Chapter Text
The train slid toward its final destination.
He waited for everyone to descend before him.
Ten years had passed since the last time he set foot in his alma mater, ten years since he had left behind more than just a city.
He was returning in search of answers, after a flight so long he no longer remembered what had set it off.
He exhaled,
and as he stepped off the carriage, the air tasted of the past.
He wasn’t a pessimist, he never had been, but after all this time he no longer recognized the city that had once given him as much joy as it had sorrow.
His luggage was light, just his old suitcase. He no longer carried Poké Balls, only clothes and a few memories that refused to disappear.
A wave of memories reached him, precise and piercing, as if his mind were trying to measure what his soul could not contain.
He remembered when he handed that same suitcase to Trevor and Tierno, when Kalm’s Pokémon was just learning to follow orders.
What had those kids become now?
Saviors of Kalos, guardians of Lumiose… or perhaps just names that time had already begun to erase.
He began walking toward the electric doors. As he stepped outside, the sunlight blinded him, he raised one hand to shield himself and, with the other, pulled out his SmartRotom.
He opened the map in search of the old Pokémon Laboratory.
Everything was new in that futuristic metropolis. The so-called wild zones seemed like an excess of ecological enthusiasm, and even more so, the way they had replaced former commercial areas, slowly displacing the people who had once given life to the city.
It felt strange.
No scent was familiar to him; everything was new, artificially clean, as if the air itself had been replaced. As he walked, he watched with a mix of excitement and bewilderment what Lumiose had become: a city where humans and Pokémon lived together in perfect harmony.
It filled his soul with a quiet kind of joy.
If only he were here to see this…
The beauty was still there, untouched, though different. As if the city had learned to bloom without recognizing its former gardener.
“Everything’s going to be fine, Augustine,” he murmured to himself, trying to believe it. Everyone thought he had left for other regions to study the phenomenon of mega evolution, but the truth was much simpler and far more cruel, he had run away.
He couldn’t bear the guilt.
Nor the pain of having lost him.
It was enough to think of that day for his heart to tighten, as if fragments of a pheromone still lingered, ones that time had refused to disperse.
Once he reached the laboratory, he took a deep breath and, summoning the courage he had finally gathered, gently pushed the door open. The first to greet him was the secretary, who looked at him as if she had just seen a ghost.
Was he really in that bad shape?
“Augustine Sycamore!” she exclaimed, bringing a hand to her chest. “You’re back! Oh, by Arceus… do you want me to get you something to drink?”
Her voice wavered between surprise and nerves.
He tried to smile, though his reflection in the glass of the entrance confirmed that he looked just as out of place. “Oh, uh… thank you, really, but…” he stammered. The air between them grew heavy, filled with the same scent that betrayed the discomfort they both felt.
“Well, alright. A Flamethrower Roast Café, please…” he said, trying to sound like his old self, the one who used to joke during lab meetings.
It didn’t work.
The secretary’s smile remained tense, and although she nodded politely before leaving, the silence she left behind weighed heavier than her absence.
“Damn it…” he whispered to himself.
He set the suitcase on a chair and headed to the bathroom.
In front of the mirror, he studied himself closely. He was no longer the optimistic, enthusiastic young man he once was, nor the “ladies’ man” everyone said he was. The reflection staring back at him showed deep shadows under his eyes, duller hair, and a weary expression that even time had been unable to soften.
The reflection didn’t lie: sleepless nights had left their mark, and the tears, once held back, had left their invisible trace on his skin. “What happened to you, Augustine…?” he murmured, not expecting an answer. His words dissolved into the hum of the air conditioner, while the silence of the bathroom grew heavier, almost as dense as the guilt that still pursued him. He left the bathroom before the guilt could consume him completely.
As he opened the door, he nearly collided with the secretary, who was holding the coffee with both hands, trembling from surprise.
“Here you go, profes—uh, I mean… what should I call you now?” she asked, with an awkward smile.
“Right…” he thought to himself. He wasn’t even Kalos’ professor anymore; someone else had taken that position. The title, the respect, the responsibilities… all had dissolved along with the old version of himself.
As he took the cup, he noticed the slight tremor in his hand. The aroma of the Flamethrower Café felt strange, foreign, as if he had forgotten the taste of simple things.
Maybe it was just that, or perhaps nothing in him felt the same anymore.
“Just call me Sycamore… by the way, where is the new Pokémon professor?” he replied, taking a sip of the freshly made coffee.
It was then that his body froze.
The taste of the coffee on his tongue was identical to the memory he carried within: not too bitter, not too sweet, with a hint of burnt wood and… cinnamon.
His pheromones reacted uncontrollably, a subtle but deep vibration running through him.
His eyes dilated and began to blur, and in an instant, an old weight pressed its way into his chest.
Tears.
Without warning, without mercy.
“Are you alright? Oh, Arceus! Was the coffee too hot?”
The secretary stepped closer, worried, until she caught the scent in the air.
Sadness, mourning, guilt.
All at once.
His eyes widened, terrified, and he ran straight to his desk, picking up the phone to call someone.
