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Act 1: Chapter 24
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Standing in a circle drawn on the Dewford beach sand, up-and-coming Dark Type master Andre waits impatiently for his dopy opponent to return. In his hand, Absol's shrunken pokeball rolls between his fingers in a dance mastered during idle moments such as this.

This Ash kid is just like the rest. It's all just some piddly little sport to them, something to laugh and have fun with. People like him will never make it into the upper echelons; the Elite. Both people and Pokemon are creatures that thrive in hardship, and they magnify each other when together, this Andre knows. The joy of being bigger, being better, is beyond trainers like this kid.

The teen ceases rolling Absol's ball in his hand and presses the button, making the ball expand with a quiet whurr. Inside, he can almost feel Absol eagerly stir, still riding the high of a victory so rightfully deserved over Brawly.

Damn that beach-bum bastard. Damn Brawly for stifling him and keeping him here for so many years. It's criminal how a privileged shit like Brawly can just do whatever he wants, riding around on his borrowed power like he owns the island. Worse yet, everyone else follows him blindly, gladly giving into the manipulation of power behind a pretty-boy smile. He still fell to Andre and his team, though. After years of struggle, Absol clashed with Hariyama again, and this time the outcome was different.

Years ago, Andre regretted his choice to run away to Dewford, but now that they've overcome such an incredible obstacle? Nothing can stand in their way. They did it. Now begins their real journey, and for the first step? The maroon-haired boy turns and stares into the setting sun, knowing it's a precursor to the bright morning where he leaves Dewford behind.

He'll beat all the Gym Leaders.

He'll win Ever Grande.

He'll find and shred Henson.

Then finally, Andre will battle the one person he wants to battle above all. The man who set himself up for ruin by being a liar.

Absol will be that ruin. He and Andre have struggled together for years, and now it's time to taste the sweet fruits of their labor.

Only people who stand up and grow from adversity can truly be called strong. Who knows? Maybe this Ash kid won't be a total disappointment. Maybe he'll learn that only through struggle do you become great. There's no place for anyone who takes shortcuts or doesn't give their all in a pokemon battle.

Hearing feet shuffling through the sand, Andre turns to face the Dewford boardwalk and smirks.

Ash is approaching, still wearing a petulant glower that the Pikachu on his shoulder mirrors. Behind him follow a few other people, probably his friends. A brunette girl in a bandana who looks to be somewhere between 10 and 12 years old, a young boy in glasses, and a tanned teen roughly Andre's age.

"Ash, are you sure about this?" The girl asks, her voice betraying her nervousness as she looks at Andre. "Do you need to settle everything with a battle?"

"I think we already know the answer to that one, May." The little boy wearing glasses dryly quips. "Is this the guy, Ash?" He asks, pulling a Pokenav from his pocket and flipping it open.

Ash doesn't answer his friends, instead stepping up the edge of the ring. "Alright, Andre. I'm ready," He says, words and stance firm.

Andre can't help it. He smirks. "Hah. I have my doubts. Tell me this, who are you going to battle with? A Nuzleaf? A Corphish? Pick any pokemon you want, it won't matter." The teen crosses his arms, tapping Absol's ball with a finger. "Whatever you do, you best give it your all."

The younger trainer has the gall to smirk back. "If it's my best you want, then I choose Pikachu!"

The Electric-type leaps from Ash's shoulder into the sand-circle, landing on all-fours with his tail raised alertly. His cheeks spark with gold arcs of electricity. "Pikaaa…" The rodent pokemon eagerly bounces in place, a leer on his face.

"A Pikachu? Really?" Andre holds back a snicker. "Sure, bud. Okay."

To the kid's credit, the Pikachu looks healthy and fit. Andre can't claim to know much about the Kanto-native rodents other than their depressing tendency to get chunky when kept as pets… and how people like showing off their overweight Pikachus online. 'Honestly, the League can't do a fucking thing right. Why not use some of that grossly overblown power to take pokemon away from abusive people like that?'

"Let's see your pokemon, then." Ash challenges, crossing his arms.

Behind him, the younger boy with the Pokenav blinks and gulps. "Uh oh… Ash might be in trouble…"

"What? Why?" The girl, May, leans over the boy's shoulder to look at the little device. "Max? What's wrong?" She asks as the tanned, squinty teen leans over to look too.

Max holds his Pokenav up. "According to Battlenet, this guy Andre is one of the best trainers in Dewford! His only big loss was against Mister Henson a few weeks ago!"

Hearing Henson's name makes Andre's smirk falter, but he powers through the anger that wants to surface.

"Apparently, he's one of the few people to ever defeat Brawly's strongest Hariyama, and he's a Dark-type master. He beat a Fighting Gym with a type disadvantage!" Max blinks and readjusts his glasses. "Ash can't win this! This guy is just a bully goading him into a meat-grinder!"

The tall, tanned teen places a hand on Max's shoulder. "Easy, Max. Don't doubt Ash now. He's the best trainer there is when it comes to turning a bad situation around." He looks up and stares at Ash's back. "He's got three league challenges and twenty badges under his belt, something Andre can't boast about."

'Three leagues and twenty badges?' When the math doesn't add up, Andre easily dismisses the claim as a lie and sneers. "False bravado for your pal will go nowhere fast." Andre uncrosses his arms and resumes rolling Absol's ball in his hand as he returns his attention to Ash. "You've heard the odds. You gonna run away?"

"As if!" Ash answers, his smirk transforming into an eager smile. "No way we're going to back down from a battle like this, right buddy?" He asks his pokemon.

"Pika!" Pikachu smiles back and sparks even more vigorously, making little beads of glass when the gold arcs coming off of him zap the sand.

Andre clicks his tongue and tosses Absol's ball up high. "We'll see how long that lasts."

Dark-type is unlike the others, a type plebeians like these don't understand. To most, dark just means the absence of light, and by association, the absence of good things like security and warmth. That's wrong. Dark is the type of raw emotion, the type of being true to oneself and not shying away from urges others cringe at. Things that are natural.

The red-and-white pokeball spins high in the air, then splits open with a pop-hiss. From the ball, white light shoots out and strikes the sand. As the light begins to fade, Absol's ghostly white form is left crouching in the circle. Just like they rehearsed, Absol rises and raises his head, and when at his full height, he snaps his blood-red eyes open and trains them on Pikachu. In the air, Andre can feel his partner's hostility.

Both the mouse and his trainer look spooked for a second before swiftly hiding it.

Dark-type is unlike the others, it's the type of violence.

And that's okay.

"Ready?" Andre asks simply, already forming a plan in his mind.

"Ready!" Ash clenches a fist.

Andre bends down and picks up a shell from the sand, then tosses it up into the air.

Ash, Andre, Pikachu, Absol, Ash's friends, and the beach-goers watching in the distance all watch the shell slowly tumble through the air, making its way back down to the ground in what seems like slow motion.

Ten feet.

Five.

Two.

One.

The shell splashes in the sand with a soft thud.

"Night Slash!"

"Thunderbolt!"

The commands come out at the same time, so Pikachu and Absol blur into action as one.

Absol crosses the circle as a phantasmal flicker of white, his scythe blade leaving a trail of dark purple behind him, but to Andre's astonishment, Pikachu dodges.

The mouse pokemon leaps straight up nearly thirty feet, there one moment and gone the next, leaving Absol's blade to slide through nothing. Hearing the sound of crackling electricity, Absol looks up, his eyes going wide.

The sparks wreathing Pikachu grow into an angry, snapping halo of yellow. The wind-up of the Thunderbolt takes less than a second, but both Absol and Andre are given just enough time to see Pikachu's confident smile. "Piiikaaa..!"

Absol's eyes glow bright.

"Chuuuu!"

A pillar of lightning shoots down so fast that it's halfway to the ground before Absol throws himself out of range. When it hits the ground, molten sand explodes out in a hail of glowing red, forcing Absol to juke around globs of hot glass lest he be forced to fight with savage burns. The Disaster pokemon is pushed all the way back to Andre's side of the circle, where he stands and waits warily.

Pikachu throws his hind legs out, somersaulting through the air and landing lightly right next to the smoldering, glassed crater left behind by his Thunderbolt. The glass groans and crackles as it cools and slowly cracks. The crater is just as big as the one made by..!

'By that explosion attack Henson's Vulpix fired off…' Andre blinks, not trusting what his eyes are showing him. 'But that Vulpix needed so much time to charge up while that Thunderbolt was instantaneous.' He rubs his eyes, but the shiny divot in the sand remains.

"Keep the momentum going, Pikachu!" Ash capitalizes on Andre's astonishment, dramatically punching a fist out as he orders; "Give him a taste of Quick Attack!"

Rather than a wispy aura, Pikachu's Quick Attack manifests as a rolling mantle of white. "Pika…" Pikachu's legs tense like coiled springs, and that's all the warning Absol gets before the electric mouse pokemon is a bullet of yellow streaking towards him, faster than any pokemon they've ever fought before. Andre is used to keeping track of his pokemon in motion, but Pikachu is little more than a formless blur that he nearly loses.

Absol's eyes shine with Detect, but even then, Andre watches his partner duck with only inches to spare. Pikachu's Quick Attack flares as he misses, then the mouse halts midair and... lets his attack fade?

Why isn't he pressing the offensive?

Pikachu lands on all-fours in the sand, turning and looking back at Ash for a new command.

"Your Absol is really fast!" Ash compliments, again wearing that stupid grin. "But it'll take more than that to come back from the defensive we've got you on! Pikachu! Thunderbolt again!"

Pikachu once more begins to spark violently, forks of lightning making a light show in the waning sunlight. "Pika…"

'Who the fuck is this kid?!' Andre thinks to himself. "Absol, Double Team!"

Absol's eyes narrow, and right before Pikachu can fire his Thunderbolt, flickering copies of the Disaster pokemon appear from seemingly nowhere all over Andre's side of the field. Each one wears the same impassive expression and stares down at Pikachu with thinly veiled distaste.

"...Chu?" Pikachu's Thunderbolt is withheld as the mouse pokemon looks between all the illusions with worry and confusion.

"Oh no, Not Double Team. I hate this move..." Ash looks at all the Absol clones with the same uncertainty as his pokemon. "Which one?"

'Fast enough to nearly tag Absol with detect, and strong enough to instantly glass sand, but Double Team trips them up?' Andre almost trips over himself at just how absurd this kid is. He won't call out the mistake, however, as he sees Absol slink between his illusions to get an angle on his foe.

"Ash!" The tall, tanned teen standing behind the kid cups his hands around his mouth and yells. "Don't worry about picking the right one! Sweep an attack through them all! Absol can dish out a lot of damage, but they're fragile!"

"Fuck off, peanut gallery!" Andre growls back, making the girl, May, scowl and cover Max's ears with her hands. The Dark trainer returns his attention forward. "Night Slash!"

Absol explodes into action, running from his crowd of fading doppelgangers and circling around to Pikachu's back, scythe blade in motion without any dramatic flourish.

Pikachu's ears twitch, his eyes widen, and he instinctively springs away back to Ash's side of the field, escaping with only a shallow gash along his back.

"Pikachu!" Ash exclaims, his brown eyes alarmed. "Are you alright?"

Pikachu turns to face Ash, presumably to answer, but Andre can't resist punishing the rookie mistake. "Night Slash!"

In a flash of white, Absol is in front of Pikachu just as the mouse's head is looking away. Absol growls and throws his neck out, his scythe-like horn whistling through the air and trailing with hazy purple Dark energy.

Schink!

Pikachu stumbles back as Absol leaps back out of retaliation range. A weeping cut opens up diagonally across Pikachu's chest, and his yellow fur quickly begins to stain red.

"Pikachu!" Ash's anguished voice carries over the whole beach. Behind him, all of his friends gasp as one. The girl even raises her hands to cover her mouth.

Pikachu rocks back, almost falling, but shakes his head and grits his teeth, remaining standing despite the wound that would have made a pokemon twice his size pass out. "Piiika!" He exclaims, falling back to all-fours with his red cheeks sparking dangerously.

"Pikachu, are you okay to keep going?" Ash asks, this time not taking his eyes off of Absol.

Slowly, Pikachu nods. Much like Ash, he keeps his gaze forward and trained on his opponent.

"That was a dirty trick!" The Kanto-born trainer points an accusing finger at Andre, quickly making his ire rise. "Why'd you have Absol attack Pikachu when his back was turned?!"

Andre narrows his eyes, silently wondering if Ash is serious. "Matches don't pause, idiot. Double Team again!" The black-clad boy smiles nastily. "Then Swords Dance!"

Behind Ash, the tanned teen's eyes widen, though only slightly. "That's not good…"

Max looks up to the taller boy with a tilted head. "What's Swords Dance, Brock?"

The now-named Brock crosses his arms and frowns. In the light of the setting sun, the sweat on his brow is plain to all. "Swords Dance is a move that provides a huge boost to physical attack power. Not many pokemon can learn it, and even fewer can use it well. If they mess up with the boost, then they might hurt themselves. That's to say nothing about pokemon strong enough to use the move in quick succession."

May gulps. "So that means…"

"Absol just got even more dangerous," Brock trails off.

'Brock, huh? He knows his stuff.' Andre wonders where he's heard the name before, but shrugs and returns his attention to the battle.

Back in the ring, illusionary clones of Absol form all over the field, each one flickering and staring at Pikachu with a frown. Around each clone, swords made of pure shining blue begin to take form. From the ethereal swords, orb-like motes of energy flow out of them and into Absol, making the Dark-type hunch his back and growl as might floods into him. His muscles bulge, his pupils dilate, and his scythe glitters with a deadly edge.

"Go! Quick Attack into Night Slash!"

An aura of bleached white explodes from Absol's body as his Double Team fades away, and with a small, sinister smirk, the Dark-type moves. With Quick Attack on top of his natural speed…

'Nothing short of ExtremeSpeed can match him.' Andre watches his pokemon move in for the knockout as a near-invisible wisp of bone-colored fur.

"Intercept with Iron Tail!" Ash orders without any time to spare.

Even with his bleeding wound slowing him, Pikachu growls and whirls around in a circle, his flat tail shining like polished steel. His tail cuts through the air like a blade, whistling through its arc.

Ka-chang!

The Pikachu catches Absol's scythe on his tail.

'What the hell?' Andre watches on, lost as Pikachu and Absol each struggle to overpower the other. Absol strains his legs and neck, trembling as he pushes down on his smaller foe with all his might.

Pikachu is trembling even more, slowly losing the power struggle as Absol pushes him back. His small feet don't give him enough grip in the sand, so he loses a bit of ground each second even as he pushes back with his tail. The mouse pokemon squeaks and whines as he loses focus on Iron Tail, letting Absol slowly cut into him. Sensing the weakness, Absol pushes even harder, determined to slice Pikachu to ribbons.

"Hang in there, buddy!" Ash calls from the sideline, his face schooled into determination. "Deflect him and counter!"

Ash's voice seemingly drags more willpower out of his Pikachu, because the Electric-type cries out and swipes his tail to the side, overpowering the Swords Dance-fueled Absol just long enough to disengage. With Absol's failed attack thrown wide, Pikachu flips backward, Iron Tail aimed to brutally smash right into Absol's chin.

The Dark-type's eyes glow with Detect just as Andre taught him, so he leans back just enough for Iron Tail to tickle the short, velvet fur of his face before leaping back to a safe distance.

"Double Team and Swords Dance again!" Andre orders the instant Absol's paws touch down in the sand. 'Not bad, kid. Your Pikachu is actually pretty strong, but you're still nothing compared to Absol and I.'

"A second Swords Dance?!" Ash's eyes bug out.

Like the previous two times, intangible clones of Absol appear all over the sandy ring, hiding the real Absol in their number. Again, shining swords of blue energy manifest from thin air, then begin to fade again as they surrender their power to Absol in the form of wispy ribbons of blue.

"RooaaaaAAAAAAAAA!"

Andre's ace finally breaks his stoic streak by leaning his head back and roaring as he absorbs the second round of Swords Dance. His red eyes gleam with unrestrained malevolence as his physical strength surges to a level even Brawly's elder Hariyama would struggle to match. The air around him even begins to distort from the heat and exhaust energy his forcefully strengthened body generates.

"We can't drag this out and there's no time to find the real one!" Ash calls, the beginnings of panic in his voice. "Hit them with Thunder!"

If Pikachu's Thunderbolts coated him in a halo of crackling yellow, then the building Thunder around him is like a dome of pure luminescent gold. The air begins to snap and spark as the unearthly charge builds, and Andre can feel the static on his skin and in his hair. The dark red bangs not covered by his hat begin to rise. "What the fuck is-"

The ring is engulfed in blinding light.

From what little Andre's dazzled eyes can see, a spear of lightning as large around as a redwood tree is thrown up into the air, rising like a breaching Gyarados at least a hundred feet up, before curving - shooting down towards the crowd of Absols vengefully.

Absol and his doppelgangers vanish in a flash of lightning before the Dark-type can even try to dodge. The Thunder attack is so violent that there is no splash of molten sand, as the sand is simply vaporized on contact.

Andre raises his arms to shield his eyes as the resulting crack of thunder generates a shockwave that throws sand everywhere. Over the ear-ringing crack, he can just barely hear a few onlookers scream in fright. '...!' So shocked is he, that Andre can barely form a coherent thought.

Slowly, the smoke clears, revealing the results to everyone.

On Ash's side of the ring, Pikachu pants in exhaustion, but still stands ready with sparks arcing from his cheeks. His wound drips slowly into the sand, making an ugly red-spot that he ignores. On the other end of the ring…

Absol's ball falls from Andre's limp fingers, falling to the sand with a soft thud.

Lying prone in a glassed divot and coated in raw, spider-webbing electrical burns, Absol is out cold. His chest rises and falls with difficulty, and the fur spared being burned off snaps and pops with left-over electricity. His keratin scythe-horn is covered in cracks and flaking, likely having been the point the monstrous Thunder entered his body through.

They lost. After the trials involved in beating Brawly, Absol was felled in one shot.

One. Shot.

"No…" Andre whispers, a terrible feeling welling up in his chest. "No…"

How did this happen? How did this happen?! Absol can go toe-to-toe with Hariyama, an Elite with a capital E! Did a common Pikachu just win?! Andre sways on his feet, struck with a sudden bout of vertigo as doubt begins to claw at him.

He's a good trainer, isn't he? He trained his pokemon well, developed strategies with them, joined them in their struggles just as they did for him, and never gave up. They clawed their way to the top of Dewford, then toppled Brawly. They're the greatest!

"Did Andre just lose?" A nearby girl in a bikini asks the man whose arm she's clutching.

There's a scoff on Andre's right. "'Course he did, he's just hot air!" An overweight man with a smug-looking Rufflet on his shoulder cuts in. Andre remembers thrashing that Rufflet and his lardass trainer at last year's Brawl. "Any good trainer could do that!"

"Hey, isn't that kid Ash Ketchum? Professor Oak's golden boy?" Another spectator, a boy in swimming trunks asks no one in particular.

"Yeah! Way to go, Pikachu!" Ash runs into the ring, the glassed sand crunching under his shoes. He scoops up Pikachu with a joyful laugh, and Pikachu, despite the hard battle, musters enough energy to smile and nuzzle his trainer.

Max, Brock, and May run up to the boy and his Pikachu, each one wearing their own smile. "Great battle, guys!" Max cheers. "I thought he had you for a second, there!"

"He almost did," Ash admits, setting Pikachu down gently and shrugging off his backpack. The Kanto-born trainer unzips his bag and pulls a Hyper Potion from inside, uncapping it and giving it a shake. "If we didn't start working on Pikachu's defense a few weeks ago, that Night Slash might have ended the match." His piece said, Ash gingerly sprays down Pikachu's wound, making the flesh hiss and knit back together.

Andre just watches numbly. Slowly, he bends back down and takes Absol's ball before mechanically recalling his unconscious pokemon. The cheers for Ash and the jeers shot his way fall on deaf ears, and before anyone can say anything further, he turns and starts the walk to the Pokemon Center.

"Hey, Andre! Wait!" Ash's voice calls out to him.

His walk speeds up to a jog, then to a run, then to a sprint. He clutches Absol's ball to his chest protectively, as if to shield his partner from any more harm.

The powerful, unevolved Pikachu, the outrageously expensive potion, being called Professor Oak's 'golden boy'...

That bastard. That rat bastard Ash is just like them. Just like Henson and Brawly.

Andre's eyes sting and his vision blurs, but he keeps sprinting so Absol might be treated faster.

It's not fair.


The ragged, frightened, panting Kirlia can only brace herself as the persistent orbs of darkness close in, as she's too frazzled to focus on Teleporting like her trainer frantically commands.

Standing across from a young woman trainer in one of Mauville's outskirts battlegrounds, Lee watches Corvi, who is hovering above the field, cackle as his newly mastered attack homes in on the hapless Kirlia.

The young woman commanding Kirlia, a fairly unremarkable trainer with her brown hair in a high ponytail and wearing a school uniform approached Lee for a battle as he and Brendan explored Mauville. Zinnia wasn't with them, having taken herself and all the female pokemon sans Shinx off for a "Girls' day out." Considering how rare the occurrence of a challenge is, Lee shrugged and took the schoolgirl's offer.

Kirlia proved to be a tricky foe, dodging around with expert short-range teleports and dragging Corvi out of the air and painfully into the ground with Confusion. That changed when Lee had Corvisquire break out Pursuers. Since she was forced to keep dodging lest she be struck by the unknown and very persistent move, Corvisquire was free to divebomb her with Pluck and Steel Wing at his leisure. Now coated in welts and cuts, Kirlia only needs one stiff breeze to be felled.

"C'mon Kirlia, one more Teleport!" The young woman orders, looking at the closing in Pursuers with trepidation.

"Corvi, stop them! Speed up Pursuers!" Lee calls up to his crow in reply.

Corvisquire screeches and spreads his wings, wispy tendrils of black flaring off of him.

The Kirlia screws her eyes shut and begins to glow with a cloak of ever-shifting colors, but falters as the hissing Pursuers surge and close in faster. Before she can move, it's too late.

Bambambambam!

The black and purple orbs smash into her like freight trains, each exploding and releasing a small cloud of caustic Dark-type energy that slowly dissipates. Kirlia is thrown harshly to the ground from the fusillade of explosions, where she groans and doesn't attempt to get back to her feet.

Once it's clear Kirlia is down for the count, Brendan, who stands at the side of the arena as the referee, calls the match. "It's over!" He waves his arms in front of his chest in an X shape. "Kirlia is unable to battle! Corvisquire and Lee are the winners!"

A few onlookers waiting for a battleground to clear up politely applaud the victory, and although most are too far away for Lee to properly make out what their conversations are about, he can see that the unveiling of Pursuers has caused a bit of a stir.

The young woman trainer - who Lee is embarrassed to admit he forgot the name of - recalls her Kirlia with a despondent sigh. Once the Psychic-type is safely tucked away in her ball, Kirlia's trainer walks to the middle of the battleground to meet Lee for a handshake. "Wow! That was some battle! Your big old crow here sure packs a punch!"

At Lee's side, Corvisquire puffs out smugly.

Lee gives her a smile as he clasps her hand and gives it a firm shake. "Thank you. He's been working extra hard and it certainly shows. Your Kirlia's Teleport is well refined. We had to break out a secret technique to break the rhythm there."

Not exactly true, as Corvisquire could have just used Scary Face to slow Kirlia down, or Taunt to halt the teleporting entirely, but the crow has been so eager to use his new move in a live battle that Lee didn't have it in him to let the opportunity go.

"Say, what was that crazy Dark move that you used?" The young woman asks as she, Lee, and Corvisquire move off the field so other trainers can take their place. "I've never seen something like that."

Lee mulls over telling her as they get to a safe distance away from the field and watch two more trainers step up to battle. One is a boy around fifteen or so years of age who sends out a fluttering Dustox, and the other is a young blonde girl who releases a surly-looking Gligar. 'There is forever a camera watching every Pokémon battle around here anyway, so there's probably no harm in telling. It'll get out sooner or later.' Mind made up, Lee explains. "Pursuers is actually a custom move created by Corvisquire and me. It has homing capabilities similar to Swift, and trades its speed for better tracking ability and a Dark typing."

The girl blinks and lets her mouth fall open a little bit. "Holy..! A completely brand-new move? That's wild! Do you think I can get a TM of it? I don't have a ton of money, but I'll pay what I can."

Lee gives her a confused, sidelong look. "A TM of a custom move?" He asks, suddenly remembering that he doesn't know the process that creates TMs. "Sorry about my ignorance on the subject, I'm from way out in the sticks."

The schoolgirl nods, apparently accepting the excuse with ease. "Yeah, how do you think new moves get circulated around? If a pokemon or a trainer makes a new move, you can usually get places like Devon or Silph Co. to make TMs if they get a cut of the profits. Lots of trainers make a killing selling limited runs of their powerful pokemon's moves."

It takes a moment to sink in, but Lee can suddenly feel his wallet weigh more. 'Really now? Powerful and custom moves can make a mint? Well, my struggles to find an Eevee might be over here soon.' The zoologist pulls the spike of greed back in with a more sobering thought. 'Assuming the cut that the manufacturer takes to make and distribute the TMs isn't huge.' He clears his throat. "That gives me a lot to think about," He glances down to Corvisquire, and Lee doesn't need any mind-reading to know the scowl on his face is from the thought of his special move being marketed. Lee levels the Kirlia trainer with a smile. "Ah, Pursuers is kind of a signature move made especially for Corvisquire here, so I don't think that one's going to be sold anytime soon, if ever. I am working under Professor Birch as a researcher focusing on moves and alternative training styles, though, so I'll probably bring something to market eventually. Look for TMs made by Lee Henson's team if you're interested."

That makes the girl's face light up. "Sure thing!" She glances up at the noon sun and hums. "I gotta get back to class. Thanks for the fun battle!" She waves and trots off.

As the girl takes off, Brendan walks up to Lee's side, taking her place. "You know, it never really struck me that you could make some crazy money selling TMs." The boy comments. He takes off his white beanie and runs his fingers through his sweaty brown hair. "If you ever make any crazy TMs, can I get a friend discount?"

Lee chuckles. "I'll make sure you and Zinnia each get free copies."

Brendan replaces his hat and pumps his fist with a grin. "Heck yeah! You're the best, Lee!"

"I try," The scarred man smiles and withdraws his phone from his pocket, checking and finding no notifications. "Any word from the girls?"

"Nope." Brendan shakes his head. "Zinnia said she was taking them to some kinda spa that caters to trainers and pokemon. I dunno how long something like that takes."

"Hmm," Lee noncommittally hums in reply. It's a little odd that a tomboy like Zinnia would be interested in something so traditionally girly, but on the other hand, what girl of any species doesn't like being pampered every once in a while? 'She's still trying to get back into Vulpix's good graces I suppose.'

The relationship between Lee's starter and the Dragon Tamer has been icy ever since their confrontation in Slateport. Zinnia's apology, no matter how abrupt it was, came off as rather genuine to Lee, but Vulpix isn't of the same opinion. She's only regarded Zinnia with annoyance at best since then and has been doing a magnificent job holding a grudge. 'I should step in… Or should I? Zinnia came off more hurtful than intended and doesn't really know the full story, but she did apologize. I don't want Vulpix to forgive her just because she mistook my intervention as an implied order…' Lee grumbles. 'I almost prefer when my chief-concerns were not getting mauled in the lion exhibit because I smelled like a horny tiger. Yet again the women in my life are out to give me gray hairs.'

Like the schoolgirl that Lee battled just several minutes prior, Brendan looks up at the midday sun with a hand shielding his eyes. "I'm getting kinda hungry. Wanna head to the Mauville mall? They've got a huge food court to check out."

Lee glances down at Corvisquire. "I could eat. What about you, bud?"

Corvisquire eyeballs his pokeball hanging from Lee's belt, and for a moment, Lee expects him to peck the button and return himself. After several seconds of indecision, the Crow Pokémon sighs and nods.

"All right then, let's get going," Lee hides his surprise as best he can and gestures for Brendan to lead the way.

The walk from Mauville's outskirts to the city proper doesn't take very long, but considering that Mauville is by far the largest city in all of Hoenn, getting to where you want through the throngs of people is the time-consuming part. As they walk along a nature trail that leads into a corporate park near the mall, Lee is given some time to mull over the last few days.

Lee, Brendan, Zinnia, and their pokemon arrived in Mauville three days ago after responding to the Pokemon Ranger ABP with little fanfare. They found a middle-of-the-pack hotel near the center of the city and just a few minutes walk from a Pokémon Center and the local Gym. Upon visiting the Gym, both Brendan and Lee were disheartened to find that the wait time for a gym match was sitting at a full week.

Wattson, the elderly Electric-type master and Gym Leader of Mauville, is apparently a very busy man. On top of his duties as Gym Leader, the apologetic receptionist at the Mauville Gym explained that Wattson is part of the Mauville city council, the head electrical engineer of the local power plant, and part of the Board of Directors for a local construction firm that replaced the now-defunct Greater Mauville Holdings. As such, he can only respond to a handful of challenges per day.

Without much in the way of recourse, Brendan and Lee scheduled their battles and have been training their teams ever since.

"Hey, Lee?" Brendan starts, pulling Lee away from his thoughts. The boy looks up at him. "Do you think you can teach me about pokémon nutrition?" He asks.

"I'd be happy to, but that kind of came out of nowhere." Lee replies as the nature trail around them slowly transitions into a sidewalk leading through Mauville's corporate district. Lee takes a look at the tall, shiny office buildings around him, silently lamenting for the poor souls stuck in corporate positions when the option of being a pokémon trainer exists. He shudders and silently thanks his past self for disregarding his father's advice and taking zoology over business. "Why do you want to learn?"

"Take a look at Corvisquire," Brendan points at the black and blue bird, who turns and gives him the stink eye. "He was a pretty normal height when you caught him, but now he's pushing three feet tall and some change. It's normal for pokemon to grow a bit before they evolve, but that's a lot of growth."

Lee meets Corvisquire's eyes and notes with some surprise that the Crow Pokémon is indeed tall enough to peer over Lee's beltline, and at exactly six feet tall with his boots off, Lee isn't short. 'I could've sworn he came up to my thigh just a few weeks ago.' He thinks, silently frustrated that Corvi's reluctance for a physical has prevented any proper recordkeeping on his pokémon. 'I'll need to make good on Corvi's promise to cooperate for a physical sometime soon. It shouldn't be terribly hard to schedule a time.'

Looking again, Lee can see the budding signs of evolution on Corvisquire now that Brendan has pointed them out. The crow's blue plumage is darkening to a metallic ink-blue. The bottom half of his beak is slowly turning black while the top half is on its way to the same ink-blue, almost purple as his plumage. A helmet-like ridge has been becoming more and more prominent over his eyes in the last few days, making his scowl even more striking.

While Brendan and Zinnia's aces are clearly their strongest pokémon, it's hard to put a label of 'strongest' on any of Lee's. 'Vulpix isn't a battle prodigy like Grovyle, and isn't concentrated piss and vinegar like Corvisquire, but her raw power, adaptability, and telepathy with me present enormous hurdles for anyone to overcome.'

'Grovyle, meanwhile, is a savant destined to be a Legend. His supernatural awareness of his own body, instincts sharper than any razor, and hyper competency that he applies to all of his techniques puts him on even footing with Vulpix and Corvisquire despite suffering a type disadvantage against them both.'

'And Corvisquire…' Lee pauses. 'Corvisquire puts so much passion and emotion into his training and fighting that he's a veritable force of nature. Add in his natural intelligence, and you got a scary pokemon. If he's only got weeks until he evolves, then I think he'll undoubtedly be my most powerful pokemon afterward.'

It's a strange thought to consider, as Lee thought that the mantle would always rest with Vulpix. 'Again, this isn't some anime, Lee. Your first isn't always your best, though there's nothing wrong with that.'

Lee mentally touches the tiny psychic line tethering him to Vulpix, almost visualizing a thread as thin as a fishing line leading into the city. This is the furthest he's ever been away from her…

He gets a tiny tug of acknowledgment back from the distant fox.

…That's okay, though. She's still there.

"I guess you're right," Lee answers Brendan after a moment. "Corvi is beefing up. I'm not sure how much of it is my work and how much of it is his impending evolution. Regardless, I'll be happy to teach you, Brendan." Lee raises a hand before the grinning boy can celebrate. "There is a lot that goes into the study of nutrition, so be prepared for that. There's a lot of math, learning how to cook, learning how to identify the best ingredients and foodstuffs for your pokémon, intimate study on the biology of your pokemon, monitoring what goes in, monitoring what gets burned, and monitoring… What comes out. Yes, I do mean that in a gross way."

Brendan cringes. "Oh."

"Oh," Lee nods knowingly. "Think on it for a bit before giving me a final answer."

'I still haven't figured out what I'm going to use to feed Corvi when he becomes a Corviknight. That's a lot of pokemon to keep fed. If worse comes to worst, I might have to send him hunting on his own as I figure something out.'

In his pocket, Lee's phone begins to ring, making anxiety suddenly boil in his gut. Taking it out, he glances at the screen and bites his lip.

Incoming call

Prof. Birch

Accept / Deny

"I've got to take this. Sorry, Brendan." Lee taps 'accept' with his thumb and lowers the call volume down to almost nothing so Brendan can't unintentionally eavesdrop. Raising the phone to his ear, he lets out an uneasy breath. "Hello. Professor."

"Hey, Lee. Is now a good time to talk?"

"Yeah, that's fine," He looks over to Brendan, silently telling the boy to keep going as he slows his own pace. Looking around, Lee spots several office workers loitering around outside of their office buildings and notes the depressing lack of pokémon out and about. None of them are close enough to overhear as he walks towards central Mauville through the corporate park.

Brendan smiles and nods, keeping his pace going and letting Lee fall behind.

"Good." Lee can almost hear Nigel's smile. "So, I've got in contact with a group of specialists who specifically treat patients who hold sensitive intelligence. They are accredited by the Johto League and approved by the Hoenn League to practice here. They really are the best of the best, as they treated the soldiers in the Kanto-Johto skirmishes years back."

"Really?" Lee ponders aloud, wondering if the not-war was really so violent as to require specialists of such caliber. Pokewiki said there were few casualties and the whole conflict was over and done in just a few months. "Are they bound by some sort of oath to not repeat what they've heard? Or an NDA like you talked about?"

"An oath? Paperwork? Try something a little more potent." Nigel murmurs, a strange weight to his words. "They aren't bound by just an oath, but a psychic compulsion. These therapists have submitted themselves to the implanting of mental blocks made by powerful Psychic-types specifically so what they learn can't get out. They can't speak it on accident, on purpose, or even if forced because the compulsion will stop them in their tracks."

The hairs on the back of Lee's neck stand up as an icy unease spreads throughout him. "That's…" He stops, at a loss for words. "I…" He stops again. In the back of his mind, Lee knows that the existence of Psychic-types means that there's more than just lifting things and tossing them with your brain. There are plenty of more subtle, unsettling things a psychic can accomplish.

If a mental compulsion can stop something like involuntary speech… Then what else can it do?

"It's some heavy stuff, I agree." Lee can hear the sound of Nigel shifting around in his chair. "But I felt that going all out is warranted here, both for your privacy and, well, there are some things that the world doesn't need to know."

Lee nods along, running his tongue over his dry mouth. "Yeah, I one-hundred percent agree there. What's the damage for the bill?"

"Don't worry about that. The League is splitting the bill with your insurance." Nigel verbally waves him off. "You'll be seeing Miss Mable Lane and her Xatu, both of whom have the blocks and are fully accredited. They'll be Teleporting to meet you for sessions. She's available tomorrow if you'd like to start then."

Instantly, Lee considers pushing it off. This is too much to dump on someone. He's proven that he's not a danger to himself or his Pokémon, so he can deal with it himself. Maybe he can-

Then a sharp pain to his knee makes Lee hiss and look down. What he sees makes him stop.

Corvisquire pulls his beak away from Lee's leg, looking up at him with equal parts disgust and disappointment. Disgust is a common enough emotion to see on the avian, but the disappointment stings something fierce.

'He can probably hear everything despite the volume being so low, and when he saw the doubt on my face… Man up, Lee.' Lee gulps and steels himself before raising his phone back to his ear. "Professor? How early can this therapist show up?"

"How does 10 AM sound? She'll be in one of the Pokemon Center meeting rooms. I'll get you the details in an email once I have them."

"I'll be there. Is there anything else?" Lee doesn't look back down at Corvisquire, half-fearing that he'll find yet another judgmental expression.

"Nothing else that can't be an email. Thanks for agreeing to this, Lee. It takes someone brave to admit they have problems that need to be fixed." Nigel's voice is gentle. "You're doing the right thing, don't doubt that. I know your pokemon in particular will be happy to see you well and whole. Have a nice rest of your day, okay?"

"Same to you, Professor," Lee says goodbye and hangs up. Finally looking back down at his side, Corvisquire looks back up at him with something resembling neutrality. "Thanks for not letting me be a pussy, Corvi. I don't know what I would do without you and the rest of the team."

The crow just huffs and bounds along as Lee jogs to catch up to Brendan.
 
Act 1: Chapter 25
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Two updates in one month? Wack.


For what feels like the thousandth time, Lee raises his hand with his knuckles poised to rap upon the door before him, one leading to meeting room number three in the Mauville pokemon center. Then his nerve flees him and he lowers his hand again. On his shoulder, Vulpix sits quietly, neither encouraging nor discouraging him to move forward.

Earlier that morning, Professor Birch did as he said he would, sending an email with all the details for the meeting. He would meet Mable Lane, the League-sanctioned therapist, in meeting room number three at 10 AM. The meeting would last only an hour and Lee would be free to end it at any point he likes.

But dammit all to hell, why can't he just knock on the door?

'It's not for you, Lee. It's for your friends. It's for Vulpix, Shinx, Grovyle, Corvi, Brendan, and Zinnia. You owe it to all of them to get better, your pokemon especially.' The man sighs to himself and glances at a clock in the center hallway, seeing that he's already two minutes late.

Vulpix presses her muzzle to his cheek in silent support. Her wet nose and hot breath serving as a reminder that he isn't alone.

Mustering his nerve one final time, Lee raises his hand and gives the door two sharp knocks.

"Coming!" The voice of a woman says from inside. There's the muffled sound of chair legs moving across carpet, and after only another second of waiting, the door clicks and swings open.

Standing in the doorway with a kindly smile on her aging face, the woman who has to be Mable greets them. "Ah, Mister Henson and Miss Vulpix. My name is Mable, but you knew that. Come right in and make yourself comfortable! I'm glad to see you today."

"Thank you," Lee inwardly chastises himself with how weak his voice comes out before stepping in after the therapist.

Looking around, the meeting room is just like one that can be found in any corporate office. The walls are a simple eggshell white, the same as the tiles that make up the ceiling. The table and chairs he expected are absent, instead replaced with a single cushioned chair, a soft-looking couch of similar style, and a glass coffee table between them. Was this room set up specifically for them, or is this particular meeting room always arranged like this?

As he seats himself on the couch, Lee takes the time to inspect his new therapist.

Mable is a woman steadily making her way out of middle age and into her elder years. The professional black bun her hair is pulled back into sports threads of gray, and although the wrinkles and laugh lines on her face are somewhat hidden by her dusky skin, they can still be seen with some effort. Her hazel eyes sparkle with a youthful energy, sharply contrasting her aged and somewhat rotund form. On her left hand is a simple gold wedding band, and on the opposite wrist is a bracelet filled with charms. Her appearance is complete by a white blouse overlaid by a purple jacket, one that shares its hue with her skirt and high heels.

Mable settles in the chair and folds her hands in her lap, smile still in place. "So, Lee. Can I call you Lee? How are you doing today?"

The man rubs the back of his head as he shifts on the couch. "Fine. A little nervous, truthfully."

Mable nods like she expected that answer. "And that's just fine. It's plenty okay to be nervous when doing something new, especially when that thing is talking to a stranger. No need to call me ma'am if you don't want to, either. Mable is just as good as any."

Vulpix slides down off of Lee's shoulder and drapes herself across his lap, letting Lee lean back into the couch to try to make himself comfortable. "Sure thing, ma'-Mable." Lee trips over himself for a moment and clears his throat to try and cover it. "If it's okay with you, I have a few questions before we really dig into things."

The therapist smiles. "Of course. Go right ahead and I'll be happy to answer!"

"Have you been told the…" The zoologist struggles to find a word. "Magnitude of the events that led me to you?"

The woman hums knowingly. "You're worried about the consequences if the information gets out?" She raises her hand and taps the side of her head with a single finger. "Well, you don't have to worry about that at all, hun. Old Mable has an XY-grade psychic block in this noggin. That may not mean much to you, but I can't speak a word at all about what we talk about here. My bosses could scream and yell, villains could do some bad things to try and make me talk, or someone really nefarious could have a pokemon try and take it by force. You can't really beat an XY, because they rooted it good and deep." Mable's smile is nothing but confidence despite her next sentence. "They want to get past it? They'll have to break a lot to get there, but then it doesn't matter because a dead woman tells no tales."

The hairs along Lee's neck stand up. In the back of his mind, he can feel Vulpix's uneasy surprise as well. "You're really serious about your profession, huh?"

"Helping people is my passion, Lee. Sometimes, one has to make some sacrifices to pursue a passion." Mable's eyes shine with pride. "But it's all worth it in the end."

Despite himself, Lee actually begins to feel himself relax. "Yeah, I can understand that," he replies, stroking Vulpix across the back and enjoying the warmth seeping into his legs. So far, this isn't the stressful interrogation he envisioned.

"I bet you do," Mable looks at Vulpix with obvious admiration. "I'm no expert in pokemon health, Lee, but Vulpix here is positively glowing! Just look at her! Through her, I see that drive, that passion you have."

Lee smiles back. "I can't take all the credit for that. She works just as hard as I do."

The therapist shakes her head with exaggerated exasperation. "No no, truly! Look at her and take her in! See your own passion reflected through her."

Humoring the woman, Lee looks down at the vixen in his lap, who in turn looks up at him.

Vulpix is just as beautiful as she's always been. With her burnt orange coat, six lustrous tails, and curly head tuft of sunset orange, creme underbelly, and her paws covered in 'socks' of earthy brown fur, she's visually striking. Her fur is as soft as a plush toy's, and the fluffy tuft of fur on her breast is a delight to the hands. Deep, brown eyes that glimmer with intelligence draws one's gaze after her shiny coat and fan of tails get their due admiration. On the back of her ear is the only irregularity, that being a splotch of white fur in the shape of a heart, the same marking he gave her in the game before this whole adventure started. Under the surface is another beauty, the beauty of function. Her body is a bundle of trained muscle, enough to easily overpower a grown man. With a leap, she can bound over a building, and with a breath, she can summon an inferno. With her in his lap, he can feel the fire in her core, so composed and under control. Th-

Lee's thoughts are cut off when Vulpix suddenly turns her head away. From her, he feels a pulse of both pride and embarrassment. At the same time, the insides of her ears darken in a blush.

"Just the look I expected." Mable's face is drawn into a grin. "That expression of awe on your face. Miss Vulpix is a spectacular pokemon, Lee, but she didn't get there alone. Remember that."

Lee schools his expression sheepishly.

"Now," Mable threads her fingers together and crosses one leg over the other. She takes on a more serious air, but the friendly smile remains. "Let's get started, shall we? What can I help you with today?"

A twinge of nervousness returns, but the zoologist pushes it away and clears his thoughts. "I'm not well, Mable. I'm not getting better, either. I… don't really know where to begin."

On his belt, Lee feels Grovyle's ball wiggle. Corvisquire's is still, but Lee has no doubt that the bird is focusing on the conversation. Shinx's ball is absent, left in Brendan's care.

"Begin with what makes sense to you," Mable firmly insists. "You can take as much time as you want, I won't count it against our hour here today."

Lee gulps and looks down to Vulpix. 'Should I?'

The fox's reply is quick as if she expected the question. 'Yes. I don'* fe*l as if s*e's lyi*g.' Vulpix meets his gaze with her soulful eyes. 'I want you to be okay.'

With a shaky sigh, Lee begins. "What if I told you that I'm not native to this world? Or even this dimension?" He asks, bracing for the worst.

Mable's reaction is… nothing. Her face doesn't even twitch. "Not the strangest thing I've ever heard, Lee," she says with a smile. "Not even in the top ten. This world of ours is rife with mysteries, so that's not terribly hard to believe. What was your home like? Can you tell me?"

The sheer lack of disbelief throws the scarred man and even Vulpix for a loop. "Uh. What do you want to know?"

"How about we start with what you want," she says, once more handing the reins over. "Maybe your job? Your hobbies?"

I want you to be okay.

'I see what she's doing.' Lee thinks to himself, wrapping Vulpix in a loose hug. The vixen looks up at him, but doesn't move. 'She wants to take this slow, build trust and all that. Do I have that kind of time, though?'

I want you to be okay.

"I'd… I'd like to jump into the main matters, if that's okay with you." Lee eventually says.

Mable's eyes widen just a smidgen. "That's very brave, but you don't need to if you aren't ready. Don't feel like you're being pressured here, because we do things at the pace best for you, no one else."

"If we don't, I might lose the nerve, so I want to start there." Lee replies, preparing himself for yet another long explanation. He draws in a deep breath and holds Vulpix a little tighter. "That home dimension I talked about? I worked as a zookeeper caring for animals. You know, pokemon but less intelligent, more mundane?"

"Mm-hmm," Mable nods along. "Tell me about it, the zoo."

"The place, the Columbus Zoo, was pretty famous and one of the largest in the nation, about five-hundred acres," Lee recalls many a day trekking across the paved walkways, and how he'd duck into the cool aquarium section on hot summer days. "Seven thousand animals called it home."

Mable lets out a quiet gasp. "That's a lot of creatures. Did you tend to all of them or just a few?"

Lee mulls the question over. "My mentor and I ran the dayshift lion exhibit, but I got called away often to help with others. Usually, it was big cats or other carnivores."

Seemingly picking her words with care, Mable quietly asks; "Did you like the lions?"

"Loved them." Lee feels his chest become tight and dares not think of any names or faces. "I raised several by hand, learned their personalities, and became part of their lives. They became part of mine, too."

"You loved them a lot, didn't you?" The therapist asks, voice still gentle.

"Still do."

The conversation falls into a lull for a minute, letting Lee reminisce on days now long gone. 'It feels like a lifetime ago already.' He turns his eyes to the little white lines on the side of his wrist, the same one the lion cubs made when setting a paw there as he fed them. Now Shinx is the one adding to it, as the crisscrossing lines have a few fresh pink additions from Shinx' tiny claws.

"Do you want to keep going? We can pause here if you like and move on to something else." Mable's voice pulls him from his reverie.

"No. No, let's just get this out of the way… It was a pretty normal day at the Zoo," Lee leans back into the couch, feeling himself return to the day. Only the feeling of warm fur in his hand keeps him tethered to reality. "I had just finished feeding the animals in the exhibit and was on my way to lunch. Funny thing was while pokemon didn't exist back home, they were a popular media franchise that I was a fan of. It probably comes off as a little childish, but I had a pokemon game on my phone that I played during breaks sometimes."

Mable clicks her tongue. "That's not childish at all, hun. If it makes you happy, then why not?"

Lee lets out an amused huff. "Sure. Right. Anyway, I was on my way to lunch and I had just sat down to eat, fiddling with that pokemon game as I did so. Then every electronic thing in the break room went off at once, blaring an EAS alarm."

"EAS?"

"Emergency alert system," Lee suppresses a tremble. Just thinking of the noise makes him feel ill, and it still pops up in his dreams. "Someone, I don't know who or why, decided 'to hell with it' and launched a missile barrage on my home. These missiles were carrying nuclear warheads, bombs powerful enough to turn a city into glass and poison the land around for years. They gave us a list of known targets, and we were right in one of them." He feels Vulpix press herself to his stomach, again reminding him that he's here and not there. "No one was sure what to do. There were no bomb-proof locations in a zoo of all places, and the panicking guests clogged the parking lot, so running was a no-go. We just… Had to sit there and wait."

"Lee," Mable tries to cut in. "We can-"

He pushes on. "The pressure was too much. People were cracking. The guard on duty wanted to go out painlessly and shot himself there in front of everyone." The words keep pouring out before he can rein them in. "One of the interns took the dead guard's gun and followed him. That… It shocked everyone so badly that the panicking stopped. Everyone just huddled and waited." In his mind, he can feel Vulpix try to worm her way in and bleed off the memory, but he shuts her out. This pain is his, not hers.

"Lee!"

His heart thunders in his own ears, drowning anything else out. "I… I thought about shooting myself too, but I chickened out. I just sat down and tried to distract myself with the pokemon game on my phone. In no time at all, it happened." His scars burn. "The bomb hit. Just the light coming through the blinds burned and disfigured my face, then the shockwave ripped the building apart, throwing glass everywhere, then the fireball reached us and-!"

"Stop!"

A hand takes him on the shoulder and shakes him out of the memory.

"Easy now," Mable is sitting next to him, her face isn't shocked or frightened, but soothingly placid as she rubs his shoulder. He didn't even notice her move. "Just take it nice and slow, okay? You had a flashback, so take a deep breath and come back down."

Lee does as she asks, sucking in a breath free of fire and ash. As she stills the shaking in his limbs, he looks down to Vulpix.

Her ears are pinned back and her tails are drawn in. Those chocolate eyes stare back up with such hurt that his chest throbs as if stabbed.

"Are you feeling better?" Mable asks, her concern plain.

Lee nods silently, stroking Vulpix across her neck with the backs of his fingers. 'Sorry, love. I didn't mean to worry you.'

The wave of forgiveness that washes over his brain soothes him.

Mable slowly rises and returns to her seat before sitting heavily. She crosses one leg over the other and steeples her fingers in her lap. "Lee, before we go further, I want to establish one ground rule. Just one."

"And that is?" Lee fights the burnout of his episode to pay attention. His eyelids feel like they're made of lead and a bone-deep weariness grips him despite the early hour.

"We will do things at the pace best for you." She stresses 'the pace best for you'. "You rushed headfirst into your trauma before you were ready, and all that does is hurt you. It's normal to feel a little uncomfortable talking about unpleasant events, and it's normal to want to get better as fast as you can, but you shouldn't rush in."

"My best pace is an expedient one," Lee counters. "The one best for my friends and pokemon."

"No."

For the first time, Mable's smile drops. "Lee, we're doing this at the pace best for you. No one else's. Please don't misunderstand that." She leans back in her chair, regarding him intensely. "I've met many a man like yourself; the type who thinks of others first. There are few people in this world better than them, but there comes a day they have to learn a lesson, one that they always view harshly and cringe away from. Do you know what that lesson is?"

Numbly, Lee shakes his head.

"That they matter just as much as everyone else."

"What?" He blinks incredulously, hardly believing what he's hearing. "You think that I see myself like that? I know what I'm worth."

Mable's mouth draws itself into a thin line. "I don't think it, hun. I know it. Your love for your pokemon says a lot of good things about you, but when was the last time you did something for yourself?"

"I…" Lee draws a blank. "Well, I… Like what?"

"Like sitting down and enjoying a movie, or reading a book for fun, maybe taking a walk at sunset, or buying yourself something nice or getting yourself a little extra at dinnertime because you thought to yourself 'I deserve this'. Anything, really." Mable explains. "Something that you did for yourself because you wanted it."

"Erm…" Lee struggles, looking away and at the corner of the room. "I was in Slateport just a week ago."

"Mm-hmm," Mable smiles encouragingly.

"We visited the market there, and I…" Lee hesitates again. Should he say that he adopted Shinx? Was that selfish? "...I picked up some quality grooming supplies for my pokemon."

The purple-clan woman's smile doesn't fall, but it sure seems that way to Lee. "And that was something to make you happy? Not your pokemon?"

He almost lies and says Yes, but remains silent.

"Try another one," Mable waves her hand in a go on gesture. "Dig deep. When did you do something just for yourself?"

'Well, maybe..? No, I would have felt bad not using that Battle Tent ticket that Zinnia spent her own money on.'

'My Eevee hunt? That's sort of work related…'

'I didn't really pay much attention to those movies in Slateport.'

The more and more Lee digs, the less he can find. He gulps as one selfish memory surfaces. "I caught an extraordinarily powerful Treecko in the Petalburg Woods. I knew about him beforehand and wanted him for how strong he was." Even with Grovyle aware of the full story, admitting it still hurts.

On his belt, Grovyle's ball remains static.

Mable hums to herself. "But you feel guilty about it."

"How did-?!" Lee clams up after accidentally outing himself. Wait. Did he out himself? He's not guilty over that! He's over it!

"It's all over your face, hun." Mable gently replies. "Why would a wonderful trainer like you feel guilty for catching a strong pokemon?" She pauses, and when Lee doesn't answer, she continues. "Do you feel guilty because you feel as if you aren't good enough for your pokemon?"

Lee hisses and opens his mouth to refute her. However, the words refuse to leave the tip of his tongue.

Mable leans back, easing off. "The first lesson men who care too much must learn," she begins slowly, "is to value and forgive themselves. You are your own worst critic, Lee. I can see you tear yourself down even as we talk."

"No, I'm not." He shoots back reflexively. "I do criticize myself, and it's a realistic amount, same as anyone else."

In his lap, Vulpix shifts uncomfortably.

The therapist regards Vulpix, then looks to Lee with open doubt. "You're certain?"

The refute makes doubt begin to slowly take root in Lee. "Yes?"

Mable nods. "Let me put this in a perspective a trainer might appreciate, then. Let's say you and another trainer battle. The other trainer's pokemon follows instructions to the letter, and yours decides not to listen. Because of that, you lose the battle. Who is at fault?"

