Chapter Text
Paxton was exhausted.
He hadn’t really gotten to sleep before the Tower had activated in the first place. Everything went to hell so quickly that he hadn’t checked the time once. It was 3:30 in the morning now, as Vinnie so helpfully told him, but the night could’ve started at 2am or 10pm and he wouldn’t know the difference. He just knew that his legs were half-numb from running, his jaw ached so bad from clenching it that it was a miracle he hadn’t ground his teeth into powder, and he was definitely bleeding out of his head somewhere, because there’s no way that sticky drip he felt along his hairline was sweat.
He knew his body was begging for a break.
He also knew that Taunie hadn’t come down from the Tower yet.
“It’s been too long, I’m gonna go get her,” he said, his throat raspy with exertion. “She doesn’t have a Flying type on her team.” He could practically hear Naveen rolling his eyes.
“Neither do you, genius,” he scoffed. “How are you planning to go up and get her?”
“Gardevoir,” Paxton answered, already bringing out her Pokéball. “She can either go up herself or catch her with a Psychic.”
“Paxton, hold on a sec—” Lida was coming forward, probably to hold him back, so Paxton grabbed the railing of the rooftop and swung his legs over. “She’s fine, just wait here and she’ll come down!”
“Too late!” Paxton called as he jumped down. He’d just healed up his Rotom phone, so it broke his fall easily, yanking him up before he hit the pavement. It gave him whiplash and made his already tired arms throb, but it was fine. He still felt bad for dropping his phone so hard while fighting the Eternal Flowers that it’d made the Rotom inside faint.
“She has a perfectly good Meowstic, you know!” Lida yelled after him, but he paid it no mind. He wanted to be the first face she saw after everything she’d dealt with in the Tower.
He tried to run towards it, but his legs couldn’t really keep up, so he had to move at a jog. When he got closer, Paxton spotted Taunie’s pink-blonde hair coming down the side of the Tower, sliding down against all the floating panels of debris. Paxton picked up his pace, even though his body hated it. She wasn’t falling too fast, just fast enough to worry him. He got ready to send out Gardevoir, in case she didn’t slow down enough by the time she got close to the ground.
“Taunie!” he called out to her, and she was close enough that he could see her head jerk in his direction, and how she pressed her arm and leg hard against the panels to slow her descent even more. By the time he caught up to her, she was safely on her feet, unsteady but okay, with a sleeping Floette curled up in her hands.
He was almost afraid to look at her.
The look on her face before she went into the Tower was going to be carved into his memory forever.
In all his time in Lumiose, Paxton had seen Taunie cycle through just about every emotion. He’d seen her happy, peaceful, determined, frustrated, confident (arrogant, even), embarrassed (rarely), affectionate (even more rarely), fighting for her life (often), and straight-up angry.
He’d never, ever once seen her cry.
But when she looked at him before, when he’d put his hand on her shoulder while she’d begged him to trust her, her eyes were brimming with unshed tears. And that terrified him more than anything.
But she had made it back and she was alive and he couldn’t just stare at his shoes while she was standing right there in front of him. Paxton brought his gaze up and took her in. He couldn’t help it— he gasped.
Whatever he was expecting, this was worse. He hardly recognized her.
The first thing he noticed was how dusty she was, as if she’d walked through a construction site while they were drilling concrete. Under the dust, her skin was littered with tiny cuts and scrapes, some of them scabbed over and some still oozing blood. Her jacket— her mother’s jacket— was torn in places. Her hair was a mess, the half-bun she usually wore coming apart.
Her eyes were so bloodshot they looked painful.
She was… dulled, like something had sucked the spark and the liveliness out of her. Pale and hollowed out.
“Taunie—” he started.
“Don’t worry,” Taunie interrupted, her words slightly slurred. “I’m okay, Floette’s okay.” She held out her cupped hands and Floette stirred, blinking up at him.
