Archive of Our Own ^beta

Once upon a time,

In a not-so-faraway land at sea, there lived a man grayed by decades of soot in his wiry hair. He sat in a carefully cultivated home studio, legs flanking a still pottery wheel off the edge of his stool. The old man cradled an orb of dry, hollow clay, which he adorned with an arching unibrow and a pointed cone at the peak. His rusty ribbon carver had molded thousands of bowls and vases celebrated across the region, but never a creation this fine.

It had to be his greatest piece yet. This ceramic would not hold a mere bushel of berries, but the beating heart of his entire world: a spinning top for his daughter, shaped with a dopey, companionable face for the young upstart to play in a way that his knees had grown too creaky to provide. He knew this to be his purpose, a toymaker. His wife gave the last of her strength to ensure the little one came into this world, both of their spirits lived in her. He would do anything, create anything, to grant his daughter a fraction of the whole universe’s happiness that she deserved.

The toymaker sealed the head to its body with a hash-marking needle and hot springs water. He took to a bucket of Cheri Berry-colored paint, scarlet red underglaze to define its unibrow and the circle on its chest, designed to flash between the blur of its long, flat arms as it spun.

However, he felt a weary weight upon his shoulders setting that clay into the kiln.

Ah, he thought, if only this top could spin on its own. Then my little girl would never be left alone.

That night, as he struggled to fill a lonely bed, his wish came true.

Waiting in his kiln, bisque-fired, a rough-textured tan with pale red highlights, was a top still learning to stand on its wobbly, diamond-shaped foot. A living Pokémon with flexible, crackly arms perfect to hug. The toymaker could cry; it was perfect in every way.

He named the new life Baltoy.

The only one who loved Baltoy more than the old potter was his daughter.

They played, and they played, and they played some more, and Baltoy was happy. But the hollow feeling in its core never went away.

So, the living top told its creator of the desire to discover its origins. “I need to find my true reason for being.” The daughter bid her toy a tearful goodbye, and Baltoy left the town on the lava’s ridge, the only home it has ever known, in whirling dervishes down a dirt path into the mysterious lands beyond.

Baltoy twirled off the beaten path on the outskirts of town and came across an abandoned hovel at the base of a burning mountain. The disrepair surprised the newborn toy, so used to a comfortable community. It entered the home’s singed door, never again to close, curious of what it could find.

Inside, the Pokémon found the remnants of old tome pages sinking into piles of ash, and a sandstorm of dust glistening in sunlight that poured through a gaping hole in the ceiling’s frame. Little else remained of the home’s former life.

But what did remain?

A doll, black as tar, huddled in the corner. Its sobbing drew Baltoy’s attention long enough to notice a shimmering zipper, turned away from view.

“Excuse me?” Baltoy spoke to the dark.

The dark snapped back. Spite and rage filled the abandoned space with overwhelming pressure as the Pokémon’s head turned all the way around, looming thrice as large as the spinning top. Its red eyes shimmered as its mouth unzipped.

“What are you doing in Banette’s home?” it asked, ethereal voice seething and pained.

“Are you also a toy?” Baltoy balanced unsteadily, unable to sit still.

Banette replied: “I was.”

“Why do we exist?”

The question struck Banette. Its plump body spun around to catch up with its snarling head.

“I exist… For revenge.”

“Revenge?”

“On my former owners.” Banette spat. “The crone who sewed me. The little witch who tore my stuffing loose.” Its eyes trained on the open ceiling; the corners were wet with agony. “When the volcano erupted and burning rocks fell from the sky, they… Left me here. Abandoned me. Let the flames engulf this house, char my fabric, boil my button eyes. If I find them again, they’ll be sorry.”

Baltoy bobbed to-and-fro, contemplated the acrid air of the abandoned abode.

“What if they didn’t leave you on purpose,” it asked, “didn’t you all have fun playing together?”

Banette found itself at a loss for words. It stared into Baltoy’s closed dome eyes. Baltoy saw the phantom’s features curl, finding something in the ceramic’s friendly, weathered face that wasn’t there.

“Only a toy born of joy could have that outlook,” Banette hissed. “Treasure what you have. Not all of us live with that kind of family.”