"The obvious answer is the pokemon, but it's not that simple." Lee crosses his arms. "A trainer has to own up to their pokemon's failings, and the pokemon can't be rightly blamed if trained incorrectly or in a manner that fosters resentment. In this hypothetical, the fault is with me, the trainer."

"But that's not a factor in the case here. Who is at fault?" Mable patiently asks.

'Why else would a pokemon just decide to throw a match?' Lee frowns. 'If they're treated well, trained in a correct and engaging way, and like the trainer, then that wouldn't happen. There would have to be-'

"Right there, pause this exercise." Mable points a finger forward, the action making her bracelet jingle. "You're trying to rationalize the situation to come to a conclusion that doesn't exist, one that lets you take the blame." She puts her hand down. "Let's circle back around for a moment. Do you think you matter?"

"I do." He answers without hesitation

"As much as your friends and pokemon?"

"...Yes." He has to think about it for a split second.

Hazel eyes bore into him with their disapproval. "Lee, was that what you believe, or what you think I want to hear? Be honest with me."

"How could I say that and believe it?" Lee sighs and raises his arms in exasperation. He misses Vulpix's spike of shock. "Here I am in what may as well be a wonderland, doing my childhood dream-job after everything I know got turned into nuclear ash. What did I do to deserve that? I'm not some extraordinary person or a genius, I'm not virtuous, I'm not anything! Shit, I didn't even go say goodbye to my animals one last time when I could, I just stayed huddled on the floor moping and waiting to die! Why didn't my teacher Aasir end up here? He would have been a champion pokemon trainer easily! Damn near anyone from the zoo would do better than I, raise Vulpix and the others better than I! Or my parents? Mom would have settled and livened up a community, and I'm sure dad would have gotten his foot in the door at Devon and made them rivals to Silph in no time with his business tricks alone." Lee's voice grows louder and louder, and he feels his face flush and fists clench when everything bottled up for months simply explodes. "Why me?! That's all I want to know! Why?! Why put me here?! Why bring Vulpix to me?! Why did everyone but me die?! I never wanted to be here!" He's sure his voice is penetrating the walls, but he doesn't care in the slightest. "Fuck!"

Spent and panting, Lee falls heavily back to the couch, not realizing that he stood as he vented his vitriol-laced angst. Tears sting his eyes, and to try and hide them, he drops his face into his hands and plants his elbows on his knees.

'Why? That's all I want to know.' The tears don't stop and his breath hitches, but he forces down a sob that tries to break free, determined to keep some dignity.

He feels a small paw slowly, tentatively touching his leg. Then another. Then Vulpix slowly crawls back into his lap, pressing herself to him as much as she can.

'I want you to be okay.'

The dam breaks.


Lee isn't sure how long he embarrassingly bawled like a child, but when the last of his tears run out, he's just left… tired.

Tired of feeling the way he does.

Tired of the dread always lurking under the surface.

Tired of always emotionally leaning on Vulpix.

Just… tired in general.

"Lee?"

With his eyes irritated and bloodshot, Lee glances up at Mable.

In her hands is a notebook he didn't see earlier, and on her face is a thin, but triumphant smile. "That was a lot to let out. Are you feeling better?"

The zoologist takes a deep breath and clutches the vixen in his lap, who refuses to meet his gaze. Does he feel better?

After months putting it off and moving forward, months of pretending that it didn't happen broken by moments of weakness, finally speaking his thoughts and bringing them into the light for both himself and someone else feels… His chest feels lighter. He breathes a little easier for the first time in what feels like years.

It's good.

"Yeah," Lee croaks, realizing that he's utterly parched. "A bit better."

"I'm glad." The therapist's smile is as genuine as it is wide before it returns to something slightly more somber. "What you're feeling about the matter is called survivor's guilt. You're upset that others died when you lived, and you feel like someone else would have done better in your place, right?"

Lee nods slowly, turning his eyes to the floor.

"Here's the fact of the matter, Lee." Mable's bracelet jingles as she laces her fingers again over top her notebook. "It's okay to mourn. I'd be more worried if you weren't upset, but don't play the 'what if' game with yourself. Do you think your friends would be happy that you lived?"

"Yes," he murmurs.

"And your family?"

"Yes," his voice picks up a bit more strength.

"Do you think they would approve of how you've done so far?" Mable looks down at her notebook.

"I hope so…" Lee inhales through his nose and leans his head back to stare at the sterile white ceiling.

"Then turn that 'I hope so' into a 'certainly' by living your life to the fullest." Mable fingers the wedding band on her left hand in a way that looks almost wistful. Lee watches her stare down at the innocent ring, already guessing the story behind it.

…But the woman looks upon it with content, quiet joy. Nothing in her expression is melancholic or even bittersweet.

"You owe it not just to all of your old friends, but to all your new friends as well to look up and face the day with a smile, a real one. The first step to that," her eyes sparkle with a learned wisdom. "Is to realize that Lee Henson's wants and needs matter just like everyone else's. The last thing any friend wants is their friend beating themselves up and thinking they're worthless."

'Is she right?' Lee wonders, still staring at the ceiling, then to one of the buzzing fluorescent lights. 'I don't… I'm not too hard on myself, am I? Do I have some kind of stupid complex? I don't think I do. Am I hurting everyone by not realizing this?'

'You are.'

With a start, Lee looks down at Vulpix, who is still cuddled to his stomach. In the back of his brain, he can feel a slight tingle from her concentration. 'You are my world. Grovyle's world. Corvisquire's world, Shinx' world. You are priceless. Please realize.'She looks up at him, raising a warm paw and pressing it against his chest.

Lee's eyes become scratchy, and he struggles to not choke up once more. From the vixen, a tidal wave of love pours forth from her mind into him, where it seeps into his body, into his mind, then into something deeper. The love touches something primal, something beyond words, and at once he realizes.

'I do owe it to them.'

"Mable," the therapist perks up when Lee near-silently addresses her. "I don't think I fully understand how to learn all of this, but I'll give it everything I have."

Her smile is utterly radiant. "There is the resolve I knew you had. You're a hardy man, Lee. You've endured great change and terrible tragedy, yet here you are bravely facing your problems. That brave, caring attitude will carry you far in life, you just need to make time for your own care and remember that not everything is your fault, most of all things out of your control. Once you have that well-deserved belief in yourself, then you can stand tall and better address the other issues in your life. We'll work on those as we go." Mable looks up at the clock on the wall. "Goodness, that hour went by quickly. I imagine that you're exhausted and in need of a good pick-me-up. Can I recommend the confection shop down on Fifth Avenue? Their red velvet is to die for!"

Lee notices the clock himself and blinks incredulously when he sees it only two minutes until eleven. 'Was that really an hour?' Outwardly, he swallows through the dryness still plaguing his mouth. "I'll take a look at the place. Are we… going to be meeting again?"

"Yes indeed," Mable nods assuringly. "We'll meet once a week as often as your schedule allows. I know the life of a traveling trainer is a busy one, but Mable Lane does not stop until her patients are ready to face every day with confidence. Here," she reaches inside of her jacket and pulls a business card from a hidden pocket before setting it on the glass table between them. "If you ever need to, you can call me or email me. We're getting through all of this together!"

With a weary smile, Lee takes the card and stuffs it into his pocket. "Yeah, that sounds good. Thank you again for today," he says with an incline of his head. After letting Vulpix take her usual spot on his shoulder, Lee begins to rise but pauses halfway. "Mable? Before I go, I have just one thing I want to run by you…"

"Go right ahead!" She smiles as she stands as well and flips her notebook closed.

"When my Corvisquire evolves, he agreed to fly me down to Littleroot so I can make a little grave for everyone. You know, for some closure." Lee stands and envisions it in his mind. It would be a little out-of-the-way spot on Professor Birch's pasture, where he would plant a small slab inlaid with the names of everyone left behind. "Is that... you know? A good idea?"

"A wonderful one," She smiles. "A very thoughtful one, too. It's good to lay those who are mourned to rest, but don't call it a grave." She waggles a finger. "It's a memorial, one where you remember the good times as well, got it?"

Lee smiles as well, finding hers infectious. "Got it." He opens the meeting room door and holds it for her. "Thank you."

"Any time, Lee. Any time. Bye-bye." She gives him a nod and a little wave as she passes, then she turns and heads deeper into the pokemon center, her high-heels making a click-clack-click as she walks and turns a corner.

Lee and Vulpix watch her go. As they stand there, Lee replays the meeting in his mind and feels himself falter when he remembers one line in particular.

I never wanted to be here!

"Love?" He whispers to Vulpix aloud. "Some of the things I said…"

She cuts him off with an exasperated huff and licks the side of his nose. 'I under*tand.'

The man reaches up and pulls her into a short, but tight one-armed hug.

With a newfound resolve, Lee takes Corvi and Grovyle's balls from his belt and trots back to the front of the pokemon center and into the common area. Off to the side of the main greeting room are a few couches arranged in a U shape, and seated on one of them are Brendon, Zinnia, and Marshtomp, the last of whom has several bandages wrapped around his left arm. When Zinnia looks up from a magazine held in her hands, she smiles and waves at Lee and Vulpix.

"So, how was your supersecret meeting?" Brendan asks as Lee seats himself on the couch opposite of him and Zinnia. "I know we said we would be cool with waiting, but some jerk with a Maractus wanted to talk trash on Water-types, so we battled him real quick."

Marshtomp holds up his injured hand with a pleased croak.

"I take it you won?" Lee smiles.

"Of course!"

"Good to hear." Lee mirrors Brendan's grin, then sobers himself up slightly. "So, that 'supersecret' meeting is something I actually want to talk to everyone about." He expands Grovyle and Corvi's pokeballs, one in each hand, and pops both open. In twin flashes of white light, the lizard and crow pokemon appear before the group. "I take it both of you were listening in?"

Grovyle nods and places a scaly paw on Lee's knee. Corvisquire merely rolls his eyes, the unspoken 'duh' obvious.

"Seems like something awful serious, Dolittle," Zinnia closes her magazine, some sort of gossip rag with Claire Blackthorne front and center, and tosses it aside. She levels Lee with a serious look twinged with nervousness. "You don't have to tell us if you don't want to."

"For my own sake, I really should," Lee's words seem to surprise both of his friends. "This meeting wasn't anything crazy like secret research or elite cabal nonsense. Today was…" He steels himself and looks to Vulpix, who gives him a small, vulpine smile filled with encouragement. 'Zinnia is sharp enough to suspect what's going on, and Brendan is plenty mature enough to handle the news.' Lee closes his eyes and forces the words out. "Today was a session with a therapist, probably the first of many."

Brendan blinks as if he doesn't understand. "A therapist?"

Beside the boy, Marshtomp looks between Lee, his Pokémon, then back to Lee, focusing on the scars on the man's face. After two cycles, understanding dawns in his beady eyes.

Zinnia says nothing, merely letting her mouth thin into a straight line.

"Yeah," Lee opens his eyes and nods absently. "I won't bore you with the details, but…" He glances around, finding no one within earshot. The chatter of a large group by the reception desk drowns out nearly everything else. "My home? It's gone."

"Gone?" Zinnia asks sharply, her eyes narrowing. "Do you mean..?"

"Gone. Completely burned to the ground. As far as I know, I'm the only survivor. I don't know who did it, or why, but I do know that the superweapons used means going back is pointless." The explanation is short and not so sweet, but he distances himself from the memories and gets it out with a grimace. "It's where the burns on my face came from. When I wandered into Littleroot and met you, Brendan, that was right after I came to in the middle of nowhere and met Vulpix."

The boy leans back, expression slightly dazed. "Oh jeez, Lee…"

Zinnia looks away. In her clenched hand, her cloak is balled up.

"She said I've got PTSD and survivor's guilt." He pushes above the feelings of embarrassment to admit it. "I'm not saying everything, but those details are a conversation for another time." The zoologist pulls at the collar of his shirt, just now realizing how much sweat is soaked into his undershirt with some exasperation. "About what I talked to that therapist about today; do I seem overly critical of myself to you two?"

"I mean, yeah, kinda." Brendan seems uncomfortable, seemingly unsure where to keep his hands, so he fidgets. "Sometimes you seem like you get upset out of nowhere, and after that battle with that guy Tyson…" The Birch heir trails off.

Zinnia, however, is much blunter. "Yes. A hundred-times yes," she crosses her arms. "Do you want my opinion?"

Lee reluctantly nods.

"Kiddo is right on the money. Whenever I see that statue-like mug of yours shift without anything going on, you go from thoughtful, to upset, to resigned. You do it all the time and I know it's because you're criticizing yourself, probably too hard." Zinnia's words form a crude mirror of Mable's observations. "Seriously, you take things too harshly. You're a good trainer and a decent guy, so why bash yourself?"

Lee looks down at Grovyle and Corvisquire, silently asking for their input.

The Grass-type reluctantly nods while Corvi caws out a careless agreement.

"Okay…" Lee bites his lip. 'Is it really so obvious?' He considers his next question. "Does it upset you that I think like that?"

Zinnia's narrow-eyed, dropped jaw expression can easily be summarized as 'are you serious?'.

Brendan is much more explosive "Of course!" The boy almost jumps to his feet in his outrage. "I haven't said anything because after Slateport… I figured…" He deflates. "I didn't want to get yelled at…" He says in a small voice.

"Good fucking god, Lee, way to-" Lee forcefully cuts off his self-deprecative muttering and clears his throat. "Okay! Look, that stops here. I hate to ask you guys for help, but I think I have to. Whenever any of you-" he quickly sweeps his eyes over Brendan, Zinnia, Corvi, Grovyle, and Vulpix – "think that I'm having a pity party, please tell me to suck it up and get over it. I'm going to do my best to do it on my own because that's what the therapist said I need to do as a first step to getting better, but I might need help if I slip. Is that okay?"

Zinnia openly grins. "Wow, you're actually asking for help rather than stubbornly doing it on your own. Well, you weren't going to get rid of me either way, Dolittle, so count me in!" She then quietly adds; "If you feel like it, you can talk to us about whatever you want. You don't have to carry burdens like that by yourself. Right, kiddo?"

"Never!" Brendan grins and stands with renewed vigor. "We've got your back a hundred-and-ten percent! It's what friends do!"

Lee smiles, feeling his chest swell. "That…" He snorts then throws his head back in an open laugh. "That's so corny, but I don't think I could have it any other way. Thank you two."


As the trio of trainers debate where to go for an early lunch, a debate where Lee voices his choice just as much as the other two, Vulpix looks down from her trainer's shoulder to her pair of teammates.

Grovyle smirks and crosses his arms. To any who know him, they would notice how pleased he is.

Corvisquire just harumphs and turns away, but it lacks his usual spiteful bite.

Vulpix herself smiles and breathes out a quiet sigh. With the exhale, a weight seems to lift from her shoulders.

Her human is finally walking the road to recovery.
 
Act 1: Chapter 26
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Gazing at his own concentrated face in the bathroom mirror of his and Brendan's hotel room, Lee drags his razor up his neck and through the last line of shaving gel on his face. He runs his thumb through the now-smooth spot as he rinses his razor in the running faucet, smiling as he does so.

It's been a few days since his first session with Mable, and he's been feeling… good. Lighter. Just, happier in general. Getting everything off his chest and letting Brendan and Zinnia in on how he's truly feeling takes just a bit off his shoulders. The days have been spent training in preparation for the battle with Wattson, while the evening hours have been spent with his pokemon simply relaxing or enjoying exploring Mauville with Brendan and Zinnia.

In regards to training, Vulpix effortlessly learned Flamethrower from Zinnia's Shelgon after watching closely, though her efforts to learn Iron Tail have been… less than fruitful, to put it nicely. Grovyle's first custom move is now in the works, being a modification of Bullet Seed that instead fires a wide shotgun blast. Once more, Grovyle's savantesque battle abilities showed themselves. After only a few days, their efforts to deconstruct Bullet Seed and rebuild it with a higher projectile count are already showing results. Meanwhile, Corvisquire has been busy mastering Pursuers with an almost concerning fervor between bouts of physical training.

'Today is going to be a full one,' Lee muses as runs his hands under the faucet and scrubs his face clean. More than once he has to pause to wipe the steam from his recent shower off of the mirror. 'Corvisquire's physical, Brendan's match with Wattson, my match with Wattson, a trip to the Mauville mall, and a proof of concept meeting with that Silph rep. Jeez.'

His time since learning just how TMs were created wasn't spent idle. After a few nights of research, he made a phone-call to the Silph branch in Mauville to pitch a potential run of powerful and custom moves copied to TMs. Initially, the rep on the phone wasn't interested, forcing Lee to reluctantly wave his clout as a Lab Trainer around, enticing the rep into arranging a demo. If all goes well, Silph Co will hold a spot for him and sell copies of his team's moves once he has something exciting to copy.

Vulpix's Convergence and Corvi's Pursuers were off the table, but that doesn't mean he can't use them as examples.

Lee looks at the left side of his face in the mirror, rubbing a finger over the smooth burn scars. If there was any silver lining to them, then it'd be the less time spent shaving. He traces the one cutting from his hairline through part of his eyebrow and eyelid, then the one from his temple to the corner of his mouth, thanking his lucky stars that he wasn't blinded.

Stowing his razor in the open toiletry bag on the corner of the sink, Lee looks down to make sure he's presentable, finding that his jeans and black undershirt haven't vanished, then tosses the bathroom door open, letting the steamy air escape into the cool hotel room.

As he steps out, Grovyle and Corvisquire, who stand by the window quietly conversing, pause to look at their trainer.

Up on Lee's bed, Shinx is too busy playing with Vulpix to acknowledge Lee. The kitten hunkers low, wiggling her rear and kneading the covers with her claws as she keeps her large yellow eyes on the fox just a few feet away.

Vulpix stands still, waiting for Shinx to strike with a patience that the kitten simply can't match. Her aloof, unruffled appearance invites a challenge. She even raises a leg to scratch her ear in open dismissal.

Shinx tenses, then leaps across the bed in one bound, tackling Vulpix and sending both tumbling in a tangle of limbs. With flailing paws and gnashing teeth, the two scuffle for only a moment before Vulpix gets the upper hand and positions herself over Shinx. Shinx makes the mistake of trying to flail and worm away when Vulpix pins the kitten's lower body with a straddle, so when she exposes her neck, Vulpix dives in.

The Electric-type freezes as Vulpix's teeth just barely touch the fur of her throat. "Merow?"

The vixen holds her stance for a moment, then releases Shinx, letting the kitten scramble to her paws and get ready to pounce again.

As silently as he can, Lee creeps up to the bed and lays his hand across Shinx' back, making her jump and zap his hand with a few static-like pops. She looks over her shoulder and arches her back into his hand as her trainer gently scratches her, purring lovingly all the while.

"Having fun?" He smiles when Shinx answers by standing on her tippy-toes to get more contact with his hand. "Ach! I've only had you for two and a half weeks and already you're getting so big. You used to fit in my hands when I put them together." He turns his gaze to Vulpix. "Thanks for playing with her, love. I know you're not normally one for roughhousing."

Vulpix shakes her head and smiles. 'I've n* issu*s pl*ying *ith Shinx. A gro*ing cub needs sti*ul*tion, aft*r all.' She says. '*ou're t*king Corvi**ire fo* his physica*?'

Lee nods as he takes his jacket from its place hanging off the bed and shrugs it on, then he glances over to the raven pokemon, who stiffens. "Ready, Corvi?"

With palpable reluctance and a grimace so intense that Lee fears Corvisquire might crack his beak, the bird pokemon nods his head.

"Hold down the fort, m'kay?" Lee nods to Vulpix and beckons to Corvisquire with his hand as he shoulders his backpack. "Let's head on out."

Corvisquire hesitates for a split second, then bounds along after Lee.

Together, they leave the hotel room and take a silent elevator ride down to the lobby, then scoot past the groups of people and pokemon checking in and out. From there, they take a straight path from the city proper out to an outskirts training field that looks to have seen better days, avoiding distractions all the while. The walk is silent, almost uncomfortably so. Corvisquire doesn't even take the time to look around condescendingly or sneer at anyone they pass. When they find themselves in a small, sun-lit training field overrun by foliage, they both stop.

"Looks like as good a place as any, yeah?" Lee smiles down at Corvisquire. "Do you want-"

Corvisquire spreads his wings and lifts off with one single flap, quickly taking to the air and vanishing over the treeline.

"-to set up here?" Lee blinks. "What? Is he checking the area? It looked plenty-abandoned."

Lee leans his back against a tree and taps his foot, waiting for Corvisquire to return. 'I guess that makes sense. He's been real cagey about his physical. Whatever he has to hide must be big.' Lee frowns in worry. 'I hope he's alright…'

One minute turns into five, and five turns into fifteen. The zoologist checks his phone to see the time nervously. 'Corvi? How far are you checking?'

Fifteen minutes turns into thirty, so he sits down and rests his back against the trunk of the tree behind him. An hour passes, then two. Lee's phone rings, but he dismisses the call without looking, not wanting to spook Corvisquire.

At the three-hour mark, his phone is ringing so incessantly that he finally looks, finding Zinnia's number flashing on the screen. Reluctantly, he answers and holds the phone up to his ear. "Hello?"

"Lee, where are you?" Is her first terse question. In the background he can hear the dull roar of people packed in a tight space. "Brendan and I came back to your hotel room and didn't find you. Brendan is battling Wattson now and your match is right after! If you don't show up, then you'll get skipped! Where are you?"

"I'm out in the woods waiting for… waiting for…" Lee grits his teeth as the unpleasant reality sets in. "Corvisquire ran away."

"What?"

"Corvisquire ran away!" He almost yells. Betrayal crushes the light feeling in his chest, simply leaving him frustrated. "He wanted his physical to be away from prying eyes, and when we got out to the middle of nowhere, he took off! I've been waiting for three hours!"

Zinnia is quiet for a moment. "Shit, Lee. I…" She sighs. "Look, I can't say a cynical part of me didn't kind-of expect this, because that bird was trouble from day one. Sometimes it doesn't matter how well you treat a pokemon, they're ungrateful. They're just as flawed as people, you know."

"That's not-!" Lee stops himself short of a tirade and takes a deep breath. He stands and begins to pace. 'I know Corvi. Whatever secret he must have must be terrifying for him to share. I know that feeling well. He'll come back.' Even with the rationalization, doubt still digs its fingers into him. "He'll come back. I know it. I have faith in him…" Lee clenches his hand into a tight fist.

Zinnia sighs. "And that's fine, but circling back around to the other issue at hand here. Your match is soon and unless you want to wait around for…" Lee hears her pull her phone away from her face and tap a few buttons. "...Eight days for a rematch, then you need to get over here. I brought your pokemon with me."

Lee looks up at the sky, hoping to see a blue and black shape overhead, but he finds nothing to his dismay. "I'm on my way…"

Slowly, he trudges his way from the training field back to Mauville proper. Several times he looks back to the field, and then up to the sky, but Corvisquire is nowhere to be found. 'He'll be back.'

Deep in his heart, Lee knows this was always a possibility, but what possessed Corvisquire to flee like that? Fear of the physical? Fear of Lee discovering something during the physical? Was this all premeditated? What could it be? All the bird had to do was ask to be freed, and no matter how reluctant Lee felt, he would oblige. Confusion and hurt swirl inside him as he passes people on the street heading towards the Gym. He looks up at the Mauville Gym as it comes into view.

The building is the same standardized Gym design as the Rustboro and Dewford Gyms, being a high-walled and likely reinforced dome. He doesn't give it much more thought and pushes open the doors, walking into the reception area. Just as he walks in, he can hear a buzzer in the arena rattle the walls.

"Manectric is down! Brendan Birch and Marshtomp did it! The Challenger is the winner!" The muffled voice of the announcer rolls through the walls, followed by thunderous applause.

Despite the day so far, Lee smiles, happy that Brendan pulled a win and earned his 3rd badge.

At the front desk are two receptionists, one a teenage girl, and the other a scraggly teen boy sending shy looks to his co-worker. The girl perks up and stows her phone away as Lee approaches. "Hello, sir!" She greets politely. "Are you here as a spectator or a challenger?"

"Challenger," Lee says absentmindedly, still pondering over the situation with Corvisquire. "Lee Henson is the name. I should be next. I just need to get my pokemon from a friend watching the last match."

The receptionist nods and looks down at her computer screen before smiling. "Sure thing! The arena will be letting out for clean-up here shortly, so just hang tight for your match!"

With a nod, Lee turns and finds a seat in one of the chairs along the wall, silently mulling. He gives the psychic thread to Vulpix a tug, only to find it muted behind the walls of her pokeball.

'What could Corvi have to hide?' Lee rubs one of his eyes with the heel of his hand. 'He's an ornery thing, and probably had a previous trainer, I know that. He's proud, too. I've never seen him strike someone who won't fight back no matter how pissed he is, and never has he shied away from a challenge. I've given him ample opportunity to run away before, so why now? Was it… something I did? Or did the thought of the physical really spook him that much?' Lee looks up and out at the window towards the clear blue sky. 'Corvi…'

Over the next few minutes, the arena spectators file out from the large double doors against the back wall leading to the battlefield, all of them chattering excitedly about Brendan's match. A Mudkip in the arms of a little girl still looks utterly enthralled by what he's seen, meaning Marshtomp likely gained a new fan.

Finally, Brendan and Zinnia walk out. On Brendan's face is a megawatt grin, one wholly justified by the Dynamo Badge he's rolling between his fingers. They're stopped once or twice by people from the crowd offering congratulations or wanting pictures with the Birch heir, but they make their way to Lee as soon as they spot him.

"Lee, you missed it!" Brendan groans. "That was one of the closest matches we've ever had! Wattson doesn't mess around. You figure a guy who has like, three jobs wouldn't have time to train his pokemon, but his Manectric nearly smoked Marshtomp even with a bad type match-up!" The boy rubs his eyes. "If I ever see the move Flash again, it'll be too soon."

"Yeah, sorry about that," Lee runs a hand through his hair, silently noting that he's due for a cut. "I took Corvi out for his physical this morning and… he ran away."

"Wha?" Brendan blinks. "He ran away? Why?"

"That's a question I'm still asking myself," Lee leans back and stares up at the ceiling, hurt and confusion still twisting around in his gut. "I don't know. We got to the field, I asked if he was ready, and he flew away. Zinnia, you said you have my pokemon?"

Wordlessly, she reaches into her bag and withdraws three shrunken pokeballs and drops them into Lee's waiting hand.

He clips Shinx' ball back into his belt and enlarges Vulpix' and Grovyle's balls before popping both open. With the usual flash of light, the fox and the gecko take form in front of him.

Vulpix immediately reaches her mind out to his like she usually does after an absence, and Lee feeds her everything. Her eyes widen in shock, then narrow in the same cold fury that she previously reserved only for Zinnia.

Grovyle looks at Vulpix with some alarm, not even needing words to feel the hostility rolling off of her.

"Love, calm down," Lee reaches a hand out and runs it through the tuft on Vulpix's head, pausing her dark thoughts. "I'm sure he had some reason… And who knows? Maybe it was just never meant to be." Admitting such a thing stings Lee's pride as a trainer and makes him feel foolish for pouring his heart out to the corvid pokemon. He looks over to Grovyle, who looks between them with confusion. "Corvisquire ran away, Grovyle. I'm not sure that he's coming back."

The wood gecko at first appears befuddled, but then he hisses as his face twists itself to a hateful mask. He clenches his fists, tightens his jaw around his twig, and the leaves along his wrists hum dangerously, glowing just the slightest green.

Lee rests his other hand on Grovyle's head like he does Vulpix when he sees a few of the people milling about in the Gym reception room eye Grovyle nervously. "Easy, Grovyle," Lee murmurs. "No need for that."

With obvious reluctance, Grovyle takes a deep breath and crosses his arms, letting the half-realized Leaf Blade power down. His face still retains a stormy expression, however.

Vulpix looks up at Zinnia expectantly, as if waiting for something.

"What's with the look?" Zinnia frowns down at the fox. "No, I'm not going to dress Lee down when this clearly wasn't his fault. Stop it!"

The vixen sniffs and turns her head away.

"You're not taking this as something that's your fault, right?" Brendan asks Lee unsurely. He rubs the face of his new badge with his thumb. "I knew Corvisquire was a grump, but maybe it went even deeper than that? I don't see how he could be upset with you."

Lee says nothing for a moment, gathering his thoughts. "I… No, you're right." He shifts in his chair, suddenly uncomfortable. "I treated him as well as I could. If this is how it ends, then I suppose there's nothing else to be said." The words are bitter on his tongue, and part of him still wants Corvisquire to return, but he stands up and smoothes the wrinkles in his jacket in a half-hearted distraction. "I hope he'll come back."

By now, a new crowd is beginning to flow in from the front door and into the spectator seating for the next match. The receptionist who greeted Lee waves him over as her partner, the scraggly boy, frantically checks and scans the tickets of everyone else.

"Let's take it from the top, okay?" Lee tells his diminished team. He briefly reaches into his bag, pulling out the neckerchief with Grovyle's Miracle Seed sewn into it and passes it to the reptile pokemon, who ties it around his neck. After, Lee raises Grovyle's ball in his hand. "Ready?"

Both Vulpix and Grovyle nod, but before he can recall the wood gecko, Vulpix asks him a question laced with worry. 'Are y*u okay?'

He smiles. "Fine," he lies. "Return."

Grovyle dissolves into red light and is pulled back into his ball. Vulpix, meanwhile, hops onto his shoulders. From her, Lee is fed worry for himself between the waves of borderline hate aimed at Corvisquire for his betrayal.

With such an intimate view into Vulpix's mind, he knows she's barely stopped to ponder why her once-teammate fled. To her, it's something that can't and won't be forgiven anyway, so it's little use to dwell upon it.

'Please just hold your judgment, love,' he urges. 'We don't know everything. Maybe he'll come back and explain.'

Vulpix huffs. No words are needed to relay her doubt, but she dials back on her open contempt regardless.

"Good luck, Lee!" Brendan grins. "Wattson usually opens with a Magnemite or a Magneton, so be ready!"

"Don't think too hard about everything, Dolittle," Zinnia smiles and pats his arm, giving it a short squeeze before letting go. "Whip some ass. The kid and I will be rooting for you all."

Lee returns their well-wishes with a small smile of his own. "Thanks you two."

The Birch heir and the dragon tamer both get in line to get seats while Lee and Vulpix follow the receptionist.

The Gym receptionist quickly takes them back into the holding room between the reception area and the arena. The little room is barren other than a watercooler, a chair, and a table where several lapel microphones sit charging on docks.

"Here you are!" The cheery girl takes one of the mics and hands it to Lee. "Do you need any help?"

"I think I've got it, thanks," Lee dryly replies, clipping the mic to the collar of his shirt and stuffing the receiver in his pocket. He fingers the wire running between them. "Wattson is a busy guy, yeah?"

The girl nods, making her curly hair bounce. "Yep."

"You know if he's got an email or some time to talk? I've got a prematurely born Shinx, and some expert insight on Electric-types would be nice."

"A Shinx?!" The girl's eyes light up. "Oh! Do you have any pictures? I've always wanted a Shinx!" She freezes, then lets out a nervous laugh. "S-Sorry, that's not very professional of me, is it? I can get you one of Mister Wattson's cards if you like."

Lee smiles in amusement and pulls his phone from his pocket. "I've got a few pictures." The small talk doesn't do much for his nerves, but yet another distraction is welcome. "Here, if you'd like to look, I don't mind."

The zoologist lets the girl gush over how tiny and adorable Shinx is for several minutes until the PA system in the arena crackles. "The next match is another heavy-hitter, everyone! Today, Wattson will battle rising star Lee Henson, Professor Birch's other Lab Trainer!"

The roar of the crowd passes through the wall easily.

"Henson has won over Rustboro's Roxanne and Dewford's Brawly going all out, can he keep it going with Wattson? Only one way to find out! Please give a warm welcome to Lee Henson!"

"That's our cue," Lee says, locking his phone and dropping it in his pocket.

"Good luck, Mister Henson!" The receptionist girl cheers before leaving to return back to her post.

With a sigh to stay his nerves, Lee pushes the double doors to the arena open and steps out.

The crowd cheers and applauds as he steps up to the trainer box at the edge of the rectangular arena. Across the way stands Wattson, the Gym Leader.

The man is in his older years, with a balding head and a full beard of white. Under the beard is a wide smile, and his eyes are framed by laugh-lines. His rotund form is covered by a yellow jumpsuit, the top half of which is covered with a brown jacket.

"So, you're Lee Henson?" Wattson asks, his voice carrying over the loudspeakers. "Hahaha! Another big up-and-comer here to challenge me, and so soon!" He grasps his belly as he laughs. "Ah! There's that Vulpix who is already putting Fire-types three times her size to shame! This is going to be an electrifying battle!"

"You know of her?" Lee asks as he steps into the center of the marked-off trainer box, his own voice echoing over the crowd. On his shoulder, he can feel Vulpix's surprise at being called out.

"Of course I do, son!" Wattson's smile becomes knowing. "We Gym Leaders talk, you know! You and young Brendan were the first ones on our radar!"

The people watching Ohh and Ahh over the unexpected revelation, but Lee forces himself to not focus on them, delegating the crowd to just be background noise.

"Really?" Lee mulls. "Interesting."

The referee standing off to the side of the battleground, a man wearing the classic black and white striped referee uniform, finally steps up and clears his throat, silencing everyone. "This official Gym challenge is between challenger Lee Henson from Littleroot and Gym Leader Wattson of Mauville." He begins, gesturing to each trainer as he introduces them. "This match will be a two-on-two single battle, and only the challenger may substitute. This match will be over when all pokemon on one side are unable to continue. Trainers!" He looks between Lee and Wattson. "Select your first pokemon!"

Lee grasps Grovyle's ball and enlarges it as Wattson reaches in his jacket and withdraws a worn Great Ball.

"Your friend Brendan eked a win out over my longtime partner, Manetric." Wattson comments with an approving nod. "I wanted him to battle you, but my poor boy is just a little too banged up. Luckily, his wife is just as good!" Wattson draws his hand back and tosses the blue pokeball in his hand. "Let's show 'em, Jolteon!"

The Great Ball bursts open, dumping a mass of light on the ground that quickly takes a spiky shape. As the light fades, it leaves behind a blinking Jolteon.

Jolteon, one of the many forms of Eevee, scents the air and shakes herself with a curious Murr? Her yellow fur and the white tuft circling her neck stand up in long spikes that crackle with an electric charge. Her black eyes shine with experience that she gazes upon Lee with no wariness, yet no dismissal.

'Jolteon, one of the fastest pokemon in the world. Our only saving grace here is how frail they are. Grovyle should be able to put her down with just a few solid attacks.' Lee licks his lips and whips his own pokeball up into the air without any announcement.

High up, the ball pops open and releases Grovyle, who lands in a crouch in the arena. He stands in one smooth motion and crosses his arms, locking eyes with Jolteon.

The barriers around the arena shimmer to life, locking the pair of pokemon in.

"First match! Jolteon versus Grovyle," the ref raises his arm and chops down. "Begin!"

"Quick Attack!/Quick Attack!" Both Lee and Wattson call at the same time.

Both pokemon become blurs instantly, crashing into each other in the center of the arena only to bound away and re-engage a split second later in another part of the battleground, creating a staccato of thuds and whacks. It takes only a second, and Lee barely sees it, but Jolteon moves just a bit faster and slams her head into Grovyle's stomach, driving the breath from his lungs and forcing him to jump back to Lee's side of the field. He grimaces and clutches his stomach.

"Pin Missile, Joltie!" Wattson presses the advantage.

The spikes of fur on Jolteon glow a brilliant white, then she crouches low and shakes herself. A split second later, a barrage of needles shoot out of her spiky coat, each one whistling as it cuts through the air in homes and on Grovyle with agonizing intent.

"Detect!" Lee orders, already feeling himself beginning to sweat. "Leaf Blade to deflect the rest!"

Grovyle's eyes shine yellow, and like a dancer he weaves around the white needles intent on turning him into a pincushion. He ducks, dips, dives, and contorts his body into shapes that would break the limbs of a lesser pokemon. His wrist leaves hum and grow rigid, then he starts slicing through every needle heading his way with supernatural precision as Detect slowly begins to fail. His eyes twitch, desperate to blink, but he resists the urge lest he lose Detect entirely.

Jolteon's eyes narrow in concentration as she continues the seemingly endless tide of needles. Before Grovyle's Detect and Leaf Blade can run dry, the glow in her fur fades.

"Bullet Seed!" Lee orders as soon as he sees the last needle shatter against Leaf Blade.

Grovyle's mouth opens, and out comes a volley of near super-sonic seeds that scream towards Jolteon.

The Electric-type needs no order to dodge, instantly moving and dodging around the shots with furious footwork. She jukes left and right, stopping on a dime and redirecting herself every time Grovyle's aim catches up and begins leading the shots again.

"Not bad at all!" Wattson laughs and cheers. "Okay, Joltie. Let's get serious!"

'Well fuck.'

"Shock Wave!"

Jolteon's fur crackles once more, showering the area around her in sparks. Then with a cry, a lightning bolt as thick as a man's wrist jumps from the electrified aura around her body and strikes Grovyle instantly, making the gecko cringe as the volts run through his body. Unlike the odd, physics-defying lightning of other pokemon moves, Shock Wave is quite literally instant, hitting Grovyle before Lee or himself could think of retaliating.

"Give 'em the old hit-n-run!" Wattson pumps his fist.

If Jolteon was fast before, then she's easily twice as quick now, jumping all over the arena as a blur of yellow so fast that her features all simply meld together. She stays in a single spot for just a scant second each time, just long enough to fire another Shock Wave with a growling cry and practically teleport to a new angle.

It's all Grovyle can do to shield his head with his arms and grit his teeth each time he's zapped. The bolts are by no means weak, and the damage is rapidly adding up even with his Grass typing cutting the damage from the Electric attacks.

'Fuck! Jolteon must be even faster than Andre's Absol!' Lee grits his own teeth right along with his pokemon just remembering the monster of a pokemon. "Use… Use Feint Attack! Move!"

A sickly aura of purple-black diffuses from between Grovyle's electric burn-spattered scales, then he simply vanishes from view. A second later, a Shock Wave scorches the ground where he was standing.

"Huh? Feint Attack? I didn't realize that a Grovyle could learn that." Wattson hums. "Stay wary, Joltie. Oh! And don't let him touch you!"

Jolteon bounces lightly on her paws, keeping her head on a swivel and turning her ears every which way, waiting for Grovyle to reappear. All the while, she keeps her coat circulating with electricity, making little arks rise up between the points of her spikes.

'He should be close enough… Please work.' Lee breathes out a tense sigh. "Seed Blast!"

Just several arms lengths away, Grovyle reappears on Jolteon's right with his mouth wide open. His throat bulges as his mouth glows a yellow-green, then with the thunderous report of a shotgun, he shoots a wide net of seeds like buckshot.

Jolteon's eyes widen and she's in motion before the first seeds are even fired, but the sheer wall of projectiles means that a number of them still clip her leg, one even lodging itself in her flank and drawing blood. She springs away, but lands awkwardly and keeps her weight off of her wounded side.

'Nice!' Lee grins as the match finally begins to turn around. 'Good luck running circles around us with a lame leg.'

"Uh oh…" Worry crosses Wattson's aged features. "Looks like we can't dally. Joltie! Agility!"

Jolteon sways on her paws, a pink haze materializing from nowhere and sinking into her skin.

"Grovyle, Qui-!"

"Baton Pass, Joltie!"

"-ck Attack!"

Grovyle flies forward like a meteor wreathed in an aura of white, but before he can reach Jolteon, she's sucked back into her pokeball through the barrier. At the same time, another pokeball in Wattson's jacket levitates on its own and pops open, once again completely bypassing the battlefield barrier to drop another pokemon into the exact spot where Jolteon was.

Thwack!

Grovyle recoils and clutches his bleeding skull when he runs face-first into a levitating Magneton. He wipes away the blood running down into his eye and hisses as he gazes up at his opponent.

The new pokemon in Jolteon's place is far more object than animal, being three steel balls seemingly welded together in a triangle pattern. Each 'body' sports a single large eye, two phillips head screws protruding without a visible hole except for the top body, which has an additional screw on the top of its head. Most notably are the two U shaped magnets on each body, which twist and turn as the pokemon hovers.

Occupying the same spot where Jolteon once was, Magneton soaks up the remaining pink residue of Agility in the air. The pokemon buzzes and hums threateningly, jittering from the sudden speed boost.

Suddenly, things seem to have taken a turn for the worst.

"Is that even legal?" Lee questions, looking at the ref. "That doesn't count as a substitution?"

The man simply nods. "Baton Pass is a legal move in the Hoenn Gym Circuit. It does not violate bans on substitutions."

"Hoho! Let's see how you get out of this one!" Wattson chortles. "Magneton! Take Down!"

The Steel and Electric-type shudders in place, then zips at Grovyle with devilish speed, aimed to crash into him like a speeding train.

"Detect!" Lee quickly orders, mentally telling himself to not panic. "Move!"

Grovyle's eyes shine, and he ducks just in time, letting Magneton sail overhead and crash into the ground, throwing up a plume of dirt and dust.

"Get 'em again, Magneton!" Wattson calls. "Slow 'em down with Metal Sound if you have to!"

Magneton shoots up out of the cloud of dust and hovers ominously over the battlefield. It convulses, seemingly trying to pull the different units of his body apart, then from the pokemon comes a positively ear rending sound akin to metal being twisted.

Lee grimaces and covers Vulpix's ears for her, making her relay a grateful flash of emotion even as her eyes twitch from the god-awful noise.

Grovyle clutches his ears, but refuses to open his mouth in a scream that would go unheard anyway. His eyes glow again as Magneton rockets down at him, but he blinks as blood seeps from the gash in his head and runs down into his eyes once more.

Magneton smashes into Grovyle like a runaway truck, and even with the slight ringing in his ears, Lee hears the telltale crunch of shattered bones.

The gecko pokemon flops along the ground like a ragdoll, before coming to a stop on the ground, unmoving. He coughs, staining the dirt under his mouth red.

Off to the side of the field, the referee shakes his head and waves an arm before the buzzer overhead sounds. "Grovyle is unable to battle. Wattson and Magneton are the winners of round one!"

The crowd erupts into cheers. In the nosebleed section of the right side, Lee can see the shocked faces of Brendan and Zinnia. The tribeswoman realizes that Lee is looking at them rather quickly and elbows Brendan, forcing the boy to school his face into one of encouragement.

Lee quickly holds Grovyle's ball out and shoots the return beam in the instant the barrier around the field goes down. In a flash of red, his pokemon is returned to the safety of his ball. The last son of Earth clenches his eyes shut in directionless irritation, easing only when Vulpix noses his cheek with a quiet, encouraging murmur.

"Phew!" The old Gym Leader wipes his forehead with the back of his hand. "We really had to pull out some tricks there. You and your pokemon are really something, Lee!"

The praise eases some of the sting of the loss, but only some. "Thank you," Lee mutters. He rases Grovyle's ball to his mouth, quietly whispering; "And thank you, Grovyle. I'm proud of you for giving your all." He replaces the ball on his belt.

"Challenger Lee, please select the second and final pokemon from your team!" The referee calls.

'I've only got one to pick…' Lee thinks to himself. "Alrighty, love. Time to take names." He points his arm out and lets Vulpix springboard herself from it and into the arena. Once her paws touch the packed dirt floor, the protective barriers rise again behind her.

The vixen eyeballs the floating Magneton with open hostility, eager to burn off the frustration from the vexing day.

'We're going to need to go hard and fast,' Lee sends his thoughts to Vulpix. 'Magneton is still completely undamaged, and although hurt, Jolteon is still ambulatory and thus dangerous. We're going to attack, use every dirty trick we can, and only sneak in status moves when we can, all right?'

Vulpix physically nods, flaring her tails and lowering herself into a ready stance. The sunlight pouring through the windows begins to intensify, growing into angry rays that heat the arena up with Fire energy.

Lee feels a tickle in his head and behind his eyes. After a second to focus, he widens his end of their connection, letting their senses overlap. The nausea and slowly growing ache in his skull from processing a body and a half worth of input is ignored, tempered by an angry sort of determination that both man and pokemon share.

"Match two, Vulpix versus Magneton!" The ref chops his hand down again. "Begin!"

'Flamethrower.'

A gout of flame bursts from Vulpix's lips before Wattson can even complete the first syllable of his order. Even rocking a speed high from Jolteon's Agility, the Flamethrower is just too sudden to avoid for Magneton, who screeches and instinctually swerves away when the fire.

"Whoa, nelly!" Wattson exclaims, his eyes widening. "Magneton, use-"

'Flamethrower again.'

Vulpix breathes in, and out comes fire fueled by fury.

Another Flamethrower with zero warning engulfs Magneton, who once again zips out of the way, only to let out another metallic screech as the fire instead bends sharply at Vulpix's will to follow.

"Magneton! Listen to my voice! Use Sonic Boom and blow the fire out!" Wattson's voice begins to grow dire as genuine confusion and distress blooms in his face.

For a moment, Lee falters, feeling as if this is cheating. A mental tug from Vulpix pulls him back into focus.

'The poi*t of the*e Gym batt*es is to overc*me them w*th whatever r*sources we h*ve. We're being t*sted.' Vulpix sends to him. With their minds so close that the border between man and pokemon is beginning to become blurred, her 'voice' is crisp and audible. 'If Baton Pass i*n't cheating, th*n our bond isn't che*ting eit*er.'

'Maybe you're right…' Lee steels himself and pours his focus back into the battle. 'Fine then. Sorry, Magneton, but we're taking that badge.'

Magneton shivers, and for a split second his body pulls itself into three pieces before the magnetism between them pulls them back together. The reunion of the three bodies is so violent that a shockwave of air rockets towards the snaking flame still pursuing Magneton.

Vulpix and Lee both grasp the flames as one, and together split it into six separate streams that scatter around the Sonic Boom attack, which misses entirely and hits the ground with a violent bang.

The broken Flamethrower then reforms into a pillar of burning orange that engulfs Magneton once more.

After taking three super-effective attacks in a row and now glowing a dangerous, superheated red, Magneton warbles and falls to the ground with a loud clatter, it's eyes becoming unfocused and it's magnets going limp.

Wattson doesn't seem to believe what he's seeing and runs a hand along his mostly bald head.

The referee seems unsure of what to do after witnessing the stomp of a battle, but eventually he clears his throat and raises his arm, making the buzzer overhead sound for the second time in the battle. "Magneton is unable to battle! Vulpix and Lee are the winners of round two!"

The onlookers go ballistic.

People give standing ovations, and more than one cell phone is raised and taking pictures. High up in the stands, Brendan is one of the most enthusiastic, standing with both arms raised and yelling even if his voice is drowned out.

The battlefield barrier goes down, and Wattson absently recalls his cooling and unconscious Magneton. "Well," he works his jaw, seemingly trying to find words as he puts the ball away and pulls Jolteon's ball out again. "Those are some new tricks if I've ever seen any. And that anger you've got on your face! Sorry if I struck a nerve, but the last thing I want to do is make this as easy as falling off a log. I've got a duty as Gym Leader to make sure that youngsters who take up the mantle of pokemon trainer end up strong."

Lee sighs and rubs the bridge of his nose with a thumb and forefinger, feeling the headache from delving so deep into Vulpix's psyche slowly grow worse. "It's not you, Mister Wattson. Today has just been a crummy day is all."

The old man laughs. "Here's hoping a good round three will make your day a bit better. Okay, Joltie! Back in ya go!" The ball leaves his hand and pops open, dropping Jolteon back into the field.

Jolteon still stands without any weight on her right hind leg as she inspects the arena, her eyes moving to the craters that Magneton created, then to Vulpix.

"Round three! Vulpix versus Jolteon!" The referee announces. "Begin!"

'Baby-Doll Eyes, then Ember in a wide net.'

Once again, Wattson can't even call an attack before Vulpix's offensive is already flying. The vixen's eyes glow a cloying pink, and Jolteon yelps as her legs suddenly begin to shake with weakness.

Vulpix then spits out a fireball that erupts into Embers the instant that Baby-Doll Eyes strikes. The Embers all spread out, guided by Vulpix's pyrokinesis, then descend on Jolteon like a swarm of furious insects.

"Discharge!" Wattson is much faster to catch on this round. "Blow 'em away!"

Jolteon howls as electricity explodes out of her in a wide dome of radiant yellow. When the Embers hit Discharge, they explode brilliantly.

When Discharge doesn't halt, Vulpix zooms to the side with Quick Attack at Lee's behest, rushing for the corner of the arena the furthest away from Jolteon. By the time Discharge makes it to Vulpix, it's lost a significant amount of power and merely stings rather than incapacitate. Vulpix barely winces, but Lee twitches from the phantom sensation of essentially being tased.

"Quick Attack, go!" Wattson points a finger as he orders Jolteon. Gone is his jovial expression, instead replaced with one of focus. "Don't let her stay at range!"

Even with a lame leg, Jolteon blitzes across the arena with such speed that she leaves a trail of dust in her wake, aiming to smash her skull into Vulpix.

'Hold.'

Vulpix's eyes narrow, then using Lee's eyes to double check everything from another perspective, she takes a deep breath and a ring of fire around her paws begins to burn.

'Now!'

A barely withheld Fire Spin churns to life around the vixen, then bursts up into a whirlwind of fire that Jolteon barely aborts running into. The eeveelution still has enough traction on three paws to near-instantly stop and bound away to the center of the arena before Fire Spin consumes her. After the miss, Vulpix drops Fire Spin and lets it fade into hot air and embers, disgruntled.

"Isn't this a pickle… Can't get too close, can't be too far," The Gym Leader grunts. "Joltie! Lightscreen!"

A protective barrier of pink energy covers Jolteon from head to toe, and Lee silently curses himself for not having Vulpix interrupt it. 'Fucking swell. If that works like it does in the game, it's going to cut a huge amount of damage out of special attacks.'

"Sorry to do this when you have a bum leg, girl, but hit-n-run with Extremesp-"

Alarm surges through Vulpix and into Lee. 'Fuck no! Flamethrower! Give it everything you have!'

Vulpix's mouth opens and out pours a pillar of bright orange flames. With the frantic pace of their collective thoughts, time itself seems to slow down for Lee and Vulpix, revealing a disheartening fact.

Flamethrower isn't going to make it in time. Jolteon is already tensing and glowing with a bright, almost blinding corona of white. Her face is set in a grimace as she coils all of her muscles, her injured leg included. Even if Flamethrower were to land, Lightscreen might bleed off enough damage for her to simply keep pelting the much slower Vulpix with attacks.

For all her pyrokinetic control, Vulpix has never once caught a speeding Corvisquire when he was using Extremespeed, barring saturating an entire area in hellfire. Trying to catch a Jolteon? It simply isn't happening,

In a less frazzled, less distracted state of mind, Lee might have simply had Vulpix use Feint Attack as Grovyle did, then try to attack Jolteon from an unexpected angle, but now...

He tries desperately to think of something to let them win this. He can't use items, he has no substitutes, he has no special gimmicks to use… or?

With his bond to Vulpix deepening by the day, Lee has found himself strangely aware of things he couldn't even conceptualize before being a trainer. Things like his own senses and how they truly all tied together, or how a language might work without words, or even the enigmatic thing known as a soul. With his eyes just barely cracked open, possibilities already present themselves to him.

So when he mentally seizes Vulpix's connection to him and drags it deep inside himself, passing his mind and instead tapping into the body, he's only half surprised when it works.

The blazing Flamethrower, now empowered by two bodies worth of stamina, surges like a jet and burns so hot that the innermost core of the flame blazes a brilliant blue. It crosses the arena like a beam, engulfing Jolteon only milliseconds before she jumps and splashing against the rear barrier in a wave of bright orange and blue.

Several people in the crowd scream as the heat bleeds through, raising the temperature in the room several degrees.



After only a second, Vulpix shuts her jaws, ending Flamethrower.

Standing shivering and coated in burns in the midst of a charred trench in the floor, Wattson's Jolteon lets out a piteous groan and collapses to her side. Swaths of her spikey fur are burned away, leaving reddened, blistered skin that would surely be worse if not for her Lightscreen.

"Holy moley…" Wattson mutters as he wipes his sweating brow. "That was… quite something."

Above, the buzzer sounds.

"That's it! Jolteon is unable to battle! Challengers Lee and Vulpix are the winners!" The referee waves his arms over his head.

Like they did last time, the crowd goes absolutely wild. Camera flashes light up the spectator seats and people stand to cheer.

Lee groans as he slowly pulls his mind away from Vulpix's. As her senses vanish, suddenly only being able to see in a single direction feels confining, and he feels dull without her ears or nose to pick up everything he misses.

As the invisible walls around the battlefield drop, Wattson recalls his injured Jolteon and begins the walk to the center of the field, still appearing mystified by the outcome of the battle.

Lee slowly trudges out to meet him, feeling the effects of something so rash as using his own body to fuel Vulpix's attack. His limbs feel as if they weigh a hundred pounds each, and he's beset by the same weariness one might feel after running a marathon. 'Yeah, we're going to save that move for emergencies.'

'You h*d bet*er,' Vulpix huffs, pressing herself to one of his legs to help steady him. 'Th*t wa* reck*ess. Did you e*en *n*w w*at was g**ng to hap**n?' Her telepathy is choppier than usual in her displeasure, and between the reduced quality and the lethargy gripping his brain, it takes a bit longer for Lee to decipher what she says.

'I had an idea, and it worked out. You said we need to use everything at our disposal, right?'

'Yes, e***ything *e c*rr*ntly h*ve at ou* disp*sal, not unt*ste* t*chniques t*at risk y*u.'

