SaSS: The End of the Beginning

In the future, the day never comes.

No winds blow. Nothing grows.

Neither spring nor summer ever comes.

It is a world of perpetual darkness.

Or. It was.

The ambipom looked out across the frozen darkness, blinking rapidly. He rubbed his eyes, then widened them, sure that he was seeing some kind of optical illusion. As other Pokémon around him slowly stopped and turned their heads east, he was struck with the realization that it was truly there.

On the horizon, a glimmer of light sparkled.

Murmurs rose above the rocks of the dark plain, concern and fear mixed with a growing uncertainty. The ambipom gulped, but stayed frozen where he stood, the other stilled Pokémon around him making the plain resemble a yard of statues.

It was then that the wind blew.

A ripple of confused cries broke out as the Pokémon huddled close to each other against the foreign burst of air, but the ambipom remained silent, leaning into the wind until the gust passed.

The murmurs of fear grew louder. What could possibly be happening? Was the world in any place where it could even get worse? The ambipom watched the light in the distance grow ever more, until it began to resemble the slivered edge of a sphere.

He mumbled to himself, only two words that almost fell from his lips. A smile grew across his face, one that even the whispers of terror behind him couldn't depress. The words still rung in his ears though they had already been spoken, resonating with both heavy purpose and weightless hope as they had since his grandfather had passed the words on for him to remember.

"Good morning." The ambipom said loudly, his sudden voice hushing the crowd. He turned to them, his smile wide and his eyes watering. "Good morning."

The crowd began to murmur again, but the whispers were no longer filled with fear. Words passed down through generations of darkness revived themselves in the minds of the Pokémon, and whispers of strange ideas floated above the dark plain.

"Wind" Rose above the crowd, carried on the resurging breeze. "Sun" rang across the stones, echoing out to the growing light on the horizon. "Growth" wound its sound through the frozen trees and grasses.

"Summer."

The whole group hushed, but the word had already been spoken. A young rotom looked around nervously, noticing the group staring at him. He wilted under their eyes, but managed to stammer out again.

"Summer."

The group remained quiet, observing the light grow brighter and brighter in the distant east. Off across the horizon, a burst of blue exploded out, washing the furthest reaches of the world with yet another burst of wind.

Suddenly, the world was filled with a strange and terrifying noise, like scales shifting over rocks. Frightened, the Pokémon huddled together, imagining any number of beings waiting to destroy them for speaking their treasonous words.

The ambipom looked around in fright, before it swiftly changed to awe. He pointed a short distance across the plain, calling out for the others to look.

A grove of trees bent wildly in the wind, their leaves rustling fiercely. The clumps of grass beneath them swayed and bent in waves as the wind rippled across the world.

Looking around, the Pokémon heard gasps of awe and excitement from amongst themselves as floating rocks descended to the earth, leaves suspended in midair resumed their twisting journeys, and plants of all shapes and sizes rustled with motion for the first time in centuries.

The ambipom reached his tail out to a passing leaf, but recoiled as the leaf passed straight through it. He pulled his tail back, only to find sparks of brilliant light rising from his body. The crowd looked around themselves, gasping in hushed tones as they and their neighbors began to glow in ever more transparent shades. Confusion and growing panic echoed just above the sounds of life around them, but the ambipom merely smiled. He pointed once again, this time upwards, and one by one the others saw him and followed his gaze.

Above them, the sparks joined together in a brilliant array, an aurora of life and light that swirled and shifted in the wind. Other auroras were soon to follow, rising across the distant mountains, through polar caps and dense forests, across harsh deserts and within vast oceans. The life of the world rose to join the light growing in the sky.

The Pokémon below settled into quiet thought, watching with ever more transparent eyes as the lights rose higher and higher. They imagined the lights rising so high, they joined the sun in lighting the new world beyond the coming light. The ambipom smiled, but it was a short lived action.

"What do we do?"

No one could pick out who had asked the question. It didn't matter. The question had been asked by all of them.

The ambipom turned to find the crowd looking at him. He was taken aback for a moment, before he looked back to the distant east.

The sun was steadily rising over the earth now, and a solid line of light could be seen in the distance. Auroras over the far horizons blinked out as the light reached them, and mountains disappeared from the distance behind the advancing brilliant wall.

The ambipom watched the light race inevitably towards them, but he found himself smiling. He stepped out of the group and began to walk, heading east with his head high and his eyes open to the light. He heard cries of confusion behind him, and waved the others forwards despite them.

"What are you doing?" The cry rang out from many mouths, but the ambipom simply laughed.

"I'm going to see the summer!" He exclaimed over his shoulder, his steps almost becoming jumps of excitement as he continued to move towards the growing light. He heard silence behind him for only a moment, and then a first set of footsteps crunched through the sparse grass behind him. Another set of footsteps followed, and then the group was walking, catching up with the ambipom to walk together into the growing light. They walked with uncertainty, but as the light grew greater they found another far deeper feeling growing within them.

They walked towards the light, hope rising above them as their sparks grew ever brighter, their forms fading just late enough to feel their first and last summer's breeze.