Meanwhile, Sycamore struggled to contain his wounded soul.
Fleeting memories assailed him: his youth alongside him, the shared research, stolen kisses between lab breaks, the quiet dates filled with promises that no one else understood.
“Lysandre…” he murmured, as if saying his name could anchor him to something real amid the storm of memories.
It wasn’t long before the elevator doors opened, and out stepped Mable, the new Pokémon professor.
Without wasting a second, she approached with steady steps, took Sycamore by the shoulders, and looked him directly in the eyes.
“Augustine, look at me…”
Her voice was firm, almost clinical, yet filled with concern.
She released a faint stream of pheromones, sweet and warm, with that unmistakable scent of maple that always followed her.
Sycamore, still trapped in the trance, began to respond.
The scent wrapped around him with an artificial calm, a serenity that wasn’t truly his.
It wasn’t like Lysandre’s, it could never be, but it was gentle enough to pull him out of the whirlwind of thoughts drowning him.
For a moment, he breathed.
And the world regained its defined edges.
It was Mable who led him to her office. There, with the ease of someone who had seen too many crises, she offered him a cup of tea to calm his nerves.
Sycamore accepted in silence. He felt embarrassed; he had caused a scene in the reception over a simple cup of coffee.
Although Mable tried to hide it, he knew deep down that she was worried.
He stared at the surface of the tea as if the answers he had come for were hidden within it.
The steam rose slowly, tracing ephemeral shapes in the air, while Mable went through some files that the city hall had sent just minutes before.
Until…
“Damn it!”
The shout shattered the silence.
Mable stared at the screen in fury, her eyes burning with frustration.
“Can you believe this? They’ve sent more budget to the wild zones! And for Pokémon research? We can barely afford peanuts here.”
She slammed her fist on the desk. The sharp sound made Sycamore jump, nearly spilling his tea.
“What?” Augustine asked, a little nervous, watching as Mable pulled out her SmartRotom and turned it on with a sharp gesture.
“Exactly what I told you! We barely have a budget for the kids’ prizes, and now they’re cutting even more!” she exclaimed, exasperated, as she scrolled through documents multiplying across her two screens.
Sycamore watched her in silence, trying to process everything.
What was happening at city hall? Why so much focus on the wild zones and the new urban districts?
He had been away from Kalos for so long that he no longer knew who was pulling the strings in his city.
But something caught his attention.
Amid Mable’s complaints, one word resonated sharply: prizes.
“What do you mean by prizes, Mable?” he asked, with a curiosity that barely masked a slight tremor in his voice.
He didn’t want to repeat the mistakes from ten years ago.
“Ah… you see…” Mable began, lowering her tone slightly.
“I gave a kid around here the mission to complete the Pokédex and… those typical things. You know, the same things you did with Kalm—”
She paused.
The silence grew heavy, almost painful.
Mable knew she had touched a forbidden topic, and Augustine, though he said nothing, felt his chest tighten with a mix of nostalgia and regret.
The steam from the tea had already dissipated.
“Why did you have to give those missions to some random kid?!” Augustine exclaimed.
His voice trembled between anger and fear. He didn’t want to see the same cycle repeat: young people bearing the weight of the world, sacrificing their innocence for an ideal he himself had helped ignite.
“Sycamore, enough. You’re getting worked up.”
Mable’s voice was firm, a perfect balance against the fragility he could no longer hide.
Although they shared the same pheromonal classification, it was she who commanded presence: her tone, her posture, her energy… more Alpha than Omega.
“It was necessary,” she continued, turning her chair slightly.
“As you know, we’re short on budget. There’s not enough staff, so I had to rely on kids to help me. Besides, it’s not for free: they receive rewards, experience candies, items… whatever I can offer them.”
She crossed her arms, fixing her gaze on the screen.
“Everything is for the good of Lumiose City.”
Sycamore lowered his gaze.
For a moment, his breathing faltered; he could smell the faint trace of Mable’s pheromones in the air, steady, contained, an artificial calm against the chaos still raging within him.
“Oh, Arceus… alright, alright. As long as they don’t do anything dangerous…” he murmured, running a hand through his dark hair. His voice sounded defeated, as if each word weighed heavier than the last.
“Nothing will happen, Augustine.”
Mable’s tone was firm, but there was something in her expression, a faint shadow, a tense gesture that betrayed her calm.
“Rather, we need to take care of a few matters here…”
“What has happened in my absence, Mable?” he asked, lifting his gaze.
There was fear in her eyes, but also a silent determination, the same that had once driven her to challenge the impossible.
Mable watched him for a moment. Then she sighed.
“Rather…” she said with a hint of exhaustion, “what hasn’t happened, Professor Sycamore?”
...
..
.
Outside, the lights of Lumiose shone with an almost painful artificiality, as if the city were trying to hide its wounds beneath a veil of neon.
In the distance, a Pokémon watched everything from the rooftops, silent and alert.
Its eyes gleamed under the city lights, calculating every movement, every shadow.
Lumiose City was in danger, and he was already beginning to plot his plan.