"Mister Lee, I gotta say you really surprised me there," Wattson says as they finally meet in the middle of the now scarred and pockmarked battleground. He looks around at the myriad of divots and burns. "You really are one to keep track of. As proof of your victory over the Mauville Gym, I'm happy to present the Dynamo Badge to you!" The man grins and holds out the little golden badge between his fingers.

Lee takes it and smiles tiredly. "Thank you."

"Haha! It's my pleasure!" Wattson's jovial tone returns full force. "Now, go get some rest after you see the front desk about your prize money and a Shock Wave TM. You're pale as a ghost!"


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Topic: Newcomers to lookout for this year (Pinned)

In: Boards ► Hoenn ► Ever Grande Conference

RunThatBack (Mod) (Original Poster)

Posted On July 5th 20XX:

Hey guys, it's that time of the year again. New blood is coming to Hoenn in record numbers. There are hundreds of new trainers this year and a ton of trainers from abroad, so lots of new teams to see and compete with. Last year was underwhelming considering the EGC winner Tanya Willis could barely stand up to E4 Sidney and got wiped, but this year already has tons of potential and the year has only been open for about a month and a half. Keep fanboy/girling to a minimum and if you really have to start a thread for individual trainers in Boards ► Hoenn ► Indiv Trainers. Rules are the same as last year for the Big Watch list. If you think you should be on the list and aren't, that sucks. Go make waves then complain. Note that this is for Newcomers to the EGC, so if you don't see your favorite here and they've competed before, check the Veterans thread. ANYONE CAUGHT ASTROTURFING THEMSELVES WITH A SOCKPUPPET ACCOUNT WILL BE BANNED.

EDIT #1: So far, our list in no particular order is:

  • Val Forrest (link)
  • Clark White (link)
  • Ash Ketchum (link)
  • Brendan Birch (link)
  • Katie Huffman (link)
  • Tyson Rhyn (link)
  • Lee Henson (link)
  • Kai Morrison (link)
  • Andre *no surname* (link)
  • Gavin Freed (link)
The links will take you to their respective profiles. Opening the thread for replies and debate.

(Showing page 1 of 98)



G_Freed (Verified Trainer)

Replied On July 5th 20XX:

10th place? C'mon, I think I'm better than that! I toasted Norman Maple EZ!



BaldQuillfish

Replied On July 5th 20XX:

@G_Freed - Lol. Beating Norman Maple's kiddie team with a Machoke isn't impressive. Also nice reading comprehension.



G_Freed (Verified Trainer)

Replied On July 5th 20XX:

[Deleted]



RunThatBack (Mod) (Original Poster)

Replied On July 5th 20XX:

@G_Freed - Cool it



UNDERMAN!

Replied On July 5th 20XX:

Katie is taking it this year, no doubt. I live in Lilycove and I've seen her battle firsthand. It's game over.



LuvMachineMKIV

Replied On July 5th 20XX:

YES KATIE IS FINALLY TAKING THE CHALLENGE AAAAAA MY QUEEN.



Umbreon778

Replied On July 5th 20XX:

Gavin going for the get deleted any% lol.



KLMK

Replied On July 5th 20XX:

Birch has huge ups on this. His dad probably trained him and gave him a monster-ass starter Mudkip. It's already a Marshtomp.



chatot_radio

Replied On July 5th 20XX:

Who is andre



Umbreon778

Replied On July 5th 20XX:

@Chatot_Radio - A Dark-type trainer who has been in Dewford for years. He beat Brawly's RT like 3 days ago with a type disadvantage.



(Showing page 2 of 98)



V_Marlo (Verified Trainer)

Replied On July 5th 20XX:

@KLMK - Yeah I've watched this kid's battles. He's got like a 90% win rate. Insanity. I guess you can get huge numbers with the power of nepotism.



BurningRightHand

Replied On July 5th 20XX:

@V_Marlo - It's not really nepotism. He's good at battling. Even strong pokemon fail with a bad trainer. He's unique… Unlike you.



UNDERMAN!

Replied On July 5th 20XX:

@V_Marlo - Thats nothing. You want to see suspicious numbers? Go look at Lee Henson's win-rate. It's hovering right around 95%. Methinks he's a ringer the League hired to spice up this year after how awful last year was.



V_Marlo (Verified Trainer)

Replied On July 5th 20XX:

@BurningRightHand - [deleted]



RunThatBack (Mod) (Original Poster)

Replied On July 5th 20XX:

@V_Marlo Global Rule 3. Stop it.



BaldQuillfish

Replied On July 5th 20XX:

Has the League done that before? Sounds like a juicy conspiracy.



Brik-e-brack

Replied On July 5th 20XX:

No Underman is just having vivid dreams again.



UNDERMAN!

Replied On July 5th 20XX:

Bruh the man is a ghost. He came out of nowhere got hired by the regional lab got a roster of rare mons and started sweeping. Does that not sound suspect? (Now that I've said this his handlers monitoring the thread are going to tell him to take a dive)



KazuoKandy

Replied On July 5th 20XX:

@UNDERMAN! - Have you seen that vulpix? Thats not a pokemon you get from some league breeder, she looks like she was hand-raised.



BaldQuillfish

Replied On July 5th 20XX:

@KazuoKandy - Missed the point of what he said, airhead. No one said he got his pokemon from the League.



(Showing page 3 of 98)



L_Blackthorn (Verified Trainer) (Kanto Champion) (Johto Champion)

Replied On July 5th 20XX:

Be ready for Ash Ketchum.



SunnyBun

Replied On July 5th 20XX:

OMFG LANCE IS HERE



Brik-e-brack

Replied On July 5th 20XX:

@L_Blackthorn Senpai please notice me



Umbreon778

Replied On July 5th 20XX:

Ketchum confirmed for OP



G_Freed (Verified Trainer)

Replied On July 5th 20XX:

DUDE



V_Marlo (Verified Trainer)

Replied On July 5th 20XX:

@L_Blackthorn - Marry me



I_Sora (Verified Trainer)

Replied On July 5th 20XX:

Yooo I looked at Ash Ketchum's battles. This kid has had a ton of hype moments and his Pikachu smoked Andre's Absol in one hit. @L_Blackthorn do you know this kid?



DukeOfJuke

Replied On July 5th 20XX:

POSTING IN CHAMP THREAD POSTING IN CHAMP THREAD POSTING IN CHAMP THREAD ASH KETCHUM IS TAKING THE GOLD

...And it derailed from there for a solid seven pages, which suits Lee just fine because he's already stopped caring. He sets his phone down and looks around the hotel room.

Brendan is sitting huddled with Marshtomp, Breloom, and Mawile on his bed. Marshtomp is still sporting cuts and abrasions upon his body from his battle earlier today, but in his usual fashion looks wholly unbothered. Breloom looks as tired as Lee feels, and he wholly understands considering the mushroom pokemon is missing part of his left claw, which is sure to be an uncomfortable healing process. His other claw has a number of cracks sealed with shiny medical glue. Mawile, meanwhile, is unharmed, as she didn't participate in the Gym battle today. Together, the four idly flip through the channels on the TV, pretending the awkward atmosphere in the room isn't there.

In the chair beside the window, Zinnia sits with Swablu in her lap, busying herself with silently helping the cotton-bird pokemon preen her wings. Both the dragon tamer and bird are too absorbed in their tasks to pay much mind to anything else. Alongside the chair sits Shelgon with his eyes closed, either asleep or meditating.

At the foot of Lee's bed, Shinx soundly sleeps alongside Goomy after her afternoon meal. The kitten could feel the tension in the room when she was let out of her pokeball and needed to be rocked to sleep after her meal, as she was simply too restless otherwise. Even then, she needed her friend Goomy by her side to truly find restful sleep.

Vulpix is laid across Lee's lap, silent comfort radiating from her warm body into his with something more active just a word away.

After leaving the Mauville Gym and dropping Grovyle off for an overnight stay at the Pokemon Center, Lee powered through his exhaustion to walk back to where Corvisquire ran off so he could wait for a bit longer.

Corvisquire never showed up.

The rep with Silph Co was given a call and agreed to a rescheduling, leaving Lee the rest of the night to himself, though his friends seemed determined to not leave him alone.

With a sigh, he lifts his phone again.


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Topic: Lost: Corvisquire

In: Boards ► Hoenn ► Sightings, Trades, Lost/Found

L_Henson (Verified Trainer) (Original Poster)

Posted On July 9th 20XX:

Lost: Corvisquire. Roughly 3'3" tall. Surly disposition and very battle competent. No distinguishing marks or nickname. Last seen near Mauville today. If seen, please ask him to return to his trainer in Mauville. Potentially violent, so do not engage. Still in my care, just lost.


"You did everything right."

Lee sets his phone down and looks over to Zinnia, who stares back at him with her serious red eyes. "Did what right?"

"Everything with Corvisquire," she drums her fingers on the arm of her chair. "You did everything right. When it comes to being a loveable goody-goody and caring for pokemon? Dolittle, you're second to none. Don't sit there and mope over an ungrateful bird when today was a huge win in the Gym."

Lee dips his hand into his pocket and withdraws his Dynamo Badge. He raises it to the light, watching it glint beautifully.

Today doesn't feel like a win.
 
Act 1: Chapter 26
"Just remember, Lee," Mable firmly says as both rise from their spots in the Pokemon Center meeting room. "Life can be challenging sometimes, but don't ever let unpleasant times control you, okay?"

"Right…" Lee sighs as he stretches his arms above his head, taking care to not push Vulpix off of his shoulder. "Thank you again, Mable."

The therapist smiles kindly and steps up to his side, placing a hand on the shoulder Vulpix isn't occupying. "I know your Corvisquire has you down, Lee. Just take heart in your other pokemon and know that someone like yourself will pull through stronger than ever."

Lee smiles back, though his smile is little more than a slight upturn of his lips. "Will do," he says, turning and leaving the meeting room. Like last time, he heads left down the hall back to the lobby of the Pokemon Center.

After Corvisquire's sudden abandonment and Lee's victory at the Mauville Gym, he, Brendan, and Zinnia stuck around Mauville for several days in an unspoken agreement to wait and see if Corvisquire would return.

So far, nothing.

Lee's post on Battlenet garnered little in the way of useful replies, though one young trainer provided a humorous five-post adventure of him tracking down what he thought was the rogue pokemon, only to discover it was a Honchcrow. One person suggested contacting the Pokemon Rangers, and Lee did so, but other than the confirmation email saying they're looking, the Rangers have been silent.

The team hasn't been idle during their time waiting, as Grovyle began to throw himself into his training with fervor. His loss in the Mauville Gym stung him, that much was obvious, and Lee didn't need Vulpix's translation to understand the wood gecko's intentions.

Grovyle, against Lee's wishes, is trying to single-handedly cover the loss of firepower that Corvisquire's departure created.

Seed Blast was mastered in less than two days, and already the Grass-type can utterly saturate an area in a hellish barrage of near-sonic seeds. Grovyle's next custom move was a simple reversal of Seed Blast, being a single, accurate super-sonic seed to pierce defenses Leaf Blade can't safely carve through. Seed Sniper is the somewhat uninspired name, and after just a day Grovyle has mastered it enough to use in a battle.

Vulpix pushed herself as well, but not to the same level as Grovyle. Her physical growth is slowly beginning to stagnate, as her weight gain began to taper off and the recorded feats in Lee's notes show less and less improvement as time goes on. It's no big surprise or a problem, as Vulpix is a special attacker first and foremost, but Vulpix herself seems irked that Grovyle is beginning to pull away from her in physical ability. Her pyrokinesis continues to grow as expected. The shapes she can create with flames grow more and more complex, and directing them in different directions is becoming easier. With her telepathy so honed and Psychic energy so familiar to her, Lee decided it was time to begin training the physical side of her psychic talents. So far…

Well, the empty soda can they were practicing with last night wiggled a little bit.

So far it's been a frustrating experience for the vixen. Controlling fire came to her so easily that telekinesis has been a rude awakening.

Stepping into the crowded midday lobby, Lee and Vulpix are just in time to see Brendan get his pokeballs back from one of Nurse Joy's white-coat-clad assistants before the boy turns to them, a smile on his face. "Hey, you guys!" The Birch heir greets as he clips his pokeballs to his belt and walks closer. "Ready for your demo with the Silph guy?"

"As ready as we'll ever be," Lee nods. "Grovyle has his moves, and Vulpix is going to show off Convergence, so I hope that'll be enough for a TM deal. Grovyle isn't super attached to Seed Blast and Seed Sniper, so we're planning on offering them up if Silph wants something right away."

"Pssh," Brendan waves a hand with a grin. "I betcha Silph will sign you on instantly after seeing just one."

Lee smiles. "I appreciate the optimism," he says, glancing around. "Where did Zinnia go?"

"Right here. I ran to the post office real quick."

Lee, Brendan, and Vulpix turn, finding the missing dragon tamer walking up with a beaming smile on her face. She stops before them and puts her hands on her hips with a satisfied sigh. "Guess who just sent her Tyrunt fossil off to be revived?"

Brendan's jaw drops. "What? How? Fossil revival is stupid expensive if you're not some bigshot!"

'Stupid expensive?' Lee wonders. "How expensive is 'stupid expensive'?"

"Hundreds of thousands of credits for just one revival…" Brendan's reply shocks Lee to his core. "Hell, if you don't put a huge deposit down, most labs don't even reply back."

'Ouch,' Lee winces. 'I thought an Eevee was asking too much, but just one fossil can set you back the price of a nice house. Wait…' Lee turns to Zinnia with a sinking feeling in his gut. "Zinnia, you didn't just put yourself in debt to get yourself a dinosaur, did you?"

She scoffs. "Have some faith in me, Dolittle. I had to pull some strings, burn some favors, and make a few calls, but I didn't pay anything other than my time. It'll take a bit, but I'll have my Tyrunt in a month or so."

Brendan still seems unconvinced. "Right…"

"Good for you, Zinnia," Lee steps in before she and Brendan can argue. "I'm glad to see this working out for you. I take it you're excited for your new pokemon?"

Zinnia beams. "Hehe! Of course I am!" She wiggles in place. "Ah! Every little girl's dream; her own dinosaur!" She sobers up and clears her throat. "Erm, anyway, how did your time with your shrink go, Dolittle?"

"It… went," Lee crosses his arms and shifts on his feet, unsure what to say. Vulpix nuzzles his cheek, and from her comes a soothing reassurance. "Last week was kind of heavy, so she suggested taking it easy this week, just talking about life and whatnot."

The tanned woman smiles and nods, not pressing. Brendan looks as if he wants to inquire further, but he bites his lip.

Vulpix paws Lee's neck, a silent reminder of the time poking his brain a second later. "Oh! I need to get to that demo for Silph! Are you guys coming?"

Brendan grins. "You know it!"

"Mmm-hmm," Zinnia agrees.

As a group, Lee, Vulpix, Brendan, and Zinnia leave the pokemon center and head deeper into Mauville through the throngs of people flooding the streets. Lee spares a look around as they walk, taking in the sights.

Wattson's popularity as the Gym Leader is apparent from how many Electric-types are out and about with their trainers. In just a few minutes, Lee spots a Pikachu riding in a girl's handbag, a Raichu jogging along with his college-age trainer, an impatient Electrike tugging at his leash, a Mareep with a giggling little girl on her back, and a Galvantula clinging to the underside of a lamp post enjoying a berry snack. Some of the smaller businesses they pass are made to cater to Electric-type pokemon only, many offering services like 'discharge therapy' or 'electro cycling', which sound like the same thing to Lee. Others are stocked with tools and insulated toys for raising younger pokemon.

'Almost like a miniature New York,' Lee hums as he peers up at the tall buildings of Mauville. 'Largest city in Hoenn, yet only five-hundred thousand people live here. I wonder if the census counts pokemon? Hard to say… Idly, Lee wonders what Nigel would think of Earth's population of eight billion when the entire pokemon world doesn't even boast an eighth of that number. 'Then again, pokemon outnumber humans so that figure might be a bit skewed… and Earth's population probably isn't that high anymore…'

A nip on his ear from Vulpix pulls him away from such morbid thoughts.

"So do these guys have a place set-up for the demo, or are you just going to trash one of their offices?" Zinnia asks with a smirk. "I gotta admit, that would be funny."

"The address they gave me leads to one of their offices," Lee says, pulling out his phone as they stop at a crosswalk with a red light. He flips through his emails back to the one from the Silph Co rep. "Yeah, one of their offices," He looks up in time to see an old truck roll by with a panting Rockruff hanging out of the passenger window. A second later, the crosswalk light turns green and lets them continue on. "I imagine they have a test site or some indoor range with a pokemon that can make force fields on-hand. I warned them that these moves are no joke."

Another thirty minutes of walking leads them to a four-story building in its own small corporate park near the outer eastern part of the city. The grass is cut short, the shrubs are all trimmed square, and the windows of the building are all sparkly and clean. At the top of the building is a large sign clearly spelling out "Silph Co" in stylized letters.

Lee double checks his phone one final time before nodding. "This is the place. Let's go."

Stepping inside, the trio of trainers and single pokemon push past the revolving door and take in the lavish lobby of the Silph Co building. Lee in particular looks down at himself afterward, now very conscious of the wear on his clothes and the dirt on his boots in the face of the immaculate room.

"Do you feel a little underdressed too?" Lee hears Brendan whisper to Zinnia as they make their way to the reception desk in the middle of the lobby.

Zinnia scoffs. "No. Why would I care about what some office jockeys think?"

As they approach, the smartly-dressed woman manning the reception desk looks up from her computer screen with a smile. That smile shrinks when the first thing she sees is Vulpix. "I'm sorry, but Silph Corporation has a no loose pokemon policy on the premises. I'll have to ask you to..!-" She trails off with a look of vague fright when her eyes shift to Lee's face. "E-Erm…"

The zoologist smiles disarmingly, or at least tries. 'Was I doing the scary no-expression thing again?' He clears his throat. "Good afternoon. My name is Lee Henson and I have a 12:30 meeting with Mister Aarons?"

When Zinnia snickers, the poor young woman seems to regain her wits. "O-Oh, of course, Mister Henson. One moment…" She returns her eyes to her computer and quickly types in a string of words, her painted nails and the large ring on her left hand flashing in the sunlight. She pauses, then types something else. "Alec Aarons will be seeing you in just a moment, Mister Henson. Will your guests be joining you?"

"If it's all the same," Lee responds kindly.

She nods and smiles back unsurely.

It takes only a moment of waiting for one of the elevators near the back of the lobby to chime and open, letting out a smiling man in a black suit who beelines for Lee's group. "Mister Henson! Alec Aarons is the name, and thank you for coming out here today!"

Lee scans the approaching businessman with an appraising eye.

Aarons is a handsome man in that difficult-to-place age range of late twenties to mid-thirties. The skin of his angular face is flawless, and his platinum blond hair is slicked back and shiny in the bright fluorescent lights of the office. There isn't a single wrinkle on his three-piece suit, and his perfectly white teeth almost glint through the narrow gap in his lips made by his easy-going smile. There's an aura about the man, one that would charm most anyone with his smooth voice and attractive face.

In the back of his mind, Lee can't help but draw a comparison to Patrick Bateman from the old movie American Psycho.

"And thank you for taking the time to talk to me, Mister Aarons," Lee reaches out and clasps the man's hand with his own in a brisk shake. "I know you must be busy around here."

Aarons lets out a single short laugh and lets his smile widen just a smidgen. "Please, call me Alec, and for one of Hoenn's rising stars? I can make time." He withdraws his hand and gestures to Vulpix before letting it fall to his side. "Congrats to you and Miss Vulpix on your Dynamo Badge. Wattson is a superb trainer even if his other duties means he doesn't have as much time for his pokemon anymore. To go toe-to-toe with his personal pokemon and win speaks volumes about you." He looks past Lee to Brendan with an appraising look. "And Mister Birch's match was just as thrilling. Watching Manectric get pushed and actually lose is a rare event."

Brendan chuckles bashfully. "Ah, we were working with a type advantage, and even then Wattson's pokemon were tough. He nearly had us."

"Regardless, it was an excellent showing," Aarons inclines his head and turns to Zinnia. "And I'm afraid I never caught your name, miss…"

"Zinnia," the dragon tamer supplies simply. She looks over Aarons with a critical eye, then relaxes. "Dragon Tamer. Nice to meet ya."

"The pleasure is all mine." The blonde man smiles back. "Let's take this to my office, shall we?"

Lee and co follow Aarons back to the elevator, where the businessman takes them up to the 3rd floor and to a wooden door labeled "Tech Machine Dept" guarded by a keypad lock, one that Aarons swiftly enters the code for. As they enter and make the trip to Aarons' office, Lee glances at the open-floor office and glass dividers taking up much of the floor space, each desk occupied by a well-dressed worker, many of whom look up to see himself, his friends, and Aarons. The air is filled with the sounds of shuffling paper, the ringing of desk phones, and muffled conversation.

On Lee's shoulder, Vulpix's ears turn as she takes in sounds human hearing would miss, then she widens the psychic channel to her trainer and wordlessly offers her hearing to him.

"-Aarons doing bringing someone up here? He should have taken them to the demo site not-"

"-ing to show off his new client? That's bold, breaking the no pokemon rule and walking right by Nasir's office."

"I thought Joan was working on the new Henson account?"

Lee reaches up and gently scratches under Vulpix's chin, making her shut her eyes in satisfaction. 'Thank you, Vulpix. Seems like Aarons is quite the opportunist to say the least.'

Along the outer perimeter of the large room are a number of private offices behind closed doors, several of which they pass, then they come to a stop by one labeled "A. Aarons - Sr Licensing Rep."

The four people and single shoulder-riding fox step inside, finding a tidy, modern office with little in the way of personal effects, though Lee is surprised to find three guest chairs before the desk. He seats himself in the middle one with Zinnia and Brendan flanking him.

Aarons sits lightly behind his desk and folds his hands over one another. "Can I get you all anything? Water? Coffee?"

"Thank you, Alec, but I think we're fine," Lee speaks for everyone. "I understand there is a demo process before any ink touches paper, so forgive me if this comes off as a little rude, but why bring us up here?"

Aarons smiles once more. "Mister Henson, I think we both know that for a trainer of your caliber, the demo is just a formality. Grass TMs are especially in vogue right now, so your personal takes on Bullet Seed will most assuredly sell out quickly."

"Really?" Lee raises an eyebrow and leans back in his chair as Vulpix slides down into his lap. "Why do you say that?"

The businessman's eyes seemingly twinkle. "Ah, that's a little secret of mine, but I can give a bit away I suppose. A great way to tell how well a TM run will do is to look at the Gym Leaders of the region, and the usual route aspiring challengers take between them. Grass is so popular right now because of the average starting and ending point of most trainers taking the circuit."

"Roxanne is the weakest Gym Leader… and Wallace is the strongest…" Brendan's eyes widen when it hits him. "Both of their specialties are weak to Grass!"

Aarons' smile turns into a small grin. "Right on the money! The data doesn't lie, and trainers want everything they can get when they first begin and are about to end a journey. In the middle, there is quite a bit of drop-off since everyone has a good idea of their own power in relation to the Gyms, but the last Gym is always intimidating. There are other factors at play of course, such as TM rarity, the cost per unit, who the TM is being copied from, and media attention given to specialists of the same type." The blonde man laces his fingers and sets his elbows on the desk. "With Grass being the answer to both the weakest and strongest Gyms, and the unexpected defeat of Fortree's Winona to the rising Grass specialist Valorie Forrest, Grass is hot. A limited run of brand new Grass moves will sell out from preorders alone."

'Huh, I never thought about it like that,' Lee silently muses. 'With the price tags on TMs, it must be a lucrative business.' Aarons' enthusiasm makes more sense. 'Ah, if he's the one doing all the behind-the-scenes work, then he probably gets a nice cut.'

"Understandable," Lee nods along. "So, how does the process work here?"

"First," Aarons holds up a finger. "We'd establish an outline of the technique you intend to propose to Silph Co. I've already done so here if you'd like to review it," he says, opening a drawer on his desk and taking out a packet of paper. He drops it to his desk and slides it over. "Pending the demo, Silph Co can then choose to move forward with the process or decide to not take the proposal, and if denied you won't be able to submit your move again for a full year. No need to worry about that one I think," he smiles. "Upon choosing to move forward, Silph Co will have you sign a number of forms giving us exclusive rights to be your TM manufacturer and distributor, along with a few more giving us the right to use your name and likeness as marketing material. Once complete, we'll have the boys in the lab copy the move from your pokemon and send it off for TM transcribing. When the disks hit the shelves, you can start collecting your royalties."

"Name and likeness, huh?" Zinnia crosses her arms and taps her foot. "And how long do you get to use it afterward?"

'That's a good question,' Lee focuses on Aarons for an answer.

"Just for the TM run," he cooly replies. "Once the last batch of disks leaves the warehouse, the contract is over. Typically a standard limited run is two-hundred and fifty units."

"Does Silph retain the rights to the move itself at all?" Lee asks as Aarons' answer isn't enough for him.

In his lap, Vulpix shifts and thinks. 'Ask if t*ey ar* allowe* to make more c*pies. Be sp*cific.'

"As in, can Silph Co just decide to make more copies of the TM after the contract is over and cut us out of the equation entirely?" Lee amends, watching carefully for Aarons' reaction.

If Aarons is perturbed by the line of questioning, he hides it masterfully. "We do reserve the right to create copies of unpatented moves without the input of the trainer who submitted the move for copying." He admits. He opens another drawer on his desk and takes out another packet of paper, setting before Lee. "Silph Co can submit the move for patenting on your behalf for a fee which will be deducted from your royalties until paid in full. If you'd like to read over the forms for yourself, then please go ahead. Now, your royalty rate does drop two percent if you decide to patent, keep that in mind."

With the beginnings of a frown, Lee takes the paper offered to him and holds it so Vulpix can read along with him. At his sides, Zinnia and Brendan lean in to see it as well.

'Fee of 11,500 for the patent app, followed by losing fifty percent of my four percent of the royalties until paid back. If a basic TM is roughly 2000 credits, and assuming my specialty TM would be worth a bit more at 3000 credits… ' Lee crunches the numbers in his head. 'That's 37,000 credits for both runs after the fees. Holy shit…' He blinks in surprise. 'That's a lot of money even with Silph chunking me for not giving up the rights to it… Or I could get 90,000 credits from the six percent and no fees just by letting them have the moves. Hell, they might price the TM even higher than 3000 and push that payment into six-figures…'

Lee looks away from the form in his hands, feeling slightly lightheaded. It might take weeks for the TMs to sell, but that's still a dizzying amount of money. If these are the sort of figures high-level trainers play with, then Lee suddenly understands how they afford to care for their rare and powerful pokemon. 'Pay to win? No. It's just free to lose.' He shakes his head and looks down at Vulpix. 'What say you, love? Do we play the long game and hope they want to make more afterward, or get a bigger windfall?'

As Vulpix mulls her answer over, Lee looks between Brendan and Zinnia. "Any opinions?"

Brendan finishes reading the form with a hum and scratches his chin. "Yeah, patent 'em. Better to keep your rights for later, or that's what Dad told me. The fee is a little steep, but I guess you're paying for the convenience."

"I dunno…" Zinnia fingers the edge of her cloak as she thinks. "On one hand, keeping the moves sounds good, but on the other…" She trails off. "That's a lot of moolah, Dolittle. I can't decide, so I'm not going to say anything else."

Vulpix snuffles and kneads Lee's leg with her dull claws. 'Keep th*m.'

Mind made up, Lee sets the form back on Aarons' desk. "I'm going to patent them. Now, any other details?


Out behind the Silph Co building and in the middle of the testfire range Silph created for demos just like this one, Lee impatiently fingers Grovyle's pokeball. At his side, Grovyle cooly waits with his arms crossed.

The testfire range looks much like a gun range back on earth. A long stretch of barren land roughly one hundred yards leads back into a tall dirt berm to act as a backstop. The range is pockmarked with craters and burns, likely from other tests. Off to the side and leaning over the range from high above, a structure of metal beams like a leaning power pylon looms over the range. On the point of the pylon, a camera-like dome shines in the sunlight.

Behind Lee and Grovyle, Aarons, Zinnia, Brendan, Vulpix, and several Silph techs holding tablet computers stand behind a screen of ballistic glass. Zinnia taps her foot while Brendan simply sways on his feet, looking eager. At his feet, Vulpix sits calmly.

Aarons turns his eyes to the techs. "Gents, are we ready?"

One of the three men, a tall, gangly man with limp brown hair nods his head. "Beginning sim. Standby."

'Sim?'

Above Lee and Grovyle, the dome-like apparatus on the point of the leaning pylon glows a dull blue, and down on the ground, a hazy shape standing a head taller than a man and thrice as wide begins to take form.

Startled, Lee takes a step back as Grovyle narrows his eyes and takes up a defensive stance before his trainer.

The mass crackles like TV static and coalesces into a shape with two thick legs, equally thick arms ending in claws, a long muscular tail, and a wide head with a shovel-like plate along its skull.

'A Kangaskhan?' Lee wonders as the pixel-like details fill in on the pokemon like a loading video game. In just a second, the details sharpen to a life-like level, and there stands a Kangaskhan minus a youngling in its pouch. 'Some kind of hologram?'

The fake Kangaskhan grunts and slams its tail into the ground, making a tremor run under the feet of everyone in the field. Its eyes are flat and lusterless, but they focus on Grovyle with a disturbingly life-like gaze.

'Not a hologram.'

"Whenever you're ready, Mister Henson!" One of the Silph techs call. "Have your Grovyle attack the Kangaskhan construct with Seed Blast!"

'Construct? Like hard light?' The technology doesn't seem too far-fetched considering the consumer-grade non-euclidean bag on his back. "You heard them, bud," Lee points a finger at the Kangaskhan. "Seed Blast!"

Grovyle hisses and draws his head back, his throat bulging as seeds manifest from pure Grass energy and travel up to his mouth. He trains his eyes on the Kangaskhan's center mass and works his jaw. Then with a flourish, he throws his head forward and spits a shotgun blast of seeds with an ear-ringing bang!

The seeds fly in a tight cone trailing with yellow light, spreading only to the size of a volleyball in the twenty yards they fly. Then Seed Blast crashes into the Kangaskhan's thick hide with a series of loud cracks, throwing bits of the Kangaskhan's rock-like armor that dissolve into static before they hit the ground. Several seeds stay lodged in the armor, sizzling with unburnt Grass energy.

The Kangaskhan reels back with a realistic gasp, holding its cracked stomach armor with a paw. It retreats with several lumbering steps, watching Grovyle warily. Above the Kangaskhan, a green HP bar of all things appears and drops to roughly 70%.

"Not bad at all…" One of the Silph techs murmurs as he taps away at his tablet. "One direct hit dealt considerable damage to a mid-level construct." He taps a button on his tablet and the damage on the fake Kangaskhan vanishes as its lifebar refills to 100. "Again, please."

Grovyle looks up towards Lee, who nods back. "Give her another one. Everything you've got. We don't need to worry about pacing ourselves here."

The Grass-type turns to the Kangaskhan and charges Seed Blast once more, drawing up even more seeds than before. The muscles of his jaws quiver as he struggles to keep the attack contained, and once he can hold it no more, he snaps his mouth open and fires a wide-spanning blast with a bang like thunder.

This time, the seeds spread out rapidly, but since there is a veritable storm of them, the Kangaskhan is struck over nearly its whole chest and head. The fake pokemon cries out and stumbles back, a number of seeds buried in its flesh. It covers its head and ducks, avoiding several botanical bullets that whizz by. The wounds on the fake pokemon don't bleed, instead leaving behind simple holes that glow a faint blue. The HP bar above Kangaskhan's head jumps down to 45%, the green color changing to yellow.

"O-Oh wow…" Lee looks back when he hears one of the techs gulp. The middle tech glances down at his tablet and clears his throat. "Well, I uh, think we have enough data to work with on that one. Let's move on, shall we? I believe the next one is called Seed Sniper?"

Once again, the Kangaskhan stands straight, its wounds vanishing and its expression returning to uncanny neutrality.

This time, Grovyle needs no prompting and leans his head back, taking a deep, lung filling breath. Like with Seed Blast, he stands still for several seconds, letting the power behind the attack build before spitting a single hyper-sonic seed the size of a marble. The air cracks sharply as the seed breaks the sound barrier and crosses the distance as little more than a streak of light.

Grovyle's aim is off even at the short distance, as rather than the center of Kangaskhan's chest, it hits her left shoulder, pushing in deep enough that the bones of a normal pokemon would be pulverized by the impact. The seed then explodes into shrapnel, shards digging into skin and making a ghastly wound. The fake Kangaskhan goes pale and grasps the hole with its opposite paw. Above its head, its HP drops all the way to 30%, which flashes red in warning.

Lee turns back to the spectators, taking in their reactions.

Zinnia and Brendan both sport grins, and at Brendan's feet, Vulpix smiles slightly.

The Silph techs look between their tablets and the hard-light Kangaskhan with dropped jaws.

Aarons?

Aarons just smiles. "Mister Henson?" He calls over the ballistic barrier. "Fantastic showing. I believe you have one more?"

"We do," Lee nods. Then an idea hits him, one that he pauses and mulls over. "Say, Alec? Is there any wiggle room on that royalty percent if we show something really impressive?"

A look crosses Aarons' face, one that stands at the midpoint of predatory and hungry, then it vanishes and is replaced with his pleasant resting smile a split-second later. "I… could be convinced to argue such a case to upper management for a better payout. What do you have in mind?"

"While we're not going to let this move be released for copying, it's proof that we have a lot to bring to the table." As Lee speaks, Vulpix is already briskly trotting around the ballistic glass. "Convergence is Vulpix's strongest technique, one that could be argued to be on-par with Fire Blast."

Is it on par? Lee isn't sure, but a bigger payment opening the route to rare breeders and better equipment for his team is worth embellishing for, he thinks.

Aarons rubs his chin. "Fire Blast, hmm? I admit, when I saw it on the demo list, I went and researched the move. Imagine my surprise when the only hints I could find were cell phone videos on the internet." He folds his arms behind his back and gives Vulpix a searching look as she and Grovyle trade places, the wood gecko walking back and standing by Zinnia. "Fire Blast is a move only the mightiest and most esteemed of Fire-types can learn, Mister Henson. If Convergence is that powerful…" He trails off and glances at one of the labcoat-clad techs beside him sharply.

The lanky tech jumps and nearly drops his tablet and Aarons' eyes bore into him. "R-Right!" He types a command into his tablet.

The panting and injured Kangaskhan straightens back up as its wounds vanish, leaving it whole once more. Above it's head, the HP bar returns back to 100%.

Lee takes a deep breath, stilling the thrill of eager nervousness that wants to make his limbs shake. "Alrighty, love," the trainer slips his hands into his pockets so as to not fidget. "Convergence."

Vulpix widens her stance and flares her tails, her eyes blazing a hellish orange.

All around the Kangaskhan, orbs of flame the size of tennis balls burst to life with a cacophony of fwooshes, casting a harsh light even as the noon sun overhead grows brighter and brighter, coaxed by Vulpix's Drought.

The fake Kangaskhan raises an arm to shade its eyes, looking around at the fireballs with confusion.

The motes of fire all shudder and bulge like disturbed liquid, growing larger and larger with a frightening haste, as if they were cancerous growths set alight. The humid Hoenn air around them begins to dry, and what little grass still alive on the ground of the range begins to blacken and smoke.

Lee blinks his eyes and turns away, the sheer heat and light swiftly becoming overwhelming even from twenty yards away. On his face, his burns tingle unpleasantly. He breathes the hot air slowly, silently assuring himself that Vulpix would never harm him.

The fireballs continue to swell, turning into hissing, miniature suns just as they did in the fight with Absol. Their growth begins to stall out around the size of beach balls, and Lee can feel Vulpix's stamina slowly flagging as her most powerful attack greedily sucks down energy.

Just like he did in their Gym battle, Lee opens his bond to his starter wider and takes the psychic tether deeper into himself, tapping into his own body.

The fireballs roar and grow another size, making the dirt below them dry up and crackle from the sheer heat. Lee cuts the feed from his own body as his head begins to feel light, already prepared to get a scolding from Vulpix later. The vixen looks back at him, and Lee covers his ears.

Vulpix's eyes flash, and the fireballs scream towards Kangaskhan.

Heat. Light. Force.

A power without discrimination.

One Vulpix commands.

KRABOOM!

Lee cracks open an eye to watch, calm taking hold even as he feels the explosion wash over him and nearly take him off his feet.

The explosion is deafening. Even with his ears covered, Lee feels them nearly pop, and the shockwave is like a kick to the chest. Dust rushes past, dirtying his clothes and forcing him to close his eyes. The sheer, burning heat is present only for a moment, but it warms his skin to an uncomfortable level. Through the trees and off the building behind them, the echoes of the explosion roll through Mauville, rousing countless frightened bird pokemon from their perches and into the air.

As the dust settles, Lee rubs the dirt from his eyes and opens them to take in the destruction.

Where the Kangaskhan was, there is now just a limp green wireframe in the vague shape of a pokemon, as if the fake pokemon had its hide blown clean off. Under it is a smoldering crater nearly a foot deep and fifteen feet wide, and the dirt within hisses as it cools from red-hot back to a burnt black.

Above the crater is Kangaskhan's HP bar. There is no number, just a flashing warning saying "ERROR".

'Th*t wa* unn*cessary, Lee.' The vixen at Lee's feet huffs, turning and jabbing his leg with a paw. 'I c*n fuel *y own mo*es.'

Lee smiles and bends down, taking Vulpix into his arms without a fight and rising again. He wraps his arms around her middle with her back to his chest, letting her hindpaws and tails dangle. When he leans down just enough to kiss her scalp behind her head-tuft, the fox's ire cools considerably. "How about that?" He turns on his heel to the spectators.

The trio of Silph Co techs are struck dumb, all three of them glued to the tablets in their hands, all of them emiting a warning chime.

"Jeez…" Brendan breathes, a hint of awe on his face. "I didn't realize it was that strong…" He looks down to his belt, where Marshtomp's ball wiggles restlessly.

The grin on Zinnia's face can only be described as savage. She clenches and unclenches her fists under her cloak as she effortlessly catches Lee's eyes, telling him that he's got a battle with her coming in the near future.

Finally…

Aarons works his jaw, seemingly speechless. His eyes look between the crater, then to Vulpix, then up to Lee. After a long moment, he smiles and combs his hands through his hair, brushing away debris that flew over the ballistic glass screen. "Oooh yes," he purrs. "We can work with this."


As the chilled night of the city begins to roll in, Corvisquire curses himself for the millionth time.

It's been four days since he liberated himself, and he feels… Hungry. His stomach gnaws at itself, demanding a meal more substantial than a stolen pizza slice or a bush of berries.

Perched high on a fire-escape on the side of an apartment building, he peers down at the multitude of people and pokemon walking by the alleyway, his powerful eyesight taking in faces, hair, clothes, and stances.

Few of them look up at him, and none are Lee, and for that he's grateful… Or…?

The corvid growls under his breath and shakes the traitorous thought away. He doesn't want to go back. He doesn't want a trainer. He doesn't… Doesn't…

"Thank you for going above and beyond, Corvi."

Corvisquire's talons grip his railing perch tightly.

"I know you'd do the same for me, even if you won't admit it."

Corvisquire hisses to himself, screwing his eyes shut.

"Can you fly me to Littleroot? I want to make a grave for them, just a little one, so they're not forgotten."

The hollow metal railing groans under his talons. "I didn't verbally agree to anything, so I broke no promises…"

Lee settles on the dingy couch, Shinx crawling up into his chest. He turns to Corvisquire with a small grin. "It feels good to get everything off my chest. You guys are my family and I felt like I was lying to you by not explaining."

Lee's mutilated face fills Corvisquire's mind, and the ugly human's kind smile fixes everything in the worst way. The crow grimaces so hard he feels his beak almost crack. Then another face, one from years ago takes Lee's place.


The boy looks down at Rookidee, surprise on his face. The surprise is traded for delight a moment later. "Wow…"

"Bred and born just for you," the other human who keeps his parents says, but Rookiedee is too focused on his young master to pay the man any mind. "He's the best of the best."

Gentle hands lift Rookidee, and he snuggles into them.

The bird pokemon was just one of many offspring to his parents. It's simply nature to not invest too much into many chicks who are bound to go, so when his little master picks him up?

Rookidee knows love for the first time, and he needs more.


The flitter of air-light wings and the tip-tap smaller talon touching down on the rail pull Corvisquire from the memory making him see red. He snaps his head to the side, half-ready to eviscerate the offender with Steel Wing.

Next to him is Swablu, the dragon woman's Swablu. She looks up at him with unreadable black eyes.

"How did you find me? Speak or else." Corvisquire demands darkly.

"Does that really matter?" Swablu's voice is just as airy as her wings with a slight trill as if she might start singing. She blinks. "I won't tell if that's what you're worried about."

"Tch," the larger bird clicks his tongue. "Really now? Why come down here?"

"Just to talk," she answers easily. "I just want to know why?"

"Why?"

Swablu nods. "Why leave like that? Do you know how much you saddened Lee? Or how angry your teammates are?"

Something in Corvisquire's chest clenches when he thinks of the scarred man, but he scoffs at Swablu. "And I care, why?"

The smaller avian scooches closer, gently running her beak through Corvisquire's wing and preening several out-of-place feathers that Corvisquire didn't notice. When did that happen? "Well," Swablu pauses her preening. "Why stick around so long just to turn around and leave?"

"I simply needed food and shelter until it stopped being convenient." the crow sniffs.

Again, Swablu pauses, looking up at Corvisquire with surprise. "Are you assuming that the rest of us don't talk amongst ourselves?"

'What?' The larger of the two frowns. "What do you mean?"

"You may not talk to your team, but Marshtomp's team and my team do," the cotton-bird looks up at Corvisquire accusingly. "You agreed to let Lee give you a physical only to run away. Why?"

Frazzled, Corvisquire barks out the first deflection that comes to mind. "I don't like being touched. It was his fault for pressuring me."

"You only needed to refuse and the worst Lee would have done is ask again. He does so out of care, not maliciousness." Swablu says dryly. "And you claim to not like being touched, but let me preen you without issue."

Corvisquire jumps to the side as if burned, putting a foot between him and Swablu and turning to her with a glare.

"Is it only an issue when humans touch you?"

Corvisquire's wings darken into a steel-gray and take on a metallic luster, humming with thinly veiled danger, yet Swablu presses on. "Are you afraid to be loved?"

Swablu leaps and spreads her wings, only narrowly avoiding the Steel Wing that screeches through the fire-escape railing in a sloppy, rage-fueled cut.

"Don't speak about things of which you have no knowledge!" Corvisquire screams at the hovering Swablu, red leaking into the edges of his vision. "Don't you dare!"

Carefully, the other bird settles back on the railing a wary distance away. She peers up at the starry sky as she folds her wings. "You're not the only one who hurts, Corvisquire," she murmurs. "Zinnia has hurts, Lee has hurts, Vulpix has hurts, everyone does. You know this, especially about Lee." She gives him a hard stare. "You leaving has left him worse off."

The crow ignores the stab of pain in his heart.

"I know you care for Lee at least, so why won't you let him return the favor?" Swablu asks. When she gets no answer, she continues on. "One only needs to open themselves up to the love of others to heal." She spreads her wings. "If humans like Lee and Zinnia can move past the pain in their lives, if they can bravely open themselves to others after the things they suffered, why can't a strong pokemon like yourself?"

'I'm not brave, you fool.'

As she takes off into the night sky, Corvisquire watches her go, suddenly feeling lost. He spreads his wings and flies in the opposite direction, feeling how smoothly his preened wing cuts through the air, and how much the other one drags.

"Can you fly me to Littleroot? I want to make a grave for them, just a little one, so they're not forgotten."

"I need to evolve, I need the armor of a Corviknight," he mutters. "Then I'll go back, if only to fulfill that promise I stupidly made."

That night, he slept fitfully in a breezy tree, alone.
 
Act 1: Chapter 27
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"Merow?" Shinx mewls, twitching her ears as the metal probes in Lee's hands touch her cheeks.

"Okay, baby girl," Lee glances down to the multimeter in the grass beside him. From the meter are a pair of red and black wires, each leading to a probe in the trainer's hand. "Give it all you got."

Shinx scrunches her face up in concentration, her claws kneading the dirt in her focus. Golden sparks jump across her fur, and the multimeter beeps shrilly. Even through the thick rubber insulation on the probes, Lee feels them grow warm in his hands.

"Very good!" Lee smiles and pulls the probes away. He hides a wince when Shinx, not yet fully powered down, nuzzles his leg with a pleased purr and sends an unpleasant shock up his body. Turning his attention to the multimeter and the notebook sitting next to it, he opens the notebook and thumbs his way over to the section dedicated to Shinx.

"Let's see…" He takes the pen from the spiral binding and clicks it open, writing down what the meter says. "Six thousand volts at roughly…" He presses a few buttons on the meter's display, changing the reading. "Two milliamps," Lee jots down the numbers, noting the day-by-day increase by small, but noticeable increments. "You're growing like a weed, you know that?" He says, reaching out and scratching her back. "Heh. Didn't think I would need to start down the path of an electrician to be a pokemon trainer. Maybe you'll be big enough to battle Winona when we make it to Fortree in a few months, eh? Could you zap all those birds out of the sky for me?"

Shinx purrs louder and arches her back into Lee's touch, but otherwise doesn't reply.

It's been just three days since the TM demo for Silph Co. Lee, Brendan, and Zinnia decided to linger in Mauville for a while longer, taking in the luxury of the city before setting out on the daunting path to Lavaridge town for the next gym. With differing plans, everyone scattered for the day. Zinnia went to thrash a small local tournament for the prize money while Brendan decided to go to the annual Mauville Trick House event to try and win a year of free pokeblocks.

Lee debated on entering the tournament, loitering around a battlefield for a battle or two, or even going to the Mauville Game Corner to gamble a bit, but after the last week or so?

A calm day in the woods with his team is what he really needed.

The previous night, Brendan pointed out that the League tournament is still ten months away, and they've taken three of the eight gyms in only six weeks, so a slowdown wouldn't hurt. Lee honestly didn't realize just how urgent a pace he was setting until it was pointed out. The conscious realization that he has no deadlines, time clocks, or anything else breathing down his neck lifted yet another weight from the man's shoulders.

Nearly a year to just… wander around and have fun, getting paid to do research that he was going to do anyway. Then he can take a shot at fame and fortune in the Ever Grande Conference. After that, he has a spot in academia waiting for him.

With a long-term roadmap laid bare to him, things just seem like they're going to work themselves out. It's no wonder the life of a professional trainer is the dream of countless people all over the world.

'Still need to keep an eye out for Magma and Aqua…' Lee leans back into the tree he and Shinx are sitting under. 'Hopefully, Ash can deal with them,' He glances to the left, where Vulpix sits.

The vixen sits silently with her eyes closed, her face a picture of focus. Arranged from smallest to largest at her paws are several rocks gathered from around the forest, the smallest barely a pebble while the largest is the size of a bowling ball. A stone from the middle, maybe a pound in weight, hovers several inches off of the ground, suspended by a solid aura of pink. Slowly, the stone lowers to the ground, jerking unsteadily a few times. It lands with a muted thump, and the pink aura vanishes.

Vulpix sucks in a harsh breath, and although his bond to her is pinched nearly closed, so as to not disturb her, Lee can feel the fox's slowly mounting fatigue.

Her telekinesis is nowhere near powerful enough to be listed as the Psychic move Extrasensory in Lee's pokedex, a move high-level members of the Vulpix line can learn. The telekinesis isn't even strong enough to be recognized as Confusion, but much to Lee's pride, Vulpix takes a deep breath and centers herself, closing her eyes once more. Slowly, almost unsurely, the next largest stone at Vulpix's paws begins to rise in stark defiance of gravity.

Already grand ideas and fantasies swim in Lee's head as Vulpix hones her newest power. He idly flips back to her section in his notebook and looks down at the next move he wants to create for her.

Name: Psychobellows (Better name pending?) (Ver 0 Prototype)

-Psychic type

Description: User creates a spherical (shape subject to change after testing) psychic barrier with the intent to trap air, then compresses the barrier while creating a small opening (add nozzle?), dumping air into ongoing Fire attack to increase intensity.

Notes: Still in the conceptual stage. Vulpix needs to better master her psychic abilities to utilize. Requires focus as this needs to be used in tandem with another attack, ideally Flamethrower/Fire Blast


Name: Forbidden Sun (Better name pending?) (Ver 0 Prototype)

-Psychic/Fire type?

Description: User generates an extreme amount of fire contained in a psychic shell and sends it towards foe at high speed. Upon reaching foe, the shell breaks and unleashes the fire inside as a terrific explosion.

Notes: Still in the conceptual stage. Intended to be an offset of Convergence with a low cast- time and alarming speed. The psychic shell should take out the necessity of carefully shaping the attack (Early versions of Convergence lost cohesion if charged hastily. See notes on pg 87) as the edge of the shell keeps everything contained. Will likely be unique to Vulpix since pyrokinesis is needed to maintain the fire in the limited-air shell. With both pyrokinesis and psychokinesis giving Vulpix two degrees of control, she should be able to move the attack at high speed. (Testing needed. Unknown if there will be any conflict between the Fire and Psychic energy.)

Addendum: Fair and Balanced.

Lee nods to himself and shuts his notebook. 'It'll take some time, but if anyone can make wild techniques like these a reality, it's Vulpix.' Lee looks to his last pokemon.

Under another tree several yards away, Grovyle stands with his arms held in a ready stance, the leaves on his wrists glowing a verdant green with Leaf Blade. All around his feet are leaves from the tree above him, each one cut down the middle.

Grovyle lets out a short exhale, then turns and kicks the tree with a harsh Whack! Despite only being a little over three and a half feet tall, Grovyle's thigh muscles, the same ones that give him his explosive speed, let him kick with bone-shattering (or tree-shaking) force.

A shock runs up the tree, and from the branches falls a number of loose leaves that slowly flutter to the ground.

Grovyle's eyes narrow and his Leaf Blades hum. Around his body, a thin outline of white, just barely noticeable, begins to glow. His legs tense, then…

Whoosh!

He rockets upward, moving so quickly that the air whistles shrilly around his Leaf Blades. The grass around his feet is blown flat from the rushing air, and he rises so fast it looks as if he's going to fly up into the branches of the tree.

Grovyle grunts, Quick Attack flaring around him… Then he stops mid-air, his momentum gone and his speed halting on a dime. Before gravity can take hold of him, Grovyle's arm blurs, his blade slicing one of the falling tree leaves clean down the middle. Quick Attack flares again, and this time the Grass-type zooms down towards the lowest leaf, only five feet from touching the ground.

Once more, his white aura flares and arrests his momentum, giving him just a split second to cut the leaf in twain, then he's gone again, this time flying up to slice a leaf that strayed from the others.

As a flicker of green, Grovyle zips from one point to the next, never letting any of the falling leaves touch the ground before he can cut them in half, each one split down the middle and only down the middle.

'He's getting so fast…' Lee watches with no small amount of awe as the second-stage pokemon cuts every leaf like some sort of samurai. Well, if samurai could tell gravity to shove it, that is. 'Grovyle's movement is becoming so fast that he has to be approaching the speed of Andre's Absol. He's really taken Quick Attack and pushed it to its absolute limits. He's done nothing but focus on it for days now. I knew Quick Attack could be used to change directions even mid-air, but full-on never-touch-the-ground propulsion?'

The last leaf is carved down the middle, so Grovyle lets himself fall back to the earth, twisting mid-air to land on his feet in a silent crouch. He lets his Leaf Blades power down and shifts his chewing twig around in his mouth, inspecting his handiwork on the forest floor with a neutral expression. Despite his cool appearance, Lee still sees the barely suppressed tremors running up and down Grovyle's limbs.

'I hope he's not doing this to make up for losing Corvi…' Lee bites his lip and runs his hand through Shinx's coat, making the little kitten climb into his lap. 'Not having a flyer sucks, but you don't need to try and fill a role you weren't made for. I know that technique is putting a lot of stress on your body.' For a moment, he considers not voicing his concerns, then he shakes his head. "Grovyle?"

Grovyle turns at hearing his name, stepping closer with a short, inquiring hiss.

"Careful not to overwork yourself…" Lee pauses, trying to find words that won't wound Grovyle's pride, which has been especially sore since the Mauville Gym battle. "Until we fill our roster out some more, I need you in top shape now more than ever."

Grovyle rolls his twig around in his mouth and nods. He seats himself across from Lee, crossing his legs and folding his two-fingered paws in his lap. Grovyle gives the empty pokeballs on his trainer's hip a pointed look.

"Wanting to know who I'm planning on catching?" Lee asks, idly stroking Shinx. When Grovyle nods, Lee lifts his notebook again and turns to a page filled with names. "We haven't had a team meeting in a while, have we? I guess now is as good a time as any. It's about time for lunch as well." He looks over to Vulpix. "Hey, love? How about a break as we talk about plans for the future?"

Vulpix lets out a slow breath and lowers the rock in her telekinetic grip to the ground, only jerking it once. Opening her eyes, she re-opens her side of her connection to Lee, letting him feel her lethargy.

Lee smiles at her. 'I think lunch will fix that.'

The fox stands and shakes herself before trotting up and sitting heavily beside Lee.

In short order, Lee pulls a pair of covered bowls from his backpack and peels the plastic lids off, letting the aroma of the food inside fill the clearing.

Both Vulpix and Grovyle perk up as Lee lays the food out for them.

