《From Glass To Crystal》


 Prologue - Poem

    "What''s that knot untangling ever slowly?


    Maybe a piece of art has simply unveiled itself?


    Is it from a dream you burned away?


    Or so-simply,


    I had now extinguished"


    It''s from what I could remember,


    released from a mouth,


    the whispers of a man who had subsided me.


    Escaped from my left,


    he said it so softly,


    any emotion welded my insides shut.


    "Do we understand?"


    Fading away the agony,


    and inserting the broken pieces,


    I dread the words which had collapsed my very core.


    "I don''t understand".


    From the bottom,


    lights flicker from a mind''s blight.Unlawfully taken from Royal Road, this story should be reported if seen on Amazon.


    As you wait


    you notice an overflow of color,


    washing away the sense of how you''ve ever believed me,


    or felt pain.


    To which you say,


    "You never cared to repute, have you?"


    Though you can''t hear me from within deluded thoughts,


    I try to scream,


    As you envy and ask,


    "What does it mean for a man to wait,


    on the end of childlike dreams,


    dear friend?"


    With no reply,


    I begin to observe your muddy waters from afar,


    Grasping,


    from which you now perturb.


    "Something''s hidden"


    I try to ask,


    as you did it without question,


    without the knowledge of the trusting,


    or the foresight of the weak.


    Something had dug you from the rot of notion,


    as it lies deeper than we know,


    waiting for a chance to yell out a name.


    Through under centuries of stone,


    these copper walls had surrounded it''s beloved,


    waiting for years to ink a taste of your tongue.


    I try to help you,


    I try,


    but you gave me no wait.


    no place to help forgive the ones around you,


    whom they''d regret suffer.


    For you''ve always been stubborn,


    always confined in a space where you''ll never run,


    hide, or shine without guide.


    I can only give you a ray of waning transmit,


    like candlelight.


    fading through the waiting glass,


    is another whisper,


    a woman,


    now tucked in a slow decay,


    as she questions her own morality.


    Just like you do,


    or as I do.

 Mild Overview Before or While You Read (Minor Spoilers)

    - The world of Pok¨¦mon has been changed by countless wars and occupation. The nations of Hand World had occupied all Pok¨¦mon regions except Galar and Paldea. Kanto, Johto and Hoenn were run by Hand World, while Sinnoh, Unova and Kalos were owned by the Hand Socialist Republic. Alola was annexed by SAW in 2018, and remains a functioning state of the Pok¨¦mon World, while Galar had was threatened by the Hand Socialist Republic to invade in 2020, but SAW ultimately stopped it. Paldea is still considered an untouched, sovereign region, but they still feel the effects of Pok¨¦mon Degeneration, or "Darenxing". Hand World withdrew their forces from claimed territories in early 2021 in agreement with SAW for compensation losses in return (due to the cost of a timely withdraw and other lost resources). They still have settlements in unclaimed territory that scatter across this planet.


    - New Alvin were the remnants of a previous Pok¨¦mon Government that was above every elite four member of the Pok¨¦mon World. It was led by Alvin, a young and talented trainer who beat and overthrew the Elite Four of Kanto and united all regions around them in times of war. They relocated to southern Ukraine after the Hand Occupation, and until the Russian invasion of the territory in 2022. They are in a defunct limbo state as Alvin''s whereabouts are unknown. Their reoccupied territory, Grand Pasio, is currently in anarchy.


    Unlawfully taken from Royal Road, this story should be reported if seen on Amazon.


    - All species of HAND, from HAND, DONKEY, CREEPY HAND, SCREAMING HAND, FIST, DOG, WOLF, FINGER, BEAR, YUCK, UNITED STATES HAND, and so on, live in a separate world called Hand World.


    - SAW is a mysterious entity that oversees the actions of every nation, from every dimension known to man. They''ve been involved with countless treaties with Pok¨¦mon World in secret for some time, and not a single inhabitant here knows anything about them. They are treated as only rumors and legend.


    - SURP is a legalized defection within the SAW Federation who cut ties and denounced the "Federalization Pact of 2021" as "degrading to the people who originally built our strong and prosperous Stuffed Animal World" and said the leader of the central government was "too soft and too stupid for the world of governance". Their goal is to extrude the corrupt parliament which colludes to protect one of the main characters in the story.


    - The rest you must follow.

 Prelude

    It appeared--the trundling figure from my thoughts. It had staggered up and over a clearing, trying to take hold of a branch, snow warping my senses and blinding me with a greenish white. The world was chalky and too course to describe, the sky above me becoming a painted black, pulsating with the occasional prism of color when -


    Shwik!


    It tumbled backward, collapsing to the ground.


    From the birch¡¯s view, it swayed and shed its chips of crystalline, decorating the bruised-like figure as though it were myself.


    But was it really?


    ¡°Carla¡±, it calls. Still coltish, still vantablack. It''s something I had recognized hours upon hours ago, even under the lightest shade of Amish green, its voice still soothed me deeply.


    How does it know my name?


