Past the blockade and up through the vine and rocks-clogged staircase, Torino found her path blocked again. They were on the second-to-top floor, and a hole in the ceiling spread thick, soporific sunlight across the rocks and crags.

Sunbaked stones formed a chunky staircase up to the ceiling and the inevitable monkeys, but unfortunately for Torino each of the stairs was packed with a tangle of snoozing serpents. Snivy lay like scattered spinach spaghetti, dreaming dreams of slow prey and endless Spring.

Torino looked to Girasoli. "Quiet," she whispered, and she tiptoed forward. Girsoli followed. They stepped lightly up the first step, then the second, and then Torino's Ledger began to sing.

The words came out thick and blackened, as impossible to understand as the redacted words inside the book itself. Trying to understand the spoken words was like trying to hear the former lyrics to a rewritten song. There was a spirit of something there, but no substance. Nothing she could understand.

The Snivy around her stirred. Tired eyes opened, and they squeaked and hissed in alarm at the intruder.

"Run Girasoli!" Torino said, and she took an overlarge step up the concrete staircase.

Vines whipped against her body, ricocheting off her breastplate but tangling around her arms and legs.

Girasoli pirouetted, bladed limbs hacking at the vines and forcing the Snivy back.

"Let us pass," Girasoli said. "You cannot hold us and we will not slow for you."

But the Snivy were set on battle, and for every moment the pair hesitated another green head poked out of the tumbled stones or over the rooftop ledge high above them.

They were surrounded and outnumbered, and the odds were only getting worse by the second.

Torino was among the flinching grass-types. She shielded her pale face with vine-slapped hands. As the flash faded, she blinked back friendly tears at the sight of her twice friend. "Oh Respiro! It is so good to see you!" Torino said, before a Snivy slapped her across the neck. "Ouch! That is not nice!" She grabbed the Snivy by its tail and held it up in front of her face. "I know we are fighting but I do not like being hit!"

Snivy bit her hand and Torino screamed.

She threw the Snivy down the stairs.

The serpent tumbled across the concrete and wriggled, righting itself in an instant and slithering back to the fight.

Girsoli spun like a twirled flower between a girl's fingers. Her body shed petals and dim, dusky pollen, which she blended with her bladed limbs. Petal flakes slid through the smoky air like daggers between ribs. Where they touched Snivy, the reptiles hissed and fled. Where they hit the ground they bit deep into the concrete.

"Respiro!" Torino called, and she reached for his dangling hand like it was the last of Tantalus' grapes. Just out of her grasp she jumped off a cement block and grasped it, plucking his grasp from the taunting air.

"Let go of him!" she called, and the vines creaked and hissed under their combined weight.

But they did not break.

Now both trainers were dangling in the air. Torino looked up into Respiro's beaky face. She tilted her head sideways to that they were aligned. This was no romantic moment, purely the lure to match the post of a stranger dangling above you. The inbuilt desire to mirror the odd in the world.

Torino grinned.

Beneath them, Girasoli danced along the concrete edges, slicing rebar sparks into the ongoing petal blizzard. She was a danger. A razor-tongued whisper. A promise of violence delivered on a folded slip of velvet.

The Snivy fled from her like leaves before a storm.

Torino held Respiro's hand tight as the greenery engulfed them. The rising pillar of vine and bud surged around them, mixing and multiplying at a fantastical rate.

Blooms and fruits budded and grew in the botanical monstrosity, and Torino felt a flower press against her cheek and mark her with a smear pollen.

As their creation rose past the roofline bright sunlight shone right through fibrous coccoon, turning the vines, fruit and flowers into a stained-grass wrapping.

"I am stuck!" she said to Respiro. "I hope Girasoli can save us!"

They reached the building, sprinted up the inner stairs, and were soon back at the site of battle.

Torino stopped just short of her slithering assailants.

"One at a time!" Torino demanded, and she pointed at the closest Snivy. "You can fight us first."

The Snivy, only just noticing her, slapped off the ground with its vines and flew straight at Girasoli with a viscious hit.

Girasoli was ready. Radiant and stalwart. She cut the Snivy out of the air with a single swipe.

But they came more quickly now. Two at a time. Two swipes.

Then three. Two swipes and a spinning kick.

Then more. A stream of scales and hissing leaves. Girasoli and Torino backed down the stairs, letting the enemies come to them.

Torino clenched her fist. She could feel the phantom pressure of her friend's hand clutched with hers. Where was Respiro? Was he trapped up ahead?

Torino danced with Respiro, jumping up and down in victory and snake-less sunlight.

"We did it!" she said, and laughed at the thought that they were both knocked out by the grasp of a thousand slithering vines. It was so funny to think that some plants were hungry enough to break down even living people!

There was a beep behind her.

Torino turned and saw a timer ticking down. This was her chance to catch the Snivy!

"Oh! Sorry Respiro," she said, and slipped from his grip like a Spring breeze. She tossed her Golden Pokeball at the flashing Snivy and caught a perfect copy. "Yes! I'm going to use this to make my perfect chimera!" She beamed, daydreaming about Type:Null for a fleeting moment.

"Let's go to the roof!" she said, and started to climb.