Vulpix's bowl is much the same as it was months ago when Lee found a satisfactory mix for her. A medley of lean beef, rice, eggs, veggies, slices of Oran, and a small amount of crushed-up vitamins mixed into a thin, savory sauce to round out what was missed.

Grovyle's lunch is much greener. Inside are collard greens, turnip greens, shredded cauliflower and broccoli, lentils, mushrooms, thin slices of various peppers, and slices of Oran. The vegetarian mix is only lightly cooked to prevent the precious water-soluble nutrients inside from escaping.

Mixed into both meals however, is something Lee has been using for only a week, and already he's lamenting how quickly it's running out.

In both bowls are paper-thin slivers of Sitrus berry, mixed in so thoroughly that they're unseen.

After discovering the miracle properties of the Sitrus berry, Lee knew he needed to have one. Not to use as a held item for a fight, no, but to use as a long-term additive to his pokemon's food. A smaller than average but high-grade example of the nearly-magic fruit drained two thousand credits from his wallet. To his utter relief, Sitrus didn't lose much potency when added to a mix. A test run with a salad for lunch several days ago with bits of Sitrus left him feeling peppy the entire day.

'Regular food to provide energy, nutrients, and minerals, Oran to promote proper digestion and body homogeneity, and a tiny bit of Sitrus for that utterly miraculous cellular regeneration,' Lee muses. 'Everyone definitely seems to be holding info about the higher-end berries close to their chest. A grand total of no one has documented info on how to promote a gradual release of the enzymes responsible for the regen.' Already, plans begin to formulate in his head. 'The Oran has already done wonders for them, so here's hoping the Sitrus takes it a step further. The better my team grows before they reach their final stages, the better… Maybe I can find a mix that better promotes Vulpix's psychic growth?'

As Lee withdraws a baby bottle of Miltank milk from his bag and uncaps it for Shinx, the thought of his pokemon team's growth flows into another. 'I'll let everyone eat first. The conversation can wait.'

Vulpix and Grovyle both down their lunches with a contained gusto, as neither wants to appear gluttonous. Shinx, however, has no issue sucking down her bottle like she's starved, and twice Lee has to remind her to slow down lest she ends up ill.

As everyone rests with full bellies, Lee clears his throat, getting Vulpix and Grovyle's attention. Shinx, however, lays dead to the world in his lap, lulled to sleep after her meal.

"So, I figure now is as good a time as any to discuss team matters," Lee begins, looking between his pokemon. "Grovyle wanted to know who is on my radar as a new team member, and honestly? I'm a little unsure."

Vulpix flicks her fan of tails, and her mind feeds Lee an image of an Eevee.

"Yes, Eevee is still very high on my list of wants," Lee nods along. "Preferably an Eevee partial to becoming a Vaporeon. Really, any good Water-type would be nice to have since the next Gym is a Fire specialist."

It's minute, but Grovyle's lips twitch downward.

Lee can't quite hide his wince. "I know, Grovyle. I know. Remember that I'll need you for the strongest gyms in Hoenn. I won't let your skill and hard work go to waste, I promise."

The gecko pokemon mulls Lee's word over, then reluctantly nods.

"Vulpix," Lee looks her way. "We've yet to actually fight another Fire-type seriously, as I assume most people think your ability is Flash Fire. I'm confident in your ability to no-sell fire attacks, but I think it would be a bad idea to rely so heavily on a single trick, hence wanting a Water-type."

The vixen nods her head easily, accepting the reasoning without any fuss.

"Hoenn's native water pokemon are…" Lee waves a hand in a 'so-so' gesture. "I've nothing against them, but after seeing that Vaporeon back on the Dewford boatride casually shapeshift, it's going to take something pretty impressive to upstage that." Lee sighs and crosses his arms. "I don't want to take in another teammate just for them to realize they were a second pick, a silver medal, and be stuck with that hanging over them, you know?"

Vulpix openly scoffs. 'Yo*r h*art's too b*g. You co*ld no* make t*em feel u*loved even if you tri*d.'

Grovyle warbles in his throat, leaning back as he reflects on Lee's words, then nods in agreement. His golden eyes fall to Lee's notebook, and Lee himself takes notice.

"There are a few besides Vaporeon…" Lee carefully takes Shinx's ball from his hip and recalls the sleeping kitten in a flash of light. After putting the ball back, he thumbs open his notebook to his 'wanted list', which has grown since he last reported to Nigel. "Squirtle and Totodile are easy picks. Both evolve into bulky, physically powerful tanks, a role we're lacking on the team. Too bad both are a pain to find in the wild and well-bred ones cost an arm and a leg…" He moves his finger down the page, tracing names as he goes. "A Gyarados would fill a powerhouse role well, but the Magikarp state is such a huge hurdle. Same thing with Milotic. Politoed is another tanky 'mon with a decent movepool, but a King's Rock to trigger the proper evolution is not an easy find…"

Both Vulpix and Grovyle look more and more unsure as more names keep getting tossed. The fox turns to the gecko, a quiet inquiry passing through her lips. Grovyle just shakes his head in a negative.

Lee frowns. His own desire to avoid pokemon with unfamiliar biology or situational utility is cutting his prospects down much more harshly than expected. "Piplup is a decent choice I suppose. Many have attitude problems and they're cheap to adopt for it, but… eh. Marrill is common enough, but they suffer from an early evolution and little time to hone their fundamentals. Octillery, maybe? They're slow, but they hit like trucks and learn a ton of moves. A Primarina would provide fantastic power and coverage with their dual Water and Fairy typing, but they're never seen outside of Alola." He sighs and closes his notebook. "I dunno guy and gal. It's a hard choice and we might be better off just praying for a Suicune to drop in my lap." He closes his eyes and crosses his arms.



After several seconds, he cracks open an eye and glances around, finding no free legendary pokemon. "Damn. I thought that would work."

Vulpix lets out a scratchy, vulpine chortle while Grovyle smiles slightly.

"Rock is also a choice, along with Ground," Lee turns a page in his notebook. "Rockruff is cheap to import and adopt, and they're much faster than other Rock-types. Trapinch is slow to grow, but a Flygon would make a great addition. A Nidoking or Nidoqueen would be nice, even if they're heavy investments given the moonstone needed."

Lee closes the notebook and stretches his arms over his head, a yawn escaping him.

"Well, it's not something we need to solve right now." Lee reaches out and takes Grovyle's empty bowl, then pauses with a faint smile when Vulpix's bowl shakily hovers into his hand on it's own. "You two are some of the best pokemon a trainer could want. You're walking blessings, really. I know you can pull us through just about anything."

Grovyle crosses his arms and looks away, vainly pretending he doesn't care when he has to fight to keep his smile from growing.

Vulpix's expression melts into one of open adoration, her tails wagging slowly. She widens her end of their bond, and through it comes a gentle river of love that makes Lee's eyes sting just a little.

The zoologist smiles back and pushes forth his own mental affection, slipping it around Vulpix and tightening it like one might a hug. After a moment, he lets go and returns his attention outward towards the bowls still in his hands. He replaces the lids on each one and slips them into his bag. "Before I forget," Lee looks to Vulpix. "What are your thoughts on evolving, love? For Shinx and Grovyle, it's only a matter of time and they can't really choose unless they want to lug around an everstone, but you can."

The fox suddenly looks uncomfortable, the love she's telepathically feeding to Lee halting abruptly.

The feeling makes Lee flinch. "Vulpix?"

Vulpix turns to her teammate and murmurs something almost too quiet to hear, and Grovyle's reply is a short, crisp nod. The wood gecko swiftly reaches an arm out but pauses an inch away from tapping the button on his pokeball. He hisses out a sharp comment that makes Vulpix visibly wince, then hits the pokeball button. Grovyle is then sucked inside the ball as a flash of red, leaving Vulpix and Lee alone.

"Love?" Lee begins, his worry building. "What's wrong?"

Vulpix trots her way to Lee and hops into his lap, standing on her hind paws and planting her forepaws on Lee's shoulders for support. Then she presses her forehead to his, filling his vision with her brown eyes. With their heads touching, Vulpix opens the telepathic bond wide, and by doing so she can't hide the smidgen of dread that hangs on to her.

'Lee…' Her 'voice' is crisp and clear. 'How l*ng does a Vulpix li*e?'

'How long?' He recalls his studies back in the lab. 'Around sixty years.'

'And how long d*es a Nin*tales live?'

'Several hundred, sometimes a thous - oh.'

Vulpix's apprehension makes much more sense.

'I want to e*olve, to become more *owerful for you.' Vulpix blinks her large eyes. 'But… Y*u're everything I k*ow and love. I'm *ot sure I can stand watching you *row old when I'll… just stay young.' A short whine makes it out of her mouth. 'I'm not sure what to do.'

With their minds so close, Lee can feel the turmoil inside her even as she tries to hide it, so he wraps her in a tight hug. Her soft, furry body warms him to the core. 'You don't have to evolve if you don't want to. It's your choice.' He tells her. 'If the legends are true,' He exhales sharply through his nose in a half-hearted laugh. 'Then maybe you can evolve, then I can grab one of your tails and curse myself with a thousand-year lifespan, fixing everything.'

Vulpix growls at the jest. 'Th*t's not funny.'

'Maybe not, but if you really wanted me to, you just need to say.''

The fox pulls her head back and nips her trainer on the tip of his nose, making him cringe.

'No.' Vulpix growls once more. 'No cu*ses, especially not a*y from me.'

"Understood," Lee mutters aloud, rubbing a finger across his smarting nose. "Just think on it, Vulpix. If you want to evolve, then I'll get you the highest grade firestone there is. If not, then I won't breathe another word of it."

She nods her head, thoughts still scattered and distracted. 'Lee..?'

'Yes?'

'I've been mea*ing to…' The vixen stops herself short and lets her forepaws fall, dropping into Lee's lap. 'No, never*ind.'

Why am I?

The confusing question Lee gleaned from Vulpix's sleeping mind several weeks ago comes to him once more, but he just reaches a hand up and strokes the fox's chin. "If you ever need to talk about anything, just let me know and I'll make time."

She huffs with a small smile, seeming terribly amused. 'Of cou*se.'

For a time, Lee and Vulpix simply sit together under that shady tree, the tension of the uncomfortable conversation washing away in the breeze.

Lee and Vulpix relax in the woods for some time, no words needing to be exchanged as they enjoy the simple pleasure of just being together. As the noon sun begins to flow into the afternoon, they decide to rise to wander through the forestry. Grovyle is let back out of his ball as well, and the three aimlessly walk about, Vulpix and Grovyle flanking their trainer. They encounter a bush of Oran along the way, which Lee picks to replenish his perpetually low stock.

It was around this time that Lee's phone beeps, making the man glance down at his pocket. "Hmm?" He wonders aloud, wiping a bit of Oran juice on his pant leg before pulling the device out. "An email?"

Hello Mr. Henson.

Alec here. I'm reaching out to you about your spectacular demo with us at Silph Co. Upon seeing the footage and data readouts from our testing, the TM Committee was quite impressed! They've expressed an interest in one run of both Seed Blast and Seed Sniper as a trial with the possibility of future runs. They, unfortunately, decided to hold fast in regards to your cut of 4%...

Lee frowns.

But seeing Convergence in action has intrigued not only the TM Committee, but a few Hoenn branch board of director members as well, which I think will open up future opportunities.

Lee shakes his head with a sigh. "Should have seen that coming I guess."

The TM Committee has hashed out the numbers with our finance and marketing departments, and they've decided to price your TMs at 3,500 credits with you receiving a 4% royalty for each one. Please swing by my office at your earliest convenience and we can get the paperwork rolling and have the moves copied.

Your friend and new Silph account manager.

Alec Aarons.
Senior Licensing Representative.
SILPH CO HOENN
5800 Junction Lane
(9790)-9856-1771


The numbers are run through his head, and Lee lets out a breath. "Holy shit, that's almost fifty thousand credits once all is said and done."

"Gro?" Grovyle raises one of his ridged eyebrows, looking at the phone in Lee's hand.

"Yeah, it was that slimeball Aarons," Lee nods absently. "Looks like all the red tape has cleared and they want the moves. We're about to have a lot more money in the coming weeks." He flips his phone between his fingers and looks between his pokemon. "Let's get going, then."

Vulpix hops to her favorite spot on Lee's shoulder and partially wraps around his neck. Meanwhile, Grovyle nods and falls in step.

During the walk back into Mauville and towards the Silph Co office, Lee browses his phone, flitting between websites belonging to professional breeders, to pokemon equipment manufacturers, to Silph and Devon, to berry farmers, evo stone sellers, and everything in-between.

Lee closes his browser and logs into his bank account, skipping past the cheerful Porygon icon reminding him his password is expiring in a week to look at the number inside.

Preferred PKMN Trainer Account ending in 4873

Checking: 10,982.25 credits

Savings: 5,200.00 credits

IRA: 2,000.00 credits (Learn more about your retirement account, yearly deposit limits, and annual returns by clicking here)

'Even after years of working at the zoo, I can't recall a time when I had more than several thousand dollars saved. After spending thousands on pokemon care, supplies, transport, food, lodging, savings, retirement, and other things all while being taxed on top of it, I still have ten-thousand credits ready to spend after just two months of a low-level trainer career.' Lee flips back to his browser. 'With just a few years of being a frugal trainer hunting for paid battles, I could buy a two-hundred grand house outright with money left over. No mortgage, no loans, just a single money wire and the deed would be in my hands.'

But the price of a house is utter chump change compared to the amount real pros throw around to make sure their pokemon are treated like kings and in top form. Full belt of Luxury Balls? Easily sixty thousand credits. Name brand food made for your pokemon's particular genus and type? Several hundred for a twenty-pound bag that any decently sized pokemon would gobble in just a few days. A full berry case? Lee already feels that multi-hundred credit-drain every week. Tailor-made training equipment? Land for your pokemon to live on? High-grade potions? TMs? Evolution stones? The costs soar into the hundreds of thousands.

Nothing is stopping a young trainer from keeping a few pokemon as pets or for low-level competition, but for the ones who dream of the gym circuit and beyond?

Pokemon training is not a casual sport. If you have no money, you've got to be resourceful and ready to hustle, otherwise, you're as good as sunk. The forty-seven thousand credits only weeks away from Lee's pocket will surely end up spent.

The walk to the Silph Co office takes almost an hour from the outskirts of Mauville, and Lee spends the time idly chatting with his pokemon, looking at an intriguing breeder site advertising rare "Hisuian" breeds in Sinnoh, and reading a news article about the Global Pokemon League considering full membership for the Ferrum region despite their unusual battle style.

'The use of augmented reality headsets and brainwave-sync tech that Ferrum is so fond of sounds interesting. Kind of like a heavily nerfed, bastardized version of telepathy.' Lee puts his phone away and pushes through the revolving door to the Silph office. 'Maybe we can go to Ferrum after graduating from Rustboro TS and show them what a real synced pair can do, eh, Vulpix?'

The fox yawns.

The receptionist at the front desk looks up as Lee, Vulpix, and Grovyle approach, not even bothering to try and enforce the 'no loose pokemon' rule she stated last time. "Hello, Mister Henson. I'll let Mister Aarons know you're here," she smiles, typing away at her computer.

Lee smiles back. "Thank you."

The wait isn't long, as Aarons steps through the elevator and whisks Lee and his pokemon away with a smile and a handshake, leading them up the elevator and to his office.

As Lee sits down in one of the guest chairs in the office, Grovyle opts to stand beside him while Vulpix just lazily remains on Lee's shoulders. All three watch Aarons seat himself behind his desk with a pleased sigh.

"Lee, thanks for coming by so quickly," Aarons smooths a non-existent wrinkle in his suit and laces his fingers together. "How are you doing today?"

"Well enough," Lee answers, scanning the walls of Aarons' office briefly. On the left wall is a trophy case and a framed diploma. Although the glittering trophies are too far away to read, the diploma, a degree in business awarded by the 'Castelia University of Commerce', is just close enough to be legible. "We were using today as a sort of 'unwind' day. Nothing planned until you emailed us."

Aarons nods pleasantly. "I see. Even experts need a day off every now and then. It's important to not burn out." His chair squeaks just the slightest bit as he leans back into it. "If you don't mind me asking, Lee, what did you do before becoming a pokemon trainer?"

Both Vulpix and Grovyle become guarded, something Aarons watches with a raised brow, but a little wave from Lee makes both pokemon calm.

"I was an animal handler," Lee begins slowly, picking his phrases with care at Vulpix's silent behest. "I worked with large carnivores in a zoo."

Confusion flits across Aarons' face but is gone again in an instant. "Sounds like an interesting profession," he smiles disarmingly and waves at someone behind Lee in the office doorway. "Why an animal handler, though?"

'What are you digging for?' As sorely tempted as Lee is to ask what the point of the small talk is, he resists. "It's rewarding work. Pokemon are filled with logical and emotional intelligence akin to and sometimes surpassing humans, so being an entry-level trainer is as easy as being friendly. Animals, though, force you to think differently, they change how you see the world." Lee smiles, a bittersweet note growing in his voice. "You can't find success unless you're willing to respect, understand, and grow. Without knowledge of their mindset and the ability to shift yours to match, I think you'd find even teaching a mundane canine how to sit on command maddening."

Aarons eyes narrow slightly as he nods and looks over at his trophy case, seemingly reflecting on Lee's words. "Interesting…" He mutters.

Vulpix's ears flick, making Lee turn to the office doorway just as an attractive young woman in a black dress suit walks in, a pair of steaming paper cups in hand. "For you and your guest, Mister Aarons," she says cooly.

Aarons openly grins. "You're a doll, Jill. They don't pay you enough." After a moment, he adds; "That dress new? Black looks good on you."

The woman smiles thinly. "Thank you." She says nothing else, simply setting the cups down before Lee and Aarons before leaving.

Aarons' reins in his expression and lifts his cup, taking a silent sip from it. "Ah, unknowable is the mind of the fairer sex, eh? I don't suppose knowing how to train animals gives you some kind of special insight, does it?"

Vulpix's body temperature rises in her offense, making her unpleasantly warm, so Lee soothes her ire by letting his own discomfort bleed through to her. Outwardly, he simply replies; "No."

A small smile rises on the blonde man's lips. "Are you sure? Your lady friend Zinnia was awful-quick to speak on your behalf during your last visit." He shrugs his shoulders minutely. "Keep your secrets, then."

Lee frowns as he raises his own paper cup and sips the coffee inside. 'Not bad. Rather good, actually. No way the guys in the cubicles outside are getting anything quality like this.' He sets the cup back down. "Well, what did you do before Silph Co, Alec?"

"I practiced law," Aarons' smile slips when Lee smirks, and Aarons realizes he seems to have lost some game of wit. He quickly recomposes himself and continues on. "I worked under Nooj, Pauling, and Sons in Jubilife city, specializing in fraud, but that's a boring story for another day. Let's get on to the real reason you're here, hmm?"

Relieved, Lee nods and watches as Aarons withdraws a number of forms from his desk.

"Let me tell you," Aarons extends his pointer finger at Lee. "The committee was blown away by your demo, dropped jaws in the whole room. Usually, these demos are nothing worth talking about, just a kid showing off a move their pokemon mastered to an unusual level. They get a percent or two and are sent on their way after copying, but Seed Blast and Seed Sniper?" Aaron's smile is all too pleased. "Very much worth the investment."

Lee raises an eyebrow. "You take move copies from… anyone?"

Aarons lets his smile dim, though only slightly. "We do. I'm not at liberty to say much, but the storage media used to hold the move data degrades over time, necessitating fresh copies from time to time. Silph Co is happy to offer a bit of money to young trainers for good copies. Now, for brand new moves we can be much more generous."

"I see…" Lee nods slowly. "And you're saying these moves developed by my team are worth only four percent?"

The businessman's face drops into one of regret. "I know, you should be entitled to much, much more, but even after arguing with our financial director, I couldn't secure anything greater than four percent. If we had more to give them…"

'Absolutely not.' Lee shakes his head with a sigh. "Convergence is off the table, I'm afraid. It's a move developed exclusively for Vulpix's use."

"Well, you mentioned a Dark-type move you wished to show a week ago. Another demo might change some minds." Aarons offers, his smile returning. If not for the slightly amused twitch of his lips that Vulpix keys Lee in on, he might have missed the condescending air of Aaron's smile. "When will that move be ready to be shown?"

Grovyle's eyes narrow, and on his shoulder, Lee feels Vulpix's hackles rise.

'You motherfucker.' Lee openly scowls. "The pokemon who knows that move is currently away," The scarred zoologist grounds out, trying vainly to put Corvisquire out of his mind for now. "He won't be back in a reasonable timeframe."

Aarons shrugs. "I understand, Lee. I can't do much else without more from you. The process of TM creation is one where both parties need to bring an equal amount to the table."

"Very well," Lee stands, drawing a raised brow from the other man. "I apologize for wasting your time."

"You aren't going to sign?" Aarons' confusion becoming plain as understanding dawns on his face. "Mister Henson, I assure you that this deal is a fantastic step towards lucrative contracts with Silph Co in the future. I understand this negotiated amount isn't exactly what you want, but-"

'Back to 'Mister', and not Lee, hmm?'

"But nothing," Lee cuts in, annoyed. "This is not just my work you're trying to buy, but my pokemon's work as well. Every single one of my team members is worth their weight in gold, and their efforts will be properly compensated. If you can't offer a proper payment, then perhaps Devon can."

Aarons' face twitches, like he's not sure if he wants to snarl or smile. "Mister Henson, I totally understand. I saw your matches with Roxanne, Brawly, and Wattson, and I was beyond impressed. You're one of Hoenn's rising stars, and you do deserve more, but my hands are tied."

Grovyle hisses.

Lee snorts. "Bull. I can do math, Alec. I know Silph stands to gain nearly two-million credits from the TM sales." He turns towards the door. "If we can't get a proper share, then Devon might like the moves."

"Yes, but!" Aarons raises a finger, making Lee pause and look back. "You need to factor things like labor, making the copies, quality assurance, shipping them to our distributors, things like that. It's not instant-profit for Silph Co!"

"Ok, how much of it is profit?"

When Aarons hesitates, Lee starts walking.

"Wait!"

The zoologist stops and turns once more, not hiding his irritation.

Aarons takes a deep breath and smooths out his suit once more. "If we frame this the correct way to the people upstairs…" He begins carefully. "Then perhaps I have some wiggle room."

Lee meets Vulpix's narrowed eyes, then Grovyle's apathetic golds. With a sigh, he returns to his seat and sits heavily. "Don't jerk us around on this, Aarons. The psychic fox on my shoulder can sniff out lies easily."

Aarons finally lets a grimace cross his visage.


Brendan Birch looks between all the people around him, wondering just how he got into this mess.

Earlier today he entered the Mauville Trick House contest hoping to win the year's supply of pokeblocks. Even if he didn't win, the trick house sounded like fun anyway. Or it would have been fun if a bunch of jerks didn't cheat and sabotage all the obstacles...

The maze was easy enough. No one said you can't use pokemon to help you, so Marshtomp's air-flow-sensing fins and ability to feel vibrations in the ground lead them to an exit.

The next obstacle, several rolling logs leading through an indoor waterfall and over a pool of water was more tricky. The slick logs needed careful balance, but a woman with ridiculous red hair stood at the end laughing to herself as she rolled the logs by hand, sending a few kids into the drink below. Brendan even saw Ash Ketchum, May Maple, Max Maple, and Brock there. All of them took a spill.

Fed up, Brendan let out Breloom, and the mushroom pokemon leaped across the entire pool of water to hold a log steady for Brendan, making the redheaded woman freak out and flee.

The next challenges were much the same. The redheaded woman, a man with blue, shoulder-length hair, and a talking Meowth made themselves into giant pains by getting past every challenge first and fouling up everyone else.

Each time, Brendan borrowed his pokemon's abilities to even the odds.

In the last room, where he burst in at the same time as Ash and his friends, a pair of trick house employees, a man and a woman, were there with a jump rope. The pair said they, the contestants, just needed to skip rope ten times to advance.

Something seemed fishy to Brendan, so he hid Marshtomp's small, travel-sized ball in his palm and played along. Quick as a flash, though, the pair holding the jump rope moved and tied everyone into one giant bundle. Before Ash's Pikachu could retaliate, he was stuffed into an apparently insulated bag now held over the employee woman's shoulder. After a few zaps failed, Pikachu resorted to fruitless struggling.

"Let us go!" Ash struggles harder than anyone else, and Brendan winces as an elbow is driven into his side. "Just what do you think you two are doing!?"

"Take it easy, Ash," Brock says tersely. "You're just making the rope tighter."

May and Max don't chime in, but they don't need to speak for Brendan to know how frightened they are.

Brendan, meanwhile, remains silent. Rather than struggle, he wiggles his hand up from its place caught in the cocoon of rope, slowly working Marshtomp's ball free. Once the mudfish pokemon is free, he can clobber these crooks and untie the rope.

The pair smirk, and from the rafters above them, a beige form hops down.

"Meowth!" The beige shape stands up, showing off the same Meowth helping the troublemakers from earlier. "Boy, you twerps really aren't da brightest bulbs around, are yas?" Meowth raises a paw with a smirk.

Recognition lights up on the faces of Ash and his friends before all four scowl.

The pair behind Meowth both laugh. "It was almost too easy," the man exclaims in a smooth voice. "I almost feel bad, right Jessie?"

"Indeed it was, James," The woman replies, one hand reaching down to grab the hem of her shirt and the belt of her pants. Her other hand reaches for the shades on her face and the bangs of her brown hair.

In a dramatic flourish, both 'Jessie' and 'James' pull their disguises off and throw the extra clothes and wigs into the air, showing off a shared white uniform emblazoned with a red R underneath.

"Team Rocket!" Ash yells accusingly.

Brendan stiffens. "Team Rocket?"

The Birch heir knows about the old crime syndicate, one Kanto police still struggle with to this day. Pokemon theft and trafficking, smuggling, money laundering, anything they could do, they did. Rumors of their leader, a shadowy man said to be an Elite level trainer, grow larger every time they're told.

What makes Brendan so wary of the Rockets however is not this scheme or the stories he's heard…

…It's how Lee speaks of them with open hatred.

Team Rocket only came up in conversation on the road twice before, but Lee's distaste for the criminals is so powerful that his Vulpix had to calm him lest he devolve into a tirade. Knowing the man after weeks of traveling together, Brendan had no idea Lee even had the capacity to hate. He spits the name Team Rocket like the words coat his mouth with poison, calling them pathetic thieves, terrorists, cowards who break up families for profit.

"These three have a fascination with Pikachu," Brock explains to Brendan, his brow furrowing. "They're slippery too. No matter how many times we send them packing, they find us again."

Brendan blinks. "This is a regular thing?'"

"Ha!" Meowth laughs. "Yous makin' me blush, twerp. Ain't no jailhouse that can hold Team Rocket!"

Brendan scowls. "I won't let you get away," he wiggles Marshtomp's ball with more urgency. "All three of you are as good as busted once we get out of here. As a Hoenn Lab Trainer, I'm not letting you go!"

"Aren't you just adorable," Jessie comments dryly. "It's been fun, truly," Jessie titters haughtily with her hand held in front of her mouth. "But the time for tricks is over, and the time for us to get this treat to the Boss is now!" She shakes the bag with Pikachu in it, making the mouse pokemon cry out and squirm.

"Ta-ta, twerps," James smirks. "Someone will find you here before long!" The three turn towards the door leading to the exit of the Trick House, leisurely strolling away as the trainers left in the rope bindings struggle.

Brendan grunts and tries to push Marshtomp's ball out faster. "C'mon…"

"...You're not going anywhere." A cold voice says.

Team Rocket all yelp as one and jump back when a plume of lava smashes into the top of the doorframe they were just about to walk through. The lava hisses and bubbles, dribbling down until it covers the whole doorway in glowing, cooling rock.

Brendan whips his head around.

There, standing in the doorway from the last obstacle is a woman beside an enormous pokemon.

The pokemon, a Camerupt, resembles a 'camel' that Lee told Brendan about with its humps replaced by miniature, rocky volcanoes giving it a height of six and a half feet tall. Both volcanoes gurgle with molten rock and plumes of smoke. The pokemon's shaggy hide is a rusty red in color, covering everything but its brown muzzle and large, cloven hooves. Its body is built more like an elephant than a camel, with a large body and short, muscular legs. The pokemon snorts, releasing wisps of black smoke from its nostrils.

To the Fire camel's side is a young woman, one who draws Brendan's attention more than the Camerupt.

The woman is youthful, in the same nebulous teen to young adult age that Zinnia is, but her stoic expression would be right at home on someone thrice her age. She's clad in a red, pullover hoodie with a small flame decal in the middle of her chest, and a black-and-red skirt that comes down to her thighs. On her feet are simple black and white high-top sneakers. Her magenta eyes, the same color as her neck-length hair, are dull and bored, observing Team Rocket like one might an interesting bug from the shade of her large hood.

Just looking at her makes the hairs on Brendan's neck stand up. It's the same feeling he gets when Zinnia breaks out into a feral, violent grin, or when Lee's face darkens.

This woman is dangerous.

"J-Just who might you be?!" Jessie pulls a pokeball from her belt nervously, voicing the unspoken question from the equally unsettled James and Meowth.

The mystery woman tilts her head back, looking down at them. "...Courtney is my name. Don't worry about that, though." She raises a hand and Camerupt snorts another plume of acrid, black smoke. "Do you surrender?"

Jessie grits her teeth. "Seviper, go!" She lets the ball in her hand fly.

"You too, Cacnea!" James pulls a pokeball from his pocket and tosses it.

In a pair of flashes, the snake and cactus pokemon materialize before the Rocket members.

Seviper hisses menacingly, mouth open to show off his huge, poison-dripping fangs as he brandishes his bladed tail.

Cacnea, being much smaller, looks at the massive Fire-type across the room with fear in his beady eyes. Nevertheless, he holds up his spiny arms threateningly.

Courtney expresses no disappointment, fear, or even eagerness. There's nothing. "You've chosen poorly," she mutters, letting her hand fall.
 
Act 1: Lee's Logs 4
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Nigel Birch settles into his office chair, wiping sweat from his brow. It's been a hot one today under the Hoenn sun, and helping his aides with a young Magby in the middle of a temper tantrum certainly didn't help things.

The regional professor ignores the stack of paperwork on his desk and jiggles the mouse of his computer, waking the machine up. Just as he does so, he sees that there is a new email waiting in his inbox.

New mail from: lhenson@hoennpkmnlab.org

"Ha, it's about time." Birch grins and opens the email, finding several audio and document files attached. He clicks on the first audio log and leans back into his chair.


"Log seventeen, day seventy."

"The last few days have been a whirlwind of ups and downs. Just as you wanted, professor, I spoke to that therapist, Mable, yesterday. She's good at what she does. I won't go into detail because I know that's not what these logs are for, but I think things will work out with her help… Thank you for pushing me, Nigel. I don't think I would have voluntarily gone myself."

There's a pause in the recording, followed by a sigh.

"The most important bit I think is… my Corvisquire ran away."

Nigel blinks. 'What?'

"I came clean about everything to my pokemon sans Shinx. Grovyle accepted what I said and swore to take the secrets to his grave. I'm still thanking my lucky stars for that. Corvisquire eventually followed suit, saying he would keep everything to himself as well. He even gave me permission to give him a proper physical so long as it was just he and I in a secluded location. Why he wanted this, I can make several guesses, many too ghastly to say. I know I shouldn't be assuming the worst, but…"

"After making it to Mauville, he and I went out into the woods for his physical and he took off without any warning. I figured that he was simply scouting the area to make sure there were no prying eyes, but seconds turned to minutes and minutes turned to hours, and he was nowhere to be found."

"I've… I've contacted the Rangers and put up a notice online to try and find him, but Corvi is smart. He won't be found unless he wants to be found. I don't really understand it. I'm sure he knows that he only needs to ask, and I would release him. He was approaching evolution, only weeks away. Is that why? Were we only a means to an end?"

Nigel pauses the recording. In the faint reflection of his computer monitor, he can see that his own face is troubled. A pokemon that knows is loose. A pokemon intelligent and determined enough to find a way to communicate one-to-one with humans should he wish.

Before going any further, Nigel writes a reminder on a sticky note in all capital letters and sticks it to his desk phone.

'CALL RANGERS ASAP TO UPGRADE LEE CORVI CASE'

Note written, he returns back to his computer.

"Grovyle and Vulpix netted us a win against Wattson. His Jolteon, a beautiful example of her species, was obviously on her way to her elder years, but she put up a monstrous fight. Jolteon was by far the fastest combatant we've ever had to face, beating out the Absol we faced in Dewford. Not only was she fast, but she could also turn on a dime as well, instantly halting her momentum and then accelerating back to top speed in a single step. I can't imagine the sort of strain it must've put on her ankles. If not for one of Grovyle's new moves, Seed Blast, injuring one of her legs, I think we would've been up shit creek."

"I… may have lost my temper slightly when Wattson pulled a Baton Pass trick with Jolteon, swapping in his Magneton, who then got the Agility stat-boost Jolteon cast a moment ago. Magneton took out Grovyle, and it stung. I sent Vulpix in and we wasted no time pulling out all the stops. After two or three Flamethrower attacks, Magneton was down for the count. Even with an injured leg, however, Jolteon proved to be just a little too fast to nail, so I pulled out another trick."

"I fueled Vulpix's attack with my own stamina."

Nigel sighs and leans back into his cozy office chair, becoming resigned to the fact that every time he views these logs from his lab trainer, there's going to be something worthy of a migraine.

"The little connection between Vulpix and I, I seized it and pulled it deeper within myself, deeper than it's ever been before. I can't accurately describe the sensation of doing so, as I think there just aren't words for it, but I took that little psychic line from Vulpix and jacked it directly into my own stamina. The resulting flamethrower was unreal. It was more like an orange-white beam than a stream of flames, and it was so fast that Jolteon was taken out before she could dodge, winning the challenge and landing us a Dynamo badge."

"It felt like I'd run a marathon in the span of two seconds after that little stunt. The sensation was so strange, as every part of me was equally tired, not just my arms or legs. Vulpix was furious that I took the risk, but after the day we had, I wasn't about to leave the gym empty-handed."

"I have more, but to be perfectly honest, I'm exhausted. I'm recording this in the bathroom of our hotel room in the middle of the night so I don't disturb Brendan or the pokemon. Lee, out."


"Log eighteen, day seventy-three."

"I meant to put this out on day seventy-one, but I was knee-deep in research, perhaps to distract myself."

"Anyway, onto my team. Shinx weighs a little more every day, and for that, I'm so thankful. She's also growing up as well as out, which is precisely what I wanted in this critical stage of her development. With any luck, she'll be healthy and of normal size by the time her evolution rolls around, however long it takes. For now, her formula mix remains unchanged since it's doing exactly what I intended."

"I've continued with the various corrective measures I mentioned in my last log, including helping Shinx stretch her limbs and massaging various muscle groups, but it looks like I won't have to do that for much longer. She's graduated from stumbling around it to being able to sprint like a professional runner even if it leaves her tuckered out. Her playfulness is an encouraging sign and I've been taking the time between work and training to play with her when I can."

"Her milk teeth are growing in, so she's been eager to gnaw anything and everything. Although this has resulted in some hotel chair legs being chewed up, I'm still happy to see it as he gives me a roadmap for weaning her off of her bottle. As the teeth continue growing in, I'll be monitoring her to determine a proper path going forward. The weaning process will likely begin in the next few weeks."

"Finally, I've begun testing her electrical output. Shinx is slowly beginning to grasp English, and being the smart girl she is, quickly learned how to output electricity on command. Her total output at the time of this recording is a few notches below a stun gun. Startling and rather painful, but nothing that would incapacitate someone let alone another pokemon. Her battling days, assuming she wants to battle, are still some weeks if not months off."

"Not much to say regarding Grovyle. He's pushing himself as hard as he ever was and continues to grow at a prodigious rate. His strength, speed, stamina, control, and sheer instinct for combat are rising with no ceiling in sight."

"He's mastered his two new moves, Seed Sniper and Seed Blast, to such an incredible extent that I felt confident enough to present them to Sliph Co. as demo material for TMs. I'll be sure to include notes on his moves along with other conceptual techniques with these logs. Anyway, he wowed the demo team and I think we've cinched it. Call me greedy, but I'm going to try and wheedle out a bit more payment from Silph for the TMs should they take it. I think the hard work of my pokemon deserves a proper payment. Just 4% before the patenting fees? Kiss my ass."

"Vulpix is in much the same boat as Grovyle. She's growing at a steady rate. Her pyrokinesis is growing more and more complex and I don't think it will be much longer before some of the more outlandish techniques still in the conceptual phase for her begin to become a reality. Physically, her growth is slowly beginning to plateau. I'm certain it's of no fault of her own, but rather she's just beginning to approach the physical limits of her small body. Not to say that she is a pushover by any means. As I noted in some previous logs, she's strong enough to pull me right off of my feet and she can probably drag me as dead weight without much of an issue. This is a very rough guesstimate so they don't have the appropriate tools on hand, but I wouldn't be surprised if she could drag a thousand plus pounds of dead weight."

"On the more mental side of things, her telepathy is now to a level that's rather clear. I haven't any idea if this is proficiency in identifying underlying emotions on my end, but the 'tone' in her 'words' is getting easier to identify without her having to manually include a burst of emotion. Something curious I've noted is how her clarity increases the closer in proximity our heads are. If she's sitting on my shoulder with our heads almost touching, she is clear enough that I need only a moment to decipher the garbled parts of what she is trying to say. If she's on the other side of the room, then her meaning is a bit more unclear."

"After a bit of testing, I can safely conclude that the range and clarity of the telepathy are dependent on distance and materials between her and I. Telepathic communication across a field of say, fifty feet, is easier than telepathy through a several-inch-thick stone wall with only twenty or so feet of total distance. This leads me to believe that this psychic connection does exist in the physical plane rather than somewhere more esoteric. I'll have to research that a little bit more."

"That's about it for this one. Lee, out."


"Log nineteen, day eighty."

"I met with Mable again a few days ago. My last session with her was… Emotionally charged, to say the least. I poured a lot of things out, and she offered advice. This time it was much more sedate. She said not to let unpleasant times control me, and I'm doing my best to follow that advice. Corvisquire… He's still not back, and as I expected, no one has seen hide nor hair of him. Rather than focus on him, I've been trying my best to put my time towards the things that are productive. Brendan and Zinnia have been helpful in that regard. Ah, I didn't mention it in my last log, but I did tell both of them that I am seeing an expert. I didn't mention any sensitive details, just that I've been going through some things."

"At first, I didn't want to burden Brendan with the knowledge that an adult in his life is mentally unwell, but now I don't regret it. I have to say, Nigel, you really hit a homerun with a son like Brendan. He doesn't pry, he doesn't joke, he just supports. He's definitely more emotionally mature than I was at twelve years old. If I ever have kids, I hope they turn out like him."

A smile warms the face of Professor Birch.

"Zinnia and I still butt heads every so often, and I think that we're always going to. It's just part of who she is to be abrasive, but she's been very understanding regarding this situation so far. I can't help but get the feeling that she and I are more alike than expected, even if our pasts are so different. I'm curious, but she ceased digging into my past after I revealed it was sensitive and I'll extend the same courtesy to her."

"There have been no significant breakthroughs with my team, it's just been business as usual. Train, rest, play. We've been in Mauville a bit longer than usual waiting for… Well, I think you know what we are waiting for, but so far nothing. I think we'll be moving on before long. In this lull, I've been taking the time to research a couple of various projects and whatnot."

"I've modified the diets of my team a bit. While the general mixture is much the same, I've taken to adding paper-thin slices of Sitrus Berry to each meal. Thankfully, it looks like the enzymes in the berry responsible for their absolutely miraculous cellular rejuvenation don't degrade when mixed with other food. I still maintain that these berries are some sort of literal godsend, Nigel. I wasn't joking when I said Oran would be a miracle food back home. Now, Sitrus? People would start wars over Sitrus, and I can say that with zero exaggeration."

"Either way, I'm using these properties to encourage rapid rejuvenation of muscle fibers and bones damaged during training for enhanced natural growth. If the few studies I was able to find on the subject are correct, then Sitrus should also facilitate the repair of damaged neural synapses and encourage the formation of new synapses in response to new skills and experiences. Sitrus is commonly seen as a restorative simply because of how rapid the effects of eating a single fruit are, so this approach should promote an even, gradual release of the super enzyme in my team. I'm hoping that by playing a long, conservative game here while my team are still in their formative years, we can min-max and push the ceiling of their powers to the highest that can be reasonably attained."

"That's not a bad idea at all…" Birch murmurs, rubbing his chin. "Huh. That gives me an idea for a study of my own. Now, where to find places with pokemon around natural Sitrus groves? I might have to see about a permit to enter a reserve."

"I've also taken the time to meditate on what exactly I'm wanting to do after this run of the Hoenn gym circuit. The Rustboro Trainer School accepted me into their university-level courses and I'll begin my attendance next year. There, I plan on majoring in either pokemon nutrition or psychology. After that, I'll probably take up a position with the League, buy a house with a plot of land for my pokemon, and who knows from there? Hard to say. None of this is set in concrete yet, so maybe I'll take a different major or go on another journey. I heard Sinnoh in winter is beautiful, and although I'm getting used to the tropical weather of Hoenn, life in the U.S. north-east made me accustomed to mild weather year-round."

"Now that I think about it, maybe I'll take nutrition or psychology as a minor study rather than a major. I've been digging deep into the topic of Infinity Energy here recently."

The Hoenn Professor leans forward.

"I'm not sure if RTS offers any courses relating to Infinity Energy, but the more I learn the more fascinated I become. I guess Devon Corp coined the term, but it's also known as aura in some small religious circles and just pokemon 'lifeforce' or 'stamina' to the layperson, aka the fuel for pokemon moves."

"In my efforts to build a diverse arsenal of moves for my team, I keep having to research different ways for pokemon to build and mold different types of Type Energy, and all the sources I keep finding can't seem to agree on how Type Energy, or TE is generated. The most common theory seems to be that pokemon generate 'stamina' or Infinity Energy in some sort of poorly understood biological process, then the IE is then consumed by the cells of the pokemon which then spit out Type Energy. At first, I wanted to scoff at this, because every single study explicitly stated that the Infinity Energy is consumed and destroyed in its entirety by the cells of the pokemon, then the overblown mitochondria of the pokemon produce the TE."

"Then I remembered pokeballs."

"So obviously you know how pokeballs have been used for centuries, right? To the average person, it just looks like the pokemon shrinks and is sucked inside the ball, and they really don't give it any more thought than that. They really don't need to if it works, right? Professor Laventon, a Galarian researcher known for his work in Sinnoh well over a century ago, accidentally perpetuated that myth. To me, though, that makes no sense. Where does the extra mass of the pokemon go if that is the case? Why doesn't a pokeball containing a Wailord weigh countless tons?"

"How early apricorn pokeballs, which for all intents and purposes were colorful coconuts, accomplished the absolutely mind-bending feat of converting matter to energy, and vice versa, I have no idea. I'm not even going to get into the storage and encoding of information into pure energy. That can wait for another day."

"I guess to people used to living with pokemon, that's kind of mundane in comparison. To me, though? I… guess I always knew that was the case in a peripheral sort of sense, but seeing one-to-one matter to energy conversion being casually glossed over in official academic texts really just… I don't know. It just messed with me. I could rant and rave about the seemingly inconsistent development of tech over the years, but I'll spare you that."

"Back home, there are a pair of ironclad rules in science. Normally it's laughable to call anything in science 'ironclad', but these rules have stood the test of time. There are some exceptions, but by 'exception', I mean theoreticals that require the energy output of the sun in order to create a small handful of useful matter. These two rules are known as the law of conservation of mass and law of conservation of energy. I know I'm going on a tangent here, just humor me."

"Both of these rules state that in a closed system, both energy and mass cannot be created or lost, they can only change their respective forms. Pokeballs just laugh in the face of this."

"The conversion of a full flesh and blood creature into a collection of pure massless energy that can be stored inside of a capsule the size of a baseball, only then to be restored back to matter again absolutely would not work in the model of science I was raised on. I did check. The weight of a pokeball doesn't change regardless of the presence of a pokemon inside of it or not."

"Then I ran into a few other things that made me think. According to most official sources, the generation of Type Energy is a process tied to the biology of the pokemon in question. It's dependent on the mitochondria within the cells to create the energy, which then is transformed into the pokemon move. It's again here that we can observe the energy-to-matter effect, as some moves create matter, like Watergun or Rock Tomb."

"Where are you going with this, Lee?" Birch wonders aloud. Nonetheless, he pays rapt attention.

"I'm of the opinion that the generation of TE is not a process locked to biology. It's well-known that a pokemon can learn moves outside of its usual repertoire with the aid of a parent's genes, and this is used to explain why a pokemon might know a move that they shouldn't. I have a theory, though, based on my observations of past studies. All the different sources and reference material I can find regarding Infinity Energy insist that it is, in fact, an energy. What if it's not? In this world, physics allows conversion of energy to matter and vice versa with an efficiency I would normally call impossible, so we already have proof of that, so what if IE is a matter produced by the bodies of pokemon that emulates the nebulous nature of TE? Or what if IE is an undefined substance existing between the states of matter and energy? Shit, anything is possible."

"I began pondering this after realizing that Grovyle shouldn't be able to learn Feint Attack. According to the current model, the Treecko line should have little to no ability to learn Dark moves. They can sometimes learn Pursuit naturally if they have a Dark-Typed grandparent, and a Treecko knowing Crunch as an egg move is rare, but not unheard of, but Feint Attack is not in the roster of even the most trained Sceptile. Yet, Vulpix taught the technique to Grovyle even if it took weeks… None of us even knew that limitation existed. According to the current model, what we did was impossible."

"So, I don't think the generation of Type Energy is constrained by biology at all, and that all TE might be available to any pokemon who learns how to properly shape their IE. I did look at the studies, and while different pokemon of the same type share genetic markers indicating a predisposition for a move type in the mitochondria of their cells, I think this has resulted in a false correlation and thus the setting of artificial limits on pokemon."

"Again, just a theory of mine, but I'm going to be studying it. I think Infinity Energy itself is not a fuel totally different from TE, but rather the starting state of the TE. Perhaps IE and its relation to TE is more akin to chemistry, where the pokemon induces a purposeful instability in the IE, which is the universal starting point, and the resulting TE is a useful decay product. The TE might even decay further, directed by the pokemon into an excited, volatile state for an energy attack, or converted into mass for a physical one. Considering the TE can end up being either mass or energy, it lends a little bit of credit to IE being it's own 'in between' state, I think. I'm hoping the more I learn of IE, TE, and the relationship between them, the better I can understand things like Vulpix's pyrokinesis and telepathy. Surely she must be creating and manipulating Fire and Psychic TE for both."

"I'm just scratching the surface here, so I don't expect any of this to be right, but I hope it's a step in the right direction. I've already got some tests in mind, but… Man, I know this is going to require a lot of expensive equipment… I'll be researching here and there, but I doubt I'll begin in earnest until I begin university. That's all for this one. Lee, out."


As the last audio file ends, Birch doesn't bother to look at the attached documents right away. Instead, he stands and slowly paces around his office, mind abuzz with the musings of his lab trainer. Mass and energy can be created, it can change shape, and it can be annihilated by both pokemon and modern technology. How strange that on Lee's bizarro earth, some of the tech people enjoy, pokeballs chief among them, just… wouldn't work. The ideas presented in the last log are messy, but novel, and they make a startling amount of sense for being pure speculation.

'Once more, the perspective of an outsider is worth its weight in gold.' Birch bites his lip and glances back to his PC. 'If Lee's theory is even the least bit true… This'll be a massive upset to the scientific community.' The professor sits back down and moves the logs to an encrypted file squirreled away deep in his computer. 'Sense sharing, stamina sharing, missing pokemon, alien theorems on Infinity Energy, this is getting to be too much. These things Lee is getting up to… He's going to cause a paradigm shift before long, and all I can do is hope the world is ready…'
 
Act 1: Finale
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"Seviper, Poison Tail!" The red-headed Rocket, Jesse orders. Her face locks into a determined scowl. "Make it hurt!"

"Use Growth, Cacnea!" James' expression is one of caution, and maybe even worry to Brendan.

Brendan analyzes the opening moves Jessie and James use as a counter to the Camerupt charging at them like a runaway truck. It's a smart two-on-one opening, having the mightier of the pair attack while the weaker one buffs up. With his Grass-typing, Cacnea will need all the strength he can muster to face a fully-evolved Fire-type like Camerupt, and any time Seviper can buy is precious.

With a deep hiss and menacing brandish of his bladed tail, Team Rocket's Seviper coils like a spring-loaded trap and waits for the charging Camerupt to get in range. The vicious red edge on the end of his tail shivers with pent-up violence.

Cacnea, meanwhile, bounces behind his snake comrade on his short, stubby legs. Once out of harm's way, the cactus pokemon glows a faint green as he draws on the dormant Grass energy in his body to strengthen himself.

Camerupt's eyes narrow, but the huge Fire/Ground hybrid continues his charge. Just as Camerupt comes within range of Seviper, Brendan notices it.

Camerupt was already moving to dodge the instant an attack was called. The camel pokemon adjusted his steps as soon as Seviper bared his tail, now charging at the space just to the right of the snake.

Seviper hisses and brings down his tail like the hammer of a gun, going from poised to striking in nary a second.

In reply, Camerupt just leans to his right the slightest amount and the tail passes by with only an inch to spare, slamming into the ground like a guillotine. A few red hairs from Camerupt's hide flutter down to the floor, shorn off by Poison Tail. The sheer economy of movement that such a large pokemon can bring to bear leaves Brendan stunned for a moment.

Brendan isn't the only one surprised by Seviper's miss. The snake pokemon's trainer, Jesse, seems just as dumbfounded that a giant target like Camerupt dodged a point-blank strike.

On the other end of the impromptu battleground, Courtney's face remains neutral, as if the outcome of the first strike was never in doubt. "Headbutt."

Now beside the wide-eyed Seviper, Camerupt stomps to a stop and rams his head into Seviper with devilish speed, the sort a beast his size shouldn't have, making a wince-inducing crack as their skulls meet.

Seviper is thrown across the room from the force of the blow, flying through the air as limp as a wet noodle. Droplets of blood trail his new head wound, then they splatter as Seviper hits the ground and rolls, landing in a tangled, unconscious heap.

"Seviper?!" Jesse's voice is shrill in alarm. "Seviper! Get up!"

The snake lets out a low, groaning hiss, but remains down.

"Wha?" Ash blinks, drawing Brendan's attention. "Camerupt beat Seviper in just one hit?"

"Is it really that surprising?" Brendan asks, wiggling the fingers holding Mashtomp's ball under the rope binding still holding himself, Ash, and Ash's friends in place. With just one push, Marshtomp could be released to back up the mysterious woman and her Camerupt, but he holds off to see where the battle will go. "I doubt pokemon belonging to criminals are going to be in top shape."

"Jesse and James aren't the best trainers," Ash concedes, "But they and their pokemon aren't pushovers either. They've nearly had us more times than I care to count."

Beside him, May groans. "I'm starting to rethink this whole 'pokemon journey' thing."

Ash just grins sheepishly.

Back in the battle, the other Rocket, James, seems to realize how dire things are becoming. He looks at Camerupt with something akin to fear, his face paling. "Cacnea! Stay on Camerupt's side and use Poison Sting!"

Cacnea bounds into action, circling the Fire/Ground-type that just floored his ally. The cactus pokemon raises his thorny arms, the spines lining the limbs glowing brightly. Then from the spines shoots a wave of sickly purple needles, all flying at Camerupt's wide flank.

Once more, neither Courtney nor Camerupt seem concerned by the attack. The red-clad woman leans her head back slightly, almost as if she's looking down on the Rockets. "Heatwave."

Camerupt's volcano humps boil and churn with molten rock, and all at once, the entire room becomes unbearably warm, slowly drying out Brendan's eyes and throat. The air around Camerupt wavers and hisses, the pokemon within looking like a mirage to the naked eye.

As Cacnea's Poison Sting needles fly through the scorching hot air at Camerupt, they simply burst into flames and disintegrate, falling short of peppering their target by a mere foot. As the last needle turns to ash, the temperature drops back down, the room now noticeably drier.

Again, Brendan finds himself astounded. 'Camerupt didn't need any extra instructions to use Heatwave as a defensive move, and he measured the energy needed for Heatwave perfectly. How did Courtney do it? Some kind of gesture I didn't see? Did they plan a maneuver like that out in advance?'

Cacnea's brow creases in worry and he looks back to a stunned James for instructions. A fatal mistake that both Courtney and Camerupt ruthlessly jump upon.

"Flamethrower."

The camel pokemon draws in a deep breath, then from his mouth pours a tight gout of blazing orange flames.

The Flamethrower crosses the distance to Cacnea so fast the poor Grass-type has no time to even raise his arms in defense, even if such a defense would be worth nothing. The fire splashes around Cacnea's small, round form with such intensity that James hops backward with a yelp, nearly brushed by the attack.

As Flamethrower ends, Cacnea reels back, covered in blackened, savage burns. He sways and falls to the ground, unconscious and overloaded from pain.

"Both Seviper and Cacnea went down in just one attack," Brendan hears Max remark with surprise.

Looking between the downed Cacnea and Seviper, then to the shocked Jesse and James, Meowth audibly gulps. "Uh, guys?" He looks up at his human partners. "Gettin' zapped is one ting, but I don't think I wanna get char-broiled by Camerupt here…"

"Me neither…" James quietly agrees.