This ghostly spirit batted Baltoy with a storm-shaded claw, sent it spiraling uncontrollably back out of the house. Then, it sat in its corner. It stewed over its short, hard life, and tried to keep the tears at bay.

Baltoy’s journey took it across fantastic landscapes straight out of the little girl’s storybooks: endless deserts with stinging sands that bounced off its clay carapace, fields of dirty snowfall from the burning mountain that recorded its curving trail in ephemeral cursive lines, and limestone cliffs just past a farming hamlet. The spinning top’s pointed foot had trouble broaching the many craggy hills there. It wished for wings as beautiful and fluffy as the nesting Swablu, rather than its flat arms swinging wildly.

It plateaued in view of a meteoric white mountain. Circling the tippy-top was a pair of living stone effigies, the sun and moon, heavenly bodies dragged down to earth.

The duo spun endlessly as they levitated in synchronous orbit, like the axis rings of a distant planet. The sleepy eyes of the sun, the bulbous eyes of the moon, only one set visible at any given time.

“I am Lunatone,” said the moon, before ceding its place to the sun.

“And I Solrock.”

And back to the moon: “To what do we owe the pleasure…”

“…of meeting a friendly new face?”

Baltoy felt less steady than ever trying to track which way was up for the celestials.

“I come seeking answers,” Baltoy explained, “are you truly living stone?”

“What we are is unknowable…”

“…but this explanation pleases us.”

Baltoy watched for the moment when Lunatone crossed over the sun far off in the blue sky, and Solrock crested the mountaintop, their eyes shining down together.

“Why do we exist?”

A long pause met Baltoy’s question. The spinning top could sense a telepathic conversation buzzing between the pair, leaving it free to enjoy the crisp smell of dew drops on the grass.

When the sky shone amber over a field of blooming light, the celestials finally spoke:

“Regarding our origins, what we know is that we…”

“…come from the depths of space. This world is not the only one…”

“…which births life. Fairies dance on distant satellites.”

“Cackling meteorites burn a dozen colors, with flaring tails of light.”

“Viruses seek new creatures to rewrite their very beings.”

“Unfortunately, we have no answers as to where we…”

“…or anyone…”

“…might come from.”

Baltoy found itself dissatisfied with this answer. Everything must come from somewhere, mustn’t it?

Lunatone and Solrock sensed its apprehensions, and continued:

“We find it does not matter where our lives began.”

“Our time has been short on the grand scale of the cosmos…”

“…but within that time…”

In unison, the duo proclaimed:
“We found one another.”

“In my estimation…”

“…and in my opinion…”

“Getting to circle here, with Lunatone…”

“…and exist alongside my other half, Solrock…”

“…that makes us feel…”

“Complete.”

Baltoy mulled over this sentiment, and found the heavenly bodies had no more nuggets to share. So, it bid them farewell, and set off with a thought trickling into the back of its mind.

The duo left Baltoy with one last gift: an inkling of where to go next.

Baltoy found its wobbly sea leg with the help of a kindly fisherman, who ferried the spinning top to a lily-speckled cove on the eastern side of the archipelago’s main island. It gyrated in and out of grassy patches until the sun fell, and starry lights glistened in rainforest puddles like hopes and dreams.

Caught in a grassy knot, Baltoy twisted and shouted until the greenery gave way. The sudden snap of freedom sent it spinning into the mouth of a nearby cave, where three hulking oracles laid in wait.

The Pokémon’s baked ceramic body bumped into steel with a metallic “Clang”! Baltoy nearly collapsed, its hollow head rung with a whining tune. It was so out of sorts, it started seeing stars blink to life on the cave walls.

But wait — these were no stars!

All 21 lights flickered bright and illuminated their corresponding statues.

The statue with circular eyes sitting center shimmered red as its glow spread across a polished body. Its voice screeched, harsh and grinding like a blacksmith’s shop:

“You who have disturbed our rest, state your purpose.” Every word was calculated, inorganic. “I am the master of metals, Registeel.”

Then came a chittering voice from a clear body sitting right, which glowed yellow straight-through thanks to its cross of eyes:

“State your purpose. I am the master of frost, Regice.”

