to have my boys back. But thank you.”

What went without saying was that, as much as Isabel needed to see Owen and Matty again, the other members of her book group couldn’t help her with that. All they could do was keep her company as she sobbed through the ordeal.

“My husband’s out sick from work” Mrs. Finch said eventually. 

“Oh, he is?” Mrs. Wexford replied. “I hope he feels better soon - that sucks. It’s not common for people to get sick in the middle of summer like this.”

“Well, it’s weird. They say it’s like a summer flu - I took a COVID test and it came back negative. I’m fine to be here - I just want you all to know that I’m not about to be this group’s Typhoid Mary.” Mrs. Finch said all this very quickly, as though she’d recited these lines and was determined not to forget them.

“We trust you” Mrs. Gorrister told Mrs. Finch as she returned from the kitchen, handing Isabel a box of tissues. “After the pandemic, I’m sure we’re all a little on edge about this stuff.”

“It’s not just that” Mrs. Finch stated breathlessly. “My husband’s a nerd, but he’s also as strong as an ox. And yet he went down the other evening, clutching his head. I thought he was having an aneurysm or something.”

A few of the other women, including Isabel, gasped. 

“That’s scary” Mrs. Kirkland replied. “To think that you can be okay one minute, then in so much danger the next…”.

“Took him to the hospital, and the tests all came back negative for whatever they thought it might be. Said the symptoms were like a summer brain flu - “.

“My son had that as a baby” Mrs. Devon muttered.

“ - but it wasn’t that either. He’s been on bed rest for the last few days - we’re supposed to keep the room as dark as possible for him. But in the middle of summer, that’s easier said than done.”

The other ladies, including Isabel herself, nodded with sympathy. But Mrs. Finch wasn’t done yet.

“There’s more,” she said.

“Continue” Mrs. Gorrister offered.

“The doctors who diagnosed him with this weird summer flu,” Mrs. Finch continued, “said that they’ve been getting a lot of similar cases. They’re talking about sequencing this virus, because it sure seems like an outbreak to them.”

Isabel gasped. “Are they talking about doing another quarantine?”

“I sure as hell hope not” Mrs. Gorrister muttered. “It’s not as much fun, having our book group over Zoom.”

“There won’t be the appetite for that” Mrs. Kirkland muttered. “Not after all those Trumpers tried to kidnap a Governor.”

That thought hung in the air for a while. Was another pandemic truly upon them?

“I can’t think about that right now,” Isabel insisted. “I just can’t. Not when…”.

Mrs. Tendai didn’t need to finish that sentence, because the other women all knew how she was going to do so. It went without saying that when your sons were both missing, other worries tended to go out the window.

“Right,” Mrs. Coventry remarked, giving Isabel a glance of utmost pity. “I hope they find Owen and Matty soon - that’s all I can really say.”

“Thank you” Isabel replied, and she really did appreciate the sentiment, even if it got somewhat repetitive when everyone said that.

“Well then,” Mrs. Gorrister said. “Maybe it’ll help all of us if we delve into discussing the book. Perhaps it will serve as a distraction.”

Make no mistake, though: As the discussion of Mad Honey commenced, Isabel found it increasingly difficult to focus. Whenever she was called on to answer one of Mrs. Gorrister’s questions, she would stumble right out of the gate.

Simply put, nothing so trivial as fictional characters in a small New England town dealing with a murder suspect mattered.

(Insert a horizontal line here)

 

OWEN’S POV

 

Over the course of the next week, I endured eight-hour shift after eight-hour shift. 

It’s one thing to sit behind a desk from nine to five, answering calls, doing paperwork, and whatever other tasks a white-collar office gig would entail. But being deep underground, amid all that stale air, blood, sweat, and tears…let’s just say that it’s something else entirely.

Every day, I was assigned to the same plot of dirt as Aikan Tepig. We would acknowledge each other at first, remarking about how much of a “coincidence” this was (though it was likely by design, not random chance), and then we’d start digging.

It was work all day, and there would be no sugar in our tea.

My paws were indeed blistered for some time, but they eventually grew calloused from the hard work. I became increasingly accustomed to it. That’s not to say that it became easy, but rather that I was able to accept that this was my new lot in life.

“Hey, Aikan?” I asked my colleague toward the end of the second day. I hated to bother him with this, but he was the only company I had.

“Yes?” he enquired, though I could still hear the sound of his shovel against the dirt.

“If you ever had a secret that you wanted to share, but didn’t know if it would be wise to share it, what would you do?”

