hi everyone!!! this is guccimetti over on cer writing blog!!! my secret santa this year was @astral-clefairy who wanted some hardenshipping w/ may as their daughter and also manaphy with the family. i hope you like what i did with this--it’s kind of like a mini study of this little family’s interaction with legendary pokemon over the years @pokemonshitposts
Once upon a time, a young boy and his friend came across a Pokémon awakened out of their millennium slumber. They were awakened, luckily for the pair of friends, on a Friday evening, after school, to stay until the next one.
“I’ve heard about Jirachi before,” the boy said, the little Pokémon easily floating around his and his friend’s heads. He had always been interested in Hoenn’s legendaries, ever since his father had told him the story of Kyogre and Groudon. “Jirachi grants wishes!”
“Yes! Wishes!” the little Pokémon said.
“No way!” the boy’s friend said, furrowing her brow, “Jirachi, I wish for that plushie I saw last week that my mom wouldn’t get me.”
“Plushie…” the Pokémon said. The little Pokémon glowed and touched a hand to the boy’s friend’s forehead. “Plushie,” the Pokémon said, more certain, and the very same Azurill plushie she had so fervently stomped her feet over appeared in her arms. She and the boy shared wide, matching grins.
-
The two lollipops, wedged into each hollow of the boy’s friend’s cheeks, made a loud pop as she simultaneously pulled them from her mouth. “Jirachi looks sleepy,” she said, “how long did you say they’d stick around for?”
“A week,” the boy replied. It was the next Friday, after school, the sun beginning to set on the horizon.
“Last wish!” the little Pokémon said gleefully but with a yawn.
The boy’s friend shot him a frantic look as if to say, You do it—that’s too much pressure for me! The little Pokémon, seeming to pick up on the silent conversation’s cues, floated into the boy’s arms. “Last wish, Archie! What is your last wish?”
What was there left to wish for, the boy wondered. It seemed he had everything he wanted—candy, all the latest toys, posters of Kyogre, a waterbed. He resolved to wish for something he might want in the future, then. He took a deep breath in through his nose.
“Jirachi, I wish that someday I’ll meet someone special. Someone really special.”
The Pokémon smiled. “Are you sure you want just one?” they asked, but before the boy could answer, the Pokémon glowed and fell back into their deep, deep sleep. The boy and his friend were silent for a time, watching the Pokémon sleep.
Then, “Hey! Am I not special?”
-
When May goes running off in the wildly oscillating flashes of skin-pummeling rain and brain-evaporating sunlight, sneakers slapping against wet and dry stone as she calls her Swellow out, both Archie and Maxie let out a shout of protest. May is gone, though, off to clean up her fathers’ messes, but of course, said fathers don’t know that. Archie’s legs shake so badly that he drops down to his knees, and Maxie immediately starts screaming at everyone around them to do something—can’t they see that their daughter, their ten-year-old daughter, has just vanished in the middle of this catastrophe? Archie starts to gasp for air and dry heave against the ground, and Maxie kneels down next to him to rub his back and cry.
Meanwhile, in the sky, May is wiping away her own tears. The way her dads had both yelled at her—in interest of her safety, but still—had gotten her thinking about yelling, about the interactions he’d seen between Archie and Maxie while they’d been separated. She gets out her PokéNav.
“Wallace,” May says, still sniffling a bit.
“May! What are you doing? Your dads are really worried about you.” Wallace tries to keep his voice loud enough to hear over the weather but low enough so that he doesn’t have any former Team Aqua or Team Magma leaders breathing down his neck asking about their daughter.
“Do you know…” and now her sniffles pick up as she thinks about the gravity of the situation, “do you know what to…what to do?” She pauses briefly. “I’m scared,” she adds quietly.
“I have an idea,” Wallace says, and as he talks, May steers her Swellow towards the Sky Pillar.
-
Rayquaza lies calm when May approaches them. She takes a deep breath, puffs out her chest (Sometimes you’ve just gotta be tough, baby girl. It’s not fun, and it’s usually not right, but sometimes, you have to. Hopefully, it’s not too often, though, sweetie, Archie had said to her once), and walks forward. Rayquaza tilts their head at her. They radiate an energy of presence ascended; it’s as if Rayquaza knows everything about the world, everything about May, everything about Groudon and Kyogre fighting and May’s dads doing just the same not long before. Rayquaza is…waiting, May realizes. She feels oddly comforted and calmer than she has the entire day.