“Good to see you, Floette,” Paxton said, reaching out to pet her head. Floette smiled at him. “Are you sure you’re okay?” Taunie furrowed her brow as if she didn’t understand the question.
“What? Yeah, I’m good, I’m good,” she said, shaking her head. She tried to take a step towards him, but she stumbled, lurching forward.
“Whoa, hey!” Paxton exclaimed, catching her by the elbows. He stumbled back a bit himself. He couldn’t support her weight along with his own, not now, so he did the next best thing.
“Easy, easy, I’ve got you,” he said softly, bending his knees and lowering them both to the floor. He winced a little at the thought of the open cuts on her legs touching the dirty pavement, but it couldn’t be helped. Taunie looked around, blinking, as if she was confused as to how she ended up on the ground when she was standing a second ago.
“Well, that wasn’t supposed to happen,” she mumbled. Paxton chuckled despite himself.
“It’s okay, we can sit here for a sec. I needed to rest my legs, anyway.” Taunie looked him in the face, and it was the first time she actually saw him. Her eyes darted around to the disheveled state of his clothes, the bruises he no doubt had everywhere, and the cut on his head (which was starting to really hurt, now that the adrenaline had worn off). The color that was just starting to come back to her face drained right back out.
“I-I’m sorry,” Taunie said, her breath stuttering. “Pax, I’m so sorry.”
“I— what?” Paxton asked. He was still holding onto her arms, even though he didn’t need to anymore. “For tripping?”
“For not being strong enough.” Taunie hunched in on herself, looking firmly at the ground. “For pushing my way up there. You’re the strongest Mega Evolution user. If I’d let you go up like you were supposed to—” Paxton had heard enough.
“Don’t. You have nothing to apologize for.” Taunie refused to look up, so Paxton rubbled circles on her arms in what he hoped was a comforting gesture.
“But I do!” Taunie insisted. She twitched in his grip, but since she was still holding Floette, she didn’t try to break out of it and risk dropping her.
“No you don’t. You have a stronger bond with Floette than I do, it made sense for you to go up there too. And you were right, in the end! We did need Zydarde, I needed to be here.”
“But we wouldn’t have needed Zygarde if I wasn’t so weak—”
“Taunie,” Paxton said firmly, “we have no way of knowing that. None of us knew what we were dealing with. Even AZ didn’t know what Ange was capable of, and he built it. You did everything you could, and I was here to work with Zygarde. That’s all that matters.” He thought Taunie was going to respond, but instead he heard footsteps, and suddenly Lida was crouched down next to them.
“I hope you’re not planning to sleep out here,” she said playfully, and he felt the tension dissolve. Lida was good at that, at making them feel at ease. Naveen chose not to sit down, so he leaned down to pat Taunie’s shoulder, which was basically a hug coming from him.
“If I were you,” he chimed in, “I’d go for somewhere with blackout curtains so the sun doesn’t wake you up in three hours.”
“I could sleep for a whole day, I think,” Lida chirped, sounding entirely too peppy for her words to be true.
“Please, I could sleep for a week,” Paxton replied. He glanced at Taunie, who had straightened up. She looked… better.
“Good thing the beds at Hotel Z are so comfortable,” she said with a small smile. “It’s the best stay in Lumiose for a reason.” Everyone let themselves laugh a little.
There she is, Paxton thought to himself. That’s the Taunie I know.
“Good to know that not even the apocalypse can knock the Hotel Z PR out of you,” said Naveen, shaking his head fondly. “Never change, Taunie.”
“Let’s get you home,” Paxton said, tugging Taunie along as he rose to his feet. The sitting had helped, he felt more steady on his feet now, even if his head was killing him.
“Yeah, home…” Taunie breathed, the smile slipping from her face. “Can someone hold Floette? I need to call Emma.” Lida nodded and scooped Floette up gently while Taunie felt around in her pockets. When she dialed Emma, she turned off the speaker and pressed the phone to her ear, which wasn’t usual for her. Paxton glanced at Lida and Naveen, who were also confused. Taunie always had her phone on speaker, since the calls she got were usually Team MZ business. What did she need to talk to Emma about that she needed to hide?