“What do you mean, Owen?” Aikan replied.

“I dunno. Maybe you didn’t know if you could trust your friends with it, but you needed to trust someone nonetheless. What would you do then?”

“Then I wouldn’t tell them,” the Tepig stated. “Unless I thought that the risk of telling the secret wasn’t too great.”

“And how would you judge that?” I asked. (It should be apparent that this wasn’t a hypothetical question; the secret at hand was Matty’s plight.)

“I’d list the pros and cons, I guess,” Aikan suggested. “And then at the end of it, I’d weigh the pros and cons against one another. That’s how I’d decide.”

“How would you decide which pros and cons counted more than others?” I wondered.

Aikan damn near dropped his shovel. Though it was dark in the cavern, I could still tell that he was glaring at me.

“Look, Owen,” he snapped. “I’m trying to focus on work right now. You should be doing the same. I don’t have the faintest idea what you’re talking about.”

“You do, though” I protested. “You know what a secret is, and you know what pros and cons are.”

“Maybe I do, maybe I don't,” Aikan replied coolly. “What matters is the nature of the secret. But again - now’s really not the time, Owen.”

I sighed. “I guess you have a point.”

Just then, Foreman McCormick happened to arrive at our plot. The Sableye’s eyes darted between us.

“Is everything going okay here?” he remarked.

“Yes” both Aikan and I replied in unison.

“It had better be!” McCormick bellowed. “Because nobody likes workers who slack off. Remember, work will set you free!”

I could barely suppress a snort there. This guy was beyond parody, but if I mocked him to his face, I wouldn’t be laughing for long.

“Right,” Aikan muttered. “We’ll make sure we stay focused. You don’t need to worry about us, Foreman.”

The Sableye nodded. “I hope that’s the truth, Aikan Tepig. I hope that’s the truth.”

Although it was only my second day on the job, I felt as though the routine had already been established. It wouldn’t be long until the days blended together, turning into weeks, and yet I’d still be down here missing my brother.

When Foreman McCormick mentioned that our shifts were over, I put my shovel down a little more forcefully than I needed to, then left the work cavern. (We were obligated to walk in single-file to the worksite, but no such rule prevented us from straying off after our shifts. As they said - “You don’t have to go home, but you can’t stay here.”)

I decided to take a route slightly different from the one I normally took. I turned onto a side street in the city of Ketchum, and it wasn’t long before I realized I was lost.

Just think, think, think, I told myself. It’s not like those times at the mall when you got lost. You can’t stay where you are and count on being found that way.

I tried not to panic, but it’s hard to remain calm in such a situation. I hid behind a trash can, which smelled predictably horrific, hoping that no hostile Pokémon would show up.

Well, it didn’t take long before the overwhelming stench was joined by a booming, stark tone. It was one I thought I recognized.

And then there was another familiar voice, though it had been longer since I’d heard it. To save you time, I’ll just admit it: I thought the voices belonged to Officer Pratt and Sheriff Buckle respectively.

I could not see the owners of these voices, but I could definitely hear them talking to one another. And this conversation was not cordial in the slightest - I knew they were having an argument about something.

“Cinccino, I don’t understand why you feel the need to be so conciliatory!” Officer Pratt barked. “It’s not like those humans have ever treated us that way!”

“I’m not being conciliatory,” Sheriff Buckle snapped. “I’m merely acknowledging that taking such an action would be highly unwise.”

“Wouldn’t it be the right thing to do?” Officer Pratt responded in an exasperated manner.

“I’m not convinced it would be right, Pratt. In fact, I’m pretty sure it would be wrong. I’m not any happier about this situation than you are, but sometimes one needs to think in practical terms.”

What are they talking about? 

“What’s practical,” Officer Pratt seethed, “is to make sure the humans don’t feel secure in their lifestyles. They are, after all, the reason we had to build this city!”

“So your solution for that is military action?” Sheriff Buckle enquired frantically. “Oh, Arceus, Pratt - how could you?”

“How could I propose such an action?” the Krookodile replied. “Well, Buckle, think of it this way: Humans have been far crueler to this planet than I could have even imagined. They drive their gas-guzzling vehicles, burn coal to send their greenhouse gasses into the sky, litter their national parks that they claim to care about so much…if this keeps up, the surface will be uninhabitable!”

The Cinccino was silent for a while, to the point that I could hear myself breathe. With each breath, moreover, my nose whistled faintly, and I realized that this might be enough to betray my presence.