"Same here…" Jesse tightens her hold over the sack holding Pikachu, who has since gone still at the sound of fighting. As one, Jesse and James recall their pokemon into their pokeballs and stand tensely. Meowth turns and looks at the door they were going to use as an escape, finding Camerupt's lava has cooled into solid, smoking rock.

So now the only exit is behind the trainer of the mammoth Camerupt.

Camerupt snorts, blowing twin plumes of black smoke from his nostrils as he impatiently taps a hoof on the ground, making the Team Rocket trio cringe and take a collective step back.

Behind Camerupt, Courtney regards the trio with the same dead expression she's worn for the entire short fight. Her eyes turn to the bag over Jesse's shoulder. "Put the Pikachu down… And surrender. You can't win." She finally says, her voice halting and oddly cadenced.

Jesse's trepidation is traded for a red face of indignant anger, but her partner is quick to place a hand on her shoulder and frantically shake his head no. With a sigh, Jesse slowly begins to lower the bag holding Pikachu…

But Brendan notices James reaching into his back pocket for something, and rather than let the Rocket get away with whatever he has planned, Brendan pushes Marshtomp's ball free.

The pokeball pops out between Brendan's body and the ropes and splits open in a flash of light as it hits the ground, letting a furious Marshtomp out. The mudfish pokemon opens his mouth and unleashes an enraged bellow, one so loud that all three Rockets jump, startled. The bag holding Pikachu slips from Jesse's fingers in her surprise.

"Marshtomp!" Brendan barks. "Stop the blue-haired one! He's reaching for something!"

Marshtomp needs no other instruction and rushes forward like a wild-eyed, speeding train, his footsteps thundering on the concrete floor.

James stiffens and goes ghost-white as he yanks a small black orb from his pocket. "These Rockets aren't blasting off today, thank you!" He says, throwing the orb against the ground with a crack.

Thick black smoke erupts from the apparent smoke bomb, quickly filling the room with an acrid haze and drowning everyone's sight in darkness.

Brendan, Ash, May, Max, and Brock all break out into a coughing fit, having no way to cover their mouths and noses with their limbs still bound. After a minute of teary-eyed choking, the smoke begins to dissipate.

Blinking through his red, irritated eyes, Brendan looks around and curses under his breath when he sees no Team Rocket. 'Aw man. I can't believe I let them get away. I should have let Marshtomp out earlier…' He watches his pokemon grumble, probably thinking the same thing. Marshtomp isn't bothered for long as he walks up to the bag where Pikachu is contained. Rather than untie it, Marshtomp just rips off the knot holding the bag closed with a loud tearing sound, letting Pikachu pop his head out.

The electric mouse looks around, his ears folding back. "Pika…" Ash's pokemon says dejectedly.

Marshtomp just waves off whatever Pikachu said with an uncaring don't worry about it croak.

"Got away again…" Ash frowns slightly, unintentionally mirroring Brendan. "Team Rocket is such a pain sometimes."

Brock nods. "They've been getting craftier too."

"This ropeburn I'm getting is an even bigger pain than those clowns," May complains with a groan, theatrically struggling as she does so. "Pikachu? Marshtomp? Please let us out."

Pikachu and Marshtomp share a look, then smile. As a pair, they start towards their trainers.

"Here. Let me."

The bundle of tied-up trainers all look up as one as the mysterious woman, Courtney, leisurely walks her way up to them with her Camerupt at her side.

With the fighting now over, Camerupt's humps have stopped smoking, and his sharp, alert eyes have fallen into an aloof sort of dullness. It's the same look most people would find on a Numel or a Camerupt, but after seeing the pokemon in action, Brendan already knows it's an act.

Courtney reaches out and gives the knot holding the rope together around the group a pull, slowly shimmying one length of rope past another and loosening the binds. As she works, she turns her half-lidded eyes to Ash. "Those three…" She begins. "You've fought them before?"

Ash nods and hangs his head with obvious frustration. "Yeah, they're a bunch of pokemon thieves! Pikachu beat them once and they've been obsessed with him ever since."

From his place atop Marshtomp's head, Pikachu sighs and slumps his shoulders right along with his trainer.

"Hmm…" Courtney hums to herself, then she turns her eyes to Brendan.

Unable to squirm in discomfort with the ropes still around him, all the Birch heir can do is stare back as the woman's piercing eyes cut into him like scalpels. Thankfully, it ends as quickly as it started, as the magenta-haired woman pulls the final part of the knot free, letting the ropes around the group go limp and fall to the floor. As one, everyone steps away from each other into a loose circle, some rubbing chaffed arms.

Max fixes his lopsided glasses and looks at Courtney. "Thanks for the save, miss. Team Rocket would have gotten away with Pikachu if you didn't come in."

Courtney's stony face finally breaks and reveals a tiny, almost nonexistent smile. "No thanks needed. But…" She once more looks at Brendan. "Brendan had… his Marshtomp ready. He would have saved you if we didn't."

Camerupt snorts.

Brendan can't help but blink in surprise 'She noticed? And she knows my name?' He clears his throat. "Well, that doesn't change the fact you and your Camerupt sent those creeps packing, so thanks anyway."

Courtney's smile grows a little more. "I've actually been looking for you, Brendan Birch."

"Me?" Brendan spares a glance down at Marshtomp as the mudfish pokemon takes the spot to his trainer's right. "Why's that?"

"You're one of Hoenn's rising stars, and son of the man who could have been champion." Courtney nods. "You're going to go far in this world, Brendan, and I have something I want to ask of you…"


"The guy was a lawyer?" Zinnia smirks, weaving around a slower pedestrian in the dense foot traffic of downtown Mauville. "That makes way too much sense."

"Exactly what I was thinking," Lee nods. "After a lot of back and forth, we finally got him to agree to five percent and to file both of the patent applications as just one rather than separately, so we only have one fee."

After fearsome debate with his new account manager within Silph Co, one Alec Aarons, Lee finally compromised on a number that left neither him nor Aarons happy. The negotiations took the better part of an hour and resulted in more than one patent form crumpled up and tossed in the trash. The shell that is Aarons' pleasant demeanor was beginning to wear thin near the end, this Lee is sure of. The businessman let a single lock of his slicked blonde hair slip free, and although his smile remained nearly unflappable, Aarons' eyes would flit between something violent and a plea to give up.

Lee gave no quarter. The work of his team would be rewarded properly.

Once ink was set to paper, they went down to the lab portion of the build to copy the move and left. Grovyle returned himself to his ball shortly afterward, leaving Lee and Vulpix to wander to a street corner ice cream stand. The frozen treat did quite a bit to soothe the former zoo keeper's fouled mood. Vulpix's delight at trying and subsequently loving a peach-flavored scoop fixed his day in a hurry after that.

'Maybe Mable was onto something with this whole 'treat yourself sometimes' thing.'

The dragon tamer fixes her crimson eyes on Lee, bemused. "They can do that and just choose not to?" She asks, sounding vaguely disgusted. "That's thousands of credits out of the patent holder's pocket though."

Lee shrugs, lifting the placid fox on his shoulders up and down. "I don't know if it's somehow less work filing the patents separately or if they have to eat some kind of cost now, but it's some kind of corporate nonsense."

Zinnia rolls her eyes. "So what happened after that? How did they actually copy the moves off of lizardman?"

"In the basement of the building, they had this…" Lee pauses. 'I don't actually know how to describe it,' he thinks, recalling the wall-sized machine not unlike the vintage supercomputers of yesteryear back on earth. "Gigantic computer-looking thing taking up an entire wall. All they needed Grovyle to do was wear this headband with electrodes in it connected to the machine and just think about the moves. Five minutes later, we were on our way out."

"That's kinda boring," Zinnia muses, unknowingly using the same words Lee did as he left the Silph Co office.

"A bit, yeah…" Lee nods along. "How did your tournament go?"

Zinnia sighs. "Barely a challenge. Swablu handled the bulk of them and Goomy got a few battles in. Shelgon swept the semis and finals, netting me a neat three-thousand."

"See any interesting pokemon?"

The draconid tribeswoman taps her chin with a finger. "There were a few. The guy I fought in the semis had a Scolipede."

Lee feels his eyes widen. "A fully evolved three-stage pokemon in a small local tourney?" He tries to picture the massive centipede pokemon in its eight-foot-tall glory, but the image in his head doesn't seem to do it justice.

"Yep!" Zinnia pops the p in yep. "He was a one trick Ponyta, though, only using Poison Sting into Venoshock. He gave everyone else a one-two punch knockout, but Scolipede dropped like a sack of rocks after Shelgon hit him with Rollout and followed up with Flamethrower." Zinnia slumps. "The money is nice, but I wish someone had put up more of a fight."

"Erm…" Lee awkwardly puts a hand on her shoulder. "You always have mine and Brendan's teams to spar against."

"I guess…" She grumbles before straightening up, making Lee withdraw his hand. "So, we're heading north tomorrow, huh? Which route are we taking?"

"I wanted to discuss that with you and Brendan, actually."

Zinnia nods, her expression firming up. "The northernmost part of Hoenn is pretty treacherous. The closer you get to Mount Chimney, the harsher it is to navigate. I think we should really plan this out and prepare, maybe even stop by a store for more gear. We've had it nice and easy with the flat plains and forests so far."

Lee looks at her, and he can feel Vulpix's curiosity as well. "Is it really that bad?"

The tanned woman nods seriously. "The Draconid Tribe have strongholds throughout northern Hoenn, and that's where I grew up. Trust me when I say we need to be ready for this, because it could take weeks to get to Lavaridge Town, and both routes have their own dangers. This leg of the journey is really going to test you and Brendan, Lee."

Lee notes how Zinnia referred to him and Brendan by their real names, and not any dumb nicknames. "Right…" He hums. "We'll start planning tonight then."

Zinnia nods, sending him a sidelong glance. "You don't want to wait any longer?"

"If Corvi comes back, then he comes back and I'll be overjoyed," Lee replies, forcing his tone to be neutral. Nearly two weeks after Corvisquire ran away, it still stings. "If not, then that's his choice."

Vulpix shifts, nosing his cheek in a silent display of comfort.

Zinnia says nothing more on the topic. "When did shrimpy say he was heading this way?"

"Just a few minutes ago," Lee pulls his phone from his jacket pocket before unlocking it and taking another gander at his recent texts.

Brendan: (2:22pm) Trick house was a bust some other kid won and some cheaters threw everything out of wack. Coming back with a new friend. We're gunna stop (HERE) if you want to meet us.

"Said he's bringing a friend too."

"Does he mean a pokemon or another person?" Zinnia asks, then she smirks once more. "Oh, what if shrimpy is bringing a girl? You better hope Birch gave his kid the talk or that might fall to you~!" She giggles and pokes Lee's ribs.

"Yeah, nah. The professor will be down a lab trainer if he puts that evil on me," Lee shoots back. "Doesn't say if it's a new pokemon or not," Lee drops the phone back in his pocket. "We'll see."

The pair of trainers and single pokemon continue their walk for several minutes, slowly leaving the bustling, skyscraper-boasting downtown to a more sedate urban market area. Rounding a corner, they find a colorful corner store where Brendan asked them to meet at.

Stepping through the automatic glass doors with Zinnia only a half-step behind, Lee perks up as he hears a familiar voice.

"Man it's hot outside…" Brendan complains from two aisles over by a soda fountain. The rows of junk food obscure the boy, but the voice is unmistakable. "I think a slushie would hit the spot. Do you want one?"

Another voice replies, this one quiet and female. "No thank you," says the soft voice of a woman.

Lee can feel Zinnia's amused smile without even turning. "Not a word."

"I didn't say anything~" Zinnia almost laughs.

They circle around the aisle, both Lee and Zinnia pausing for a second to take in Brendan's new friend.

Standing a few inches taller than the young Birch is a woman in her late teens. Her large red hoodie covers much of her form, and her hands are resting in the hoodie's pockets, hiding them from view. Her hood is pulled up, but the zoologist and dragon tamer can still make out a gentle, placid face with pink hair and eyes of the same color. A red shoulder bag rests slung across her body, and her skirt and shoes are unremarkable, but…

'I'm getting the weirdest feeling I've seen this girl before…' Lee blinks. That thought is immediately followed by; 'Brendan why are you letting a strange woman follow you around? If you need either a stranger danger talk or the talk I swear to God I'm going to have a stroke.'

The unknown woman takes notice of Lee and Zinnia first, watching them with a raised brow as Brendan finishes filling a soft drink cup with his slushie.

Brendan caps his treat and sticks a straw in with a smile. His smile grows as he turns and spies Lee and Zinnia. "Hey! About time you got here." He pauses to take a sip from the cup in his hand and looks over at his new 'friend'. "Guys, meet Courtney," he says, raising a hand to the now named Courtney, who just nods politely. "I met May Maple and her friends at the Trick House, and apparently they were being stalked by a pair of Team Rocket thugs."

Lee feels his breath hitch, not questioning why the name Courtney seems familiar right now. "And you got involved?" He asks sharply.

Smile falling, Brendan laughs nervously. "Ah, maybe? It's fine, though! Courtney and her Camerupt sent them running like the babies they are!"

"Camerupt, huh?" Zinnia gives Courtney an appraising look, and Courtney returns the stare coolly. "You a trainer then?"

The red-clad woman nods. "I am."

When she doesn't elaborate further, Zinnia pushes more. "Really? What kind of pokemon have you got, and what's your motivation? Looking to hit the gyms?"

"Zinnia…" Brendan frowns. "You're being nosy again."

"It's okay Brendan…" Courtney raises a hand to halt him. She looks back to Zinnia. "I have Camerupt, Swellow, and Mightyena. My motivations?" She glances away, the barest hints of a smile on her face. "We just need to be strong for someone precious to me."

"That's a more noble reason to be a trainer than most," Lee smiles, hoping to smooth over Zinnia's less-than-stellar first impression. "Three fully evolved pokemon, huh?" Lee wonders aloud. "You must be a talented trainer."

The pink-headed woman shakes her head. "My pokemon and I are formidable to any who care to judge, but we've a lot to learn. That's actually why I am here." As she speaks at length, odd halts make themselves apparent in her speech, as if she's not used to speaking more than a few words at a time.

Yet another thing that is so strangely familiar, but Lee can't put his finger on just who this woman is.

"If you are Zinnia," Courtney glances over to the frowning draconid. "Then you must be Lee, the leader of the group," she finishes, turning to Lee.

The scarred man blinks. 'Leader?'

'Yo* fit t*e part,' Vulpix's dull amusement bleeds over to Lee.

'Hardly,' He inwardly scoffs. "I'm not really the leader, the other two are just too lazy to make decisions."

Courtney shrugs. "You're still the one in charge then." She then politely bows at the waist towards him. "I've heard of you and Brendan being expert trainers, and I would like to know if you would permit me to travel with you."

"Huh?" Is Lee's intelligent reply.

The pink-eyed woman raises her head, looking at him intensely. "I would like to travel with you as a learning experience, if you'll let me. I have the funds and skill to pull my weight, and I'm willing to see hardship through."

"C'mon Lee!" Brendan vouches with a grin. "You shoulda seen her Camerupt in action! I'm sure there's tons we can learn from each other on the road. The more the merrier, right?"

"Not necessarily…" Zinnia gives Courtney a stare that borders on accusatory. "We don't know anything about this chick. You could be anyone for all we know."

'A good point…' Lee looks at Courtney to see how she'll respond.

The woman shakes her head. "I'm not a danger to you. To another group, maybe, but I'm aware of the talent around me. I know my team and I would lose should we come to blows."

"Didn't you kinda force your way into mine and Lee's group anyway, Zinnia?" Brendan asks with a raised brow. "At least she's asking, and politely at that."

Zinnia opens her mouth to respond, a finger raised to make a point, but after several seconds, she withdraws her hand and glowers at Brendan. Then she sniffs and looks away. "Fine. Do what you want."

'She gave up rather easily.'

Brendan also seems bewildered by the dragon tamer's refusal to argue further, but he shakes it off. "So, what do you say, Lee?" He asks, smiling.

'I say. "I want to know where I've seen this woman before"…' He looks over to the vixen resting across his shoulders. 'Thoughts, love?'

Vulpix mulls to herself. 'We're m*ving into d*ngerous terr*tory come tomor*ow. More ha*ds and eyes c*uld be useful.' Then she adds; 'I w**ld not trust in*tantly, howeve*.'

'Same thing with Zinnia then. Does the protection offered justify the risk of letting a powerful unknown hang around? She did save Brendan from the Rockets, which is a talk we are definitely having later,' Lee sighs. He turns his attention to the eager grin on Brendan's face, and despite some part of him warning him this is a bad idea, Lee says; "If you would like to come, Courtney, then we'll have you as long as there's no funny business."

Courtney smiles thinly once more and inclines her head. "Thank you."

The young Birch laughs, a joyful sound. "Told ya Lee is a cool guy," he says, looking up at Courtney.

"We're starting our trek north towards Lavaridge tomorrow, though, and the road isn't a fun one," Lee begins, leveling the red-wearing woman with an even stare. "Are you prepared for that?"

She just nods. "I'm acquainted with routes 111 and 122."

"Well…" Lee scratches the back of his head. "Nothing left to do but get ready for tomorrow then."

Beside him, Zinnia nods, her temper now apparently cooled off. "Hey, shrimpy. Take your girlfriend and pay for your drink. Lee and I got something to discuss."

As Brendan blusters out a denial with his cheeks pink, Zinnia turns and heads for the front of the store, stopping only to turn her head and urge Lee to follow with her narrowed eyes.

Outside the store, the draconid tribeswoman grabs Lee's collar and drags him down roughly to whisper in his ear so no one passing by can hear. "Whatever you do, don't freak out." she begins, slow and serious. "That woman, Courtney? She's a Magma affiliate."

That's why her name and face are so familiar. The swiftly fading memories of the Pokemon Ruby remake slams back into Lee's brain like a strike from a hammer, and he just screws his eyes shut as a headache forms. Lee isn't sure if the thrill of alarm he feels is from himself or Vulpix, and frankly he doesn't care.

'I wish I was still back in the forest getting zapped by Shinx.'

"Dare I ask how you know that?" Lee grimaces, keeping his voice down.

Zinnia's face screws itself up into a snarl. "I think Magma and Aqua are up to no good, no good on a scale that might endanger my tribe, so I was going to sneak in to see what they were up to. A few payments to the right brokers, and I had dossiers on some key members. That bitch is one of Magma's admins."

With a long-suffering sigh, Lee can already guess where this is going. "You quit putting up a fight over her joining for a reason, didn't you?"

Zinnia blinks in surprise. "Er, yeah." She shakes it off. "I think this is a perfect opportunity to slowly pump one of these admins for info. I have no idea what she wants or why she decided to seek us out and play innocent, but I know an opportunity when I see one." She looks around Lee's frame back into the store, what she's looking at, he's unsure. "We could nip all this in the bud from the Magma side."

"And why, pray tell, can't we just lead her to the police?" Lee asks with a sigh. "We keep doing this shit over and over where we risk our lives when there are professionals to handle things. I'm getting tired of it."

The tanned woman shakes her head. "Lee, the police would be stupidly outgunned by an admin of a criminal syndicate smart enough to lay this low for this long. You can't just talk the talk in the criminal world, you have to be able to walk the walk too, so her pokemon have to be strong with a capital S. If she gets violent, then that's a big problem in a populated area like Mauville."

"And so the alternative here is?"

"Keep your friends close…" Zinnia's face darkens. "And keep your enemies closer. If she's here with us, then she's not helping Magma or causing trouble."

"Damn it…" Lee growls, frustration mounting. "Damn it!"

Zinnia lets go of his collar, letting Lee stand straight and cross his arms. "I know, Dolittle…" her voice is quiet in sympathy. She reaches out to pat him on the arm. "But either three capable trainers handle this…"

"...Or it gets passed off to someone else who can't…" Lee hisses through his teeth. "I don't like it."

"I don't either, Dolittle," Zinnia murmurs. "I don't either. People with power have gotta do the right thing though, and with our pokemon, we are those people."

Lee sighs once more, silently hating how much sense Zinnia is making.

On his shoulder, Vulpix finally speaks up after having been silent for the entire conversation. 'Lee,' she begins, pressing her head into the crook of his neck. The curly tuft of fur on her head tickles his cheek, and reassurance 'Do wh*t you f*el is rig*t. Grovyle and I w*ll follow.'

Lee reaches up and gently strokes Vulpix's head. "Fine. I guess we're playing babysitter for a criminal."

END ACT 1
 
Act 2: Chapter 1
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Rookidee bounces across the lavish sitting room table impatiently, waiting for his master to ready himself for the day. They'll be exploring the mansion grounds to find pokemon to battle, and after so many weeks of solo training, Rookidee is ready to pit himself against another in glorious combat in the name of his master.

Well, sort of. His master's father, The Lord of the Manor, is coordinating a grand event in the background. The 'wild' pokemon are actually all in the care of the manor's servants, and each pokemon has been given instructions to provide only a light challenge for the young master and Rookidee. If one were being entirely truthful, this is more a confidence-building exercise than a glorious gauntlet that the Galarian nobility of old would traverse as a coming-of-age.

Not that Rookidee minds, however. Any period spent with the young master is time well spent.

A sound like a great, harrumphing cough pauses Rookidee's pacing. The raven chick bounds over to the side of the table and peers down.

There, gazing up at him with droopy eyes is Stoutland, the Lord of the Manor's First and Most Faithful. The eyes of the great dog pokemon are just as droopy as the blonde fur upon his chops, which forms a long and majestic mustache.

Perhaps "majestic" isn't quite the correct word, but it's the one Stoutland insists upon, so Rookidee will acquiesce. His respect for the prestigious station Stoutland holds as Lord of the Manor's First and Most Faithful demands it.

"Pace not upon furniture within this parlor," Stoutland's tone is sharp and criticizing despite his rug-like countenance. "It would do you well to not mar the table with razor claws and impatience when there exists a perfectly fine floor below you."

"I assure you that mine talons will only tear into those who would challenge the young master," Rookidee's tone is even, but he bows his head and turns his eyes away...surreptitiously checking to see if his claws had indeed left any marks in the richly colored wood.

Stoutland harrumphs once more, a deep sound that reverberates across the painting-adorned walls. "Then perhaps learn patience. The young master shan't be long."

Rookidee bows his head again, not replying and thus not inviting retort.

It takes ten and five minutes more, but the doors to the sitting room slowly swing inward on soundless, oiled hinges. From the entrance steps the young master and his father, Lord of the Manor. The young master is still dressed smartly in his school uniform, though his tie is loosened.

Without much of a thought, Rookidee flutters from the table to his master's shoulder. Leaning down, he takes the tie in his beak and gives it a short tug, returning it to a proper, pristine noblesse.

"Oh, Rook, must you?" The young master complains. The sparkle in his eyes is all humor, however. A thin, fair hand rises so a finger can stroke Rookidee across the bottom of his beak, and the raven chick savors the contact. "The tie is perhaps the worst bit of the academy attire. I feel as if whoever conceived this uniform must have been a hangman in a life prior."

The Lord of the Manor allows a thin smile to grace his angular features as he watches. "Come now, my son. It is the duty of the First and Most Faithful to care for their master. Spurn not his dedication, even in jest," he says, putting a hand on the boy's unoccupied shoulder.

Rookidee can't help but puff up in pride at the words of his Lord.

He would see to the young master's every need without fail! That's what a human's First and Most Faithful does.

...Nay, that's what any good pokemon does.


With a start, Corvisquire awakens. He blinks his blurry eyes and takes the sight of the foliage around him. With a glance down, he confirms where he is, finding rough bark instead of finely polished wood, or the scratchy shoulder of an academy uniform.

Mauville Central Park, perched high in a tree and hidden from prying eyes.

With a beak-cracking yawn, the raven stretches his wings, working out kinks and warding away the pins and needles of sleeping in the wild. For a moment, he debates scavenging a breakfast for himself, but his stomach still feels full from the night prior. With nothing to do, he takes flight and lands on the edge of a building overlooking the streets closest to the park.

Standing high above the land-bound crawlers below on his perch of brick and mortar, Corvisquire surveys the city of Mauville with a narrow eye, taking in the people and pokemon below. He recognizes none of them, and for that, he's thankful. He's been blessedly alone since Swablu's singular visit.

'I've lingered here long enough,' he muses to himself, thinking of the prior night's dinner of greasy, stolen stromboli that still sits heavily in his stomach. The more human garbage he stuffs down his gullet, the less appealing it becomes. 'Greener pastures are quite literally green in this case.'

He goes to spread his wings but hesitates. Again he looks down, and again he spies no one of note. With a huff, his wings shoot out before he springs into the air with a mighty flap. Beneath him, the ground falls away at a pace anyone else would find alarming, but to a Flying-type such as he, it's practically leisurely.

As he levels off high in the sky, he banks to the west, lazily riding a thermal of warm air rising from the city below up to the edge of the clouds. When his thermal putters out, he glides back down until he reaches yet another thermal, where he starts the cycle anew, flying slowly with barely a single flap of his wings.

Hours pass as the land below slowly passes him by and the sun gradually climbs to beat down upon Hoenn relentlessly. With his metallic feathers hot and his stomach growling, Corvisquire looks down, spying a human town much smaller than Mauville. The greenery surrounding the artificial oasis is encroaching on the edges, unlike the conquering city of Mauville.

'Verdanturf town?' Corvisquire wonders to himself, recalling the map L - the human would show everyone before they hit the wild trails. 'A town renowned for its clean air and integration with nature. The wind patterns keep it clear of ash despite its proximity to Mt. Chimney. Or so the map blurb said.' The avian shrugs to himself. 'Not important. If it's so clean, then perhaps I might finally stumble upon something lacking the taste of grease to eat.'

His mind made up, Corvisquire partially tucks his wings and descends in a sharply angled glide.

The town below is even more quaint than expected, with the largest building being the tall, four-story pokemon center. The people and pokemon milling about below are ignored, however, as Corvisquire banks to the south and soars mere feet above the treetops. Peering downward, he looks for bright colors in the rushing sea of green, a telltale sign of fruit to enjoy.

There! A succulent purple!

Corvisquire folds his wings to his sides and dives down, nimbly twisting around several tree limbs before snapping his metallic blue wings open a foot away from the ground, halting his descent. He smiles at what he finds.

A large, full bush of Bluk berries. The beautifully purple sweets gently wobble in the breeze on their branches, almost begging to be eaten.

"Well well, don't mind if I do," Corvisquire purrs, hopping forward and snagging a berry in his beak. The force breaks the skin of the delicate fruit, dribbling sweet violet juice down the raven's throat. Wasting no more time, he bites down and savors the flavor dancing across his tongue.

"Ahem!"

The sweetness coating his mouth stays Corvisquire's anger at being rudely interrupted, so rather than snarl, he turns with a grunt. "Ah, rabble. Wonderful..." He sighs.

On the branches of the trees around Corvisquire are perched countless Taillow, all of whom glare down at him with no small amount of displeasure. At their center a puffed-up male sucks in a breath that makes his breast feathers swell even further. "This grove belongs to our flock and has been our territory for generations. You best get going before something bad happens, outsider," he spits.

Corvisquire sneers back, his own feathers ruffling in agitation. "Such bravado for such a thin-feathered, runty fledgling. Tell me, were you the last to hatch amongst your brood? You certainly sound like you were oxygen-starved as a chick. Or perhaps your oaf mother cracked your shell with her fat rear and let an infection permanently addle your already small brain? Begone and waste someone else's time, dullard."

The young Taillow reels back at the vitriol, then grits his beak as he flushes so red in anger that the color bleeds through his feathers. "Y-You! You stupid thief! I'll make you regret that!" He says nothing else, diving at Corvisquire with his talons bared and murder in his eyes.

'How dreadfully slow,' Corvisquire watches Taillow close the distance between them without alarm. 'If Queen Furball and the Treehugger were good for anything, at least they were decent sparring partners.'

At the last second, Corvisquire powers up a Steel Wing and holds it before him like a broad shield, digging his talons into the dirt to steady himself. A moment later, Taillow crashes into the raven's wing and painfully rebounds with a sound like a gong.

Taillow flops to the ground with a wheezing gasp, winded. Before the tiny bird can stand, Corvisquire swings his wing around like a battering ram and slams it into Taillow, making the smaller bird breathlessly cry out in pain as he's thrown tumbling through the air towards a distant tree with almost no arc to his flight. With a thud that makes the surrounding flock flinch, the young Taillow smacks his skull on the unforgiving tree trunk and falls once more to the dirt, dead to the world.

Chuckling deep in his throat, Corvisquire haughtily stares up into the infuriated flock, drinking in their uncertainty and slowly mounting dread like one might a fine wine. "Just a single strike and the mouthy brat falls. Truly, an outstanding display of defense for an ancestral feeding ground," he mocks. "Do I have any other challengers? I've nowhere to be other than this bush enjoying a meal. And I do so enjoy working up a proper appetite before eating."

The countless glowers sent his way bother Corvisquire none. He answers them with a malicious smile, openly inviting them to try where their friend failed.

From the leaves above, a large form zips down and lands before Corvisquire with a flutter of sleek wings.

Corvisquire takes in the newcomer with a raised brow. "Oh? A Swellow?"

Standing before the raven is a larger bird pokemon than the nervous, agitated Taillow up in the trees. She shares the same coloration with the Taillow, with a red face and breast, white underbelly, and dark blue back, wings, and tail. The Swellow differs from her fellows only in size, being two feet tall to the one of the various Taillow, and possessing a backswept fringe of feathers on her head. Corvisquire might have found her fetching if her unmarred coat of feathers didn't announce her weakness like a wailing siren.

"Matriarch Swellow is here!" One Taillow hollers in excitement, hopping in place. "She's going to put this thief in his place!" The rest of the flock needs no other encouragement and breaks out into cheers, broken only by jeers hurled at Corvisquire.

Swellow raises her head higher, and at some unseen signal, the noisy flock quiets into total silence. Swellow then levels Corvisquire with an even stare. "This land is the territory of my flock." Her voice is hard, yet matronly. "Why are you here?"

"Why am I here?" Corvisquire guffaws. "A flock of fools picks a blind leader. The jokes write themselves these days. Why else would I be here?"

Corvisquire smiles nastily. "I'm taking this grove."

Swellow's eyes narrow. "It belongs to us."

"Duly noted and disregarded." The raven steps closer, looming over Swellow. He's easily a foot taller than she is, perhaps a little more. "What sort of stratagem do you have for me? Will you meet me one-on-one? Pile upon me with the bodies of your compatriots? It matters not, but please, do try your best."

Despite Corvisquire being well above her weight class, Swellow's stare remains unimpressed. After a long moment, she says; "I know your sort. You're too large, too groomed to be wild. You belong to a trainer."

Corvisquire sees red.

Swellow doesn't flinch when Corvisquire's beak snaps shut scant inches from her eye with a sharp clack!

"You're playing a dangerous game, Swellow," the raven hisses in her ear, his hateful red eye boring into Swellow's calm hazel. "I will warn you no more on that matter."

Undaunted, Swellow continues. "You stand three heads taller than I and felled one of our own with a single blow," she says, looking up at him boldly. "I will not posture when the conclusion is already foregone. This is our home and we love it, so I will ask you to leave us in peace."

Corvisquire hacks out a harsh laugh and draws his head back. "Ask? Ask? You would presume to ask me?" He turns his back on Swellow, strutting up to the Bluk bush and plucking off another berry. He twirls on his foot and eats the berry in one slow, taunting bite.

To his annoyance, Swellow is unruffled by his disrespect.

"Yes, yes I would," she declares, stepping closer until she and Corvisquire are nearly abreast once more. "This grove and the ones adjacent feed my flock. We've lived here for generations and cared for this land as if it were family. You may eat your fill, but then please be gone."

Corvisquire chuckles. "My my, today has been a humorous one. You go from asking me to leave to bargaining that quickly? And what is this may nonsense? You can only broker from a position of power, you ignorant little Pidgey. No, either you have the power to defend what you claim to love, or you will forfeit it. That is how this world works. Now..." The raven steps closer, calling upon the latent power within him and pushing.

With a hiss of writhing, caustic Dark, a wreath of five Pursuers is born over his head like a cadre of spirits. Each black orb shivers in barely restrained violence, and several of the surrounding Taillow tense.

"Let's see how much you love this grove of yours," Corvisquire grins as his heart begins to race in anticipation of the impending fight. "Step forward so I can break you."

Swellow narrows her eyes and spreads her wings...

...Then flies up to a high branch, no combat stance to be seen.

Befuddled, Corvisquire furrows his brow and waits.

"Everyone..." Swellow's voice is quiet and apologetic. "We're leaving."

Protests erupt from every Taillow, falling together into a nonsensical din that makes a headache bloom in Corvisquire's skull. The raven is too dumbstruck to shout above the noise, however.

'Leaving? What? What does she mean by that?'

Swellow opens her beak and releases a single, authoritative screech, silencing the grove. "I will have no arguments on this matter..." She cranes her head from one side to the other slowly, taking the time to meet each and every set of eyes on her. "Verdanturf well and truly earned the 'verdant' in its name. I and the prior Patriarch knew such a day would come, so we prepared. A new home awaits us."

"But Matriarch..." A young female Taillow asks from nearby, her face heartbroken. "T-this is where I was hatched. This is where most of the flock were hatched! We're just going to give it up to some bully without a fight?!" The Taillow asks, anguished.

Swellow turns her eyes away. "The safety of the flock is paramount..." she forces out. "I will not send you all into, what is the human term? I will not send any of you into the meat grinder that is a trained pokemon in a foolhardy attempt to preserve our pride or bushes of food." She raises her head again, voice stern and commanding. "We will gather in Verdanturf, then I will take everyone to our new home. Scouts! Gather the wider flock. Everyone else, go. Now."

For a moment, none of the Taillow seem to believe their ears, but then one reluctantly spreads his wings and flies away. Then another. Soon the trees are empty and the sound of many pairs of wings beating the air fades, leaving Corvisquire and Swellow alone.

Corvisquire stares at Swellow, slowly processing what happened. "Wha..." He blinks as his Pursuers fizzle out into swirls of dark mist. "That's it? You're going to run away?" He asks, a terrible, hot sensation blooming in his breast. "You're just going to run away!?" He screeches.

Swellow peers down at Corvisquire coolly. "You wish to take the grove, and I agreed to give it," she clicks her tongue. "You're upset that you have what you want?"

"You're supposed to fight for it!" Corvisquire roars, the rage inside of him growing to volcanic proportions in an instant. His breath is fast, his head is hot, and he sees red bleeding into the corners of his vision. "You're supposed to fight me, you damned Pidgey, not run away! You're the worst sort! You're a coward! A coward who can't do anything because you're too weak! Did you even bother trying to grow stronger when you know you have such things on the line?!" He spreads his wings and tries to form another volley of Pursuers, but with this focus so scrambled, he can only spark impotently with crackles of violet energy.

Swellow's composure finally cracks as she leans back, a disturbed expression crossing her face. "I know two things for certain, you sad thing: I know my limits, and I know nothing can last forever."

Corvisquire's answer is a cackle, one that makes Swellow's skin crawl. "So you admit it? You're a coward and a weakling." He glares up at the smaller avian with pure HATE.

Swellow spreads her wings, but before she takes off, she mutters one last reply. "Sometimes, nothing can be done. Like all who wish to live without regret, I've come to peace with that."

Corvisquire freezes, not pursuing as Swellow grows smaller and smaller in the sky. His eyes follow her, but he's looking past her.

"The medication isn't working. Nothing can be done."

"The proper technology just isn't there yet. Nothing can be done."

"I'm sorry. Nothing can be done."

"Nothing can be done."

"Nothing can be done."

"Nothing can be done."

"You can't do anything."

Corvisquire screams.


When the haze of inarticulate anger finally begins to drain, leaving Corvisquire weary and aching, the sun is past noon and on its way into the evening. In his first conscious decision the whole afternoon, he pauses and surveys the grove.

Or what's left of it.

In his rage, multiple trees have been felled as if a twister blew through the area. Not a single trunk isn't covered in burns, rends, cuts, and drill marks. The places he unleashed Pursuers are obvious, as the greenery is dead and decaying, leaves reduced to withered brown husks. The delicious bush of Bluk berries is gone, and in its place is a crater wide enough for Crovisquire to lay beak-to-tailfeather. The ground is little more than blackened and turned dirt.

With a huff, Corvisquire turns to the afternoon sun. "A whole day gone by, and only two bites of Bluk for my troubles," he grumbles in tandem with his stomach, which is now a yawning void in his middle. From hunger or something else, he isn't sure anymore.

He raises his head when he hears bushes shaking in the distance. A scowl returns to his face and his sour mood grips him with even more might.

Only a human would walk towards such bedlam.

Sure enough, a young boy unsurely emerges from the brush only to stop and gape at the destruction around him. "Wha...?" He begins, looking around with open fright.

The boy is a skinny waif of a child. With his gangly limbs, pale skin, and unkempt green hair, he looks as delicate as a sheet of wet paper. His eyes, a plain gray, finally land on Corvisquire.

The raven frowns. "What are you looking at, boy?"

Corvisquire's harsh tone makes the child flinch and recoil. "A-Ah? Did you do all this?" He asks, looking around at the carnage with wide, disbelieving eyes.

Rather than answer, Corvisquire draws back a shining wing, readying a path for his Swift that will nearly brush the boy and hopefully scare him off.

The boy's eyes widen so far that it's a wonder they don't pop out of his head, and Corvisquire can pinpoint the moment the green-headed child's life starts to flash before his eyes.

"Wally! Wwwaallllly! Wait for me!"

Corvisquire holds his attack, turning his red eyes to the bush behind the child.

From the underbrush bursts a tiny Ralts, trundling along on his short legs, legs far too short to keep pace with a human. Ralts gasps, looking at Corvisquire and the leveled clearing with no small amount of fear. "W-What happened here?" He asks, covering his mouth with his hands.

"What is it with everyone's fixation with obvious, asinine questions today?" Corvisquire's patience hits its limit, so he modifies Swift's flight path in his head to strike Ralts and sweeps his wing with a grunt, shooting five weak Swift stars no larger than coins.

The boy, Wally, reaches out with one hand as the other clutches his chest. "R-Ralts! Block it with Confusion!" He gasps out.

The panicking Ralts holds his hands up and screws his eyes shut, a thin semi-circle of pink telekinetic force blinking into being just in time to block the first Swift star. Another strike, and Ralts grits his teeth. Another and his Confusion falters. The final two stars smash through his defense and explode against Ralts with bone-rattling pops, throwing him to the ground where he lays prone, wisps of smoke rising from his battered form.

Wally wheezes. "R-Ralts..." He gasps again, making Corvisquire raise an eyebrow. "Ralts... Please get up," he pleads, sucking down another desperate breath as his already pale face loses what little color it has. "W-We need to run... Uncle was r-right, it's not safe outside of t-town."

With a moan of pain, Ralts slowly gets back to his feet, standing with a heavy wobble and unfocused eyes.

Corvisquire sighs. "Today really is an exercise in frustration," he murmurs, raising a shining golden wing again. "Begone, I have no interest in a pair of weaklings like yourse-"

Before he can finish his sentence, Wally falters, then falls to the ground in a heap on his back, clutching at something in his breast pocket with clumsy, nerveless fingers. His chest is heaving so quickly that it's almost like-

Corvisquire banishes the thought before it can form.

"Wally!" Ralts forgets all about the battle and the Swift burns adorning his chest as he rushes to his trainer's side. "Wally?! What's wrong?! Oh no, oh no!" Ralts frets, his voice warbling and eyes glistening. He turns to Corvisquire, face pleading. "Please! I need your help! I-I need to get him back to town! I don't know what's wrong with him!"

Corvisquire tilts his head, hardening his heart. "Are you listening to yourself, you little fool?" He mocks. "You're asking a pokemon you were fighting but ten seconds ago for help. In what world does that make sense to you?"

"Please! I'll do anything! Anything!" Ralts begs, tears beginning to pour down his cheeks. "Wally is my trainer and I love him! I don't want him to die!"

"I love him."

"I don't want him to die."

"I love him."

"I don't want him to die."

"I love him."

"I don't want him to die."

"Nothing can be done."

"There must have been something I could've done!"

Images flash by Corvisquire's eyes, and as though in a trance, he marches up to Ralts' side. "His condition. What's it called?"

Ralts' teary face snaps to look up at Corvisquire. "W-What?"

"The boy's ailment, fool!" The raven barks, making Ralts flinch. "What is it? What's the name?"

"I-I-I don't know!" Ralts cries and flinches away when Corvisquire glares down at him with barely-contained fury. "Wally came to Verdanturf because his lungs are bad, and living in the city was making him sick. I don't know what it's called!"

With a click of his tongue, Corvisquire pushes away his disgust at touching a human for just a second and grasps the boy's wrist with a set of talons. The instant Corvisquire confirms his suspicions, he steps back as if burned. "Tachycardia with a regular rhythm, shallow hyperventilation..." He looks at Wally's pale face, noting the boy's wide eyes looking at him without really realizing what he's looking at. A glance at the boy's lips confirms that they're gradually turning a worrying blue. "Oxygen isn't getting to where it should be. This looks like a stress-induced asthma attack." He looks over to Ralts. "Does he carry some sort of medication? Like an inhaler?"

"I-Inhaler?"

Corvisquire growls. "Are you the boy's pokemon or not?!" He demands, once more making Ralts cringe and bow his head. "You should know these things! I'm talking about a small, plastic apparatus with an aerosol canister sized to fit in a hand."

"His shirt pocket!" Ralts answers instantly. "Wally keeps that thing in his shirt pocket!"

With no finesse, the raven bites the breast pocket on the child's shirt and rips it open without regard for the button keeping it closed. Sure enough, inside is an inhaler. He takes it in his beak and tosses it to Ralts, who fumbles and nearly drops it. "Take the cap off the end and hold it to his mouth. Press down on the aerosol canister as he's breathing in to administer the medicine. Quickly, now!"

Ralts wastes no time in doing as ordered, rushing to Wally's side. "Don't worry Wally, j-just hang on!" He pleads, shakily holding the inhaler to the boy's mouth and depressing the canister. A puff of white gas is shot down Wally's throat and almost immediately the green-headed boy breathes a bit deeper.

In his confusion, Wally tries to weakly resist with a distressed gasp, but Corvisquire clasps the young trainer's wrist in his talons once more, this time pinning him to the ground. The raven looks over to Ralts. "Again."

The Psychic-type obeys immediately, puffing another dose into Wally's mouth as he breathes in again. After a tense ten or so seconds, Wally's breaths begin to deepen and color starts to return to his face.

Corvisquire watches silently, tracking Wally's eyes as the glazed look in them begins to fade. "Fool."

Ralts turns to look at the raven, rubbing at his puffy, teary eyes as he does so.

"Stay with the boy. He'll recover over the next few minutes." Corvisquire spreads his wings. "Cherish what you have while you can. That naive happiness of yours will run out soon, mark my words."

Without looking back, Corvisquire rises up and into the sky, his thoughts in disarray.

"Nothing can be done."

"Nothing can be done."

"Nothing can be done."

"There must have been something I could've done!"


"So this Courtney lady is no good?"

"Try and keep your voice down," Grovyle hisses to Marshtomp. The Gecko pokemon looks over his shoulder to the trio of nearby trainers, each one looking down at a picnic table with a paper map spread across it. Brendan and Zinnia argue animatedly over differing routes while a stoic Courtney watches the bickering.

Lee, along with Vulpix, are away for a last-minute, early-morning meeting with Doctor Lanes. Considering the harsh route and probable two-to-three-week walk ahead of the group, Grovyle can't help but applaud his master's initiative, though anything that speeds Lee's recovery is something Grovyle will support.

His thoughts return to the matter at hand as he lets his yellow-eyed gaze wander, taking in the small groups everyone's various teams have divided up into. The hotel grounds where everyone stayed their final night in Mauville is a regular circus of pokemon, one passersby can't help but slow down to observe. With so much attention fixed on the more boisterous of Grovyle's fellows, no one noticed him quietly gather Marshtomp and Shelgon for a private conversation.

One far away from Courtney and her pokemon.

"Zinnia hasn't told me much." Shelgon's voice has a metallic timbre inside his shell. The encased dragon looks between Marshtomp and Grovyle. "We did room with Courtney last night, however, so Zinnia was likely being cautious. Considering her hotheaded nature..."

Marshtomp laughs. "A Dragon calling someone else a hothead? You see somethin' new every day," he grins widely, then sobers up. "Yeah, I guess that makes sense that your girl is treating this so seriously. Don't wanna tip your hand early, or that's how Brendan phrases it." He gives Grovyle a sidelong glance and crosses his muscular arms, drumming his thick fingers on his bicep. "Did Lee call my boy's dad about this yet?"

Grovyle nods, shifting his twig in his mouth; he's going to need a new one soon, at this rate. "Last night. Professor Birch was understandably cagy when details came to light but understood in the end. We have only my master and Zinnia's word on Courtney's true allegiances, and while we know they can be trusted on word alone..."

"The Pokemon League will want 'proof.'" Shelgon finishes with an annoyed grunt. He paws the grass in irritation. "Stupid humans and their stupid rules. This would be so much simpler if humans would trust their instincts properly. None of this bureaucratic nonsense is needed, you just dispose of bad eggs before they ruin the clutch."

Marshtomp shrugs. "Would you not have trusted her from the get-go? I mean, she seems kinda creepy, but not bad to me," he asks, playing devil's advocate.

Shelgon snorts. "That's because your sort can barely tell mud and water apart."

The mudfish scowls, a vein bulging in his forehead. "What is that supposed to mean?"

"Enough, please. Let's return to important matters here." Grovyle sighs and raises his claws between Marshtomp and Shelgon before they can level the area over a disagreement. "We need to be wary and ready to act at the first sign of foul play. According to my master, Courtney presents a very real and significant threat due to her status within Magma and the prowess of her team. Zinnia and my master are going to try and pump her for information during our travels, and in a best-case scenario, convince her that Magma's mission is demented. Until she is gone or neutralized, we need to be ready at all times." Grovyle pauses to rub the Miracle Seed woven into his neckerchief, feeling the vibrant life energy within. His master insists the Grass-boosting trinket should be kept close at hand from now on. "Are we in agreement?"

Shelgon rumbles in thought. "I'll not be passing this information to Goomy." He declares. "He has enough on his plate. Zinnia's upcoming acquisition will also be kept in the dark until properly vetted."

"Um..." Marshtomp rubs his chin when the other 'mons look his way. "I'm pretty sure both Breloom and Mawile can handle the info. If my boy gets any new teammates, I'll make sure they're trustworthy first."

Grovyle nods. "Vulpix already knows. Understandably, I will refrain from informing young Shinx for some time. Hopefully, this is all wrapped up before she can begin to comprehend things like subterfuge."

Marshtomp grins at his friends. "Man, what a journey this is turning out to be, huh?"

"I'm certain some could do without the drama," Grovyle's retort is as dry as the desert they'll be braving in the coming days.
 
Act 2: Chapter 2
Want to support me? See Fuggmann is creating Fiction | Patreon. As a thanks for donating, patrons get to see updates a few days early and suggest edits to the final draft before it goes live. I did have a few people ask why this took so long, so if you want updates, you can use disschord code yh8dvXJDnx


"I don't recommend it," Courtney shakes her head, her magenta locks bouncing under the red hood of her jacket. "The Valley of Steel... holds many powerful wild pokemon. Steven Stone trains there. The desert... is unpleasant, and the path is longer, but safer."

To the side, Zinnia groans. "It'll be fine. I've made it through the valley several times without anything bad happening." She waltzes up and throws an arm around Courtney's shoulders. "You're worrying too much, sister. Don't encourage Dolittle's worrywart streak. We're strong enough to fend off most anything."

Bemused, Lee raises an eyebrow as he watches the spectacle. "Didn't you say the trip to northern Hoenn would be a challenge that we should be careful of?"

Zinnia promptly ignores him.

The incognito Magma admin sighs, gently shrugging off the other woman's arm. "Keyword: 'most'. One trainer might slip by, but... a group will invite both curiosity and challenge from natives. Are you certain?"

Brendan looks between the two women, visibly biting back the retort that is undoubtedly in Courtney's favor. In his eyes, Lee can see the desire for the challenge a Champion's playground would present.

As one, all three of them look to Lee, much to his chagrin.

"Well?" Zinnia asks, an eyebrow raised. "Which way are we taking? 122 is faster and not through a miserable desert; just sayin'."

Courtney doesn't protest any further and stares at the zoologist as well.

Rather than lament the leadership position being foisted on him yet again, Lee looks down at the paper map held in his hands, then back up at the fork in the road he and his friends have come to after a three-day hike out of Mauville. The trees in the forest path have waned, revealing a flat, verdant grassland and giving everyone a breathtaking view of the ever-looming Mt. Chimney and the rocky plateaus guarding its base. Lazy wisps of smoke rise from the maw of Chimney's volcano top, mingling with the sparse clouds.

Lee lets his eyes turn to the left path. The worn, dirt road of route 122 snakes into the distant rock formations, vanishing into a narrow, shadowed valley. Over on the right path, route 111 extends far into the distance, vanishing into the horizon, but beyond that, Lee knows the grassland will eventually run out, and even further beyond that, the harsh Hoenn desert awaits. Both paths lead into Hoenn's northern regions, with the desert route of 111 being the longer, safer option that curves around the valley and its tough-as-nails pokemon.

'Where to go?' Lee mulls. 'I need to seriously look into a new teammate, preferably one who can deal with Fire-types. Trapinch would do. Sandshrew would also be nice, but the Valley isn't home to only Steel-types. There are a plethora of Rock and Ground-types too. Powerful ones." Lee frowns, making his scars tug unpleasantly. 'It's risky, but Corvi's departure really put a dent in our ability to battle. We've only just been scraping by in the battles that really matter, and with Magma and Aqua on the move, we need the firepower.'

Laying across his shoulders, a dozing Vulpix perks up an ear. 'Gro*yle and I p*ssess typ* adv**tages agai*st m*st of the denizens ** the Va*ley, it sounds like. If i* is the route you wi*h to take, th*n we will su*port you.' After a second, she opens her eyes with a huff. 'Perh*p* this hyp**hetical ne* member will k*ow what l**alty is.' Her telepathy garbles slightly from the spike of agitation.

Lee smiles and leans his cheek into hers, soaking in her warmth for a moment before returning his attention to his less-furry friends.

"We already prepared for the desert..." Lee muses aloud. He shifts his shoulders, but the water and travel cloak bought three days prior in his backpack add no noticeable weight. "But at the same time, the Valley is home to many rare and interesting pokemon..." He looks at Courtney. "Courtney? I won't force anyone into anything they don't want, but..." Lee frowns and looks at the placid vixen on his shoulder, who stares back. "Vulpix and Grovyle are my only combat-ready pokemon. I have faith in them, but it would place an unfair burden on them if the Lavaridge Gym demands a three-on-three match. Zinnia and Brendan want to traverse the valley, and I'm tentatively in agreement if only to recruit a new pokemon with enough strength to stand up to a Gym. Is route 122 a hard 'no' for you?"

Courtney's face remains frustratingly unreadable, but she shakes her head after a second. "No. I was merely advising against it. If you are confident... then I will follow."

Nodding, Lee turns to an eager Brendan and surprised Zinnia. "Anything to add?"

Both shake their heads no, so the group forms back up and begins down the road to the Valley of Steel. As they walk, Lee and Zinnia lag behind a little bit, letting Brendan excitedly chatter into Courtney's ear.

"You've been through the Valley before, Courtney?" Brendan smiles radiantly up at the disguised Magma admin like a Growlithe puppy might. "What's it like? How strong are the pokemon there?"

The magenta-haired woman breaks her stoic mask to smile faintly back. "Rocky. The valley is rich in iron ore... so the pokemon there eat it, making their steel armor strong."

Beside Lee, Zinnia snickers under her breath as she watches. "Ah, kiddo is crushing hard."

'Maybe a little too hard for my liking…' Lee inwardly frowns. 'Both because of who he's crushing on, and how he keeps getting defensive when Zinnia tries to get Courtney to talk. He and Zinnia have been at each other's throats for days now.' How to turn Brendan away from the Magma admin without hurting him, though, is a question Lee hasn't found an answer to yet.

Zinnia's giggles dry up as she sobers. "You know we'll have to tell him at some point, right?"

Lee doesn't answer for a moment, gathering many thoughts that buzz in his head like a swarm of Beedrill. 'Love? Scan her again?'

On Lee's shoulder, Vulpix shuts her eyes and pretends to doze, hiding the purple glow in her gaze.

Although invisible to the naked eye, Lee can feel the tendril of psychic energy reach out from Vulpix and snake its way to the petite woman ahead. With a feather-light touch, Vulpix makes contact.

Both man and fox focus on the faint emotions sifting by, taking each one in and carefully gauging them.

Intense curiosity.

Enjoyment.

Contentment.

Devotion. Overwhelming devotion to a tall man in red attire, slicked crimson hair, and glasses with a curious stone sent into the frame. Devotion so powerful that his image can't be divorced from it.

'That unhealthy obsession with her leader again, but nothing malicious.' Lee breathes, shaking off the nervousness and revulsion of invading Courtney's privacy so grievously once more.

If anyone knew that Vulpix has been psychically interacting with a human beyond simple lie detecting, Lee would most assuredly have his trainer license shredded. If they knew that he purposely ordered her to do emotional scans and has been doing it for days, he would enjoy living in a prison cell for quite some time, but...

If it means keeping his friends safe, then lines will have to be crossed. Though to his concern, Vulpix had no issue with the order and skimmed Courtney's emotions without any delay the first night.