“We can walk,” Taunie said while she waited for Emma to pick up. Paxton still felt uneasy about it, but he followed when they all started making their way back to Hotel Z.
“Hey, Emma,” Taunie greeted, voice dripping with relief. “Thanks for picking up, and sorry to wake you. Did you end up doing what I asked you for, before?” Paxton made eye contact with Lida and Naveen again.
Is she being cryptic on purpose? He tried to communicate with his eyes. He wasn’t sure if they understood, but judging by their faces, Lida was saying “probably?” and Naveen was saying “yes.” Whatever Emma had to say on the other line, it wasn’t what Taunie wanted to hear.
“No, it’s okay, I understand,” she said, frowning. “I can check myself. Thanks Emma, goodnight.” She shoved her phone back in her pocket and kept walking. It was uncomfortably silent for a while. Paxton hadn’t realized how much he’d gotten used to the city’s noise until it was gone, with everyone evacuated. He couldn’t stand it, actually.
“So,” he started, trying (and probably failing) to be casual, “was that about the person you’re looking for?”
You know, the one you refuse to tell us anything about? his brain supplied unhelpfully. Taunie’s head jerked in surprise.
“What? No,” she answered, as if he was ridiculous for even suggesting it. “No, I just— I had asked Emma to check on AZ if she had a minute, since he can be pretty vulnerable without Floette to protect him. She didn’t get the chance to, though, with the evacuation and the Rogue Megas and whatnot.”
“I’m sure AZ’s probably been asleep for hours anyway,” Naveen said. “He always goes to bed so early.” He had hurt something in his right leg, he was limping a bit. Not enough to need support to walk, but enough to make him lag behind. Paxton slowed down to match him, and the group fell in line.
“I hope he follows through on that celebratory dinner tomorrow, though,” Lida said. “Not that I’m tired of croissant curry or anything, but it’d be awesome for AZ to cook us something from his travels way back when.”
“Mm,” Taunie hummed in response. She was closing off again, putting her walls back up.
Damn it, Paxton thought. And we were doing so well. He’d become acutely aware of every change in Taunie’s behavior recently, like a sixth sense that was trained on her. Not even just on her, on all of Team MZ. They all had it, at this point. If anything was off with any of them, the rest would feel it.
It wasn’t always like that for them. They’d started out as any other team did, really. They all saw to their own affairs during the day— Paxton clearing the Wild Zones for his Pokédex, Taunie taking on Emma’s assignments and managing the hotel with AZ, Lida at dance school and auditions, and Naveen studying and checking on his sister Maya— met up at night before splitting off in the Royale, debriefed over dinner, then passed out for as long as possible. They were basically night shift coworkers, for a time.
But then the Rogue Megas started cropping up more frequently, and they were all hit with the abrupt realization that their lives were in each others’ hands, and each others’ hands only, and things started to shift.
They started training together, finding out where they could fill the gaps in each others’ teams and fighting styles. They slept in shifts at odd hours, with the Rogues and the Royale cutting into their nights.
Different foods started showing up on their dinner table— homemade tonkotsu ramen whenever Lida had a big audition, fresh palmier cookies when Naveen had a fight with his grandmother, and even an attempt at Unovan-style pizza, which came out pretty well for something made in a standard oven. Of course, croissant curry was the norm, but Taunie had gained the ability to sniff out homesickness and combat it with comfort food when needed. She memorized everyone’s coffee orders, and never came back from Nouveau Café without a full tray of to-go cups.
Personalized accessories appeared in their closets, too. A satchel shaped like a croissant, a pair of Staryu earrings, a Feraligatr patch on Paxton’s favorite hoodie. Naveen “tested out designs” on them and pretended it was a coincidence that his “throwaway samples” fit their exact measurements. He sketched them sometimes, in beautiful outfits they could never wear anywhere— ball gowns and tailored suits and elaborate jewelry. He let them flip through his sketchbook freely, which they all understood was the deepest expression of his trust.
