The reporters and journalists mobbed the both of them when they returned to the Champions Chamber. The battle had been broadcasted in Sinnoh and was making international news already. Cynthia held Luna's hand and guided her towards the private League rooms where the reporters weren't allowed access. They arrived in a conference room, with a long table and a computer embedded in the table. Cynthia started typing away at it, a screen popped up with a registry, Cynthia clicked 'invite all' and pressed enter.
"You Championship title ceremony will be held in a few days time, we must make preparations right away." Cynthia said.
"What do you mean Championship title ceremony?" Luna asked.
"It's protocol. We have a ceremony in Jubilife each time a new champion comes about. We haven't done one in decades. Since no one has beaten me in a long while, I invited all the Champions to Sinnoh for the event. We'll have festivities, it will be a nice change of pace." Cynthia seemed enthusiastic, but Luna wasn't.
"There's no need." She said simply.
"There is a need. Sinnoh hasn't had a different champion in 23 years. It's what Sinnoh needs." She said matter-of-factly. "Now that you're champion, you can't think only about yourself and your Pokémon, but the whole region's interests are of your concern." Luna almost laughed. Cynthia was in her 40s, she must be eager to retire.
"What about Interpol?" Luna asked.
"Interpol have decided to close the case on the Black Lotus Cynthia said.
"Why?"
"The Pokémon League forced them to. They were too in debt to you to even agree to track you." Cynthia explained the summary of the last meeting she had with them. Booker wasn't convinced, but the league had all unanimously voted against working together to find Luna. "Besides, now that they know who you are, it's unlikely that they'll try to oust you out of your position as champion."
It was true. Now that Luna was a league member, fair and square, it would make them unpopular to hunt her down.
"So...What now?" Cynthia led her to a balcony on one of the upper floors of the cathedral. The sea breeze was refreshing, and cold.
"I'm not sure...This has never happened before..." Cynthia trailed off, eyes glossing over the crystal blue sea. Luna felt at peace.
"Thank you." She said after a while, Cynthia raised an eyebrow questioningly. "For...everything."
-
The next week had been an utter blur. To be champion was to have a thousand responsibilities and Luna was bombarded with all of them all at once. Cynthia helped her to get through all the bureaucratic stuff though. The other Champions had arrived and were eager to meet her.
But she was nervous as hell.
She and Cynthia spent their days in the Canalave library looking at official documentation for the championship title, at Jubilife city watching how ceremony preparations were going, and at each other's houses in Twinleaf and Celestic town. Sinnoh was in chaos, every town celebrating the arrival of the new champion, none other than the Black Lotus. Flowers decorated every city, banners, flags, confetti, the whole lot.
Luna was in the yarn shop in Jubilife when her phone buzzed. It was a message from Cynthia.
'Meet champions @ 15:00. Jubilife grand hotel, the conference room top floor. Good luck xx'
Luna gulped and put her phone away in her pocket, greeting the Nth customer who only came by to congratulate her. The customers were sweet, but they were mostly old ladies and the attention on Luna was overwhelming. Arceus only knows how she would get through all the ceremonies.
Luna had time for a quick bite to lunch and then she would have to close shop. She wasn't hungry though, anxiety taking up all the space in her stomach. She decided to close early and clear her head before meeting the champions. The only problem was that crowds followed her wherever she went. There was only one place she knew she wouldn't be disturbed.
The distortion world.
In the back of the shop, Luna opened a portal where she stood, and like quicksand, she quickly slipped in. The distortion world was a world of nothingness. A place where space and time simply didn't flow properly, floating landmasses, waterfalls that went upwards, trees growing mutated in every direction. Most of all, it was dark. The void extended for evermore.
Luna sat down; she was near a small floating pond. She looked into the water, but there was no reflection. Just a bluish grey wall of water. She mustn't stay too long, minutes could be hours, and hours could be minutes here. Luna stuck her hand in the water, it felt weird on her skin, more like a mist.
Suddenly a memory popped up into her head.
-
Julia and Luna were knitting on the couch, it was peaceful. Skitty was curled up in Luna's lap, and Delcatty in Julia's. the pick yarn all over the living room as Luna knit away. Julia instead was undoing a giant knot that Skitty had made. She loved to get into all the balls of yarn and play with them.
"Did you manage?"
"Patience Luna, you must be patient." Julia replied to the young girl. The fog outside made the windows impossible to see through. All the Mareep were warm in the barn for the weather. It was winter in Sinnoh, and they predicted Snow in twinleaf town, but all that came was fog.
-
It was a simple memory. Luna was very young. Life was easier then, she didn't miss her mother, she didn't even know who she was back then. She hadn't left for her Pokémon journey yet. Must've been about 8 years old. Julia had shown her how to knit when she was very young, to teach her to be patient. It must've worked, she always loved to remember those times by the fire in the farmhouse.
She decided it was high time to leave. She couldn't be late to meeting the champions. She raised an arm and a portal opened beside the pond, to which she hopped through quickly. She was spat out back where she started, it was time to close the yarn shop.
Jubilife grand hotel was uptown, but it wasn't too far. Luna walked casually down the street, skitty around her shoulders, keeping her neck warm. It was Winter, Luna had a warm black coat, and underneath a long beige corduroy skirt with a black turtleneck, and her handmade crocheted granny square scarf. Several people stopped her to ask for a photograph, but she politely declines, saying she was late to a meeting. When she arrived to the hotel, a man she was unfamiliar with greeted her.