On his shoulder, Vulpix picks up on Lee's mixed feelings and pokes his cheek with her nose. 'I do*'t s*e the bi* deal. She's an e*emy in o*r midst. We sho*ld use all the a*vantages we ha*e.'

What a... human thing of Vulpix to say.

Lee bites his lip, staring into Courtney's back as he does so. 'Vulpix, I think your perspective might be a bit skewed. We've been linked together every day since this adventure began, ever since your...' He almost thinks 'creation'. 'Birth. There is a good reason the League cracks down on rogue psychics so hard. People don't want other people in their thoughts seeing their dirty or shameful moments. The mind is meant to be a sacred place.'

Vulpix mulls the explanation over. 'But I kn*w all of your sham*ful moments. A*d you kn*w all of mine. I... und*rstand, but a* the same ti*e, I don't. The M*gma admin is in*olved in a plot t*at thr*atens to reshape the w*rld...' The six-tailed fox sighs a hot breath. 'I think she forf*its a*y moral protec*ion after throwi*g in her lot with M*gma.'

'What we have isn't the norm,' He patiently responds. 'I don't think anyone has what we have. We should be careful to not overstep our bounds more than necessary. Not only is that a dangerous road of thought to tread, the League will not agree in the slightest. We're only going as far as we already have because lives might be at risk.'

"Hello? Hoenn to Dolittle?"

'We'll talk more on that later,' Lee finishes with Vulpix and returns his attention to Zinnia. "Sorry, Zinnia. I had a quick exchange with Vulpix," he clears his throat and lowers his voice a little more. "I don't think Courtney is bad per se, but maybe misguided. She hasn't given off any hostile vibes at least. I'm hoping to build some trust, maybe even a friendship, then confront her and convince her that Magma's scheme is insanity."

Zinnia's eyes narrow, and her crimson eyes almost seem alight in the shadow cast by her bangs. "That could backfire big time, Lee. Do you think Magma and Aqua can be reasoned with? They pick up crazies and people with no morals on purpose, because what sane person wants to be an eco-terrorist? I'll trust your judgment on this chick not being malicious—" she gives a pointed look at Vulpix, who bristles slightly. "—but that means she's on the other side of that spectrum; the crazy side. You can't reason with people like that. Don't do yourself dirty and get attached when we're going to come to blows with her one day, probably sooner rather than later."

'Why does she have to be so damn perceptive?' Lee breathes in and exhales. "Zinnia, I understand where you're coming from, but let's at least try the non-violent approach, okay? I think this can work."

The dragon tamer gives him a sidelong glance as they both pick up the pace to catch up with Brendan and Courtney. "That's awfully hopeful of you."

Lee lets a sardonic smirk lift the unmarred side of his face. "Hope is something I'm good at."


The walk to the valley is spent with idle chatter, a single stop for lunch and a break, and a pause to watch two wild Linoone dart at each other in a high-speed battle that forces the smaller loser to scamper away. The winner preens pridefully under the eyes of his audience, especially so with an amazed Shinx, before zooming away into the grassland.

Finally, as the sun begins to shift into the late afternoon, nearly on the cusp of the evening, Lee, Zinnia, Brendan, and Courtney reach the mouth of the valley.

Lee cranes his head nearly all the way back with Vulpix following suit, taking in the imposing rock faces above. Now on the threshold of the valley, the high, jagged cliffs are so much more imposing. The rocks are all a rusty brown in color, and the scent of iron is so thick in the air that Lee doesn't need to borrow Vulpix's nose to smell it. The path into the valley looks as if it were a tiny crack from a distance, but now that they're standing before it, Lee realizes a jumbo jet could fly through the opening without worry of clipping its wings on the towering valley walls.

'The Valley of Steel is a shortcut? This place is huge!'

"If not for all of the powerful pokemon living here..." Courtney begins suddenly. "This place would have been turned into a giant iron mine." She turns to everyone else, eyeing Zinnia first. "Zinnia. You've traversed the valley before?"

The tribeswoman nods resolutely. "Yep. More than once."

"Do you know the routes?"

Again, Zinnia nods.

Courtney then withdraws a pokeball from her hoodie pocket and leisurely taps the button, popping it open in her hand. In a flash of light, her Camerupt is beside her and the area grows several degrees warmer.

"Camerupt..." Courtney lays her hand across Camerupt's snout, making the camel grumble and focus his droopy eyes on her. "We're navigating the Valley of Steel. Please be vigilant."

Camerupt's eyes sharpen for a moment.

Courtney then turns her eyes to Brendan and Zinnia. "I recommend having a pokemon on hand. Things might go sour quickly."

Without needing another word, Brendan snags Marshtomp's ball from his belt and hits the ball's button. With another flash of light, the mudfish pokemon materializes at his trainer's side, already in a dutiful salute with a croak. Rubbing a hand across his pokemon's head, Brendan grins. "I don't even need to ask, do I? You're the best, pal."

Marshtomp beams.

Zinnia is last, taking Shelgon's ball and popping it open. After the light of Shelgon's materialization fades, she gives his metallic shell a poke. "Into the valley again. You know the drill, right bud?"

The encased dragon says nothing, only stepping a little closer to his trainer.

Together, the team of four trainers and four pokemon step into the maw of the valley, eyes scanning every which way. The first several hundred feet are empty, devoid of any other people or pokemon on the snaking path further into the heart of the valley. The cliff walls form a twisting corridor that they follow until the throat of the passage truly opens up, spitting them out into the valley proper.

Lee, Vulpix, Marshtomp, and Brendan all peer around at the high, flat-topped plateaus that all share a rusty red color while Courtney, Zinnia, and their pokemon only give the area a cursory once-over with their eyes. Zinnia then steps forward, Shelgon on her heels. "I'll take it from here. I know a few good stopping points for the night. Keep an eye peeled for aggressive pokemon, they really aren't fond of outsiders here." She digs out a folded-up bit of paper from her hip pouch and opens it, turning and showing everyone a hand-drawn map. "Stay close. We've got to navigate with only the basics here. The iron in everything throws off compasses and cell signals."

On a whim, Lee pulls both this phone and pokedex out, and sure enough, neither device has any service. "That's concerning... What if you run into an emergency out here?"

Zinnia snorts. "You're on your own. Don't give me that look, we'd be on our own in the desert, too. We're not going back now."

The draconid tribeswoman leads them down from the entrance of the valley and through a trodden path marked with cairns and arrows scored into the rocks of the plateaus. Along the way, they finally begin to spot pokemon.

Above, a trio of Magnemite peers down at the group curiously. In the sun, their shiny bodies cast harsh glints that make them difficult to look at. They idle high in the sky for only a moment before floating away.

Some minutes later, in the lower part of the valley where several hardy trees grow, they find a Scizor scoring the bark of a tree with his pincers and drinking the sap that flows out. The Bug and Steel-type watches them warily but doesn't attack. Inside Lee burns the boyish desire to challenge the Scizor to a battle if only for the cool factor of having a Scizor on the team, but the practical side of him shies away from the idea of a fight with a fully-evolved pokemon; type advantage be damned, the Scizor must be a monster if it's living in Hoenn's answer to Mt. Silver.

Above the tree and hanging on a rocky outcropping, a Ferrothorn glares down at the group and shivers its iron spines threateningly, so they make haste to continue on.

A screech rends the air, forcing everyone to stop. Finally, the first challenger presents himself.

Swooping dangerously close overhead, a Skarmory twists midair and pulls a high-G turn that would have knocked out any human pilot. The armored bird touches down on the rocky ground with an ungraceful slam of his feet and stands with his beak held high.

The huge bird pokemon easily stands five feet tall and is coated in silvery, metallic armor. His wings, resembling a folded fan of blades, lay tucked against his sides, and his thin neck leads to an angular head with a sharpened beak. Glaring at them for a moment, the Skarmory suddenly spreads his wings and lets out another piercing shriek, eagerly spoiling for a fight. He hops forward one step, the action making his wing blades rattle.

Camerupt snorts and steps forward, the humps on his back boiling with magma and spewing smoke. Vulpix takes that as her cue to jump from Lee's shoulder and leap into position next to Camerupt. Her stance is low with her hackles raised and flames licking the edge of her mouth.

The avian Steel-type looks between the two defenders before him, yellow eyes narrowing with the realization that he's facing not one, but two Fire-types. After a tense standoff, Skarmory scoffs and spreads his wings, rising into the air and zipping away.

Vulpix and Camerupt stand ready for another minute, then share a glance before slowly returning back to Lee and Courtney's sides.

Courtney turns her pink eyes to Vulpix appraisingly. "Perhaps this will be easier than expected. The natives... won't want to tangle with two Fire-types at once."

Lee nods, a bead of sweat unrelated to the sun rolling down his face. "Here's hoping."


Zinnia expertly leads the team through several paths crisscrossing the valley, pointing out useful landmarks along the way. Twice more they're accosted by denizens of the valley, a Mawile and several Durants, and twice more the armor-slagging danger presented by Vulpix and Camerupt drives the aggressors away.

Lee tries his hardest to pay attention to Zinnia's crash course on advanced land navigation, but he can't help but lose focus as he takes in the details of a biosphere that houses almost exclusively Steel-types. Working with pokemon and their fascinating biology in controlled environments is one thing, but never on earth has raw iron ore of all things been needed for any conventional animal's health. Seeing one such habitat with natives doing as they do is too much to pass up. His notebook quickly finds its way out of his bag and into his hands, much to Vulpix's amusement.

'Even after months here, months into a... new life, I still understand so little.' The thought is humbling, and the furious pace of Lee's pen slows a little. 'Vulpix, Grovyle, and Shinx have vast biological differences from animals, but they're still in the ballpark of what I know. Maybe... Maybe I need to step out of my comfort zone a bit more, expand my wanted list and try new stuff even if it seems dumb.' He muses to himself, finishing his rough sketch of a Lairon gnawing on a large lump of ore.

Draped across his shoulders, Vulpix raises her head and smiles. Lee almost stumbles when he feels Vulpix's pride for him piped directly into his brain.

'I'm glad you're getting better.'

The zoologist isn't stunned for long. With a small smile of his own, he leans his head into Vulpix's and returns her affection, making a telepathic loop of adoration.

"It's starting to get dark," Zinnia's announcement breaks up the man and fox's shared thoughts. With a dramatic flair of her cloak, Zinnia turns to the group and taps her map with a finger. "There is a little nook in the plateau east of us that most Steel-type pokemon avoid because of its bad habit of being damp. It should be a safe place to stay tonight."

"Aww... do we have to use a damp cave?" Brendan whines. "My sleeping bag isn't waterproof. I'll wake up soaked!"

Zinnia shrugs. "It's a cave or out in the open. Do you know what's out here, in the open? Pokemon that aren't happy that we're here." She levels Brendan with an amused smirk. "If you wanna rough it outside, be my guest." She reaches a finger out and pokes the younger trainer in the cheek. The boy glowers at her for a moment, before Courtney clears her throat

"Camerupt can dry the cave out... with Heatwave," she offers on her pokemon's behalf. She looks at Camerupt, who nods once.

Brendan grins. "You're the best, Courtney."

She smiles a tiny smile. In his peripheral vision, Lee catches Zinnia rolling her eyes.

The trip to the cave takes only a moment, and as promised, Camerupt steps in first, the volcanos on his back churning. The camel pokemon focuses, and Lee can see the air distort with heat as a warm gale blasts out of the cave, battering everyone with sticky, moist air that rapidly dries out. It takes only a few seconds, then the heat cuts out and Camerupt placidly returns himself to Courtney's side.

Lee steps in after everyone else, dragging a finger along the now warm and dry walls. "Dry as a bone but not actually hot at all. Camerupt has some expert control over his Fire powers, huh?"

Courtney takes the compliment in stride. "Yes. We've worked on being efficient," she says, setting her shoulder bag down. She pulls her bedroll from inside the non-euclidean bag that seems to be a staple of all traveling trainers and unrolls it.

'So you can use that efficiency to dry up the ocean.' The scarred man shakes away the thought as he sets his bag down as well, opening it and withdrawing a lantern before the last bit of sunlight fades. From his shoulder, Vulpix slides down to the cave floor. "Any reason why you focused on efficiency so much?"

In the corner of his eye, Lee notices Zinnia slow down the prep of her own bedroll to listen in.

Courtney shrugs. "I believe in doing the best with what you have. Improving. Not settling."

With a thoughtful hum, Lee turns back to his lantern. "What did you do before deciding to be a trainer, if you don't mind me asking?" He flicks on the gas of his lantern and clicks the igniter, only to frown when there's no spark. Two more tries, and two more ineffective clicks. 'Love? Can you help?'

At his feet, Vulpix opens her maw and lets a single flitting ember corkscrew its way to the lantern. The ember flies up into one of the small vents in the lantern, and the gas catches fire, casting a warm glow around the cave.

With a raised brow, Courtney watches Vulpix sniff and eye her handiwork. "I worked as an intern researcher for Devon. Worked with their geology labs." She withdraws her other two pokeballs and pops them open, depositing her Mightyena and Swellow down beside Camerupt. Other than their good health, Lee can't find any real difference between Mightyena and Swellow and any other member of their line. "I can talk more... once we've settled," concludes Courtney.

Lee gives her a smile and a nod.

In short order, everyone's pokemon are released for a cozy dinner. The chill of the cave is kept at bay thanks to Camerupt's toasty presence, and the floor even begins to heat up pleasantly as the giant camel pokemon settles to the ground with a weary sigh. Grovyle and Mightyena finish their dinner quickly, and in some unspoken agreement, both stoically take watch at the entrance of the cave. With the sun going down, the pair strike dramatic silhouettes.

"So, Courtney," Lee shifts on his bedroll. He, Brendan, Zinnia, and Courtney arranged their sleeping bags in a rough circle with the lantern between them. With little else to do, the four settled in to talk a bit before bed. "You were saying?"

"I worked with Devon's geology lab," Courtney states once more. "In Rustboro. Corporate life... didn't agree with me. I decided to be a trainer after that. Been a trainer since my teen years." Before any more questions can be asked of her, she pins Lee with a cutting stare. "What did you do... before being a trainer? Not often an adult decides to change lifestyles." She shakes her head. "Transition... is too harsh for most. Many quit, too discouraged by competing with children and veterans."

"Erm..." Lee flounders, not expecting the questioning to round back onto him. "I worked with carnivores in an animal sanctuary. Considering the training needed to handle and care for them safely, it wasn't too hard of a changeover." In his lap, Shinx purrs contentedly as his fingers comb through her fur. 'Should she even know when I started as a trainer? I guess it's probably on my Battlenet profile and I doubt a Magma admin would be dumb enough to pull... whatever this stunt is without researching her marks.'

Pressed against his side, Vulpix widens her side of their link, her lightning-fast mind already generating contradiction-free answers that offer little to nothing for any questions that Courtney might have.

'Love, remember what Zinnia said? I need to think for myself. I can't have you feed me everything.'

The fox is quick to reply. 'What we h*ve is uniq*e, you said so y*urself. The dr*gon *oman has no fra*e of ref*rence, and t*us no aut*ority to tell us how to do t*ings.' After a split second, she adds; 'The Mag*a admin is *n enemy... cur**ntly. You s*ould use all the r*sources y*u have to ensure this g*mbit works. I am one such re*ource.'

Before Lee can chastise Vulpix for calling herself a resource, a magenta eyebrow rises on Courtney's face. "Why quit?"

Lee takes one of Vulpix's answers. 'That's another thing we'll be talking about later.' Outwardly, he clears his throat. "The facility isn't in business anymore."

Zinnia tags herself into the conversation during the seconds long silence after Lee's answer. "What did you do with Devon?" she asks, leaning forward with her twiddling fingers in her lap. "In the geology lab, I mean."

Courtney turns her attention to Zinnia. "Energy storage. Devon was researching the use of crystalline structures as a method of energy storage and release."

"Really?" Lee doesn't need to feign his interest. "I'm aware of the natural formation of evo stones and the incredible concentration of Type Energy they hold, but no one seems to be able to artificially enrich one. Was Devon looking into artificial evo stones?"

She shakes her head. "I don't know. Was only an intern at the time. I think... they were trying to store Infinity Energy, not Type Energy."

'Infinity Energy? What could they be doing with — oh.' Lee instantly recalls the gimmick introduced in the games prior to Omega Ruby. 'Mega Stones?'

Zinnia catches on at the same time and hones in on Courtney's words, this time with an intensity that she can't hide behind a facade. Zinnia's red eyes stare into Courtney's cool pinks. "Infinity Energy storage in stones, eh?" Her tone is casual, but her face is anything but. "That's... interesting. They get anywhere? What were they trying to make after that?"

Courtney's mouth slowly dips into a frown, and behind her, Camerupt raises his head and cracks an eye, taking notice of his trainer's displeasure.

"Zinnia, can you quit being a nosy weirdo for a single day?" Brendan snaps, barging into the exchange. He actually glares at the dragon tamer, making her pull back, stricken. "You don't need to interrogate everyone about everything! I get that you're from some dumb, insular tribe and new things are scary, but cool it!"

Zinnia stares at Brendan, hurt plastered across her face. She opens and shuts her mouth, but no words come out.

All around, the pokemon watch the unfolding scene with differing, but tense expressions. Shelgon and Swablu, who is perched on Shelgon, stare daggers at Brendan. Goomy doesn't seem to believe what he heard.

Marshtomp slides in behind Brendan with a reluctant Breloom following. Both keep their eyes locked on Shelgon and Swablu, uneasy. Mawile, however, slowly creeps into Shelgon and Swablu's blindspot, letting her jaws crack open soundlessly.

A mewl from Lee's lap snaps the zoologist out of his own shock, and looking down, he takes in the frightened yellow eyes of Shinx, who tries to dig into his shirt to escape the sudden, hostile atmosphere that hangs over the cave.

Finally, Zinnia seems to come to her senses, and with her recovery comes face-reddening anger. Already Lee can see the verbal venom pooling in her mouth. "You little bastard..." she grounds out past gritted teeth. "Who do you think you are, talking to me like that!?"

"I think I'm someone talking to someone else who doesn't know when to leave well enough alone!" Brendan yells back, a scowl forming. "You have to know everything about everyone, and no one likes it! Heck, you had to force yourself into mine and Lee's group! That should tell you something!"

"I've got a mission from my tribe, you little jerk! One to improve myself anyway I can, and being around talent is how I do that!" Zinnia shoots back just as quickly. "And you act like I've never done anything or pulled my weight! I pay my share despite not getting a nice government paycheck! I clean up my part of camp! I cook when it's my turn! I book hotels and look for events we can do! I teach you guys things I know and give feedback in training! Quit with the high and mighty shit, mister Professor's kid!"

Brendan erupts. "I wish you'd get swallowed by a volcano or something!" He screams.

'Oh fuck no. We are not doing this here in the middle of nowhere,' Lee clutches his tiny Shinx and gently covers her ears. 'Especially not when I have a baby in my lap.'

"Enough!" Lee's rarely raised voice booms across the cave walls, drawing flinches from nearly everyone. He rakes his narrowed eyes over everyone, satisfied when no one challenges him. Now that he has everyone's attention, he uncovers a nervous Shinx's ears. "Zinnia," Lee locks onto the dragon tamer, making her stiffen. "Calm down. Let's not dig into anyone tonight, okay?"

She grits her teeth once and nods stiffly, obviously not trusting her mouth. She bows her head, her hair covering her eyes.

"And Brendan," Lee turns to Brendan, who looks like a Deerling in the headlights. "You're way out of line flinging personal insults like that. I had better not hear anything like that again, got it?"

White in the face and shrinking in on himself, Brendan nods rapidly. "Okay..." He agrees, his voice small.

Lee then sweeps his head around, stopping on Zinnia and Brendan's teams. "There will be no fighting in our group, understood?"

Taking an order from someone other than his trainer makes Marshtomp look as if he bit into a lemon, but he lowers his fists at a glacial pace. Breloom, on the other hand, sighs in relief and sits himself down next to Brendan. Behind Shelgon, Mawile quickly makes herself scarce.

Goomy and Swablu are both cowed by Lee's words, but Shelgon's eyes are alight with terrible wrath. It's then that Lee realizes he not only made a demand of a dragon, he made a demand of a dragon that isn't his.

A demand to not defend his trainer's honor.

'Love, you really are spoiling me. I'm looking at pokemon as if they were human more and more.' Lee tenses and prepares to spring away, shielding Shinx with his arms. 'Get Confuse Ray ready.'

Vulpix takes a stance in front of her trainer, eyes cold.

"Stand down, Shelgon."

Shelgon's eyes widen.

Zinnia raises her head, and Lee can't help but be a bit startled by just how weary she looks. She turns her gaze to her disbelieving dragon. "It's not worth it."

The Dragon-type visibly seethes for a moment before turning away and laying himself down. The action is so sudden it almost throws a flailing Swablu off of him.

"Let's get some sleep, everyone. Today has been a long day, and we've got several more ahead of us," Lee murmurs. "Cool off and all that."

Zinnia needs no more prompting, throwing her sleeping bag open and settling inside, facing away from everyone else.

Courtney catches Lee's eyes, and he's surprised to see her appear apologetic. He shrugs helplessly in return.

"Hey, uh. Lee?"

The man turns back to Brendan, who nervously twiddles his fingers. "You don't, uh... You don't want to stop those pokemon nutrition lessons you were giving me over this, do you?" He asks, giving Lee a hopeful look.

Lee shakes his head. "No. C'mon, if you're wanting to keep going, we'll head a little further back in the cave so the girls aren't disturbed by our chatter." He roots around in his bag and withdraws both his notebook and a large textbook personally recommended by Roxanne on the subject. He gently lifts the now sleepy Shinx from his lap and sets her in the warm divot he was sitting in, with Vulpix dutifully moving in and curling around the kitten.

The Birch heir smiles wanly and stands to follow, dragging his bedroll along.

In the back of the now low-hanging cave and seated on Brendan's bedroll with the boy just beside him, Lee opens the textbook and drapes it across both his and Brendan's laps. With his other hand, he withdraws a small penlight from his pocket, turning it on and reaching behind his ear to give them a reading light. "Now, where were we again?" He glances at his notebook. "Ah, amphibian pokemon metabolic rates. That'll be important as Marshtomp matures. Amphibians are marked by their different dietary needs through different stages of their life. One needs to know much to feed them, and the rates they can digest and absorb the different components in their food. For example, a Mudkip's metabolism should follow..."

Brendan listens raptly, eyes never leaving Lee.


"Hey, Lee?" Brendan asks during a lull in their lesson.

"Hmm?" Lee jots a note down in his notebook, drawing out a meal plan for Shinx and a timeline to wean her. It'll only be a few weeks.

"I'm sorry about tonight. I didn't mean to blow up," Brendan looks down at the book in his lap, shamefaced.

Lee pauses, then after a moment he clicks his pen and shuts his notebook. "It's not me you should be apologizing to." He begins. "I know Zinnia and you don't always see eye to eye, and she's a hothead who... is sometimes nosy and misguided, or how... she sometimes doesn't know what she's talking about." He recalls Vulpix's words, her critique of Zinnia's opinions on his and Vulpix's relationship. The more he thinks of the fox's take on the Draconid Lorekeeper deciding he should do everything himself, the more he wonders if maybe he was too quick to take everything she said to heart. Does Zinnia know how deep their connection goes? Maybe what works for Zinnia and her team isn't the best for him and his pokemon. He shakes the thoughts away and keeps speaking to Brendan. "But she's not malicious. Do you see her as a friend? Real talk."

Brendan looks down at his hands, folding them in the open textbook, right over a cutaway diagram of a Wooper. "Yes."

"Then I can guarantee she considers you a friend in return," he nods resolutely. "Insulting her, then her tribe hurt her something fierce, and it's made even worse coming from you. You two have some back and forth banter, but I think this was the first time it was actually angry. I get that you made fast friends with Courtney and that Zinnia overstepped herself by getting pushy, but that doesn't excuse personal attacks and yelling. You were solidly in the wrong too, Brendan."

As Lee talks, Brendan sinks lower and lower into himself, becoming more puddle than boy. He clenches his fists as his breath hitches. With his head hung, Lee can't see the young trainer's face, but the shuddering tempo of his breathing is clue enough that tears are on the way.

'Oh jeez, Brendan. So willing to rush into a burning building or fight terrorists, but a dressing down makes you teary?' Lee slides an arm over Brendan's shoulders. "I'm not trying to make you feel bad or anything, Brendan, but I think you should reflect on what you said and apologize not only to Zinnia but her pokemon too when you're ready. She's probably just as upset as you are, and her pokemon were really rankled by you insulting her."

Brendan silently nods, not lifting his head.

"C'mon, let's head to bed. We've got a long day tomorrow." Lee shuts the book in Brendan's lap and takes it under his arm.


Another three days are spent traversing the valley in tense silence. Each day ends with everyone and their respective pokemon teams by themselves, trying to relax, doing light training, or exploring the locale as best as could be done without getting lost. Brendan and Zinnia's moods are so foul the entire time that neither says a word to each other. Along the way, several pokemon approach the team each day, and without fail, their demeanor is aggressive. Most are turned away by the firepower presented by the defenders, and either through fortune or something else, none of the fully evolved natives see the group as worth their time. To Lee's consternation, he finds a grand total of zero pokemon he felt interested in trying to capture.

On the fourth day though, as they trek between a pair of low plateaus...

Brendan slows down to peer upward when a glint stabs at his eye, nearly making Lee plow into him. Shielding his eyes from the sun with his hand, Brendan blinks. "What are the Magnemite all doing?"

His statement brings the group to a halt as everyone follows his lead and looks up.

Lee blinks in confusion right along with Brendan. "Huh, what are they doing?"

High above, countless Magnemite zoom back and forth, forming long metallic chains in orderly lines. They criss-cross each other, somehow not colliding despite their speed and the fact that not all of them are facing forward. In fact, most seem to have a random orientation. Each one buzzes and crackles with an electric charge, arcs of electricity jumping between them with pops muted by the distance.

Then all at once, the horde of Magnemite begin to buzz even louder, their single-file lines breaking as they erratically fly like a swarm of Beedrill. A deafening crack of thunder rends the air, and beyond the plateau ahead of the group, the sky lights up a brilliant gold despite the sun being high in the sky.

"I'm no expert on Magnemite or anything," Zinnia grumbles, rubbing her still-smarting eyes from the flash. "But whatever the hell that was is probably bugging them."

Another crack of thunder rolls through the valley, picking up and throwing dust as another flash melts away all the shadows for a moment. Then another, and another.

"Can't be natural..." Courtney murmurs, holding up a hand to keep from being blinded by the relentless lighting. She squints into another flash, then lets her mouth drop into a tiny 'o' in surprise. "That's... not one pokemon. Two are clashing with Thunderbolt."

Lee forces himself to watch yet another flash, and sure enough, there isn't a single bolt of lightning flying into the sky or crashing down onto the earth, but two bolts meeting. For the split second they're visible, it's as if the bolts are jagged streams of liquid meeting and deflecting off of each other. As the latest flash fades, Lee can see the attacker hanging above.

Hovering menacingly above one of the plateaus is a Magnezone, the final form of the diminutive Magnemite. The Steel-type pokemon superficially resembles a UFO, with a disk-like body of shiny steel, a gold antenna with a bulbous tip jutting from its body at the top, and a trio of horseshoe magnets seemingly welded to the underside of its body. In the center of its disk-like abdomen, a large, red eye stares down at something they can't see from the angle. Even for how alien the pokemon is, the anger in its eye is perfectly recognizable.

Magnezone lights up in a crackling corona of gold once more, and a split second later, a bolt of pure electricity lances down at the plateau like a vengeful arrow of Arceus.

This time, however, there is no answer to Magnezone's attack, and the bolt strikes the rocky plate, kicking up an explosion of rock and dirt that rises into the sky like a cloud.

Lee, along with everyone else, covers their faces with raised arms as dirt and loose rocks tumble down the high cliff and pelt them. 'Good god. I haven't seen an electric attack that powerful since Ash's Pikachu went ballistic in Littleroot. What could have pissed off Magnezone so much?'

The answer comes swiftly bounding down the side of the plateau.

Hopping between outcroppings on the rockface with supernatural speed and grace is a simply gigantic Manectric, one easily standing tall enough to look a grown man in the eyes without needing to move its neck. Held limply by its neck scruff in the Manectric's jaws in an equally large Electrike. The smaller of the two must be three and a half feet tall at least, big enough to bowl over a human should it get a running start.

'Wait...' Realization strikes Lee like one of Magnezone's lighting bolts. His eyes shoot open, and beside him, he feels Vulpix's flash of recognition. 'That's the mama Manectric from Oldale! What's she doing all the way out here?' He focuses on the Electrike again. 'Is that the youngling from the egg?'

Manectric and her fragile cargo touch down on the ground, and after setting her shaking pup down and giving him a nuzzle and a once over, Manectric raises her head and locks her eyes directly onto Lee.

'She came here on purpose. For me. Why?' His attention is drawn back to the agitated Magnemite and furious Magnezone above. 'Did a powerful Electric-type invading the Valley set off the Magnemite? They're crazy sensitive to changes in atmospheric charge if I recall. Manectric probably zapped another pokemon and every Magnemite in the valley likely felt it.'

Above them all, the dust of Magnezone's attack finally clears enough that the UFO pokemon can see Manectric's new position. Magnezone lets out a seething burst of chirping and buzzing, not unlike a computer pushed to its limit, then it divebombs down right at Manectric. Its body begins to glow with the telltale signs of an attack.

Manectric retakes her pup's scruff and tenses.

"Flamethrower!"

Vulpix is in motion before the command is even spoken, reading Lee's intent instantly. Leaping high in the air, she sucks in a breath before loosing a stream of fire at the charging Steel-type.

Magnezone reverses its thrust near-instantly, coming to a dead halt long before Flamethrower reaches it, but when the gout of flames suddenly bends in an unnatural turn, Magnezone can only screech in distress as it almost instantly begins to glow red hot. With haste borne of agony, Magnezone strafes to the side and screeches once more.

Cra-cra-crackle!

'Love, get out of there! Quick Attack!' Lee silently urges.

Magnezone crackles gold, then another bolt of lightning shoots down right at Vulpix with terrible wrath behind it. The attack comes out so quickly that Vulpix simply can't charge Quick Attack in time. All she can do is watch with wide eyes as the lighting races towards her.

'Too fast!'

Courtney's Camerupt skids to a stop between Vulpix and the Thunderbolt, almost overshooting himself. The Electric attack hits Camerupt dead center, and the camel takes it with barely a wince, his Ground-typing negating nearly all of the electric damage.

Lee's head shoots to the side, and he finds Courtney standing there, her face a perfect visage of calm. She turns her head just enough to give him a short nod. "A friend?" She asks, tilting her head toward Manectric.

Lee nods absently.

'Okay, well, miss Magma doesn't hesitate to earn her keep.'

"Marshtomp! Mud Bomb!" / "Flamethrower, Shelgon!" Both Brendan and Zinnia order their pokemon to jump into the fray at once. For the first time in days, neither is glaring at the other.

Marshtomp's mouth swells, then out of it shoots a cannonball of mud. Beside him, Shelgon's barely visible mouth opens and fires a billowing burst of flame.

Magnezone rises out of the way of Shelgon's fiery breath, but Mashtomp's dense ball of mud strikes its flank, denting its armor and forcing the UFO pokemon to spin in a full circle. When it stops and looks back down, Magnezone's red eye narrows to a sinister, glowing slit as the magnets on his body vibrate with a bright violet haze.

Lee coughs and falls to his knees as gravity seems to increase threefold around him. He can't even keep his torso straight and is forced down onto his hands, but even then his arms begin to shake from the effort of holding his body up. 'Gravity. Magnezone used Gravity on us.' Once upon a time, Lee thought the move to be situational at best, but here, where its effects are very real? It's all he can do to keep breathing. With herculean effort, he turns his head and looks at his friends.

Vulpix stands, but her stance is wide and her teeth gritted. Her tails are pulled to the ground by gravity, and her head tuft lays flat on her skull. Her legs shake, but she's still upright.

Caught flat-footed, Marshtomp is down on his back and straining to rise. His muscles and veins rise against his skin, and slowly he turns himself over so he can push himself up, but the effort leaves him red in the face.

Poor Shelgon is in a crater, helpless with his shell bottomed out. His short legs push at the ground, but all he can do is accidentally pulverize the rock under him and growl in fury.

Manectric is standing, but her limbs are shaking. Under her, her pup lays wild-eyed and gasping for breath on his side.

Brendan and Courtney are in the same boat as Lee, on their hands and knees, stuck from the invisible hands of gravity pushing down on them relentlessly. Brendan's eyes are wide and perhaps even frightened, and Courtney's brows twitch, but she keeps her aloof mask on even as sweat drips from her brow.

"Shit!" Zinnia, the only trainer standing, slips under a patch of sandy ground and falls prone to her stomach with an explosive exhale. Winded, she wheezes and tries to stand, but she can't even get her hands underneath her.

Crunch!

The rocky ground under Camerupt gives way to his super-weighted bulk, and with an alarmed bellow, the camel pokemon falls to his side, making the ground shudder and sending the gallons of magma in his humps spilling out. The molten rock creeps along the ground...

...Right at Zinnia, who was standing just feet behind Camerupt as Gravity hit.

The dragon tamer's eyes bug out as the sputtering and spitting lava inches toward her, and for the first time since he's met her, Lee watches Zinnia's expression twist in terror. "No. No!" She tries to scramble away, but she's pinned to the dirt. Every second that passes, the lava crawls closer.

Shelgon roars and digs at his crater with even greater desperation, but he can't move. His rage quickly turns to open fear, his eyes trained on his prone human.

'Shit shit shit!' Lee frantically thinks. 'Vulpix, Confuse Ray on Magnezone! Get him to release Gravity!'

Vulpix huffs and raises her head, staring evilly at the Steel-type above them. Her eyes glow with sinister Ghost-energy.

After a second of travel, the invisible ray strikes home and Magnezone wavers in the air, his eye growing hazy. The Gravity lightens, slowly but surely, but...

'It's not going to be fast enough,' Lee's heart sinks. He pushes himself as hard as he can to get up but he just isn't strong enough. 'Ember! We need him to drop Gravity now!'

Tiny motes of fire manifest around Vulpix and fly at Magnezone like a swarm of insects, but even confused, the fully-evolved pokemon has enough mindfulness to twist out of the way.

Vulpix growls and redirects the Embers with her pyrokinesis, tugging each one along an invisible, mental string, but with her focus split so heavily, the turns are wide and sluggish. Many of the Embers extinguish themselves mid-flight. Many others miss, and the few that land splash across Magnezone's armor, not doing enough damage to kick him out of his attack, not even close.

Zinnia's struggles grow more frantic, but being prone on the ground makes the effort of getting back up so much more difficult. She starts to hyperventilate and screws her eyes shut, the lava hardly a foot away and crawling towards her at an agonizing pace.

"Zinnia!" Brendan, against all odds and to Lee's silent awe, slowly pushes his way to his feet. The boy huffs and forces himself to shuffle across the ground, lifting his feet less than an inch each time. "Hang on!"

Back hunched and arms like lead weights, Brendan forces himself toward the dragon tamer, his face red and the veins in his neck bulging. Sweat pours down his face in a river as he comes to a stop next to Zinnia. Arms shaking, he reaches down and takes fistfuls of her cloak before sharply tugging.

Zinnia gasps as she's yanked a single inch away from the superheated rock only seconds away from disfiguring her.

The lava grows closer another inch, so Brendan grunts with inhuman strain and yanks the cloak again, pulling Zinnia further away.

'Vulpix, we need to drive off Magnezone ASAP! I have no idea how long Brendan's going to last!' Lee takes as deep a breath as he can, and after brushing off hesitation from Vulpix, begins transferring his own stamina to her. 'Convergence!'

The fox's eyes blaze with the color of brimstone, desperation and two bodies worth of fuel empowering her.

All around Magnezone, swelling balls of deep orange flames with white cores manifest from nothing and grow rapidly. From basketballs to beach balls, to the size of grown men. Magnezone, still dazed, tries to shy away from the heat, but every direction he tries to fly backs him into another miniature sun, forcing him to recoil away in a short, endless dance.

'Do it.'

Vulpix yowls.

The fireballs all bear down on Magnezone and explode with a horrible, vengeful fury. Behind the Steel-type, part of the cliff is blown away in a burst of rock and smoke, obscuring part of the sky.

All at once, gravity is returned to normal and Lee sucks in a gasping breath before shooting to his feet. He gets back up so quickly and breathes so deeply that his head swims for a moment. An instant later, Vulpix is at his side, pressed against his legs. Her brown eyes meet his, and the concern pouring from her doesn't need words.

"I'm fine, Vulpix, I'm fine," Lee kneels down and strokes the vixen across her back, hiding his wince from how his muscles everywhere sting and pinch. The encroaching exhaustion of helping Vulpix power up Convergence is ignored for now. If Lee's hurting, he doesn't even want to think about- "Shit!" He raises his head, alarmed. "Brendan!"

A ways away, Brendan stands, supported by an unusually tender Zinnia and a fretting Marshtomp. The boy hangs almost limply in Zinnia and Marshtomp's arms, panting. "Ohh..." He groans. "Everything hurts..."

"Gee, I wonder why?!" Zinnia snarks in his face, looking as if she's one word away from throttling the Birch heir. "You only stood up with several Gs trying to flatten you! What the hell were you thinking!?"

"I'm sorry for what I said."

Zinnia stops, stunned.

Brendan looks up at the dragon tamer, a regretful air hanging over him. "I didn't mean to blow up at you a few nights ago. And I didn't actually wish you'd get swallowed by a volcano." He chuckles listlessly. "Especially not since it actually almost happened today. I'm sorry."

The wind fallsout of Zinnia's sails, leaving her looking exhausted, but a smile remains on her face. "You little shit," she begins, voice warm despite her words. "I thought you hated me for the better part of a week. If you weren't so messed up right now, I'd suplex you right into the dirt. I'm…" she lets out a long-suffering sigh. "I'm sorry too. That wasn't cool of me to get angry at you and start screaming."

Brendan's lips lift into a bright smile. "Forgiven."

A buzz disrupts the moment and draws everyone's attention back skyward.

"No way..." Brendan mutters, slumping in Zinnia's arms as the smoke around Magnezone clears. "That guy took Vulpix's super move and can still fight?"

The smoke clears, revealing an ugly sight.

Magnezone hovers above them, his steel armor partially slagged and blackened. Cracks run along his magnets, and his eye is lucid again. The red eye stares down at them with utter hate. Between his front two magnets, a brightly glowing mote of white and red begins to form. The mote balloons and swirls, forming a hauntingly familiar attack. The ball before Magnezone grows larger and larger before beginning to lengthen out into the beginnings of...

"Hyper Beam!" Zinnia calls, her face pale. "Shelgon, get over here and use Pro-"

Before Zinnia can finish the order, Mama Manectric rejoins the fight, zooming in front of the group as a flicker of yellow. With a howl that echoes off of the surrounding cliffs, Manectric lights up in a corona of sparks before shooting a mammoth bolt of lighting up at Magnezone, striking not the pokemon, but its charging Hyper Beam.

With a sound like a bomb going off, the nearly complete Hyper Beam detonates in Magnazone's face, consuming him in a bright flash and an earthshaking explosion.

Lee clamps his eyes shut, breathing deeply and counting backward from ten as the unexpected noise and shock wave washes over him. The fox curling around one of his legs helps keep him grounded and remembering where he is.

Once the smoke clears, Lee's jaw drops.

Magnezone is still hovering above. Even more of its armor is warped and melted, and it shivers midair, seemingly having trouble keeping altitude, but the monster of a pokemon is still conscious. Once more the red eye is trained on them.

Then Magnezone turns and begins to slowly fly away, the cloud of Magnemite above it following suit. As they leave, the tooth-rattling buzz the horde emits vanishes with them.

The four humans and teams of pokemon, both wild and trained, stand and wait for the other shoe to drop. When nothing else comes, they hastily gather themselves and limp away, Manectric and her pup following a cautious distance behind.


"It looks like you pulled pretty much every muscle in your back and legs," Lee and Vulpix sit down next to a shirtless Brendan, who is laid out on his stomach on his bedroll. Shrugging off his backpack, Lee reaches in, pulling out his canteen and a bottle of over-the-counter pain pills. He offers both to Brendan.

After their hasty retreat, one where Camerupt had to cool his volcano humps down to carry Brendan, everyone regrouped further into the valley, in a small copse of hardy trees against a cliff. All the pokemon were released and spread out to form an impressive honor guard for the battered trainers, and so far not a single wild pokemon has approached their agitated phalanx of defenders. The only wild pokemon that even dared get close were Mama Manectric and her timid pup. Even then, they sit a respectful distance away under another tree.

In the cool shade of the valley tree, Brendan groans and opens both the canteen and the painkillers. Popping two pills in his mouth, the boy washes them down with a swig of water. "Ohh..." he groans after swallowing, of all things, pains him. "Will I have any cool scars afterward?"

Lee glances at Brendan's back, which sports a number of ugly, bruised splotches. "No. And riding out of here on Camerupt is going to suck."

The boy groans again.

"You can't get all marked up, Hero."

Zinnia and Courtney both sit a short distance away in the sparse grass on the other side of Brendan, Courtney with her legs folded under her, and Zinnia cross-legged. In the latter's lap, both Goomy and Shinx lay in a purring, cuddly pile.

Zinnia rests her chin in her propped-up palm and continues. "It'll mess up the dynamic we have going, you know?"

With a frown, Brendan asks; "Dynamic?"

"Yeah!" the tanned woman grins. "You're the young peppy Hero, Dolittle is the grizzled old guy, I'm the crouching Torracat, hidden Dragonite, and Courtney here is the love interest."

'Hidden Dragonite? Zinnia, you are the furthest thing from subtle.'

Both Lee and Courtney roll their eyes, but Brendan flushes red. "Great. A new dumb nickname..." he grumbles under his breath.

"I can go back to Shrimpy if you want."

"A new nickname is fine!" Brendan hastily amends.

Lee smiles then turns his eyes to Manectric and her pup.

Manectric apparently takes that as a signal to approach, because she stands and begins slowly walking over. As she walks, her pup is right on her heels, constantly looking up at her for reassurance.

About twenty feet away, Manectric and Electrike pause.

Lee turns to them and rises to his feet, determined to meet Manectric on equal terms this time. "You're here for a reason."

Manectric snorts. Leaning down, she nudges her pup with her snout, urging him forward. The not-so-little Elecktrike looks up at her pleadingly, but his mother's face remains stern. With a tremble, Electrike slowly pads his way to Lee.

'What is going on?' He blinks, but nonetheless, Lee lowers himself to his knees as slowly and non-threateningly as he can. He can feel everyone's curious eyes on his back, but doesn't let it bother him for now. "Hey little guy..." he murmurs as if the Electrike isn't large enough to look him in the eye while he's crouched. "You and your mom came a long way, huh?" He asks, presenting an upturned hand.

Elecktrike shivers and looks at the hand nervously, but doesn't pull away when Lee reaches out to gently scratch his chin. It's slight, but a tiny bit of tension flows out of Electrike's shoulders. Other than his nervous demeanor and large size, nothing seems out of place with Electrike. He's alert, fit, and well-groomed. 'Mama takes good care of him.'

Manectric then steps closer, coming so close that Lee could reach out and touch her if he so felt like it. She leans down with a light growl in her throat, nuzzling Electrike again. The pup whines when his mother pulls away... then doesn't follow when Manectric turns and begins to trot away. The pup's suddenly needy eyes bore into Lee.

"Hold on..." Lee's words halt Manectric, who looks back. "Are you..." The picture starts to make sense. "Are you leaving this pup with me?"

The giant Electric canine raises her head imperiously, as if daring Lee to challenge her decision.

'I didn't make that big of an impact in Oldale, did I? Tracking us down in the Valley of Steel to drop off your pup is a lot of dedication.' Lee gulps, and for just a moment, he looks away back at a surprised Zinnia, or more actually, to the tiny, purring Shinx wholly focused on cuddling her squishy friend. 'I suppose I can see Manectric's logic. With how special Electrike's Giant Gene makes him, he's going to be hunted by trainers long after his mother can't care for him anymore. Why take the risk of her son landing a bad trainer when she already knows a decent one?'

"Manectric..." Lee begins, licking his lips. "I've got a little one of my own to care for, you understand, don't you?" Then an idea suddenly strikes him. One perfect yet harebrained at the same time. "But I know someone else who would be perfect for the job."

The mother pokemon raises her head a little further, as if to say 'go on.'

"Brendan," the boy jumps a little when Lee turns to him. "What do you say to raising a Giant Gene Electrike?"

Brendan's mouth opens soundlessly, and it takes him a second to find his voice. "Wha?" He asks, slowly and carefully sitting up. "I mean, I would love to... but why me?" He asks. "Lee, you're passing off the chance to have a natural giant just like that?"

Lee turns back to Manectric. "My friend here, Brendan, is the son of a man who can go toe-to-toe with champions, and he's got one of the biggest hearts around. He's got grit, intelligence, the nerve to admit when he's wrong, and the resolve to make things right. You saw it today, didn't you?" Lee waves a hand back toward the battleground they vacated barely an hour ago. "Brendan can care for your pup just as well as I could, if not better. He's the kind of guy who goes above and beyond when everything is on the line."

Manectric stares down at Lee for a long moment, then she returns back to her pup's side.

She leans down and nudges Electrike towards Brendan.
 
Act 2: Chapter 3
BANG-NG-NG!

The echo of yet another gunshot races down the valley, forcing Lee to look up from his notebook for what feels like the tenth time in the last hour alone. 'I wonder. Is it a bad sign that I find the noise more annoying than concerning, even if it's not by much?' He looks to his side, where Grovyle, his escort for today, is frowning past his chewing twig. Both Shinx and Vulpix are napping in their pokeballs, leaving the wood gecko as Lee's sole defender for now. Each bang breaks Grovyle's meditative state, forcing him to restart with a growl.

Several days after the run-in with Magnezone and Elecktrike's addition to Brendan's team, the group ventured out of the heart of the valley towards the northern exit. Despite being a mess of aches and pains, Brendan put on a smile and gladly showered Elecktrike in affection, easing the not-so-little pup's obviously raw nerves. Anyone can see that the poor thing was shaken by Magnezone and latched onto the Birch heir. Mama Manectric's departure was as sudden as her arrival, and she vanished only minutes after urging her unsure son into Brendan's arms, bounding up the side of a plateau and disappearing like a specter.

Silently, Lee is glad that the boy and Electric-type are taking to each other so well. Though he would have been overjoyed to raise Electrike, Shinx requires too much time. It'll be weeks before the kitten breaks into a truly healthy weight range and weeks more before he feels comfortable easing her out of her physical therapy.

Now only a single day outside of Lavaridge, everyone is enjoying a break in one of the oases dotting the north end of the valley, a pleasant change from the endless rock and shrub.

By the edge of the water on a beach towel, Zinnia lays facing the noon sun with sunglasses shielding her eyes. Her cloak and usual sleeveless top have been put away, traded for a bikini to "tan up" as she said. Lee isn't sure why, as he's never seen the hue of her golden-brown skin fade at all. Beside her, Swablu sits in the soft grass, carefully preening her cloud-like wings.

Courtney is further out under a tree, leaning back into it as she quietly enjoys a book. Camerupt is resting in his ball, and in the camel's place is Mightyena, who has her head laid out in Courtney's lap. The hand not holding a book is tenderly petting the content-looking wolf pokemon.

Finally, Brendan lays in the sparse grass feet away from Lee, dozing. The boy, still horribly stiff from their run-in with Magnezone, has been resting whenever possible, mostly at Lee's insistence. At Brendan's side are Mawile and Electrike. Electrike is still a bundle of nerves and trying to relax, but Mawile...

"Mawwwww!" Mawile holds an uncomfortable-looking Electrike, her tiny hands on his cheeks. Mawile's eyes sparkle, devoid of her usual mischief. It's an almost comical sight considering Electrike is nearly a foot taller than Mawile. Just what about Electrike fascinates the Fairy-type so, Lee can only guess.

Despite the calm, though, Lee has yet to find a 3rd combatant for his team in the valley despite the trek taking over a week, and honestly? His nerves are beginning to fray over it.

Several days back, the group made a short detour to watch a herd of Rhyhorn, squat Rock-type pokemon with a resemblance to rhinos. Lee and Grovyle approached them, stopping at what the zoologist felt was a respectful distance with a pokeball rolling between his fingers, making the duo's intentions clear to the herd of Rhyhorn.

All of the pokemon watched the pair carefully, but none rose to the challenge. After a ten-minute-long standoff, the herd made their discontent apparent. Snorting, pawing at the sparse grass, a few of the large males took aggressive stances, their heads low and horns poised to gore. None were interested in being captured and the males were surely approaching without a fair fight in mind.

Lee just bowed his head and withdrew. Grovyle was disgruntled but followed after only a second of delay. Several more times through the week did Lee approach wild pokemon with Grovyle or Vulpix flanking him, and each time he walked away without a new pokemon.

There are plenty of oblivious Magikarp in the many oases and rivers they passed, but the hurdles involved with their growth and the logistics of feeding and caring for a Gyrados stopped Lee from tossing a pokeball in the water and inevitably hitting one. In the Valley of Steel, low-level pokemon are absent, so the other oasis candidates ended up being Poliwhirl, Lombre, and even a Buizel. Alas, though, all of them were so timid that they fled into the water when confronted. 'Even with a type advantage over many of the Valley natives, all of the Water-types here are ready to book it at a moment's notice... sans Magikarp. Is the power gap truly that vast?' Lee frowns and thinks of all of the other small bodies of water they passed.

The oases proved to be superb breeding grounds for many types of flora, but for some odd reason, many of them were deserted with no Water pokemon to be found. They happened upon one such empty pond, and the only pokemon there was a lone Lairon drinking deeply. 'How odd.'

The Steel-types are a dime a dozen but are also the most aggressive by a long shot. The Magnemite swiftly became pests, drawn in by the uncontrolled atmospheric charge produced by Electrike. They'd swoop and try to latch on to the oversized pup to drain him like a living battery, and by Arceus did the pooch make a panicked racket when the first one touched him. Vulpix has been pulling double-duty during night watches pelting the living magnets with Embers until they buzz off.

The Aron and Lairon roam in large herds, often led by a weathered Aggron, each one even larger than the disgruntled Alpha the group met in the Granite Cave back in Dewford. Lee couldn't even get close to one herd before the lead Aggron looked him dead in the eye and began charging a Hyper Beam in his maw. The beam, in a clear warning shot, turned a giant boulder of iron ore fifty feet to Lee's left into a puddle of molten slag. That boulder was roughly the size of a small house.

Vulpix was the pokemon escorting Lee that day, and try as she might, she can't quite hide her creeping anxiety at the thought of facing a pokemon like that Aggron. Enough bled over that Lee could imagine her face going pale under her fur.

The displaced man didn't try to approach any Lairon herd again.

'Good fuckin' God,' A realization strikes Lee as he ruminates over the last week. 'Steven Stone comes here for fun.'

BANG-NG-NG!

Lee winces.

"Okay, what the hell is that noise!?" Zinnia shoots up into a sitting position, nearly throwing her sunglasses off. A scowl on her face, she stands and throws her usual sleeveless black top over her bikini. "Once or twice is whatever, but it's been like an hour! Give me a break!"

BANG-NG-NG!

"Whoever that was is mocking me now..." She glowers. The dragon tamer rolls up her towel and stuffs it away in her small, space-bending bag. Her cloak is thrown back over her shoulders as she slips into her sandals again.

"You're not going to go towards the obvious gunshots, are you?" Lee asks Zinnia wearily, already knowing the answer. "Common sense should dictate that you go the other way."

'Why am I even arguing?'

The tanned woman sniffs and holds out her arm, letting Swablu flutter up and perch upon the offered limb. "I've got my pokemon," is her simple answer.

Lee sighs and stands, closing his notebook and holding it under his arm. By his side, Grovyle rises in one seamless motion. "I maintain that this is a bad idea, but Grovyle and I are coming along to make sure you aren't killed. I don't want to have to explain that one to the professor."

"Aw, Dolittle~!" Zinnia's grin is as cheeky as it is flirtatious. She raises her hands to her face like a bashful schoolgirl might, hiding cheeks that aren't actually blushing. "You do care!"

Ignoring her, Lee turns to regard Brendan, Courtney, and their pokemon. "Anyone else coming?"

Brendan makes to stand up but winces as the motion pulls at his back. Gingerly, he lays back down. "Ah... Maybe I'll skip this one..." He says, sullen.

Mawile stops her doting on Electrike long enough to pat her trainer on the arm... then she turns and opens her larger, croc-like mouth to give Brendan a wet, affectionate lick across his face with a tongue as large as a man's arm.

The grimacing boy wipes at his saliva-coated face and flicks his hand, sending the (thankfully) clear goop off into the grass. "Thanks, Mawile..."

With a small grin on his face, Lee turns to Courtney. "Courtney?"

The Magma Admin shakes her head and snaps her book shut. "I'll stay here. Dangerous to split the group unevenly." As she speaks, the woman's Mightyena reluctantly pulls herself out of her trainer's lap and stands dutifully at attention.

With a nod, Lee is suddenly struck with the realization that he'll be leaving Brendan alone with the Magma Admin. One part of him wants to stay to keep any potential foul play at bay, but the other doesn't wish for Zinnia to wander away alone. He trusts Brendan's capable team with keeping the young trainer safe, but...

'Ah, duh.'

Taking Vulpix's ball from his belt, Lee taps the button and pops the ball open in his hand. With a flash of light, a sleepy, irritated Vulpix is at his feet. She looks up at him, silently questioning why she was awakened.