Their phones filled up with curated playlists— for training, studying, cooking, sleeping, anything you could possibly need background music for. Lida walked them all through stretches to warm up before a rough fight and soothe their muscles after. She and the other dance students were always hitting convenience stores after practice, so she came home with heaps of drinks and snacks for long nights. She wrapped up sprained ankles like a pro, and took charge of first aid. She had a knack for knowing when people were tired and how to boost them up. Her door was always open for a conversation, gossip, or a joke, no matter what time it was.
Their item stores never ran empty. Paxton saved every potion, berry, and vitamin he collected from Wild Zones and side mission rewards. He passed Lida Mystic Waters and an Eviolite for Staryu when she was on the fence about evolving it. He kept Naveen stocked with Roseli berries and Lumiose Galettes, for him and for his Pokémon. He shared his Power Items with Taunie while they fumbled through their first attempts at EV training together, convinced it was what would give them an edge in the Royale. They let him jabber in Galarian sometimes, when Kaloçais felt heavy in his mouth, even if they didn’t understand him all the way. He taught them dumb Unovan slang in return.
They were an airtight unit, a well-oiled machine. Paxton knew them all just as well as he knew himself, and he could say with absolute certainty that something was wrong with Taunie. Something had been wrong with her, as much as she pretended otherwise. It rolled off her in waves.
He was so lost in his head that they were standing in front of Hotel Z’s facade before he knew it. The relief sank into his bones. It was good to be back. He pushed the door open and ushered them all inside.
“Oh thank Arceus,” Lida said under her breath. “Home, sweet home. Can someone grab the first aid kit? I think I strained my wrist on a bad Pokéball throw.”
“I do not volunteer,” Naveen drawled. “My knee is fucked and I am claiming a chair.”
“Ha! Swear jar, pay up!” Lida gleefully exclaimed. Naveen tended to act like he was above swearing, so Lida had decided to enforce a Naveen-only swear jar until he accepted that swearing was fun, appropriate at times, and not a sign of moral decay.
“Oh, bite me,” Naveen huffed, sinking into one of the plush armchairs. Lida giggled as she set Floette down on the hotel’s reception desk. She was awake now, just exhausted.
Paxton wished he could enjoy the easy banter between them, but Taunie hadn’t moved since they’d stepped inside. Normally she’d be getting the first aid kit and rummaging in the pantry for snacks, or demanding fist bumps from the whole team. Instead, she just stood there, silent. Paxton sidled up to her and gave her a friendly nudge with his shoulder.
“Shower first or debrief?” he asked. Naveen and Lida glanced over at them, registering that they hadn’t heard Taunie speak since halfway through the walk home. The room was tense again, and Taunie’s mind was somewhere far, far away.
“Neither,” she said finally. “I’m gonna go find AZ. Floette, are you coming with?” Floette chirped and nodded, floating up to Taunie’s side.
“He’s probably just asleep in his room,” Naveen said. “We can talk to him in the morning, it’s not worth waking him up.” But she was already walking to the elevator.
“I have a feeling he’s on the roof.”
“Taunie—” Paxton called after her, to no avail. The elevator doors closed behind her. “Damn,” he muttered, shaking his head. He walked over to Naveen and collapsed into a chair, Lida following behind. If he wasn’t so worried, he’d laugh at their shell-shocked expressions.
“What,” Naveen said lowly, “in Giratina’s hell happened to her up there?” Paxton blew out a long breath. His head throbbed painfully.
“Not in the Tower,” he said. “It started before.”
***
Taunie leaned back against the elevator wall, head turned towards Floette.
“Are you ready?” she asked. Floette nodded solemnly.
“Good,” she sighed, “because I’m not.” She had time for one more breath before the doors opened.