Fortunately, I was lucky, at least for now. Sheriff Buckle and Officer Pratt were too busy going at each other to notice that someone (one of their former inmates or suspects respectively, moreover) was eavesdropping on them.

Speaking of Sheriff Buckle, he was the next one to speak.

“You might think it’s worth it to punish the humans for what they’ve done to the surface of the Earth,” he said, “and I’m sympathetic to that sentiment. However, it would simply do too much damage to the environment.”

“Well, I’ve got another idea,” Officer Pratt muttered in response. “I could tell you what it is, or I could just release it myself.”

“You do realize,” Sheriff Buckle replied, “that I am your superior in this position? I gave you your job. I put you where you are now, and don’t forget: I can take you back down too.”

I gulped.

“What does that even mean?” the Krookodile barked. “I’m telling you, Cinccino, I don’t see any reason why we should be nice to the humans - “.

“It’s not about being nice to the humans,” Sheriff Buckle insisted. “It’s about making sure we can truly inherit what is rightfully ours as Pokémon. I’m thinking long-term, Pratt - you’ve got tunnel vision!”

“Maybe I do,” Officer Pratt admitted. “But just hear me out, okay? We have lots of toys at our disposal, and they won’t be a sack full of joys for the humans.”

Sheriff Buckle grunted. “What are you proposing?”

“Well, if we use a conventional agent, you are correct - the infrastructure and environment would be in grave danger. But notice that there was an outbreak on the surface not long ago - coronavirus disease 19, they called it.”

“Right,” Sheriff Buckle mouthed. Then, though I couldn’t see his face, I imagined it dawned on him at that very moment.

Not whether his subordinate was sane or not. But how he hoped to accomplish their goal.

“You’re proposing that we use a biological weapon against the surface!” the Cincinno exclaimed. 

“Yep,” Officer Pratt confirmed. “That’s the idea. And we’ve got one that we’re cooking up in our labs.”

He wants to unleash a pandemic upon the humans. Officer Pratt is already putting this plan into motion, too.

“There are some holes in this idea,” Sheriff Buckle said. “For instance, where will the virus go once it’s decimated the population?”

Officer Pratt snorted. “That’s not what decimate means, boss. Decimate means that one in ten die. We want one in ten to live at most - that way our reclamation of the surface will be far easier.”

“But what corners of the globe will we inhabit once the virus has carved its way through the human population?”

“Well, we’ll live wherever we want,” Officer Pratt muttered. “We’ll take over America, Russia, France, Canada, Australia…it’ll all be ours, and it should be ours, because it’s rightfully ours.”

“I do not think you understand what I’m asking,” Sheriff Buckle repeated. “The virus will still be there when we return to the surface. I do not know what virus you’re creating, but if it can pass from the dead to the living…”.

At that, Officer Pratt began cackling maniacally. It was one of the most horrible sounds I’d ever heard - it can hardly be described, but maybe an old cat playing a trombone would be an apt comparison. If that cat meant to wipe out humanity, that is.

“Why are you laughing, Pratt?” the Cincinno asked. “This isn’t funny.”

“What I haven’t told you yet,” Officer Pratt replied, “is that you do know what virus we’re synthesizing! And the vast majority of Ketchum residents are immune to it! Once it’s devastated the human population, we’ll swoop in and take over! The infrastructure will still be intact, but the human race’s wanton greed will not be!”

He said all of this very fast, but I wouldn’t have needed him to slow down. I understood precisely what Officer Pratt stated, and it was only a few moments before their plan clicked into place for me.

I could not hear what Sheriff Buckle said in response, but my heart was thumping too close to my ribcage for me to care.

Officer Pratt’s proposal was to use a viral bioweapon to decimate the human population, leaving at most 10 percent of them left standing. Unlike guns, bombs, and artillery, this virus would not harm the civilian infrastructure, meaning that transportation systems, cities, and even hospitals would remain in place. (Of course, the latter category of institutions would be overwhelmed, but eventually there’d be no humans left to overwhelm it.)

This virus was the one I’d recently recovered from, the one that had swept through Ketchum eighteen years prior. I’d be immune to it, so in theory I’d have nothing to worry about. However, if they were able to make it more deadly somehow…

Mom and Dad will be right in the crossfire! So will the rest of Wildebush, and the rest of the world for that matter! 

I had to get back to the surface. If not for myself, then for the rest of humanity. I needed to warn them about what was coming.