And finally came a deep, gravelly voice from a body of cobbled-together stones sitting left that barely reflected its orange ladder-shaped eyes:

“State your purpose. I am the master of sediment, Regirock.”

The toy spun itself dizzy keeping track of all three voices. Seeing these giants made of the same stuff as itself, Baltoy’s response was simple:

“Why do we exist?”

The Regis’ eyes shone like a midnight sun as they turned inward to confer. Their calculus took but a moment.

“In the beginning,” Regirock cued.

“Groudon the Great One begot land from the sea,” Regice slid the conversation along.

“And our creator, Regigigas, pulled the continents into place.” Registeel’s sonorous high pitch fit the mood like a stretched-out glove. “We and our siblings exist to oversee the lands which were shaped, the adhesion of minerals and primal energies. All until our master awakes.”

“Our purpose keeps us going,” Regice continued—

“And we can do what we love forever,” Regirock concluded. “Together.”

Baltoy understood the story of this trio, salt of the earth. Yet it looked no more satisfied by the answer.

“What if I have no purpose to guide me?”

The Regis conferred once more, then returned to their visitor in a blink of their starry eyes.

“Seek the sleeper on a foggy mount,” Regirock recommended.

“The master of wishes on a funeral pyre,” Registeel amended.

“And you will no longer be in doubt.” Regice ended.

The cave of stars went dim, and Baltoy pivoted out through the dark.

Baltoy found the Regis’ mountain just a bridge away, stretched impossibly, comfortingly high like its mountain back home. The interior was a carved-out, ghastly labyrinth that Baltoy navigated slowly but surely, ascending each floor past a myriad of wishes and gifts left on ancient gravestones, their engravings worn by time immemorial.

As it reached the mountaintop, Baltoy’s flat arms cut through thick fog like Bisharp knives. It’s only hope? A pair of red and blue guiding lights in the smoky sea, which led to an altar above the clouds.

There, beneath a canvas of stars brushed across the eternal night, Baltoy found a floating figure as small as itself: a porcelain baby doll swaddled in a dandelion blanket.

The ceramic’s presence shook the sleeper to their core, until empyrean eyes fell upon the living clay. With naught a hint of sleep left, the sleeper unfurled its blanket into ribbons of gold, which trailed around Baltoy as it circled the living toy, swirling clouds in its wake.

“What a joy this is!” the mysterious Pokémon chirped, Baltoy spinning faster and faster to make sure it kept up with that smiling face in a whirlwind of ribbons and fog and stars. “Do you remember me, from your lonely dream before life began?”

Baltoy suddenly remembered: “Jirachi, did you create me?”

The Mythical being laughed and laughed. Its twinkling voice rippled throughout the sea of stars above.

“The potter created you, silly.”

Then, Baltoy had but one question to ask.

“Why do I exist?”

Jirachi held no qualms in their response: “Why, you were born of a wish! The wish of your father, his desires overwhelming. A wish that you may live a life to protect and to love. To give a young girl the life she deserves.”

The wish-granter wrapped its ribbons around Baltoy, steadying its posture for the first time in its short life.

“Do you understand, my treasured friend?”

Baltoy wondered if it did understand. Existing just to love? Could life really be so simple? It felt wrong, but Jirachi carried such gravitas in its slender frame, enough to make the spinning top swirl with jealousy and awe.

Still, it bid its celestial patron a fond farewell, leaving it to slumber once more.

Baltoy descended the foggy mountain—
It crossed the endless sea—
It broached hilly terrain—
It surpassed some sooty snowfall—
It braved a baking desert—
And soon enough, it returned home.

The little hollow toy reflected on all the lessons it had learned, all the people it had met. For days, it remained stuck on the question of what to make of it all. The only time its muddled mind would clear came when the little girl asked to play. In those happy moments, it desired nothing more than her companionship.

Born from the hands of an old ceramicist, brought to life by wishes and dreams, perhaps Baltoy would never truly figure out its own purpose for being. But in the face of those overjoyed eyes, those eyes that called it home, the Pokémon may yet have a chance.