Wordlessly, Lee offers her his thoughts, and the vixen jolts to alertness. 'Love, stay here and keep an eye on things, please? Let me know if there is anything amiss and we'll come right back. Make some sort of physical signal to cover our telepathy, okay?'

Vulpix's eyes shine, and she preemptively widens the mental pipe between them, enough for thoughts to come and go without effort, but just short of their senses overlapping. 'Of co*rse.'

Lee shakes off the short headrush that usually follows him and Vulpix melding closely. After so many times, it only takes a second for the dizziness to pass. "I'll leave Vulpix here as some extra firepower," Lee's eyes shift between the curious Brendan and ever-blank Courtney. "She'll send a signal flare up if you all need backup. Zinnia and I will come running if we see it."

Courtney nods, accepting Vulpix's presence easily, but Brendan frowns.

"Lee, Vulpix and Grovyle are your only battlers right now..." The young Birch slowly sits up, aided by Mawile gently pulling one of his arms. "Do you really want to leave her behind?"

"Grovyle is more than enough," the zoologist responds quickly, hoping Brendan's words don't bruise Grovyle's already tender ego. "Plus we have Shelgon, Swablu, and Goomy. Zinnia and I are not lacking in battle capability at all," he says, casting a look down at the wood gecko beside him.

Besides an ever-so-slight narrowing of his eyes, Grovyle doesn't react to Brendan's unintentional slight.

"M'kay," Brendan flops back down with a low groan.

Vulpix leisurely trots to Brendan's side and sits, catching Lee's eyes with her own. 'Be c*reful,' she sends to him, tilting her head when Brendan idly reaches up to scratch her ear.

'We will,' Lee's promise is silent to all but Vulpix. He looks down to Grovyle, then to Zinnia and Swablu. "Ready?"

Swablu trills on Zinnia's shoulder while Zinnia herself smiles confidently. "Ready."

Grovyle's answer is a crisp nod.

Together, the four set off away from the oasis, leaving Brendan and Courtney under Vulpix's watchful eye. The loud bangs continue to rupture the air, and after pausing to gauge the echoes bouncing off the plateau walls, the impromptu scouting party adjusts their route and ventures towards the racket. After taking a turn that leads through a dried riverbed flanked by jagged faces of rock, Zinnia turns her head to Lee.

"Good thinking, leaving 'Pix with them," the dragon tamer smiles.

Lee doesn't reply right away. "I still think Courtney isn't as twisted as we might think," he eventually says. "Somehow, I doubt she would do anything to Brendan, and even if she tried, he's got his team. I left Vulpix behind more for peace of mind than real protection."

On Zinnia's shoulder, an amused trill flits out of Swablu's beak, and Zinnia herself rolls her eyes. "Ever so dutiful," Zinnia begins, voice mockingly dull. "Ever so worried."

"Weren't you just concerned about Brendan being left alone?" Lee crosses his arms.

"I can praise initiative and make fun of you for being a worrywart at once," Zinnia grins. "Say, how far can you and Vulpix talk anyway? Uh, if you want to answer, that is." She asks, hastily amending her question afterward.

The words, don't worry about it spring to mind instantly, but Lee hesitates. 'She and Brendan are my friends. I should be more open with them.' After the self-aimed reminder, he answers; "We haven't tested exact distances, but after a few miles or so, the connection thins to almost nothing. It doesn't seem to weaken any further after that, however. I could still feel her after you took all of the girls to that spa in Mauville."

Zinnia blinks. "Wow... Really? So far?"

On her shoulder, Swablu seems equally astounded, her beady eyes widening.

Even Grovyle is surprised somewhat, glancing up at Lee with a scaly eyebrow ridge raised.

The slowly rising self-consciousness in Lee's gut is squashed. "Is that strange?"

"I'm not all that sure..." The dragon tamer admits. "I don't know much about psychic stuff." After a beat, she asks another question. "Is it always on? The telepathy?"

Lee nods, finding himself more and more comfortable opening up about the topic. "Yeah, Vulpix and I have maintained a connection for months now. It's been a while since we've disconnected."

Idly, he focuses on the line of thoughts leading back to Vulpix. With the growing distance and the landscape between the man and fox, the psychic thread is thin. Not as thin as it can go, but thin enough that all he receives is flickers of foreign emotion. If he so wished, he can 'tug' on the line to get her attention.

Lee has read studies into mindscapes and other tricks psychics use to organize their thoughts, but without any talent in the art himself, rough imagination is all he has to go off of. Regardless, though, he's always likened his connection to Vulpix as a complicated plug fitted to an equally convoluted socket.

Months ago, telepathy with Vulpix was clunky and awkward. Feelings, urges, and images were distorted and he could only draw a human analog to her most primal emotions. It was as if some of the 'prongs' on the connection she offered weren't where they should be, and most didn't even seem to reach anything at all. Research on Psychic-types and even a bit on Ghost-types to better the process revealed precious little, as even in the modern era telepathy is still a rare thing.

So, Lee shifted his own expectations and interpretations just as he might in the zoo, no longer trying to make sense of what Vulpix offered as a human would. His 'socket' changed in response, morphing into something Vulpix could more easily grasp and connect to. More prongs sank into his mind, and so his understanding of her grew. Weeks upon weeks of daily refinement later, and the psychic plug and socket sit neatly flush.

'Wait... Where is it? Where did the seam go?'

Through his musing, Lee blindly gropes at the spot where his and Vulpix's minds touch, or at least as well as a non-psychic can. He feels along the whole connection, trying to find the nexus where he, Lee the human ends, and Vulpix the pokemon begins.

'It's gone?' His brows furrow. 'Where did it go?'

"Lee?"

With a start, Lee blinks his eyes rapidly. He turns to Zinnia, who looks up at him with concern in her red eyes.

"You okay?" Zinnia asks, reaching a hand out to lay on his arm. "You spaced out way harder than you usually do. Is something going on at camp?"

Lee shakes his head and takes a deep breath, clearing his thoughts. "I'm fine, and nothing is going on at camp. I just ran into something I should probably talk to Vulpix about."

Zinnia gives Lee's arm a short, comforting squeeze before letting go.

There is a subtle nudge against Lee's hip, so without moving his head, he turns his eyes down to Grovyle.

The Grass-type cooly regards him with a raised brow as if to ask are you actually okay?

Lee nods. The motion is stiff but certain.

Grovyle, ever dutiful, drops the matter and returns his yellow eyes forward.

The group weaves between plateaus and around another oasis where a pair of Azumarill watch them warily, following the sound of gunshots the entire way. As they go, Lee spends the time feeling along his connection back to Vulpix, not finding the seam between them as he expected. There is a side where Vulpix resides, and one where he resides, but the middle is... He doesn't have words for it. Blurry? Blurry is close, but not right. 'When was the last time Vulpix and I disconnected? I don't remember. Slateport? No, she shut me out most of the way, but there was still a thin line.'

As they walk through a blind corner around a rock and several shrubs, they find themselves on the outskirts of yet another verdant oasis.

BANG-NG-NG!

Lee, Zinnia, and Swablu all wince while Grovyle hisses.

Above the oasis, a Skarmory flies in tight, swirling circles, twisting and juking past speeding projectiles with a rictus of loathing carved into his face. Below him is no gunman, however.

BANG-NG-NG!

Skarmory banks hard to the side, just barely dodging a bolt of pure black.

Down on the shore of the oasis is no man with a gun, but a narrow-eyed Octillery. The Water pokemon resembles a large octopus, with off-red skin, eight tentacles with undersides covered in pale yellow suckers, and a bulbous head fitted with two large eyes. The glaring thing separating it from its animal cousin is the narrow mouth shaped like the point of a funnel, giving the octopus pokemon the appearance of having perfectly round, puckered lips from a distance.

"An Octillery?" Zinnia questions aloud. "I thought they were ocean pokemon?"

"Some Remoraid are known to swim inland and navigate rivers. They can live in freshwater as well as saltwater." Lee recites a study he was reading several weeks prior almost without thinking. "It's only natural that some would evolve into Octillery. The nearest river is several miles back, though, so I wonder what this guy is doing here?"

The Octillery narrows its eyes more at the Skarmory circling above, sucking in a gurgling breath as he does so. Its mouth quivers, then;

BANG-NG-NG!

A bolt of liquid ink leaves Octillery's mouth with the force of a rifle shot, breaking the sound barrier with an explosive crack. If not for its pure black color against the blue sky, Lee would have missed the attack's travel entirely.

Skarmory rolls to the side, but is a hair too slow as the ink bolt tears into his side armor with the horrendous screech of ripping metal. Blood quickly begins to mix with the splattered ink, and Skarmory looks down at the wound in disbelief.

'Was that Octazooka?' Lee wonders to himself. 'I...I don't recall how strong Octillery's signature move is supposed to be.'

Still flying high above, Skarmory's disbelief swiftly transforms into shock as the pain of his wound visibly sets in. He shivers, and the flaps of the wing on his wounded side are ginger.

Down in the water, Octillery gurgles and swells, another attack building.

Skarmory's eyes widen as he watches, and with a harsh maneuver that surely tugs at his wound, the avian Steel-type finally abandons whatever his objective is and speeds away. He trails droplets of blood and ink as he soars over a plateau and down into the safety of a valley beyond Octillery's view.

The red octopus watches his foe vanish, seemingly disgruntled if the further narrowing of his eyes is any indicator. Those eyes then turn to Lee, Grovyle, Zinnia, and Swablu. It's then that Lee notices something off about the Water-type.

'His eyes are unfocused,' Lee backs up a step as Grovyle takes a defensive stance in front of him, wrist leaves bared and ready to form Leaf Blades. 'This guy isn't comprehending what he's looking at.'

A few other things begin to paint a picture of something not quite right. 'Octillery's skin color is off. It should be a vibrant red, but he's got this odd gray tint discoloring him. And his tentacles...' Lee watches the appendages move in jerky, almost uncontrolled flails. The two tentacles oriented at his front are longer than the others, marking the Water-type as a male. 'That movement doesn't look wholly voluntary, or even pleasant. What's going on with this guy?'

The Octillery burbles and scowls as best as his anatomy allows, raising his primary tentacles and letting the webbing between them stretch out in a clear threat display. He then brings the tentacles down harshly over and over, slapping the muddy shore and making a great racket that flings mud around.

'There's no other pokemon around either. Did Octillery scare them away?'

"Dolittle..." Zinnia whispers, getting Lee's attention. "I always thought these guys were chill pokemon," she nods her head towards the off-red octopus as her Swablu puffs up, ready to fight. "Why is this one so hyped up?"

Lee is silent. When he does speak, he keeps his voice low, hoping to avoid triggering the aggressive Water-type a dozen yards away. "He looks ill. His eyes aren't focused, his movements are erratic, and he's discolored. That's probably why he's so aggressive."

Zinnia shifts. "Any idea what he might be sick with?"

"I'm trying to figure it out..." Lee fingers the Pokedex in his pocket, trying to find the volume wheel and turn it down before he pulls the device out. His thumb finds the volume control and turns it down to nothing, so he slowly withdraws the 'dex and flips it open. "The aggression, unfocused eyes, and involuntary movement could point to something neurological, but I have no idea if the skin discoloration is related or not. Honestly, I've never worked with cephalopods at length. Lemme think for a moment..."

'Some kind of infection? If Octillery has a wound that went septic, the infection could spread... but pokemon are intelligent enough to treat injuries, and a smart pokemon like an Octillery would know to keep a wound clean. A traditional infection or pathogen would likewise be self-diagnosed and treated in all but the most severe of cases. It has to be something Octillery wouldn't have noticed right away or something he couldn't escape...' Lee frowns and thumbs through the pokemon native to the Valley on his Pokedex, wondering if any entries might shed clues as to what the angry cephalopod is afflicted with. 'Incorrect diet, maybe? Or... something in the water?'

He stops on the entry for the Aron, specifically on their diet, when several lines catch his eye.

While omnivorous, The Aron family also requires a significant intake of iron or other ferric materials to facilitate the growth of their armor. Dietary iron does not strictly need to be pure iron (Fe), as Aron and later evolutions utilize special enzymes located in the gastrointestinal tract to separate iron from composite materials. Solids like iron oxide (Fe2O3 aka common rust) and iron sulfate (FeSO4) along with materials diffused in water (ferrous salts) provide less for the pokemon than ores or pure iron, but are acceptable substitutes.

Lee shuts his Pokedex and slips it back into his pocket, mindful of Octillery's heated gaze. He looks past the addled pokemon to the water he rests in. The pond is cloudy and clearly filled with some sort of contaminant. "I'm not a hundred percent sure, but I think this Octillery has secondary hemochromatosis."

"Homo-Chrono what?" Zinnia wrinkles her brow. "That's that movie where a guy and a Celebi go back in time and the guy falls for himself because he's a narcissist, right?"

"Hemo. Chromatosis," Lee corrects with an exasperated sigh. "That, or some other heavy metal poisoning. What kind of movies are you watching?"

Zinnia crosses her arms with an exaggerated huff. "Hey, I didn't get to pick the films, okay? Whatever my home village could get their hands on is what we watched..."

"Well, what I'm talking about is a medical condition. Iron poisoning, essentially." Lee shares a look with Grovyle, whose eyes are half-lidded in disinterest. "Heavy metal build-up in the body can cause a myriad of issues. Brain damage, organ failure, or cancer just to name a few. If acute poisoning isn't treated promptly, then your death isn't going to be pleasant." The more Lee thinks about it, the more his theory on Octillery makes sense. "Remember all those ponds we went past that were deserted?" He asks Zinnia.

She nods her head. "Yeah, do you think…?"

"They must have a toxic amount of iron salts or some other soluble metal compound in them, making them useless other than as drinking holes for Steel-types." Lee grimly finishes. "It also explains the gray color of Octillery's skin. Excessive iron build-up can cause the skin to pale or turn gray."

'I thought octopi used a copper-based protein rather than iron for oxygen transport in the blood, but I guess that's not the case with pokemon... Or maybe they do, and that just makes them more prone to iron building up in the body?' Lee tries to recall past conversations with his zoo's aquarium keeper, a bubbly older woman with a love of all things that swim. None of the half-remembered exchanges involved octopi and what happens when they get metal poisoning of all things. 'I'm pretty sure a mundane octopus would go into toxic shock and die before showing symptoms.'

"Hmm..." Zinnia hums, leveling the Octillery with a wary eye. "Do you think he was chased here and forced to hide out on the dirty water? Maybe he had no idea until it was too late?"

Lee nods, his hand falling to one of the empty pokeballs on his belt. "I could see both happening. The Steel-types certainly live at the top of the hierarchy here, and a pure Water-type would be easily bullied by the roving Magnemite and Magneton. One thing is for certain, though." He unclips the shrunken pokeball his fingers are brushing and taps the button, expanding it with a dull whine. "If he stays here, he's going to die. We need to get him out of that water and to a pokemon center."

Zinnia looks at the pokeball in Lee's hand with some surprise. "Do you intend to keep him?"

"We'll see..." Lee takes a deep breath and uses the moment to survey the field. 'Wind is dead. Most of the area is water with a loamy shore. Octillery has the home-field advantage here, he can just dive to avoid Grovyle if things look dicey, and we have no idea what his other moves are. I don't want to bank on his impairment to help us, but I think that's all I can realistically hope for... We could have Grovyle drive Octillery out of the water...' For a moment, Lee imagines Grovyle using his mastery of Quick Attack to dance across the water, not giving Octillery an inch. Before ordering Grovyle to engage, though, he calls out to the octopus.

"Octillery!" Lee raises his voice, trying to find a volume that catches attention but doesn't seem challenging. "You look sick and we want to help you! Can you come out of the water, please?"

Octillery gurgles and blinks his eyes, seemingly confused. He pauses his 'look at how big I am' display and sets his webbed tentacles down. The cephalopod pokemon regards the scarred trainer with care, or as much care as he can in his befuddled state. Just as Lee begins to hope Octillery might see reason, the irrational anger returns to Octillery's cloudy eyes and he raises his tentacles even higher.

"I was afraid of that..." Lee sighs. "Ready, Grovyle?"

The Grass-type's eyes sharpen and he lowers his stance.

"Swablu, Zinnia, be ready to jump in if needed," Lee turns to the pair.

Zinnia smirks and Swablu tweets an affirmative note. "Hogging the glory?" Zinnia teases.

Lee rolls his eyes. "Grovyle, feel him out. Circle and Bullet Seed!"

In a blur of green, Grovyle rushes out along the right perimeter of the pond, his clawed feet tearing at the loose soil. He opens his mouth, his throat glowing a bright green before a burst of nearly-sonic seeds erupts from his maw with a loud ratatatatatatatatat!

Octillery jukes away from the shore and ducks back unto the water as expected, letting the Bullet Seeds ineffectively hit the water and throw bursts of muddy mist up.

Grovyle skids to a stop, watching the water his foe vanished under carefully.

Several air bubbles rise to the surface as the muddy water churns, and the instant a bulbous head begins to rise out of the murk, Lee barks a new order.

"Detect! Then Seed Sniper!"

Octillery's head pokes up, mouth puckered.

BANG-NG-NG!

Grovyle sidesteps a supersonic bolt of ink that pulverizes a boulder behind him, eyes aglow. Several rock fragments bounce off of his back, but that distracts him none. His mouth snaps open again, this time launching a single large seed back at the octopus.

BANG-NG-NG!

Octillery is far too slow to dodge and the super-effective attack drills him in the forehead, tearing at his skin and knocking his head back as if punched by a Machamp. His soft, water-filled body goes limp for a moment, and Lee's breath hitches, wondering if the attack was too much. A moment later, the octopus burbles in pain and paws at the seed with his tentacles, dislodging it and dropping it into the water with a plop. A second later, he retreats under the rippling surface, leaving a cloudy splotch of blood on the surface of the water.

Huh. His blood is red like a mammal's. I guess he uses iron-based blood then.'

Grovyle stands tense as the surface bubbles again.

"Grovyle, try to herd him out of the water! Bullet Seed just to his left!" Lee nervously fingers the pokeball in his hand, hoping both a concussion and metal poisoning keeps Octillery from realizing the plan.

Grovyle's jaw snaps open. Ratatatat!

Bullet Seeds violently impact the water just to the left of the bubbles, and Lee can almost imagine Octillery's distressed flailing as the bubbles move away from the attack, closer to the shore.

Once more, Grovyle fires off a bombardment of hard-shelled seeds from his mouth, sweeping his fire along the still submerged Octillery's flank and startling the octopus into moving inland. Twice Grovyle needs to pause for a moment to catch his breath, but it's never long enough to let Octillery form a plan. Finally in the shallows, the red octopus has no choice but to surface and scuttle to the shore with nearly limp tentacles.

Lee winces as he beholds the Water-type.

Octillery's entire forehead is an ugly bruise with a twisted patch of missing skin in the center. The pokemon's eyes roll in their sockets, panning around in open panic. Octillery gurgles as if to charge up an Octazooka, but all that comes out of his mouth is a dribble of ink and saliva.

"We just want to help you, bud!" Lee calls, guilt for harming an obviously unwell pokemon prompting the words. "Just come on out and let us treat you!"

Octillery pays Lee no mind, but when a final burst of Bullet Seeds splatters sandy mud just inches away, Octillery flinches and rushes back to the water.

"Head him off!" Lee's words fly nary a second into the water pokemon's flight.

Still on the right side of the oasis, Grovyle's maw opens once more, and out pour seeds glowing yellow like tracer bullets. Ratatat!

This time, Octillery braves the barrage, being struck several times with painful smacks. His watery flesh sizzles as the Bullet Seeds dump volatile Grass energy into him, but the octopus ignores them to dive into the water and vanish with a splash. There are no bubbles or movement under the water, even after waiting a full minute.

Lee sighs and rubs his forehead. "Damn it..." He looks up at the harsh Hoenn sun, now aware that he's been sweating even more than usual in the excitement of the battle. Part of him wishes Vulpix was here to dull the hot sunlight with Drought.

Grovyle slowly walks back to Lee's side, keeping his eyes trained on the water. Once he's returned to Lee, the wood gecko pokemon bows his head in apology.

"It's not your fault, pal," Lee reaches down to rub Grovyle's head, feeling the cool, smooth scales rasp against his calloused fingers. "We had no idea Octillery would be willing to walk right through a super-effective attack."

Grovyle still rolls the twig in his mouth around, visibly discontent.

Lee turns his eyes to Zinnia and Swablu. "Any ideas?"

Swablu shrugs her little wings as Zinnia rubs her chin. "Maybe you could..." she trails off, looking at the water with bewilderment. "What the hell?"

Lee and Grovyle follow her eyes, watching a blue glow beginning to light up the heart of the oasis. Lee's heartbeat pounds in his ears as he feels his heart jump. "Grovyle!" He snaps "Be ready!"

Grovyle growls, his eyes already glowing yellow with Detect.

The blue glow brightens, then without any warning, the surface of the oasis slowly turns into muddy slush, then freezes solid with a noisy CRACK!

Under the ice, the blue glow fades down to nothing.

For a moment, the oasis is silent, then Lee lets his jaw drop as an ice-chilled breeze wisps over his sweaty body. "Really? This guy knows an Ice move and pulled it out to trap himself in a toxic pond?"

Grovyle tentatively steps closer to the ice, one of his wrist leaves lengthening and glowing with the power of Leaf Blade. His arm blurs and chops at the ice, only for his blade to barely sink several inches in. With a frown, he yanks his blade free as he clenches his jaw, then with an echoing BANG, he shoots the ice with a Seed Blast.

Bits of ice chip away, but most of the seeds are stopped dead with several ricocheting and skipping across the surface of the frozen oasis. One bounces far enough to land just inches away from Lee's boot.

Kneeling, Lee picks up and rolls the perfectly smooth orb composed of nothing but seed shell in his hand, trying to think of some way out of the new predicament. "Well, shit," he mutters, dropping the seed. "As much as I don't want to, I think I'm going to have to call Vulpix for this one. Even then, it's going to take some time to melt all of this."

"Hold on!"

Zinnia steps forward, drawing an inquisitive trill from the bird pokemon on her shoulder and a raised eyebrow from Lee. She gives Lee a cheeky grin. "Rather than openly advertise your telepathy to miss Magma, let's have Swablu shatter the ice with Hyper Voice," she says, her grin growing. "I've always wanted to try this!"

"Lemme guess, you saw it in a movie?" Lee's voice is dry, but inwardly he's somewhat curious if such a thing would work.

"Fearow Flotilla vs Pidgeyman 2!" She giggles. "Okay, cover your ears, everyone! Swablu! Get to the center and use Hyper Voice, point blank!" Her hands fly to her ears.

Lee plugs his ears with his fingers as Grovyle walks back to his side, reptilian paws already pressed against his earholes. Lee catches his pokemon's eyes and drops a hand to tap the gecko's pokeball, but Grovyle declines the unspoken offer with a shake of his head.

Swablu flutters from Zinnia's shoulder and lands daintily on the center of the pond's icy cap. She taps a spot with her beak, then takes a deep breath that puffs her tiny body up.

EEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE!

Out of Swablu's beak comes a screech of such horrendous volume that the ground rumbles, making pebbles dance at everyone's feet.

Even with his ears covered, Lee winces. The noise does more than hurt his ears, he can feel it in his bones, but his wince is for Grovyle, who has his eyes screwed shut as his sensitive ears take a headache-inducing beating. 'Stubborn lizard...'

Swablu holds the note for three seconds before the ice begins to groan. At five seconds, there is an audible crack, one just barely heard over the terrible screech of Hyper Voice. Then at ten seconds, just as Swablu's voice begins to give out, there is a great cra-cra-cra-crack!

The solid cap of ice shatters like glass, breaking into several large, cloudy floes with smaller shards dispersed in between. Swablu takes to the air with an alarmed chirp as the spot she was standing on crumbles away, falling into the warmer water below and melting.

Lee lets his hands fall and watches the ice bob in the oasis. "Huh," he begins. "I half expected that to not work."

"Fearow Flotilla vs Pidgeyman 2 had a total budget of like twenty-thousand credits. They did all their stunts and stuff with no special effects," Zinnia quips. "So of course it would work!"

Before Lee can comment on how bad an idea it is to pull tactics from B movies, the water between two ice flows begins to bubble, making everyone snap to attention.

Slowly, almost lethargically, Octillery crawls out of the water and into a sheet of ice, settling into a rather pathetic-looking pile. The octopus is still slowly bleeding from the skinless, bruised patch on his head, and he looks as if he can barely focus on anything going on around him. His eyes flutter, passing over Swablu, who is hovering overhead. He tries to raise his head and aim his mouth, but when the effort is too much, he goes limp.

"Oh, man..." Zinnia frowns. "Either Hyper Voice shook the fight out of him, or Octillery was already on his last legs when we got here."

"Maybe both..." Lee sighs and readies his empty pokeball. "At least he surfaced." Without any fanfare, he taps the button on the ball in his hand, feeling it vibrate and confirming the auto-return feature is enabled. "C'mon, Octillery. Let's get you some help." Lee winds up his throw and lets the ball fly towards the limp Water pokemon.

The lobbed ball flies in a gentle arc, hitting Octillery and snapping open as it rebounds off of the octopus's springy body. Octillery's whole form is engulfed in red light before the pokemon is sucked inside as a wriggling mass of energy. The pokeball then falls to the ice, weakly shaking as the barely-conscious Octillery inside fights. A few tense seconds pass, but the ball clicks and goes still. Then as if picked up and thrown by an unseen hand, the pokeball rises and shoots back towards Lee.

The zoologist plucks the ball out of the air before immediately pointing it at the ground and tapping the button, making the ball snap open. "Grovyle, stand by in case he needs to be restrained." Lee orders as Octillery takes form at his feet. Lee doesn't bother looking, already knowing his gecko is in position as he kneels and shrugs his backpack off.

Octillery cracks open his eyes, taking in the human above him before reaching up and wrapping a tentacle around Lee's wrist. Even so weakened, Octillery's grip is still akin to a grown man squeezing with intent to harm.

"Just take it easy, okay?" Lee murmurs gently, ignoring the slimy tentacle trying to crush his wrist. With his free hand, Lee unzips his backpack and digs inside, silently thanking Silph Co for adding a sorting feature to their already miraculous bottomless bag. Through the clutter inside, Lee's berry case rises to the top. He wastes no time popping it open and withdrawing his last Sitrus berry. "Here, this'll make you feel a bit better."

Octillery's grip lessens at the sight of the yellow fruit, but his foggy eyes are still distrustful.

Smiling calmly, Lee slowly sets the berry down. "All yours. Eat up. I bet you're exhausted huh?"

Lee can see the thoughts running through Octillery's swimming head, and as the sickly octopus lets his wrist go, Lee backs up to give him space.

For a long moment, Octillery just stares at the fruit, then with visible effort, he raises his head and reaches a tentacle out, snatches the Sitrus, and brings it to his mouth. His conical 'mouth' opens a bit wider, and Lee can't help but be surprised to see an octopus beak hidden within. Still casting doubtful looks all around, Octillery nibbles the berry, then begins scarfing it down in great bites, letting yellow pulp and juice run down his front. Before he's even halfway done with the food, the bruise on his head begins to shrink and the patch of missing skin begins to heal over.

As Octillery finishes the last bite, Lee clears his throat.

Octillery's eyes snap back to him, but the pokemon still sways unsteadily.

"You're sick, pal," Lee raises Octillery's ball. "We're going to get you to a place to help you, okay? After that, you're free to go if you want. Just hang tight. Return."

Before Octillery can protest or retaliate, he's drawn back into the pokeball as a flash of red. Standing up, Lee gives the button of the pokeball a long press, locking it so the delirious pokemon inside can't let himself out. The ball buzzes once in confirmation, so Lee shrinks it and clips it back to his belt.

"Thanks for the help, everyone," the zoologist smiles at Grovyle, Zinnia, and Swablu, who has settled on Zinnia's shoulder again.

Grovyle crosses his arms and nods once, but Lee can see his lips rise a little from the praise.

"No prob at all, Dolittle," Zinnia grins as Swablu beams happily. "Here's hoping that floppy sea spider is grateful enough to stick around. I know that kinda messes up your plans of a Vaporeon, but..."

Lee waves her off and shoulders his closed backpack once more. "I can live with two Water-types. Water is a good type, all things considered. Let's worry about that later, though. I've got a sick pokemon to deal with."

As they all get ready to march off, Lee pauses, then shrugs off his bag once more. From inside of it he pulls a bottle of water that he uncaps. He offers the bottle to Grovyle, who gratefully pours half of the contents down his throat before returning it to Lee, who then drinks the remainder and silently curses the Hoenn sun under his breath. Ignoring Zinnia's raised eyebrow, he jogs over to the thawing oasis and dips the now empty bottle in, collecting some of the water inside before capping it.


The trip back to the temporary camp is quick and devoid of any stops. One roving Graveler spoiling for a brawl tries to stop the group, but a Leaf Blade from Grovyle carving into the wild Rock-type's armor forces a hasty retreat from the aggressor. Once Vulpix is in range for clear communication, Lee reaches out to her and feeds her a replay of the last hour and some change.

As they step back into camp, Lee wastes no time with any niceties. "Brendan! Courtney!" He calls, cupping his hands around his mouth. "Recall any pokemon who aren't escorting you and pack up! We've got a pokemon in bad shape and we're double-timing it to Lavaridge!"

Courtney stands as if bitten by something, her placid face hardening at Lee's tone. In a flash, she recalls her Mightyena with a pokeball in one hand and releases Camerupt from a ball in her other hand. As the great camel materializes, he shares his trainer's severe expression. Without needing to be told, he begins to trot over to Brendan to carry the still injured boy.

Brendan, however, blinks and slowly sits up, aided by his Mawile holding his arm. "A pokemon is hurt that bad?" He looks between Grovyle and Swablu with confusion. "What happened? You got enough stuff back in Mauville that you could be a walking pokemon center."

Lee grimaces, remembering how his conscience nagged him into buying nearly a thousand credits worth of supplies before they set off into the Valley. The only thing they've used is water, painkillers for Brendan, sunscreen, and MREs on nights where firewood was sparse. "That gunshot noise?" Lee begins. "It was an Octillery. The poor guy was trapped in a toxic pond and wasting his energy taking potshots at other pokemon. I'm ninety percent sure he's got some sort of heavy metal poisoning which is not something I can treat in the field. I fed him a Sitrus which should keep him stable for now, but I want to get him to a real pokemon center, one that can run an analysis on the water sample I have and get a more certain diagnosis." He crosses his arms, mirroring Grovyle as Vulpix trots over and leaps up to rest along his shoulders. "Sorry for the rush, but I want to get Octillery treated before he suffers some sort of permanent condition."

'For all I know, it's already too late and he's going to have some sort of complication…

The grim thought prompts a mental shushing from Vulpix, who touches her cool nose to one of Lee's scars. 'Don't dw*ll on what *ou can't contr*l,' she sniffs.

The news plants a determined frown on Brendan's face that looks comical considering his youth. With a grunt, he stands on wobbly legs and clambers up on Camerupt's back, between the volcanos. Brendan then paws at his belt and takes Mawile and Electrike's pokeballs in his hands. "Return! Erm..." He stops short and looks at his backpack that's still on the ground. "Electrike? Could you get my bag, first? My back is killing me and I really don't wanna get down again..."

The green and yellow pup looks down at the ground, spying Brendan's one-strap backpack. Gingerly, almost unsurely, he picks it up in his teeth and walks to Camerupt's side, timidly meeting eyes with the larger pokemon for only a moment. With a tremble, he rises on his hind legs, planting his front paws on Camerupt's side as he offers Brendan the backpack.

Brendan's grin is almost blinding in how bright it is. "Thanks, Electrike. You're the best!" He says, bending down just enough to take the offered backpack and stroke the large pup across his head.

Elecktrike's stubby tail wags slowly. Behind him, Mawile holds her cheeks with her hands and giggles, gushing over something. Both pokemon are swiftly recalled into their balls after that.

Lee readies Grovyle's ball and looks down at the Grass pokemon. "Take a rest, Grovyle. We need you in top shape in case things go sour. We've been setting a nice and easy pace until now, so if a local gets upset about us making a quick march through their turf..."

Grovyle's eyes harden as he too imagines what could happen.

"Yeah, that's why I want a rested Grass-type on hand," Lee nods. "Return."

Grovyle is recalled in a flash of red.

Lee looks around at everyone.

Courtney hasn't said a word. She just stands ready by Camerupt and Brendan. Her narrowed eyes tell Lee just how seriously she's taking the situation.

Brendan himself gives Lee a thumbs up and a wide smile. "Let's go!"

Zinnia hooks the thumb of her left hand into her belt and taps a foot. In her right hand, her hand-drawn map is already bared. "Ready when you are." On her shoulder, Swablu tweets in agreement.

Finally, Lee shares a short look with Vulpix. In a tenth of a second, a full conversation passes. "Right," Lee begins. "Zinnia, take point. Vulpix will psychically scan ahead and forewarn us of anything amiss. Let's be in Lavaridge by morning."

As he rapid-fire trades thoughts with his starter, Lee privately wonders if he should bring up the strange lack of a termination point between his psyche and Vulpix's. After a moment, he discards the thought. 'It can wait until we're out of the Valley.'


Verdanturf, Covisquire decides, might be his favorite human settlement... In Hoenn, at least. Nothing quite compares with the artistry of Olde Galarian. Castles built to repel invaders and still bearing the scars of glory long past have always fascinated the corvid pokemon. Each mark tells a story of struggle, a story of a time the field of honor was littered with more than broken dreams.

Inside these grand forts and citadels hid luxury and finery without equal. Art, in Corvisquire's mind, can take many forms. The art of battle is of course the greatest. There exists no greater beauty than when two foes with everything to lose pit their skills against one another in honorable combat. Some might frown on Corvisquire's understanding of honor, but if his life has taught him anything, the version of honor venerated in fables and tales long past is outdated. Modern combat requires modern tactics.

'Chivalry is for the old and the dead...' Corvisquire muses from atop his street light perch. 'And I intend to be young forever.'

And art can take more traditional forms. The magnificent painted ceiling in the Hammerlocke Cathedral back in beautiful Galar left him speechless as a chick. How many hours did the artist spend, and how long did he hone his skills to see such a moving piece borne? The divine visage of Arceus was captured to such a degree that only seeing Him in person could be better.

...Modern art, however, is just plain mystifying. How is a mangled bit of car frame painted green 'art'? Putting junk on a pedestal and giving it a confusing name like Tired Sunkerns Aren't Fireproof doesn't make it art, it's just stupid.

His Steel Wing rent the offensive sculpture in the town park down to bits one night a week ago, and the city council is still in a great hubbub about finding the culprit. Most blamed "no good teenagers."

Now minus the stupid eyesore, Verdanturf is Corvisquire's favorite town in Hoenn. The humans live with nature rather than on top of it, the buildings are quaint but tasteful, and the land is rich with food and fresh air. Here during the twilight hours when everyone is heading home, the town is pleasant to behold.

'Though, I could do with a proper contender to fight...' Corvisquire clicks his beak in annoyance. 'Like a sword left in the rain, I feel the rust forming on my skills, and I'm so close to evolution, too.' He grips the streetlamp in his talons roughly in his irritation, making the paint chip and the metal below squeak. 'None of the weaklings around me can give me the push I need. I need only fly that fool trainer back to Littleroot then my obligations will be over and I can wash my talons of him.'

"Wally, there he is!" a squeaky voice calls below, breaking Corvisquire from his brooding. Looking down, he bites back a sigh.

Below him are a diminutive Ralts and a green-haired brat of a human child. The Ralts is pointing up at him as the child gapes like a moron.

'These two again...' Corvisquire's eyes narrow as he remembers the pair stumbling upon him a week prior, and how he had to exercise his mercy to save the stupid boy from his own traitorous body.

"Wow... that's a big bird..." Wally, the child mutters.

Corvisquire narrows his eyes even further, and Wally seems to realize he's already on thin ice as he gulps.

"M-Mister Corvisquire?" Wally calls up to him, gray eyes nervous. "Can we talk to you?"

For a moment, Corvisquire debates his options. He could just leave. He could hurl an insult and tell the pair to begone, or he could-

"We brought you a present, a-as thanks for saving me!" The boy calls up, raising a wicker basket in his hands that escaped Corvisquire's notice until now.

Inside the basket is an assortment of berries. Some are of the mundane variety, but he spies some he enjoys like Cheri, Oran, Persm, Mago, and even his favorite; succulent, mouthwatering Pecha berries.

'Perhaps I can bear them for a few minutes.'

Corvisquire flutters down from his perch, landing on the street with a click of his talons, and the boy seems taken about by his stature. The green-headed brat is only a foot taller than Corvisquire.

"O-Oh..." Wally looks down at the now meager-looking basket. "If I had known you were this big, I would have brought more..."

Corvisquire rolls his eyes and looks to Ralts. "What do you want?"

Ralts twiddles his fingers. "Oh... We just wanted to thank you. Wally..." Ralts tears up slightly.

'Oh, here we go...'

"Wally almost died because I wasn't a good pokemon for him. You were so calm and knew what to do and...and...!" Tears run down Ralts' face now.

'And I wanted to turn you into pulp. You seem to forget that, fool.'

"Ralts, is something the matter?" Wally sets the basket down and drops to a knee, setting a hand on Ralts' head. "What's wrong? Are you hurt?" He reaches into his shirt pocket and pulls out a handkerchief, dabbing at his pokemon's tears. "Please tell me, Ralts..."

"I know I can't make you do anything, but I know you're a good pokemon, s-so can you teach me to be a good pokemon too?" Ralts hugs Wally's arm as he asks. "Please?"

The first thing Corvisquire wants to do is laugh. Laugh until he's hoarse. The request is just so absurd and the little idiot's assumptions are so wrong that it's pure comedy.

"I..." Ralts hiccups as he forces his emotions down. He looks up at his trainer, eyes red and puffy. "I want to be a good pokemon for you, Wally, but I don't know how."

Wally smiles. "You're already a good pokemon, though..." Wally murmurs.

Corvisquire stops, his mirth gone as he hears the trainer clearly and directly reply to Ralts. "Fool," Corvisquire drills his eyes into Ralts, who freezes. "Do you know how to use telepathy?"

Ralts seems to debate hiding behind Wally but stops. "I'm not very good at it," he admits quietly.

'Telepathy is not just a skill, it's a hallmark of potential...' The raven pokemon looks between the boy and the tiny Psychic-type, an idea hatching. 'Never have I met a telepath without the finesse for greater skills, greater heights.' Unbidden, he recalls the past telepaths he's clashed with.

'That blasted Mr. Rime serving as the First and most Faithful of Dusan Durrinshire, dashing foes across jagged, invisible walls with a smile on his stupid face.'

'Espeon, that damned, smug banshee of House Mourn. Psychic screaming is no proper technique. How I would love to give you another scar so your left ear matches the right.'

'And finally... ' The final image is the most vivid, and in his mind's eye, Corvisquire sees a pair of brown, burning eyes, smoldering with hate for a perceived betrayal. No matter how damning the imagined eyes are, Corvisquire stomps upon the guilt that wants to bubble in his chest. Of all his foes, Vulpix remains one he's yet to beat, and her powers aren't even matured.

The brown eyes change, morphing into red gems that shine with a hellish, vengeful hue. The fur framing them transforms from dull orange to radiant gold.

Never would Corvisquire admit that under the guilt, there was a thrill of fear at the image.

"Hmm..." The raven hums to disguise his thoughts, and like a favored chick, his idea hatches into something magnificent. 'None of the weaklings of Verdanturf can challenge me, can push me to evolve, but I care not for leaving this town quite yet. So, rather than finding a worthwhile foe... What if I manufacture one?'

"You wish to learn from me?" Corvisquire purrs, relaxing.

The sudden shift, one even the human perceives, catches both the boy and pokemon off guard.

Corvisquire struts up to the basket, plucking a delectable Pecha from the top. He tilts his head back and bites down, savoring the sweet pulp and juice. With another bite, the Pecha is in his gullet. "If mentorship is what you want, I can be convinced..." the raven smiles nastily.
 
Act 2: Chapter 4
Want to support me? Find Fuggmann is creating Fiction | Patreon on the place of patrons. I do have goals on there that will hopefully allow me to cut back on work in favor of more writing. As a thanks for donating, patrons get to see updates a few days early and suggest edits to the final draft before it goes live.

These chapters keep betting bigger goddamn

"Well, Mister Henson," Nurse Joy's smile instantly soothes Lee's nerves. "I'm glad to say your Octillery will make a full recovery."

Lee sighs and leans against the wall outside of the Lavaridge Pokemon Center's aquatic ward. He turns slightly as he rests on the wall so as to not accidentally pin Vulpix, who is in her usual spot upon his shoulder. "Thank goodness," he murmurs, peering through the observation window into the ward.

It truly seems like every Pokemon Center has everything needed to treat any sort of pokemon, evidenced by the multiple wards even the small Lavaridge center has. Through the glass, Lee runs his eyes over all the different tanks and enclosures. Only one is occupied right now, and it's a large, closed-top rectangular tank of glass holding Octillery.

After only several hours in the center's care, the octopus pokemon is already beginning to look more lively. The sickly pallor of his skin has receded somewhat, and his sleep isn't wracked by tremors or spasms.

"We ran an analysis of the water sample you gave us, and it did indeed have a worrying amount of metallic contaminants in it," Nurse Joy peers down at the tablet computer held in her hand. "Thank you for bringing it in. Having a sample cut down our diagnosis time quite a bit."

Lee returns his attention to the iconic nurse. "Will he have any complications while recovering? And what are you doing to treat him, if you don't mind indulging my curiosity?"

Joy smiles. "We don't expect any complications, but if he experiences any symptoms like unusual fatigue or unprompted confusion, please bring him to the nearest Pokemon Center. As for his treatment…" She glances down at her tablet and swipes the page up, reading it briefly. "The filtration system in your Octillery's tank is being treated with chelating agents that bind to the heavy metals in his body. These help him expel the contaminants through his urine. Every few hours, we're also returning him to his ball and giving him a short session in an Omnitrauma unit to repair the damage caused by his heavy metal poisoning. He's been responding to everything quite well!"

'Maybe I could intern at the Rustboro Pokemon Center when I start my classes. The fact that a tiny town like Lavaridge has a center with all of this specialized equipment and these treatment methods blows me away. What could I learn in a high-traffic center?' Lee wonders with a touch of awe.

Lee files the thought away for later and offers Nurse Joy a bright smile. "Thank you, nurse. Really. I was certain he would have some kind of chronic ailment after god-knows how long in that toxic puddle."

"It's our pleasure to help, Mister Henson." The red-headed nurse matches his smile easily. "Now, perhaps you should get some rest. You look quite exhausted."

'Do I?' Lee runs a hand down his face. After thinking about it, his eyelids are rather heavy and his legs ache a bit… 'We did kinda march through the night…'

Upon arriving in Lavaridge and regaining cell service earlier that very morning, Courtney called ahead and secured a pair of rooms in one of the modest town's small inns. While Lee went straight to the Pokemon Center, Zinnia, Brendan, and even the usually unflappable Courtney agreed that a nap was warranted and ventured to the hotel to sleep.

"Yeah, a rest sounds nice…" Lee agrees with Joy. He turns his eyes to Octillery once more. "Any idea how long until Octillery is recovered?"

"We're expecting his discharge to be in ten to fourteen days."

'Two weeks to treat heavy metal poisoning so bad that Octillery was half-dead… That's nothing short of incredible.' Lee shakes his head with a smile. "Sounds good. Please give me a call if anything comes up."

"We will, Mister Henson," Joy nods.

Nurse Joy escorts Lee and Vulpix out of the deeper part of the Pokemon Center, passing a few doctors, regular nurses, and a number of Chansey on the way back to the lobby. As they walk, Lee's tired brain flits between several subjects at once, going from how in the world Octillery can blow through steel with water and ink, to wondering how the Joy family got involved with the Pokemon Center business in the first place. Once past the doors leading to the wards in the heart of the building, Nurse Joy bids them a kind farewell and returns back to her seat behind the front desk.

As Lee and Vulpix exit the center out into the still-morning sun, Lee looks around the town while he stretches his arms over his head with a yawn. The town of Lavaridge is small, densely packed, and rife with Kanto's Japan-esque culture and architecture with almost no empty space. If space isn't used by an artistic nihon kenchiku-styled building or dense foliage grown from the fertile, volcanic-ash-strewn soil, then it's a street or walkway. The largest buildings are the Gym and the Pokemon Center, and over the rooftops, Lee spots Hoenn's fire-themed Gym sitting on a hill against the foot of the mountain. "Love," he pauses to yawn once more. "Is there anything we needed to do today? I want to get it out of the way."

Vulpix mulls the question over, flicking her tails. 'Re*ister at the g*m.'

"Ah, right," Lee frowns, annoyed. "Why the hell would a Gym website not have a check-in? That's the one thing literally every trainer uses."

'It's not st*ndardi*ed? The we*sites f*r the Gyms, I *ean.' Vulpix asks as Lee begins a slow walk towards the Gym.

"You'd think they would…" With so few people out and about in the early hour, Lee doesn't think much of verbally replying. The path leads him and his fox west down Lavaridge's main street, and looking to the north, Mt. Chimney's imposing image cuts into the blue sky like a stony, smoking knife. For a second, Lee ponders the wisdom of building a town at the foot of a volcano. "But the Gym Leaders apparently get carte blanche for everything. So long as they don't abuse their power, I think the League will let them do whatever they want."

'While not as hot a vacation spot as Dewford, Lavaridge still seems to thrive on tourism. What was the big thing here again? The hot springs and tours on the volcano, right?' Lee spies a not-inconsiderable number of novelty stores, gift shops, and themed restaurants just beginning to open on the way to the Gym. Many offer mass-produced knick-knacks like mugs, hats, and shirts bearing some sort of logo or slogan related to Lavaridge, but a few have more unique pieces on display. One such shop has a sign saying 'Volcanic Ash Glass Sculptures. No two are the same!' In the window sits a handful of pokemon statues made from glittering black glass, each one ranging from several inches large for a Spinarak to three feet tall for a boastful-looking Grumpig.

'I wonder if they do commissions…' Lee wonders, conjuring a hazy image of each of his pokemon, their details captured as shiny statues.

The path to the Gym leads them out of the business sector of the town and down a wide, tree-flanked path that snakes to the north, up a hill, and to the foot of Mt. Chimney. As the Gym comes into view, Lee can't help but whistle.

The Gym is styled after an old Kanto manor, with several levels and walls of white stone. The red, slanted roof is covered in tile, and the whole complex is surrounded by a stone wall capped by a tiled red overhang. Built into the wall is an open wooden gate, painted the same red as the roof welcoming them in. It's a far cry from the utilitarian domes used back in Rustboro, Dewford, and Mauville.

Walking past the gate and up to the glass double doors of the gym, Lee checks the posted hours from a sheet of paper taped to the inside of the glass, then he pulls his phone from his pocket, checking the time.

"Nine-o-seven," he comments more to himself than Vulpix. "They're open."

The door is pulled open, and the pair walk inside.

While the exterior of the Gym is traditional and pleasing to the eye, the lobby is somewhat uninspired by comparison. Some chairs pushed off to the side, a wooden reception desk with an ancient-looking computer sitting behind the raised edge of the desk, a water cooler in the corner, and a set of double doors on either side of the desk. It looks so much like any other generic business lobby that Lee's tired brain doesn't bother dedicating any of it to memory. Instead, he simply walks up to the empty reception desk and gives the bell sitting upon it a ring.

Ding-ding!

The noise echoes in the large room, and after a moment, footsteps can be heard beyond the right set of doors. "Coming!" Calls the voice of a young woman.

"Jeez, the Gym has only been open for ten minutes…" The unseen woman grumbles as she pushes the doors open. "Who in the world-" The doors are thrown wide, and red eyes widen as the owner sees Lee.

Standing in the doorway is the heir to the Lavaridge Gym, Flannery.

The woman is striking, to say the least. Her long, crimson hair is pulled back into a high, wild Ponyta tail with her bangs left free to hang over the side of her angular face. A tight, midriff exposing t-shirt and well-fitting jeans accentuate her attractive figure and expose a fair amount of clear, smooth skin without being risque. On her red belt, a trio of pokeballs hang. It's clear to Lee why she's enjoyed so much popularity online following the announcement of her upcoming appointment as Gym Leader.

"Good morning." Lee smiles. "I was hoping to register for the next available Gym battle. I tried to book it online, but the website…"

"...Doesn't work? Looks like it was made back when Aerodactyl were still flying around?" Flannery finishes for him with a sheepish chuckle. "We get that a lot. Here, I'll get you put in the system."

Flannery slips in behind the front desk and seats herself at the dinosaur of a computer with obvious familiarity and wiggles the mouse to wake the old machine, which it does with the whine of a spinning drive. "We've got a fifteen-day wait. Is that cool?"

"That's fine," Lee nods, withdrawing his wallet and sliding his license across the desk to the redhead. "Fifteen days, huh? Hitting peak season?"

"Something like that," Flannery gives him a small, seemingly unsure smile and taking the plastic card, glancing between it and the computer screen as she types. More than once, she slows to steal a quick look up at Lee's face or at Vulpix. It's often enough that Vulpix pokes Lee's brain over it.

"Something wrong?"

Lee's words startle the Gym heir, who jumps in her seat and almost drops Lee's license. "N-No, nothing's wrong." She says with a hasty smile. "It's just… My grandpa, the current Leader, has been having me take over more and more of the challengers lately, and he might want me to battle you. I thought I would have more time to prepare for you, is all."

"Prepare for us?" Lee shares a look with Vulpix, who stares back with the mental equivalent of a raised eyebrow.

'Gym Le*ders talk a*ongst *hemselves, rememb*r?' Vulpix supplies. 'We've d*feated three G*m Leaders *t their full *ower. Ot*ers might *e nervous.'

'Ahh…' Lee crosses his arms. "We're not that scary, are we?" He directs his spoken question to Flannery.

She shakes her head, making her Ponyta tail bounce. "Not scary, I'm excited about it… but also a teeny bit anxious, too." Flannery admits, face flushing pink as she averts her eyes. "I'm still new to this whole Gym Leader thing, you know?"

"I understand," Lee nods slowly. His memories fly back to his first days on the road as a trainer, and before that, his first days back in his Zoo. In both instances, uncertainty followed, nipping at his heels. "New job jitters and all that. It's twice as bad for an important position like a Gym Leader, yeah?"

Flannery's smile slowly returns, and she seems pleased by the sympathy. "Yeah… I've got my loaner pokemon, but I think you'll be the first trainer I'll have to go all-out on." She types a few last lines into her computer and hands Lee back his trainer license. "We've got you in for the Tuesday after the next at Five PM. Expect a two-on-two or a three-on-three."

Lee smiles back and slips his license into his pocket. "Thanks. I'll see you then." As he turns to leave, another voice comes echoing down the hallway from deeper in the Gym.

"Flannery, dear! Do you know where I left that half-used inkwell? That calligraphy set I ordered came in and I don't want to uncap any new ink if I don't have to!" The weathered voice of an older man calls. Footsteps head towards the lobby where Lee, Vulpix, and Flannery stand, then from the same set of doors Flannery used comes an elderly man. The man stops, regarding Lee and Vulpix with surprise.

In a pink, Kanto-styled robe, socks with straw sandals, and a pair of thin, wire glasses, the older gentleman could easily pass as a village elder in a less developed region. "Goodness," he begins, running a hand through his curly white hair as a smile lifts his gently aged face. "Mister Henson. I wasn't expecting you for weeks to come. You've certainly set quite a pace, haven't you?"

Lee chuckles and turns back around to face the man. "I suppose we have. My group and I debated on taking the desert route here, but ultimately we decided to cut through the Valley of Steel-"

Behind the elder, Flannery inhales sharply.

"-which probably saved a week or more."

The elderly man rubs his chin and nods. "Ah, that would explain it." Then a realization seems to strike him, as he reaches up and taps his own forehead with a sigh. "D'oh, where are my manners this morning!?" He holds a hand out with a smile. "Mura Moore, Lavaridge Gym Leader for another month or so. It's nice to meet you in person!"

Lee returns the smile and clasps Moore's hand, giving it a shake. He inwardly grumbles about how the niceties are keeping him from returning to his hotel and passing out, but pushes on. "Lee Henson. It's a pleasure to make your acquaintance, Mister Moore."

Moore releases Lee's hand. "I take it you've already met my lovely granddaughter, Flannery?" He asks, giving said granddaughter a bright grin that forces her to look away in embarrassment.

"I have. We were discussing the jitters that come with new jobs just before you arrived."

"Ha!" Moore's grin lowers into a knowing smile. "Nothing will do that quite like taking the mantle of Gym Leader. Heck, I was part of the Elite Four before taking over the Lavaridge Gym. Imagine my surprise when being a Leader turned out to be the harder job." He clears his throat. "Since you're here, Lee, could I interest you and Miss Vulpix in some tea over a conversation? I've been watching your progress and just how far you've come in only a few months is almost unbelievable."

Once more, annoyance at being denied the rest his body is aching for gnaws on Lee.

'Cons*der the off*r,' Vulpix makes her vulpine not-purr deep in her chest. As she does so, Lee feels her tug his mind to a tender embrace, siphoning away his aches and pushing away his exhaustion by pouring her own stamina into him. The sensation is like soothingly warm water running through his veins, and the odd feeling almost makes him shiver. 'Relatio*s with M*ore mi**t be v*luable.'

"I can spare some time," Lee nods after considering Vulpix's words, drawing another smile from the old man.