AZ’s white braid glowed softly in the moonlight. It was draped over the back of one of the chairs, the one that faced Centrico Plaza. She could almost pretend AZ was just admiring the skyline, if not for the fact that the only view the city could offer right now was the wretched husk of Prism Tower. Floette landed on Taunie’s shoulder and nuzzled against her neck.
“Yeah, I know,” she said. “I need to face this.” Step by cautious step, she advanced towards AZ, Floette’s weight warm and comforting on her shoulder. She covered her mouth to muffle the strangled gasp that escaped her.
AZ’s cane was on the floor. His eyes were closed, like he was sleeping, but his chest laid unnaturally still. With slow, trembling hands, Taunie touched his wrist. It was cold. No pulse. Her shoulders slumped.
“So that’s it,” she whispered. Just like that. He was dead. Another person for her to bury. Floette made a soothing sound and patted Taunie’s shoulder.
“I… I want to say goodbye,” she said, and Floette nodded, floating to the other end of the balcony so she could have some privacy. Not knowing what to do with herself, Taunie sat in the chair next to him and stared at her hands, folded in her lap.
“Hi, AZ,” she said, her voice breaking. “I hope you’ll forgive me if I don’t cry. I think I’m all wrung out by now.” She took a deep, shuddering breath.
“I keep wanting to be mad at you for dying right now, but I know I can’t. I mean, no one can say you were taken before your time.” She snorted a little. “I guess it was overdue. It’s just… I’m gonna miss you, AZ. I don’t know what I would’ve done without you taking me in all those months ago. I don’t know what I’ll do without you now. This place is my home, you know. And it won’t be home without you. If I can even keep living here now that you’re gone.” Her breath hitched. She had to believe she’d still be able to live here. She didn’t have anywhere else to go, she hadn’t even found her grandmother yet.
“All this to say, thank you, for everything. And I’m sorry you’re not here to see us rebuild Lumiose. You had such a vision for this place, and we want to make it come true. I just wish you’d be around to see it.” Impossibly, tears were forming in her eyes again. It was stupid that the human body could produce so many of them in the span of one night. She wiped them away with her fists.
“We were supposed to be celebrating together by now, AZ,” she sniffled.
“I know my lifetime is just an insignificant blip compared to yours, and the time we knew each other was even smaller than that. But I hope… I hope that our time together meant something, that I made a mark somehow, because I can’t begin to tell you how big of a mark you left on me.” Taunie stood up gingerly. Team MZ were waiting for her. She had to tell them the news. She had to call Emma again.
“I promise to never forget what you’ve taught me. I’ll treasure the people and Pokémon of this city forever, and never take them for granted. And I’ll take good care of Floette, for as long as she needs. Or as long as I live. Whichever comes first.”
She took one last look at him before waving Floette back over. He really did look peaceful.
“Would you like to say goodbye, too?” Taunie asked her, feeling guilty. Floette had known AZ for three thousand years, she should be the one giving a tearful speech, not Taunie. Floette nodded and drifted towards AZ’s face. She let go of her flower to cup his cheeks with her tiny hands and rested her forehead against his. Eyes closed, she made a few sounds, almost like a prayer. She stayed there for a while, foreheads pressed together. Eventually, she came back to settle on Taunie’s shoulder.
“Goodbye, AZ,” she whispered, and she turned back to the elevator.
The ride down felt both too short and eternal. How do you prepare to tell your friends someone they love is dead? She steeled her nerves as best she could. She wished Emma was there.
The doors slid open. Team MZ were all still in the lobby, half-asleep in the armchairs. Taunie made her way towards them, one step at a time.
“You’re back,” Paxton said, scanning her with his eyes. He’d developed this habit of looking at her like he was searching for something. He must’ve found it, because his gaze dropped and his mouth hardened into a straight line. “What happened?”
Taunie’s blood turned to ice. She took in their faces, drawn tight with concern. Her throat felt so tight.
Just rip the band-aid off, she thought to herself. Just get it out.
She opened her mouth, and choked on the words as they came out.
“AZ’s gone.”