"Ah Champion Luna!" He was a short stout man, bald with a moustache "An honor to finally meet you, yes, yes, your meeting is in the conference room on the top floor so I shall accompany you. Ah! I forgot to introduce myself, I am Mr Victor Neren, chief advisor to the pokemon league in its complex. I'm an ex Champion." Luna shook his outstretched hand warmly.
"A pleasure, Mr Neren." Luna said.
"Ah Victor is fine, Champion Luna." He replied with a genuine smile. "Now let me accompany you to the conference room." He pressed the up button near one of the elevators.
"Victor, if I may, of what region were you champion to?" Luna asked genuinely curious.
"Johto, I was two champions before Lance." Luna nodded.
With a ding the elevator doors opened to a long corridor, Luna had never been in the upper floors of the Jubilife Grand hotel, it was usually reserved for important figures. Victor led her to the first door on her right but didn't go in yet. "Are you ready, champion Luna?" the young woman, adjusted her hair, and let skitty down by her feet, then nodded. And with that, Victor opened the door.
Inside were all the champions, in the flesh. Including Red, Lance, Diantha, Alder and Steven stone. Along with them were the Island Kahunas from Alola, Hala, Olivia, Nanu and Hapu. Aaron, Bertha, Lucian and Flint, her elite four, were also in the room. There were a couple of people there she didn't recognize as well. Everyone turned to look at her, Luna's cheeks were dusted pink with embarrassment.
"Ahem! If I can have your attention everyone! Our Host of honour has arrived, may I present to you Champion Luna, the Black Lotus!" The room applauded. Luna blushed deeper. "Now, we have much to discuss. Shall we take a seat Champion?" Victor's head gestured towards an empty chair at the head of the table. Luna took off her coat before sitting. "First of all, I'd like to introduce out advisors of the league to you, Caleb, Yvonne, and Lawrence. All ex Champions. Cynthia should be with us shortly." Luna remembered Yvonne, she was the champion before Diantha of Kalos, must've been about 10 years ago or so. The others, she didn't know, but they looked much older, as old as Victor.
"A pleasure to formally meet you all." Luna said in a quiet voice.
"We welcome you to the Pokémon league, champion Luna." Victor announced again, grandly. "This meeting is mostly a formality, it is customary you see, but we actually wanted to discuss and thank you directly for your help in the Kalosian Crisis." Luna tried not to cringe. She felt rather uncomfortable. They wanted to...get to know her?
"Yes, if it were not for you and Steven, I'm not sure I would be here." Diantha said, a hand on her heart. Steven and Luna briefly crossed eyes. They had met already, the first time in Glittering cave, where they had saved a researcher from team Flare, then again at the Kalos power plant, and finally in Lumiose city at the height of the disaster.
Steven Stone was a charming man. It was true, he was as gorgeous as they all say he is. Their age and now title as champion was about as much as they had in common though.
"What we need to know from you however is your...ahem...abilities. Interpol agreed to close the case if you disclosed the details about Giratina." Victor explained with a frown, it seems he didn't want to pry, but he had to. Everyone in the room unnoticeably inched closer in their seat. This was what they had been waiting for. Luna's anxiety rose insurmountably.
"Cynthia didn't tell you." She noted, a blank expression on her face. silence.
"Cynthia.... knows?" Lance said, growing irritated it seemed.
"Well I just thought... nevermind." Luna hesitated then brushed off some invisible dust off her skirt. "I was born in the distortion world. To Callisto Renn."
The room was silent for an unbelievable amount of time. It seems she had left everyone speechless; Victor Neren's mouth was slightly parted in shock. Luna looked at everyone individually, it was actually quite comical. After a few long moments of silence, Luna continued to speak. "I don't know how or why, but Giratina must've helped me get out, I was carried to Twinleaf town by my mother's Luxray. And ever since I've been able to travel between the distortion world and this one. That's about all I know myself."
"And Giratina?... is it your Pokémon?" Red asked curiously.
"Oh Arceus, no. I needed its help because I knew if we didn't do something big, Lysandre would destroy Kalos. It agreed, but certainly not without some thorough convincing." Luna explained.
"You can talk to Pokémon?" Diantha asked.
"No...more like Giratina can talk to me. It doesn't really listen to what I have to say though." Luna thought back to all the times she travelled to the distortion world as a young girl, demanding to see her mother's or Cyrus' body, and all she was met with was beady-eyed silence.
"What I want to know..." Alder spoke up. "Is why did you decide to become Champion?" the room looked back at her, eagerly awaiting her reply.
This was the question she was dreading. Originally, she had done it out of anger for cynthia, then she wanted to make her mother proud, but then again, her mother wasn't even here. She was doing this for a ghost, not for herself. What did she do this for? The answer came out of her mouth almost in automatic.
"For Sinnoh." Once again, the room was shrouded in silence, awaiting elaboration. "I've lived here my whole life. I know every crevice of this region. And yet, I'm not even from here. I'm from a world of Nothingness. I became champion because I grew to love the world and the people I was brought to." Something relaxed in the room. Everybody seemed to exhale a breath they were holding and smiles graced people's faces. It was the truth.
Julia came to her mind then. The woman who raised her, who gave her her first Pokémon, who taught her everything she knows. She remembered the night she came home after the championship battle. Jule had hugged her tightly, I'm so proud of you my sweet girl. Julia had never pretended to be her mother. Not once, but in that instant, Luna had never considered her more so.
"Well then," Cynthia said, opening the door, "Tell me...did I miss something important?" Luna smiled, picking up Tofu onto her lap.
"Not at all." She said.