    I tried to say something to this form, assuming its plight. I wanted to ask the questions that I''ve held to myself for so long, but my mouth wouldn¡¯t open. Even if I pry for these particular answers, I couldn¡¯t change these actions, decisions, questions. It''s like I''ve lived in this world before


    ¡°Your brain still in there?¡±, I''d jest in Asana, but why? Why did I care to say such things? I don''t know him, I didn''t even know myself sometimes. It gnawed at me from the inside, an indescribable feeling of dread which welled over like boiling water from someone else, but who, why, was unclear to me while the world shifts and so does the figure, observing my form draped in snow, a presence now all the more alluring. The sky would change its color as it came closer, no longer black, the snow rippling with that of an emerald color with every shift, every rapid movement. I wasn''t scared of it. I never was. It was an oddly comforting thought, maybe I could change its mind. Maybe it''d let me stay if I tried, if I could persist here just a little longer. In protest of consequence.


    "Carla?"


    It moved to my right erratically. My eyes never flinching with neither my body nor self. Instead, I began to concentrate again.


    Concentrate.


    "Lucario?"


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    It was piercing. Pestering. Its breathing, its aura, still that of a familiar black and blue that remained by my side. Still determined to break my focus.


    "Appalachia wears me solemnly." I would repeat to myself, in an attempt to inure anything else but he was persistent. Becoming more and more until its fragile demeanor slipped, turned impatient.


    "It''s freezing out here, what''re you thinking?"


    It was beginning to fumble with its words, the cold sewing its jaw stiff. Gripped by the wind which, I assume, bombarded its face like a whip. I swore I felt something, the same feeling that was gnawing inside of me earlier. The petulant nagging, the worry. It was growing into something. Something out of my control, and I couldn¡¯t stop it. I am one with nature. I kept thinking to myself in mantra.


    I am one with nature.


    ¡°...look at you. You''re covered in snow - come on! Get up! You''re gonna freeze!"


    "Get the hell up!"


    And I did, the stoicism and grace I once displayed turning into a frantic stumble. Frost still amassing in fusillade. My hind legs tripped on something I couldn¡¯t recognize, and onto the birch. He was driving me down, wasn¡¯t he? My heart, my haste. The thought of the night, of it killing me. My inner focus now destroyed.


    "Oh, Arceus...¡± I kept repeating to myself, my voice shaking. ¡°Fuck-"


    I couldn¡¯t even bring myself to stand, the caked patches of snow had rubbed against my clothes, crunching, nubs flaking off along my hoodie which was frozen solid. I looked up to the sky, a thought of Justin passing, he was just as vulnerable. The clouds turned from a gray to an orange, then a purplish black when it fully started to set. The minutes dragged on for centuries, as I felt it again, of how the trees seethed into its deep, deep sleep, and how their branches forked the clouds and held it up. Each tangling over one other like power lines in the wind. It was a sharp but orderly mess. The moon now an unrecognizable haze as it pulsated. We''re all going into the same place.


    ¡°Carla!¡± it rang out amongst the chaos ensuing in my brain, the voice snapping me back into place with a magnetic click. Even if it was just for a moment.


    He skipped through the dark. Once again wet, damp, and with a sense of urgency. He could barely see the world, with only the light from his flashlight guiding him, shimmering the newly covered or dented whites. Glittering, flailing with a hurried kick that parted snow.


    My name kept passing through me dully, the light obscuring his movements and figure. The smaller, thinner trees strobed an outline of blue with Justin¡¯s fading aura. Its light was blinding me, wasn''t it? Those scavengers can''t find me again, please Arceus, no.


    ¡°Fucking hell¡­¡± he grunted as he approached closer. His hands dragging across the ground, the light obscuring his clumsiness, trying to grab the bough again.


    He kept repeating himself, ¡°Come on - come on¡­¡± through gritted teeth, grabbing my arm insistently. I could barely stand. I couldn¡¯t feel my legs; it¡¯s stinging and stiffening. My senses, try as they may, struggle to come back to me, as I sunk oddly warm in a suddenness. What have we become?


    ¡°J-Justin¡­¡± I whispered, my voice husked, racing itself out of my own body, tumbling over and onto my trainer violently into the snow.


    I can¡¯t think. Everything has turned itself into a molecular haze, my body and mind melting for Mother Earth, the silhouette of Justin¡¯s leering head began to distort the sky, his body now the very stump I¡¯ve been meditating on. It¡¯s a charred figure that had become obscure by a brightening glow and I don¡¯t know why. He¡¯s trying to break me from my concentration. He couldn¡¯t, he mustn''t. I know I¡¯m one with nature; I am one.


    ¡°I am - -¡±


    "No." he cuts off, "I already know - I don''t want to come back here again."


    ¡°That¡¯s not what I¡¯m trying to say.¡± I retorted.


    ¡°Then what?¡±


    I could see it in his face, the way it mangles into an uncomfortable squint, showing his checkered, repulsive smile. What had he become?


    For a moment, I just sat there. My stare turning to that of indifference, long before I spoke. How hadn''t''ve he taken the hint?


    ¡°Just leave me alone, Justin.¡±


    I closed my eyes, as I felt the wind brush up against my ears. The figure once again stood to the right of me. Kneeling over as he sighs.


    ¡°Please, Carla. I don¡¯t want you to die out here.¡±