The ghost echoes came like seizures.
Not predictable. Not rhythmic. Just… ambushes.
Teo would be filtering acidic water through cloth, and suddenly—a voice: "Don't leave me in the rain, trainer…" (a feral Eevee's last thought before its bond was severed).
He'd be tying bandages with shaky hands, and—a flash: a Charizard, wings clipped, standing in a cage, watching its trainer walk away without a backward glance.
Each echo lasted only seconds. But they left behind a residue—grief, confusion, abandonment—that clung to his aura like tar.
By the third day, he barely slept.
His left eye—already grayscale—now flickered with phantom afterimages. His hands trembled not just from nerve damage, but from emotional overload.
Yumi watched him with growing worry.
One evening, as Teo sat hunched over a fire of dried kelp, flinching at every crackle, she knelt beside him and placed a warm cup in his good hand.
The herbal brew smelled of sampaguita and ginger.
He drank it without speaking.
Then she signed: You're drowning in their pain.
Teo nodded, voice raw. "I can't shut it out. Every time I sync with Lucario, it's like I'm tapping into… a network of loss."
Yumi's expression softened. She placed a hand over his heart, then over her own.
"Pamamanhikan," she signed.
Teo frowned. "The courtship ritual?"
She nodded. In traditional Filipino pamamanhikan, families gathered to ask for a daughter's hand in marriage. But before words were exchanged, both sides sat in silence, hands clasped, breathing together—aligning their intentions, their loob (inner self).
"It's not just for marriage," Teo whispered. "It's for… attunement."
Yumi smiled faintly. She gestured for him to face her.
She placed her palms against his—right to right, left to left, despite his tremor.
Then she closed her eyes and began to breathe.
Slow. Deep. Rhythmic.
Not just inhale-exhale.
But shared breath.
In for four—together.
Hold for four—together.
Out for six—together.
At first, nothing.
Then—Teo felt it.
A grounding. A tether.
His aura, which had been fraying at the edges from empathic static, began to weave back into coherence.
The ghost echoes didn't vanish.
But they quieted.
Like distant radio signals fading behind a stronger frequency.
[ NEW TECHNIQUE REGISTERED: "PAMANHINKAN BREATHING" — AURA GROUNDING VIA SHARED INTENTION ]
[ EMPATHIC STATIC REDUCED BY 63% ]
Teo opened his eyes, tears in them. "Thank you."
Yumi squeezed his hands once—you're not alone—then let go.
But the reprieve was short-lived.
Because that night, the Lucario began screaming in its sleep.
Not whimpers.
Full-throated, soul-rending cries.
Teo woke to find it thrashing, aura blazing white-hot, eyes wide but unseeing.
"It's happening to him too," Teo realized.
He tried the pamamanhikan breath.
No response.
The Lucario was trapped—not in a memory.
In a moment.
Its trainer's final second.
Teo didn't hesitate.
He grabbed the Lucario's face with both hands—ignoring the spikes, ignoring the risk—and forced eye contact.
"I'm here!" he shouted. "You're not there! You're here, with me!"
The Lucario's pupils dilated.
And then—Teo was pulled in.
Not a memory.
A reliving.
The white tower. The sky splitting like a wound. Violet static pouring through the rift. The trainer—barely older than Teo—standing with arms outstretched, aura flaring like a dying star.
"Go!" he screamed over the roar of collapsing reality.
Lucario refused. It gripped his sleeve.
"I SAID GO!" the trainer yelled, tears streaming. "Live for me!"
He shoved Lucario into the escape portal.
As the rift closed, the trainer turned to face the storm.
And smiled.
"I'm proud of you."
Then—erasure.
Teo gasped, collapsing onto the wet metal floor, Lucario in his arms.
The Lucario was sobbing—real, shuddering sobs, like a child who'd just lost everything.
Teo held it tighter. "He didn't abandon you. He chose you. To live."
The Lucario buried its face in Teo's chest.
And for the first time, it let go of the guilt.
[ SYNCHRONIZATION: 68% ]
[ TRAUMA INTEGRATION COMPLETE — LUCARIO CORE STABILITY: RESTORED ]
But the victory was bittersweet.
Because as the Lucario's pain settled, Teo's own mind filled with a new ghost echo—stronger than the others.
A voice, calm and weary:
"If you find my Lucario… tell him I never regretted a single day with him."
Teo knew then.
The trainer's final thought hadn't been fear.
It had been love.
And that love had crossed the void.
At dawn, a figure stood at the edge of the ship graveyard.
Not Silas.
Not Veyra.
Kaelen.
His Milotic floated beside him, but its scales held a faint shimmer—less vacant than before.
Teo walked out to meet him, Lucario at his side, Yumi watching from the shadows.
"You look worse," Kaelen said, eyeing Teo's trembling hand.
"Rough week," Teo replied.
Kaelen didn't smile. "The Conclave has mobilized. Silas is just the scout. They're sending a Sunderer next—a being that doesn't just extract aura. It unmakes bonds."
Teo's blood ran cold. "Why are you telling me this?"
"Because you're the only one who understands what a true bond looks like," Kaelen said, voice low. "Even if you're wrong about its nature."
He held out a small obsidian shard. "This will dampen empathic echoes. For a time."
Teo hesitated. "What's the catch?"
"No catch," Kaelen said. "Call it… professional respect."
He turned to leave, then paused. "And Teo—don't trust Veyra's mercy. She doesn't free Pokémon. She empties them. And the Conclave? They don't want to study you."
He looked back, eyes burning.
"They want to become you."
Then he was gone.
Teo stared at the obsidian shard in his palm.
Yumi approached, signing: He's using you.
"Maybe," Teo said. "But right now, I need every edge I can get."
He pocketed the shard.
Then looked east, where the map Yumi had drawn on kelp-paper showed six other landmasses beyond the Archipelago—each marked with a different symbol.
Seven broken regions.
One shattered world.
And somewhere, at the center of it all, the truth of the Sky Rending.
He turned to Lucario. "We're not just surviving anymore."
He took a deep breath—in for four, hold, out for six.
"We're going to find out why this happened."
And as the crimson sky pulsed above them, the System remained silent.
But Teo no longer needed its prompts.
He had his purpose.