“Rayquaza,” she begins, and her voice is steady, “please help us. Please help our world.” Rayquaza breathes a puff of warm air against May’s skin, and she takes it as encouragement. Rayquaza likes her, she’s coming to realize. “It was my dads,” May admits, nodding a bit to herself. It doesn’t hurt to say—it doesn’t make her want to cry like it did. It feels nice to say everything out loud. “Don’t get them wrong: they both love the Earth. They just…love the Earth differently, and I think that was their problem. But I don’t really know what made them think this was a good idea, and I tried to stop them, but…” May takes a deep breath, “they’ve awakened Kyogre and Groudon, and they’ve realized now how bad of a mistake they’ve both made. Don’t begrudge them for that, Rayquaza. I just ask that you help us because what’s happening right now with Kyogre and Groudon…it’s scary. I don’t know what’s gonna happen to…to our home, Rayquaza.”
Rayquaza stares for a moment at May. She stares back. Rayquaza breathes another puff of hot air against May’s skin, lets out a cry, and flies up out of the Sky Pillar. May gives herself a moment to breathe and then runs down the stairs.
-
“What’s happening?” Archie asks, now standing, he and Maxie both supporting portions of the other’s weight. The sky is clearing.
“Rayquaza listened to May, I suppose,” Wallace says with a smile.
“Rayquaza?” Maxie barks out.
After Groudon and Kyogre have gone back into their caves and into their sleep, Rayquaza takes off into the sky again. They come back to Sootopolis City with May on their back.
That’s when Archie and Maxie know.
-
Two years later, when May comes back from an adventure with the legendary Pokémon Manaphy nestled into her arms, given everything, it isn’t really much of a surprise to Archie and Maxie. After the fact, at least.
“So, Dads,” May says quietly, mindful of Manaphy, once she reaches them in the living room, “don’t freak out.”
Archie and Maxie stare at her for a bit then look at each other. They like to think they live a nice, calm life in Alola, away from the mistakes of their past. But, of course, Tapu Koko had flown over from the Ruins of Conflict to greet May nearly the moment they’d come to Alola, and Rayquaza sometimes still crosses the oceans to come and visit her. What is there to do?
Archie is the first to set down his book. “Well, you know my policy. Water type Pokémon are always welcome in my house.”
“And because this is our house,” Maxie adds, “all Pokémon are always welcome.”
Archie looks over at Maxie, affronted. “I can’t even ruffle your father’s feathers anymore, May!”
She laughs and shifts Manaphy a bit in her arms. Manaphy sneezes, and water goes all across the floor.
“I’ll get paper towels,” May says.
-
The sound of May’s laughter and loud splashes ring out through the air, creating a warmth in Archie and Maxie’s chests along with that of the warm Alola breeze. “Manaphy!” May yells, and Manaphy jumps high above them to jump back down and splash her yet again. May squeals with laughter, and Archie squeezes Maxie’s hand tighter, that never-ending warmth spreading yet again.
Archie and Maxie are sitting on a cliff overlooking the ocean, and the sun shines brilliantly on May and Manaphy as they play. “Sometimes,” Maxie says, and when Archie glances over at him, he still feels the urge to giggle at his giant straw hat, “I feel that we don’t deserve this.” From below the cliff, May clings to a beachball, and Manaphy propels them along.
“Maybe we don’t, Max,” Archie responds, “but I like to think we’re good people despite it all.”
A giant bubble floats up to the cliff, then another. Archie and Maxie look down to see Manaphy blowing larger and larger bubbles while May laughs and claps. They love days like this: when May doesn’t have to be the girl who saved Hoenn or one of the strongest trainers in Alola and can just be a 12-year-old girl instead. Archie gently nudges Maxie with his elbow. “Come on, let’s go swim.” Maxie groans but takes the hand Archie offers to him.
When they swim out to May and Manaphy, all four of them brighten up. And if a few other ancient, legendary Pokémon smile a bit, wherever they are in the world, in whatever state of consciousness, that just makes sense, doesn’t it?