"Here, it's a personal blend of mine," Moore smiles and sets down two steaming cups on the low table before taking the spot opposite of Lee.

'I hope I'm not causing offense by sitting cross-legged,' Lee watches Moore seat himself seiza style, sitting on his feet with his legs folded under him. 'I don't think I can do that even with my boots off.'

After an assurance from Flannery that she would handle the morning challengers, Moore leads Lee and Vulpix deeper into the Gym to a very Japanese-looking sitting room, showing the man and fox that the Kanto styling of the building goes deeper than just surface aesthetics. The Gym Leader certainly seemed pleased when Lee took his boots off before stepping on the straw-mat floor of the rather spartan sitting room.

Lee raises the cup to his mouth and takes a short sip, finding that he doesn't particularly care for the tea inside. "It's good."

Moore smiles and raises his own cup, taking a long drink. "Ahh, like mother used to make," he sets the cup down with a clack. "So, Lee. What made you choose Vulpix as your first pokemon?"

"Hmm…" Lee gives his tea a swirl, watching his reflection ripple in the dark liquid as he thinks. 'I wonder where Moore heard that. More chatter between the Gym Leaders?' He does not dwell upon it too much. "It's more that she chose me. I used to be an animal handler, you see, and the facility I worked at… closed under less-than-ideal circumstances and sort of left me adrift…" He sighs and sets the cup down. "Vulpix happened upon me when I was hitting my lowest point, and being the sweetheart she is, decided to stick with me."

The vixen presses her head to Lee's cheek. 'Y*u're ge*ting better at *alking ab*ut it.' Her pride is as warm as the fur tickling him.

Without taking his eyes off of Moore, Lee smiles and raises a hand to scratch the fox gently along her jaw, drawing a content sigh from her. "Needless to say," the younger trainer continues, letting his hand fall again. "I'd be lost without her."

Moore's smile becomes fond as he watches. "Ah, we're not too different then," he says wistfully, crossing his arms and leaning his head back. He stares up at the ceiling, taking in something only he can see. "Ty, my Typhlosion, that is, he and I were exactly the same when we were young. This was back in the day when you didn't get a starter pokemon, the League wouldn't start doing that for another ten years, you see. I was a boy with a pokeball in hand and the determination to become a trainer. I thought I would meet a grand Fire pokemon head-on and catch him with bravery and guile, but for days I found nothing. Not a single Fire-type.I started losing heart and sat down to wallow, frustrated. Who stumbled upon me not a minute later?" He laughs, deep and hearty. "A mellow little Cyndaquil who came right up without a single fuss, all curious as to why a sad boy was grumbling up a storm just outside his den. The rest is history."

Lee smiles politely at the tale. "Sometimes that's just how the best of friendships are formed. There's no rhyme or reason to it, but it lasts."

"And how!" Moore agrees. After another chuckle, he takes another sip from his tea before setting the empty cup down. "Lee, I can see you're worn out from the road so I'll spare you the old stories. I was wondering if you'd be interested in a trade?"

Vulpix tenses up, and Moore notices instantly. "Not a pokemon trade! Don't worry your little head, Miss Vulpix!" He raises his hands, palms up in surrender. "I don't think I could get Lee here to agree anyway."

"What sort of trade?" Lee asks, confused. He combs through a mental list of the inventory in his bag, but can't think of anything Moore might want.

"I heard that you've been heavily focused on a number of research subjects in your travels, one being move creation and modification," Moore's smile takes on a more professional air, straddling the line between diplomatic and grandfatherly. "As Gym Leader, it's both my duty and pleasure to support the newest generation of trainers, and in that regard, I'd like to make use of your talents in that capacity as a Hoenn Gym Leader."

Lee struggles to keep his frown from showing, realizing he's just stepped into a political arena by total accident. 'And I did it while running on three hours of sleep, too.' Taking a sip of his tea to stall and think of an answer, he reaches out to Vulpix. 'Love, help me out here, please.'

The vixen's eyes narrow, and from her mind, a number of answers rocket to the forefront of Lee's brain. None are in true words, answers that Vulpix formulates for him never are. They're complex impressions that will pull words from his lexicon and form a sentence before leaving his mouth. How Vulpix figured out how to do this is beyond him.

Rather than take an agreeable one and essentially let Vulpix use him as a mouthpiece, Lee scans over the replies, picks one he likes, and allows the words to arrange themselves in his head… Then he edits several words and returns the answer to the fox on his shoulder for review.

Vulpix's surprise is plain to him, even if her face remains neutral. There isn't enough time to converse, so Lee just transmits his intentions.

Can't have you think for me. Team effort instead.

The fox's lips twitch in a ghost of a smile as she amends the answer with her own edits and sends it back to Lee.

Twice more the collective reply is cycled between trainer and pokemon at the speed of thought. They can't be too dismissive considering Moore's position of prestige, but neither can they seem eager to bend, as that invites the possibility of unfair compensation for whatever this trade might be. The Gym is also something to account for. No doubt Moore will observe a more traditional and respectful method of negotiation considering his adherence to Kanto culture so far. A nice middle-ground is what they find.

The whole exchange lasts just a few seconds, long enough for Lee to sip his drink and set it back down. "That's an interesting direction to take the conversation, Gym Leader Moore." Lee folds his hands in his lap, staring at Moore's faintly smiling visage with his own neutral mask. "I would be happy to assist you during my stay in Lavaridge, but opening with a trade offer has the implication that this is no small matter. May I ask what it is you require from me?"

Moore nods slowly. "Of course, forgive this old man for not starting with that. As you are no doubt aware, my granddaughter's appointment as Gym Leader is upon us, mere weeks away, in fact. Her debut will be another "changing of the guard," if you will. Roxanne and Brawly both took their places from predecessors boasting a long and rich tenure, drawing skepticism and worry about Hoenn's place in this ever-more competitive world. When the two kept their Gyms rising to reach ever greater heights, the naysayers grew quiet, and a hopeful optimism began to bloom throughout our region." Moore's smile grows just a tiny bit. "Liza and Tate took control of Mossdeep City's Gym only two years ago after soundly thrashing their former master, who was an expert trainer, albeit a rough, arrogant character of a man. The twins are true once-in-a-generation prodigies, having taken control of a Gym at the tender age of ten years, and through their stellar efforts as trainers, Mossdeep has risen to become one of the most daunting Gyms in Hoenn, perhaps even in the world. Roxanne and Brawly paved the way for Liza and Tate to transform the view of elder Leaders retiring. Now rather than lament the loss of a learned elder, the people look forward to seeing new and ever more grand talent."

Lee blinks, not expecting the sudden history lesson. "I see…"

"It's because of this…" Moore's smile falls. "Expectations weigh heavily on Flannery's shoulders. People expect her to be so many things all at the same time. Her opening day, her debut, will be critical. Gone are the days when the title of Gym Leader alone demanded respect; now we must all bow to the eternal Rattata-race that is popularity." Moore chews on the word 'popularity' bitterly. "The masses expect her to wow them out of the gate, and if she doesn't? Then the crying and complaining will start. People will feel cheated that my granddaughter isn't all they dreamed, and who is it that notices those complaints?" Moore sighs, almost aging before Lee's eyes. "The bean-counters holed up in the Pokemon League HQ, that's who. They only look at approval ratings to decide if they want to hassle you or not. Suddenly something as simple as ordering office supplies needs two weeks of waiting and ten batches of forms because some algorithm says that you, a low-ranked Gym Leader, don't need extra pens."

With a sigh, Lee closes his eyes in thought. "Roxanne said something along similar lines, that the League heavily limits the strength of pokemon used in educational settings despite her best efforts to change that." He pauses. "I didn't realize the League was so rife with bureaucratic woes."

Moore's smile returns, small and sardonic. "Some advice from one trainer to another: get used to it. Red tape is the perfect trap for ambitious men, and someone like you, Lee, will be seeing more of it before long."

'Well, that's not ominous or anything.'

"I intend to give Flannery every advantage I can," the Fire-type master continues. "This, my friend, is where you come into the equation," Moore levels Lee with an even stare. "I wish to commission a custom Fire-type TM from you."

Several things quickly jump out as wrong to Vulpix, who shifts slightly. She's quick to point them out to Lee. Once more, she shortens her telepathy back to wordless urges and sensations so Lee isn't silent for too long, and another several rounds of phrase crafting jump between her and Lee. After only three seconds, they come to an agreement on what to say.

"Am I correct to assume that the intention of this hypothetical technique is to be an edge for Flannery?" At Moore's nod, Lee continues. "While I'm not rejecting the project, I have to wonder, why ask me? Surely your pokemon have a plethora of expert Fire attacks that would benefit Flannery's team far better than anything we have to offer. It's my understanding that moves within TMs come with the knowledge of how the original owner used them, including tweaks and whatnot. Perhaps you even have a custom move of your own to offer her?" He asks, raising an eyebrow.

"You are correct on all accounts," Moore smiles and reaches for the teapot between them, filling his empty cup until white steam gently floats from the rim. He takes a drink before answering further. "But a brand new move will have a public impact that one of Ty's moves can't hope to replicate, powerful or not."

"Truly?" Lee hums. Vulpix slides from his shoulder to settle in his lap, resting her chin on the table as she does so. "If you say so…"

Moore adjusts his glasses, pushing them a little further up his nose. "Truly. I think you underestimate the ripples new techniques have on the state of the competitive battling world. If you were to engage a common pokemon, let's say a Roselia, you would know roughly what to expect, yes?"

Lee nods once.

"You formulate a plan, and decide to close the gap, owing to Roselia's poor close combat abilities. When your pokemon draws close…" Moore raises a hand and snaps his finger sharply, making Vulpix's heart-marked ear twitch. "Suddenly, the Roselia fires off a devastating close-range move that you've never seen before, and your plan has gone up in smoke as your pokemon is critically injured due to a mistake you had no idea you were making. Now you have to scrounge up a new plan, manage your injured pokemon, and while you're doing so, now you're wondering if there is another unpleasant surprise waiting for you." Moore levels Lee with a serious expression that makes the younger trainer sit straighter. "Knowing is half the battle, but what happens when you can't trust what you know?"

"I imagine that you battle with half-effectiveness…"

"Oh, it's worse than that," Moore chuckles. "Trainers, real serious ones, study their opponents for days or sometimes weeks. What do you do when you can't prepare for what your foe has? No one can account for everything that might go wrong in a battle, and one unexpected move can turn the whole tide of battle. One can certainly account for unusual tactics and novel applications of existing attacks, but facing something undocumented?" The old man crosses his arms and leans back on his heels a bit more. "Once we're done here, take a look on the confuser. Trainers competing in Hoenn are starting to get awfully nervous of you."

'Confuser?' It takes a moment for Lee to realize he means 'computer.' "I apologize for the ignorance, but are new moves really that big a deal?"

"Let me put this in perspective," Moore holds a hand up at chest height, palm up. "I've been a trainer for nearly sixty years now. I've been both an Elite Four member and a Gym Leader for much of that time, and many recognize me as a Fire-type master. Do you know how many new techniques I've created with this time and skill? And I don't mean little changes to existing attacks, but full, real attacks made from the ground up."

Lee looks down at Vulpix, who leans her head back to meet his eyes. "Twenty?"

Moore openly laughs. "Less."

"Fifteen?"

"Less."

"Erm. Ten?"

"Nope. Less."

"Five?"

"Four," Moore finally reveals. "Ty and I bashed our heads into the wall for years to make just four moves. Flame Terrain, Burning Ash, Dry Out, and Crashdown. Each one was made to cover a weakness or fill a niche he was missing. More than once, the clever use of one of our home-baked specialties snatched victory in a critical match out of the jaws of defeat. Only Ty, his offspring, and Flannery's pokemon know them. To this day, the moves keep challengers wary because there are no documents, no explanation on how they work, no nothing. I imagine a few of Ty's kiddies that were released to the wild have made families of their own by now, so the moves are out there, but it's going to be generations before they're anywhere close to common. You've made how many moves?"

Lee mentally debates revealing the info with Vulpix, and after another rapid-fire round of phrase crafting, he answers. "Four."

"It's taken you three months to do what took us six decades," Moore doesn't seem upset at the admission. No, he actually smiles. "Now do you understand why I'm asking? Flannery knows our four, but one of her own to unveil during her debut would be perfect for cementing her status as a Gym Leader."

"..." Lee mulls over Moore's words. This time, rather than ask Vulpix for a suggestion on what to say, he forms the reply in his mind and shows it to her. He feels the vixen scan the message intently, then alter several words.

"What you're asking for is a tall order, Gym Leader Moore…" The zoologist begins. "You're asking me to essentially halt my own team's training to begin the development of a move that might be used against us, and you're imposing a deadline of a month or less. With that time, we could train, conjure up something for our own roster, or just relax after the ordeal that was traversing the Valley of Steel. May I ask what you're offering to trade?" He says, reaching out to take his teacup once more. 'Better drink it before it gets cold.'

Moore smiles. "Both as payment and for ease of your commission, I have a Fire Stone I'm willing to part with."

Lee hums into his sip of tea and sets his cup down, drumming his fingers on the ceramic. Just saying Fire Stone means very little, considering the purity and concentration of Type Energy in the stones are the biggest deciding factor of their worth. The better the stone's grade and purity, the smoother the evolution would go, and the greater the ceiling for the newly evolved pokemon's power would be. 'Or so they say.'

The best ones Lee can find online semi-regularly seem to be grade-4, which is quite a lot of contained TE, and purity-3, meaning the stone only has minor blemishes that won't inhibit the energy transfer much, though the common examples seem to hover around grade-5 or 6, purity-4. Anything below a grade or purity 8 regardless of the other stat seems to only be fit to be a glowing paperweight.

He saw a grade-2, purity-2 Water Stone on an internet auction house once. There were still three days left to bid, and the highest bid was already at eighty-thousand credits.

"Vulpix and I are still discussing the merits of evolution," Lee says diplomatically, letting his free hand idly stroke the fox in his lap and soothing the creeping worry he feels inside of her. "To go from a Vulpix to a Ninetales is a huge leap. It's not like the natural evolution of other pokemon."

Moore nods, his shoulders dipping somberly. "Yes, I can understand that caution. Ninetales are some of the most venerated pokemon around, and for good reason. They're powerful, dangerous pokemon. A Vulpix will go from flesh and blood to… something not wholly mortal. Something not easily controlled."

A frown finds its way to Lee's face even if Moore's words chill him. "I'm not worried about her harming me."

"I never said it was you who would be in danger."

The conversation comes to an awkward lull, or at least it feels awkward to Lee.

"Buuut for a trainer like you, Lee, I doubt that would be an issue anyway." Moore hastily tacks on. "Ah!" Moore exclaims, reaching up to tap his forehead once more. "I almost forgot. The Fire Stone? Ty and I dug it from Mt. Chimney not a week ago. It's quite the pretty thing…" Moore smiles like a Meowth who caught a fat Pidgey. "A grade-1, purity-1. I haven't seen one in years."

The teacup in Lee's grip shatters.


The next six days are spent agonizing over Mura Moore's words. The elderly Gym Leader didn't mind them leaving to think over the offer, even going as far as to say he expected it. He told them if they want to accept, come back, as he would keep the stone until he got an answer or until Flannery's debut in one month, whichever came first.

During the day, the rest of the group is relaxing, or training, or off seeing the sights of Lavaridge. Brendan went to schedule his Gym Battle and landed a spot only a day after Lee.

Lee, however, spends every bit of his time buried in study. The subject?

Ninetales.

Of course, as a trainer to a Vulpix, Lee did some minor research on Ninetales back in the Hoenn Lab. His searching lasted only one day, as he didn't expect to have a Ninetales for years, if ever. Most of what he found were folk tales, and they were entertaining enough to occupy the day.

Now, with the best possible stone dangled in front of him and Vulpix still up in the air about evolving?

To his dismay, concrete information on the rare fox pokemon just doesn't exist. There are peripheral scientific articles mentioning Ninetales in passing, one news article of a Ninetales in Unova who apparently inherited a chateau or something, but the old fox declined to reach back out to the news channel. There is plenty of Kanto folklore almost deifying the fox pokemon, saying they can control minds, cast illusions, and are agents of trickery, purity, evil, divinity, and everything in between. One article claims that there are only around a thousand Ninetales alive at any given time, citing that there are less than two hundred registered to known trainers.

Less than two hundred. That's not just for Hoenn, but the entire world.

His pokedex proves equally useless, as the gadget barely has a page worth of info, and much of it comes with disclaimers that the data might be inaccurate or outdated. There is a list of moves that Ninetales have doubtless been seen using, a rough weight and height range, a diet that may or may not be correct, and a map of their usual nesting grounds that of course shows nothing.

'Maybe I should shoot Nigel an email asking about this.'

By comparison, Vulpix is as common as the humble Caterpie. There are thousands of registered Vulpix around the world, and there are likely just as many unregistered foxes kept as pets. Yet Vulpix is still considered to be a rare and coveted pokemon. No single study can seem to figure out the disparity. Some blame the cost of Fire Stones, which price out casual trainers, while others say evolution anxiety is common in the Vulpix population for all sorts of reasons. Every study comes to a different conclusion.

One click-bait site ranking pokemon by rarity got one thing right for certain: Ninetales is borderline legendary.

He dared not ask Vulpix a thing, however. Much like him, she's been in deep thought for days. Sometimes, when she thinks she's hiding her emotions well, Lee will feel flashes from her. Flashes of apprehension, dread, or even guilt for some unfathomable reason. Those soulful brown eyes would stare at him full of conflict, and it tears at him.

Between multi-hour bouts of study, Lee cares for his team, visits the Pokemon Center to see the nearly-comatose Octillery, and on day six, he sits outside the hotel, preparing to go and see Mable for the first time in several weeks.

Lee leans back into the beam supporting the overhang just outside his and Brendan's hotel room door, watching people and pokemon walk by. The hotel is situated on a flat stretch in the middle of a steep hill, making the road a chore to climb but a breeze to descend. More than once a kid on a bike has zipped by, barrelling downhill with a holler. A large, balloon-like pokemon called Drifblim lazily follows the girl and her bike from overhead. The same kid is then carried back to the top of the hill in the arms of her Drifblim friend, bike and all, where the cycle restarts. The antics are a pleasant distraction.

At Lee's feet, Vulpix stares up at the sky, her face blank and her mind whirling so quickly that Lee can't make heads or tails of her thoughts.

'Another ten minutes or so and we should be off.' Lee withdraws his phone and checks the time, finding it to be 9:30am. 'The Pokemon Center is roughly twenty minutes out?' He looks down at Vulpix.

The vixen doesn't acknowledge the telepathic question, still staring off into space.

Lee sighs and crosses his arms as he leans back again, following his pokemon's eyes up to the cloud she's locked onto.

It looks like a lion, so he tears his eyes away after only a second.

Behind them, a door opens and shuts quietly. During the short period it's open, Lee catches the sound of light snores.

"Still thinking about the offer the Gym Leader made?"

Looking to his side, Lee spies Courtney there, looking up at him from the shadow of her red jacket's hood.

"I am." Lee nods. He saw no harm in telling the Magma Admin, so she was included in the little huddle about Lee's day nearly a week ago. "Zinnia's snoring wake you up?"

The purple-haired woman shakes her head. "No. I'm usually up much earlier."

The two fall into a silence that isn't awkward, but neither is it comfortable. Perhaps it's only Lee who finds it unnerving, knowing Courtney's true allegiance. Either way, Lee clears his throat. "Courtney, you worked with Devon's geology labs, I recall? Do you know how much of a difference evolution stone grades and purities make?

Courtney folds her hands into her hoodie's pockets. "Big difference. The stone is the catalyst… and also the fuel. The more energy a pokemon gets from a stone, the less their body needs to provide to make up the difference. Anything left over doubles back, making the pokemon more powerful and adding more potential." She shrugs. "Simplifying things, skipping over some bits for the sake of time, but a better stone means better pokemon."

Her words seem to snap Vulpix out of her funk, as she looks up at the Magma Admin with searching eyes.

Courtney stares back, unflinching.

"If you want to do it…" The woman breaks off her staring contest with the fox at Lee's feet to look back at Lee. "Don't wait. Fire Stones degrade with time. Energy leaks out and cracks form. High-grade stones destabilize faster."

'I kinda guessed that. The glow that some stones have means there has to be some kind of radiation.' Lee nods wearily. "Thanks for indulging me, Courtney."

Another few minutes pass in silence, then Lee glances at his phone once more. "C'mon, love." He gives Vulpix a nudge with his boot, pulling her from her thoughts again. "We've got a schedule to keep." He then looks over to Courtney. "We've got a meeting to get to and we'll be back in a bit. See you then."

The hoodie-clad woman simply nods, accepting his words. "Until then."

As Lee and Vulpix slowly trod to the Pokemon Center, Lee can't help but let his mind wander. 'If a Ninetales is such a powerful pokemon, why was Courtney so candid? Surely she knows that if we get tangled up in Magma's business, that means we'll come to blows and things will just be harder for her. I thought she would have gone down the cautious or concerned route and discouraged any strength building…'

Lee ponders the question all the way to the Pokemon Center.


"Ah, there you two are!" Mable Lanes' voice is as rich and soothing as ever, and Vulpix can see the tension drain out of Lee's shoulders as they step into the rented meeting room with her.

The room is the same as it always is. The same eggshell white walls, the same cushy sofa, the same chair Mable always sits in. To herself, Vulpix can't help but wonder if all Pokemon Centers have this exact room, or if Mable and Xatu go to the trouble of hauling the same set of furniture around.

The door closes behind them as Lee seats himself, and Vulpix is quick to hop up on the sofa with him, settling into his lap. As per usual, her trainer leans forward a little bit, wrapping his arms loosely around her.

Vulpix gladly presses herself to the arms.

"It's been a while, Lee," Mable smiles. "I heard you took a daring path to Lavaridge. Why don't you tell me about that? Seems like a thrilling journey!"

"Well," Lee shifts, and Vulpix is heartened by how safe and comfortable he feels. "There were a few reasons for it. First off…"

Then on the edge of Vulpix's 6th sense, she feels it.

Xatu, Mable's Xatu, doesn't abruptly appear in her 3rd eye as if he teleported. A mind blinking into existence would draw the attention of anyone with psychic talent. No, Xatu fades into the material world like a ghost, and if she weren't already experienced in feeling him out, the wizened bird would have escaped her notice entirely.

Just outside the door leading to the room, Xatu stands and maintains a silent vigil. Then with a flicker of thought from Xatu, reality itself seems to hiccup.

All at once, everything Vulpix can hear and feel beyond the borders of the meeting room just vanishes, as if the room jumped into a dimension all its own. Her fur stands up on end.

The vixen yawns, playing off her discomfort as a stretch.

What sort of power Xatu holds, Vulpix isn't sure, and she isn't sure she even wants to know.

For some time, Vulpix sits, listening to Lee recount the last several weeks to Mable, who pauses the story for a question here and there. Then with an inward sigh, Vulpix reaches a thin tendril of isolated thought out into the ether, waiting.

Scarcely a second later, something reaches back out.

If her psychic probe is a tendril as thick as a human pinky finger, then the newcomer is barely more than a Spinarak web strand - so minuscule and thin that Vulpix's 3rd eye doesn't even see it. Yet when the strand touches her tendril, a shock runs down her spine.

'Hello, Xatu.'

'Good morn, Miss Vulpix.'

Vulpix suppresses a shiver as the elder pokemon's words run through her body and touch her core as if her mental defenses don't exist. The thin strand can snake its way through anything, it seems.

During the first session, Xatu reached out and introduced himself, saying he offered his services to her just as Mable does for Lee, but Vulpix was too concerned with comforting her trainer and ignored the Psychic bird.

The second, Vulpix tentatively reached out, then withdrew out of hesitation before Xatu could actually communicate with her.

On their third meeting, the fox and bird finally had their first true conversation. Xatu was unoffended by being spurned twice in a row, and finally having a willing ear that wouldn't be burdened by hearing her, Vulpix spilled and told him everything.

Her fears of the future.

The nightmares of Lee's final moments.

The terrible, unknowable blackness that awaits at The End.

And the maddening question of why she was born.

Xatu listened and listened well. The Psychic-type did not judge, nor did he pity or patronize her, and for that, Vulpix was grateful.

Then came his roundabout answers to her questions, and Vulpix was less grateful.

'Have your nightmares abated?' If Vulpix had to put a word to the way Xatu 'spoke,' it would have to be smoky. Each word blazed in her mind, but at the same time, they were paradoxically ephemeral.

'They have,' Vulpix answers. 'I've been meditating before bed as you instructed. I… don't believe I've found answers to my questions inside myself, but putting my thoughts in order has helped.'

'I am gladdened to hear that.' She can almost imagine Xatu bobbing his head in a nod, for his Spinarak strand conveys almost zero emotion. 'What troubles you today?'

The fox hesitates, shifting a bit in Lee's lap. As she thinks of what to say, she flicks her ear and returns her attention to Lee and Mable for a moment.

"-A little frustrated that Moore sprung this on us so suddenly…" Vulpix catches the tail end of Lee's grumbles. "Vulpix has concerns about her evolution, and it's a take-it-or-leave-it kind of thing. We can't really keep it with us, because a stone that strong might trigger evolution even with no contact."

"Have you talked to Vulpix on this?" Mable asks, and Vulpix is suddenly aware that both Lee and Mable are staring at her.

"I have," Lee's words herald an outpouring of love that flows into Vulpix, who silently curses and realizes she's been letting her worry bleed over again. Nevertheless, the warm tide of her trainer's affection washes away both the worry and self-aimed frustration. "I told her it's her decision, and no matter what she picks, I'll support it," his hand combs through Vulpix's tuft of breast fur, and as always the cool fingers relax her.

'You want to accept, but you're hesitating.' Xatu's 'voice' pulls Vulpix back into their conversation.

'It's a complicated matter.'

'Then explain, and I will assist as best I can.'

Vulpix tries to be upset at how blunt Xatu is being, but the hand still stroking the cream-colored fur of her chest makes it a chore. 'I'm afraid, Xatu,' she finally admits. 'I know trouble is on the horizon, and I want to be stronger for Lee, stronger for my team, strong enough that I can shield them from everything that might hurt them, but…' She draws in a breath. 'Evolution… is going to change me. Change me in ways I don't want. I don't want to live for a thousand years, I don't want to outlive Lee, Grovyle, or Shinx. Sixty, seventy, eighty years from now, any one of them might be… The word 'gone' simply refuses to come out. Her whole being screams at the thought of being alone. She would sooner throw herself to the primordial void awaiting at The End.'Then I'll have hundreds of years to live after that. What would I do with myself? Other pokemon know what to expect when they evolve, but I don't. There are so few Ninetales that Lee can find almost nothing.' Once more, Moore's words play out in her head.

A Vulpix will go from flesh and blood to… something not wholly mortal.

'I'm scared, Xatu.'

Xatu remains silent for a second. Then; 'There is no folly in fear. It exists for a reason. There is folly, however, in letting fear paralyze you. Take care that you do not let yourself fall into that trap.' Vulpix gets the impression that he pauses to adjust his wings or somesuch. 'You wish to be strong for the ones you love, yet not to change. You'll find this to be an impossible task, Miss Vulpix, one that will drive you mad. We change every day. I am not the same Xatu from the last time we spoke, just as you are not the same Vulpix. We all change as time goes on, both in ways we can and cannot control. You will find that a force as mighty as love will often force change upon you.'

Vulpix frowns. 'You're saying I should evolve?'

'No,' Xatu's reply is curt. 'There is an expression for what is occurring here. You wish to have your cake-'

'-And eat it, too. Yes, I'm aware of common human proverbs.'

If Xatu is annoyed by the interruption, it doesn't show. 'Quite. You will find that with changes to life and person, there is rarely an event that is all positive or negative. It is up to the one facing the change to make it into what they wish as best they can…' Xatu pauses once more. 'Let me tell you of my ilk, Vulpix. The greatest of Xatu are blessed, or cursed, with an ability most terrific. One needs only to gaze into the sun, the eye of Arceus, and the secrets of the past and future will play out before them. Many are overwhelmed, frozen in place. They see the mistakes of the past and the horror of the future. Countless stand in the same place, upon the same cliffs and mountains, staring forward, motionless. They dare not move, for fear of making their visions of what is yet to come even worse.'

Vulpix swallows thickly. Lee likes to chatter idly when they're alone, and the supposed prophetic powers of Xatu came up once. She found herself skeptical, but now…

'Paralyzed by fear, these Xatu waste away and die on their feet, almost never venturing out to try and correct what they see. The fear of change roots them, and many never even think to do anything. The despair of 'what if' is their death knell, for it's only natural to stare into the dark and assume the worst.' Xatu's Spinarak strand wavers. 'They focus so intently on the negative that they never see the other side of the coin, the visions where horror is replaced by shining utopia, for the future is always in flux. The few who break the spell, the very, very strongest, leave so they might bring about their utopia. They know what might await them, but they make choices, embrace changes, and move forward fearlessly. Heed these words, Vulpix:

'Time will change you one day. Will you rage and resist, or will you step bravely forward?'

'Love will change you one day. Will you live in your own world, or will you open your eyes and see?'

'Loss will change you one day. Will you weep over gravestones, or will you live?'

'Reach for your utopia, Vulpix, or you will never have it.'

The vixen goes stiff in Lee's arms, each and every prophetic word slamming into her with the force of a hammer blow. It takes everything she has to not tremble.

'Do you…' Vulpix needs to stop to breathe and gather her thoughts. 'Do you speak from experience?'

For a second, it seems like Xatu isn't going to answer the overly-personal question. 'I do. Your path is your own, Vulpix, but never should you walk it with doubt.' Xatu's strand of thought begins to withdraw. 'We are nearing the hour mark for our visit. Remember; change is what you make of it.'

'I'll remember.'

'Good. Meditate further on your other questions. I am aware that you do not wish for Lee to be aware of your personal woes, but I think you will find him to be more capable of comforting you than I. Consider telling him what worries you.'

'I'll think about it,' she lies.

Xatu withdraws, and the minds and sounds beyond the door return.


An hour passes, and Vulpix realizes she's been inside her own head the whole time, much to her annoyance.

Xatu's words… She keeps replaying them in her head. It's the most the damn bird has ever said in a conversation with her. Normally he would keep quiet, let her vent, then make suggestions. All of her quandaries are of an introspective sort, and Xatu took that as "I'll help you but I'm not answering any direct questions."

'Reach for your utopia, Vulpix, or you will never have it.'

What does that mean? What is utopia supposed to represent? A happy life with her team and trainer? She's already reaching for that.

'Time will change you one day. Will you rage and resist, or will you step bravely forward?'

What else can she do? No one can stop time.

'Love will change you one day. Will you live in your own world, or will you open your eyes and see?'

Vulpix isn't even sure how to interpret that one.

'Loss will change you one day. Will you weep over gravestones, or will you live?'

Vulpix bites back a growl and returns her attention outward.

They're out wandering the town of Lavaridge. Vulpix is in her usual spot, draped across her trainer's shoulders whilst baby Shinx is held in his arms. At Lee's side, Grovyle walks along with his arms crossed, dutifully watching for danger as Lee peers into the window display of a storefront.

Tentatively, she reaches her thoughts out to Lee, and to her relief, he wears his high spirits on his mental sleeves. She dares not incriminate herself by asking for his memories of his session with Mable and is content with the knowledge that he left better than he went in.

Then she reaches an isolated mental probe out to Grovyle.

'Grovyle?'

The Grass-type doesn't even flinch. 'Vulpix. Are you well?'

Of course, Grovyle would notice. Nothing ever seems to escape him. 'I'm not. I have… a dilemma, I suppose, and I would like your opinion.'

'Regarding evolution?' He asks, falling back into step with Lee when the latter loses interest in the electronics in the store window.

'I thought I was the mind reader here…' Vulpix wearily jokes. She huffs out a hot breath, making Lee reach up and rub the now warm part of his neck. 'I want to evolve, Grovyle, I do, but I don't want to outlive everyone.' Her heart pangs painfully at the final thought. 'What would you do if evolution meant outliving the ones you know and love?'

Grovyle rolls his twig around in his mouth. 'I would still evolve.' Vulpix's surprise must bleed over, as he continues after a short delay. 'I've already outlived my home, but I don't let the loss itself be the focus of my memory. I remember the times spent with my colony and growing up fondly. It would feel like spitting on the Old Tree's memory if I let my spirits fall every time I thought of it. Evolution means more power, and it means I can protect what I love until things I can't fight, such as time, are the only concerns.'

Of course, Grovyle would have such a refreshingly simple yet noble view, and through his inexperience with telepathy, his honesty lights up each of his words like a beacon.

'Does that alleviate your concerns some?' Grovyle asks.

'...Earlier, Xatu said I had to 'reach for my utopia or I would never have it.' Does that make sense to you?'

'Flowery, but I understand. If you want a pleasant future, it's up to you to do what you can to create it.'

Vulpix licks her chops, trying and failing to keep the Butterfree in her stomach still. 'That was my takeaway as well. Thank you, Grovyle.'

'Anytime.'

Vulpix withdraws from Grovyle and reaches her mind back out to Lee. 'Lee?' The word comes across clearly.

Her trainer looks her way, blue eyes bright and a hint of a smile on his lips. 'Yes, love?'

Vulpix widens the psychic channel between them, both so her words are clear and to embolden herself with the everpresent undercurrent of love inside of Lee. 'I've decided. I want to evolve.' She drops the bomb on him.

His surprise is as sharp as it is sudden, and she almost flinches. 'Vulpix…' He begins seriously. 'Are you sure? That's a huge decision to make, and this isn't the only opportunity that we'll get. I'm sure we can find another stone if you have any second thoughts.' As he 'speaks', he carries both her and Shinx to a nearby bench and sits heavily.

Grovyle follows afterward and sits to Lee's right. Vulpix is acutely aware of his yellow eyes on her.

'I'm certain!' Vulpix insists. She narrows her eyes and banishes the fluttering in her stomach. 'I want to be powerful, powerful for you and everyone else. If this stone is as powerful as it's made out to be, then this is an opportunity I have to take.' She can feel several of her words garble as she forces her meaning into rigid human language, but Lee's eyes still shine with comprehension. 'I'm ready.'

Baby Shinx, so sensitive, apparently feels the shift in the atmosphere, as she squirms and whines in Lee's arms, pawing at him with distress.

Lee shifts gears in only a second and shushes the little kitten. "Don't worry, babygirl," his soft murmurs take the burgeoning tempest out of Shinx's sails, and the Electric-type slowly ceases her struggles. For a moment, the man whispers quietly to her and gently strokes her across the back. "Here, take a nap for now, okay? We'll have lunch when you wake up."

A few passers-by stop to smile or gawk at the scene of a large, scar-marked man baby-talking a tiny Shinx, but to Vulpix's pride, Lee is unbothered.

Slowly, Shinx is soothed into a drowsy bundle of blue and black fur, and after her eyes close, Lee returns her to her ball in a flash of red before giving Vulpix his undivided attention. 'Sorry, love. Anyway,' He leans back into the bench. 'Are you sure about your decision? I don't want you to feel pressured just because I researched Ninetales, either. I went into that knowing full well the call is yours and yours alone. Also, when we last talked about this…' He bites his lip. 'You were… concerned about outliving me.'

Doubt tries to bubble up in Vulpix, but she ruthlessly crushes it. 'I was…' she shakes her head. 'I still am a little afraid of that. One thing has become apparent to me, though. Changing is okay, and I should worry about the here and the now before concerning myself with what happens decades later. I'm not going to be afraid of growing, not when I have you at my side. When you…' She still can't bring herself to say it. 'I won't cry because it's over, I'll smile because it happened.' She turns her eyes to Grovyle and smiles as best as her vulpine lips allow her.

Lee sags on the bench with a sigh. After a moment of thought behind a private curtain in his mind, he smiles faintly. From him into Vulpix flows a trickle of resignation, more than a little giddiness, and a torrent of pride for her. 'You're one brave fox, you know that?'

'I learned it from you,' Vulpix presses her face into his neck, relishing in both his affection and contact. The Fire-type feels so light that if she were to leap, she fears she might not ever come down.

"Well…" Lee says aloud, standing with a smile. "Let's go to the Gym and let Moore know that we accept."

The walk to the Gym seems to pass by in a flash for Vulpix, who can't help but shiver in anticipation. So distracted is she, that she almost doesn't notice Lee pull his phone from his pocket and send a message to Zinnia, Brendan, and Courtney telling them to meet them at the Gym. One moment they're in the heart of Lavaridge, and the next, they're in the lobby of the Gym, greeting an elated Mura Moore.

"Lee, I'm so happy you decided to accept!" The human elder's smile is blinding as he shakes Lee's hand. "Come with me to the courtyard! I'll have one of my trainers fetch the stone and gather everyone else so they can witness this!"

Lee's face is much more collected than the buzzing thoughts in his head, Vulpix muses to herself. "You know this means you're making Vulpix into a giant problem for your own match against us in a week, right?" He asks with a smirk.

Moore waves him off. "Bah. Small price to pay to receive a brand new move and witness the birth of a Ninetales." After a beat, Moore adds, "In some Kanto legends, they say witnessing a Vulpix evolve into a Ninetales is said to grant a divine sort of luck upon all who watch. Did you know that?"

"I do now," Lee quips.

As they sweep through the halls of the Gym to the central courtyard, Moore stops one of his assistant trainers and hands the boy a key from his robe, telling him to get 'the box' and to spread the word to meet in the courtyard. The boy bows with a "Yes, Leader Moore!" and takes off as if a Houndoom was on his heels.

A few turns later, she, Lee, Moore, and Grovyle emerge into the courtyard behind the Gym. Vulpix hops down from her trainer's shoulder and peers around, finding the courtyard to just be packed dirt with several lanterns on posts in the corners. In the dirt are faded chalk lines outlining a battleground.

Over several minutes, a trickle of murmuring trainers all dressed in robes similar to Moore trickle in and gather off to the edge of the ground, away from the center where Vulpix, her trainer, Grovyle and Moore all stand. Some of the trainers are accompanied by Fire pokemon, and one teen trainer even has a surly-looking Combusken at his side.

The last to come through is Flannery, who runs out into the courtyard out of breath before taking a moment to compose herself. "Sorry for being late, Grandpa! I had a challenger I was finishing up with!" She peers around at everyone curiously. "I heard someone yelling that you called a meeting. What's going on?"

Moore smiles brightly. "Flannery, we're about to see something that might be a once-in-a-lifetime experience. We're just waiting for Kay to get back here with the stone."

Lee keeps his face carefully schooled into neutrality, but Vulpix can feel his embarrassment as the process gets turned into a big ceremony. Silently, she wraps him in a quick, mental hug.

The embarrassment transforms into a grumble.

Flannery looks at Vulpix when the stone is mentioned, then the Gym heir's eyes widen. "Whoa… I didn't think he'd accept…" Her attention turns to Lee.

Vulpix's awkward human plays off his nerves with a shrug.

As they wait, Brendan, Zinnia, and Courtney slip into the courtyard as well, apparently, led in by a straggling Gym trainer. The trio chatter quietly to themselves, going to stand in their own group a few yard away from the milling Gym trainers. Both Brendan and Zinnia's faces are locked into excited smiles, while Courtney looks on in open curiosity.

Moore hums and rubs his chin. "Friends of yours?" He asks Lee.

"I told them to come here if they wanted to watch," Lee confirms.

At long last, the Gym trainer who must be Kay returns, a lacquered wooden box held in his hands. "Leader Moore," he trots up to the human elder and hands the box off.

Moore runs a thumb across the lid of the box, maybe taking in some inscription that Vulpix can't see from her vantage point. Slowly, almost reverently, he opens the lid and pulls from the box a beautiful, shining stone.

Even in the daylight, the Fire Stone casts shifting rays of orange light that brighten the courtyard, and Vulpix struggles to not let her jaw drop at the sheer, raging hellstorm she feels contained in the fist-sized crystal. Her pyrokinetic sense is going haywire just being within twenty feet of the Fire Stone, for the extra sense tells her that the stone contains more power within it than herself several times over.

"It's a good thing you came when you did, Lee," Moore hands the stone to Lee, who takes it gingerly. "It has a day at most before it cracks."

"It's warm…" Lee's voice is too quiet for anyone but Vulpix to hear.

"Silence, silence!" Moore hushes the chattering of his trainees with a harsh wave of his arm. "Now, back away and watch. You may never get to see this again." Moore steps off to the side with his gym trainers and beckons Grovyle along.

The Grass-type and Lee share a single look, then both nod as one. In a blur of motion, Grovyle vanishes and reappears with his arms crossed between Moore and Flannery, the latter of whom jumps with a stifled yelp.

Lee smiles and then turns back to Vulpix, who feels her heart begin to race. Slowly, he kneels down to one knee, rolling the Fire Stone between his fingers.

"Has it really only been three months?" Lee wonders aloud, eyes fixed on the stone. "Three months since you came into my life and saved it, love, yet it feels like I've known you for years, or even my whole life."

Vulpix smiles, calm overtaking her. Her jitters vanish, the Butterfree in her stomach stop, and the doubts of the day seem so terribly small now. 'I have known you for my entire life, and I'm looking forward to every day, week, month, and year we have together.'

Lee huffs out a laugh. 'Don't spread that line around. People might get funny ideas.'

'Let them,' she sniffs.

Lee rolls his eyes good-naturedly, then slowly, almost hesitantly, he holds the stone out.

Vulpix pads closer, conscious of every step she takes, and how the distance shrinks. Her heart begins to thunder again.

Before her is a turning point in her life, and once she starts down that path, she can never turn back. What is done may never be undone.

She comes to a halt less than a foot away from the bared stone, the orange glow dominating her sight. So close is she, that she almost feels as if she were set aflame. The light warms her fur. It makes her head swim, and her breaths shallow.

The world is a dangerous place, and her human, her dear Lee, needs a team of pokemon who can stand against the tide. The Powers That Be, for she knows them to be out there, are not stirring yet, but it's only a matter of time. She can't hide, she can't shy away. There is time before the world begins to rumble, and she can use that time to grow.

She can be the best pokemon she can be just by touching this stone. Grander heights are all hers.

All it costs is the burden of burying the one she loves one distant day.

Vulpix gulps, but finds her mouth dry. 'Lee. He's going to die one day. He's going to go off to The End again.'

'Reach for your utopia, Vulpix, or you will never have it.'

'But he will die old and fulfilled. I will see it no other way.'

Her paw falls upon the Fire Stone.

A grand white glow blinds Vulpix, and she feels her veins filled with rushing inferno.

Power.

Unfathomable power fills her entire body and soul. The wellspring of fire deep inside of her balloons, growing twice, thrice, four times, and more until it pushes against the boundaries of her body painfully. The fire keeps spreading without end, so her body breaks and morphs before she bursts into uncontrollable flames. She feels her limbs, her neck, her muzzle, and her tails lengthen. Bones shift without pain and from her spine, three entirely new tails sprout. They bud and grow like plants between their sisters as if they were always meant to be there. The tails unravel, each one waving slowly in its own unseen and unfelt wind.

Her fur transforms in the heat, brightening to a radiant, shimmering gold. Under her pelt, she feels fire wash over her bones and muscles, burning away weakness and tempering them like steel.

But inside her head, something else takes place.

A blinder comes off.

Had her body not been engulfed in searing heat that would turn tears to steam, she might have cried.

Like a blind man suddenly shown color, she can see. Her third eye, now wide and unblinking, takes in the entire town and the surrounding landscape. Gone is her puny dozen-meter range and the strain of focus. She can see everything. Deeper in her psyche, all the difficulties she faced with her more esoteric powers seem so silly now. Her mind, now properly equipped to handle the skills she practiced before, neatly snaps everything into place.

Then there is the fire. Her fire.

Before, it required prodding and intense focus to command the flames. Moving her attacks, tracking foes, pouring more energy in, it all fought her on some level. Now? Now she feels the fire thrumming under her skin, eager and waiting for a command like a Growlithe. She dares not even errantly flick a tail lest she set some poor bystander alight.

The might that's been gifted to her… She feels as if there is nothing she cannot beat. It's euphoric. It's right. She hasn't any idea if the lightness in her limbs is from newfound strength, the relief that nothing seems to be amiss with herself, or if it's just the rapturous sensation of the sheer power she holds.

The raw, unfettered Fire rushing into her from the stone begins to abate, then drops to a trickle. After what seems like an eternity, the white aura of evolution fades and all that's left of the stone is a clear, inert crystal.

Vulpix watches the hand holding the crystal go limp, letting it drop to the ground. The same hand reaches up to her still raised, golden-furred paw and takes it in a gentle grip.

She raises her head almost shyly, taking in her trainer's face.

He stares at her, face drawn into picture-perfect awe. "Vulpix?" He breathes, little more than a whisper. In Lee's eyes, she sees something that drives a spike into her heart and kills the high of her evolution.

Doubt. Doubt about who she is.

With only a flicker of thought, she wraps her entire mind around his, weaving a psychic tapestry filled with love and reassurance.

'Ninetales is my name now, Lee.' She smiles, finding her new lips much better at the task. 'I'm going to miss riding on your shoulder.' The words are smooth and utterly clear, she knows it.

She's not sure if what comes out of Lee is a laugh or a sob, but he steps closer and drops to his knees to pull her into a tight hug, his emotions an utter mess. With her sensitive new skin and fur, Ninetales delights in the hug, but she still takes the time to wrap her psychic blanket a little tighter around her human's psyche. After a second of thought, she curls her tails forward, wrapping Lee in a physical blanket of affection too. 'Goodness,' she smiles and presses her thin muzzle into the crook of her trainer's neck. 'I was the one who had the life-changing ordeal. One would think you're the one getting used to a new body with that reaction.'

Lee chuckles into her neck. 'When I had that little thought back in Mauville's Battle Tent, about a Ninetales being beautiful enough to make a grown man cry? I didn't realize my joke wasn't a joke.'

Ninetales purrs deep in her throat at the compliment, noting with some surprise that the noise is actually rather close to what a feline would make.

There, fresh after her evolution and with her trainer in her hold, love flowing in both directions through their telepathic channel, Ninetales makes a decision.

'I must have been born for a reason, but I don't care what that reason is any longer,' She declares to herself. 'I have my own reason. I exist here…' She tightens the hug around her human ever so slightly.

'I exist here to love and be loved, and there is no better life than that.'
 
Act 2: Interlude 1
Want to support me? See Fuggmann is creating Fiction | Patreon on the place of patrons. I do have goals on there that will hopefully allow me to cut back on work in favor of more writing. As a thanks for donating, patrons get to see updates a few days early and suggest edits to the final draft before it goes live.


Seated in his cozy office, Nigel Birch sighs and leans back in his chair, enjoying one of the rare afternoons where everything seems to be caught up. No meetings, no aides or researchers absent, and no pin-headed prodding from the League Academic Board over what he's up to.

Just earlier he submitted an approval request to the Pokemon Rangers to run a research expedition in a protected area outside Verdanturf, one where a wild Sitrus grove supposedly exists. If Lee's theories on long-term consumption of the berries are correct, then the pokemon living in the area should make for an interesting study. With any luck, the Rangers will get back to him before the week is out.

'It's been so long since I've had time to myself.' Nigel realizes. 'If I wasn't working, I was showing the ropes to Brendan, and if I wasn't with him, I was jumping through hoops for the Academic Board.' The man sighs wistfully. 'It seems like only yesterday Brendan was a knee-high hellion demanding daddy teach him about pokemon. Now, look at him! Out in the world and making a name for himself.'

The thought of his son makes Nigel smile. 'I didn't start my journey until fifteen, and my first Gym battle was a solid defeat. Brendan, though?' He allows his smile to take on a smug air, though it only holds for a few scant seconds before something melancholic takes its place. 'My son is growing up…' Nigel shakes his head gently, dispelling the thought.

After a brief phone call to order some delivery for lunch, Nigel jiggles the mouse of his computer and checks his email once more. Finding nothing urgent, he smiles and allows himself to goof off for a bit. Naturally, the first site he visits is BattleNet.

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The first newest topics are nothing special. Gossip about Elites, bogus Legendary sightings, popularity contests between teen girl trainers, conspiracy theories about world leaders being lizard pokemon, nothing unusual. One post pinned to the front page does jump out at Nigel, however.

Topic: Paldea re-opens borders
In: Boards ► International ► World News & Events
AllBite_NoBark (Original Poster)

Posted On June Xth 20XX:

After two decades of silence, Paldea is apparently going to throw open their borders after their civil government underwent a regime change following the illness and death of Marco "El Presidente" Juno. The geezers online might remember how they Clamperl'd up but here is a history lesson for the kiddies.

Back in the day, Paldea was considered to be one of the strongest regions in the world owing to the fact that all of their trainers stomped in any tournament hosted in Paldea. Seriously, a non-native has never won a single Paldean League tournament, and that's something no other region can boast. A few weaker regions formed lopsided trade agreements with them in return for defense pacts, including some non-League regions, and Paldea raked in the cash for it. This usually kept the other fighty non-League localities in line and reluctant to eat their weaker neighbors. As you probably know, Johto and Kanto got into a dispute over the ownership of Mt Silver and the surrounding areas around this time, and it got violent. It was a huge shock when the civil government of Paldea refused to honor the mutual defense agreement between Paldea and Johto during the Kanto-Johto skirmishes.

Marco Juno, who entered the office of President that same year after a landslide victory, immediately dissolved the agreement, more or less telling Johto "You're f*cked. Have fun." Some people think this was a move to protect Paldea from Kanto, and thus from Interim Champion Samuel Oak, while others think Marco Juno had an alternate reason. Reportedly, the Paldea Pokemon League and the civ gov butted heads over the issue and hit political gridlock. The Paldea PL said Marco had no authority to annul military agreements, and the civ gov said the agreement was entirely defensive, then accused Johto of being the aggressor which annuls the agreement anyway. No one was really sure what the wording of the agreement was since it was drafted behind closed doors. Considering the funny dragon honor Clan Blackthorn has and how loudly they decried Paldea's declaration, I think we all know Kanto threw the first punch.

Paldea was already very prickly over international travelers, and using fear over the possibility of Samuel Oak burning the region to the ground, Marco Juno convinced the Paldea Senate to grant him emergency powers using a supermajority vote. Normally a Pokemon League could overturn even a supermajority, but the worldwide unrest convinced a number of League officials to side with Marco, and the countervote fell short. With his emergency powers, Marco suspended his term limits, deported every foreigner in Paldea, recalled all his trainers, revoked every passport and travel visa, then closed the borders and enforced an information blackout.

But there is probably a bigger reason why Marco wanted to close off Paldea. Get this: according to the source article there is some sort of geological phenomenon in Paldea that allows a pokemon to change their Type. It's been known to a few native Paldean ethnic groups (one of which Marco Juno belonged to) since before modern days, and globalization was making the secret harder and harder to keep. The problem with this is that the type-change thing only works on Paldean soil, which explains why native Paldean trainers and pokemon were such incredible sh!tkickers but never liked leaving home. So while Paldea would 110% suck to invade, they never had any real force projection. Rather than help Johto and risk the ruse, Marco Juno took his ball, went home, and locked the door.

Following Marco's death, the civil gov is supposedly in disarray and the Paldea PL is cleaning up the mess. You can already see some of the ripples hitting the market as Paldean pokemon breeders ballsy enough to dip their toes in the international market this early are making bank selling pokemon not ever seen outside of their region. Former Paldea PL Official and now Regional Professor Sada, a rallying figure for younger native Paldeans, says they hope to officially re-open the borders in the coming months, and that they'll be burying the shame Marco brought upon the region along with his body.

Wack.

Source: PNN (link).


After re-reading the post and opening the article to read the official source, Nigel blinks and scratches his chin. "Full-on type changes?" He wonders aloud, pondering how such a thing could happen as a result of something geological. Dispersed TE concentrations in the soil? Maybe… "Well then," he grins, not hiding his excitement for such an interesting study being dangled before him. "I guess Lee and I are taking a research expedition to Paldea once this League year is out. That'll be right up his alley."

The comments in the thread aren't really anything constructive, so Nigel skips them to keep flitting between posts that catch his fancy. Out of curiosity, he searches his son's name and pulls up the profile on Brendan the site maintains.


TRAINER TRACKER: BIRCH, BRENDAN
Currently participating in: Ever Grande Conference Challenge
Badges: 3/8 (R Stone, R Knuckle, R Dynamo)
Last seen in: Lavaridge

TRAINER INFO
Username:
B_Birch
Age: 12
Years Active: 0.2
Home Region: Hoenn
Official Trainer: Yes
Trainer Class: Lab Trainer (Hoenn)
Trainer ID: [Hidden]

STATISTICS
Winrate (W/L/D):
71/7/0
Average Match Time Per Pokemon: 2.1 minutes
Total Badges Collected: 3
Tournaments Entered: 0
Tournaments Won: 0
Pokemon Owned (Past Evos Included): 6
Most used pokemon: Marshtomp

POKEMON
Ace Pokemon:
Marshtomp
Known Team: Marshtomp (m), Breloom (m), Mawile (f), Elecktrike (m)
Known Reserves: N/A

POKEMON NOTES

Marshtomp
Ability:
Torrent
Typical Held Item: N/A
Known Moves: Bide, Watergun, Take Down, Mud Shot, Seismic Toss, Rock Throw, Foresight, Growl, Mega Punch
Notes: Birch's first pokemon. Evolved from Mudkip. Superior physical strength and resilience. Deceptively fast. Boasts impressive tolerance to Grass attacks. Torrent was observed activating in several battles. Obedient and quick to execute orders, even when visibly upset.


Unofficial BattleNet Power Rankingsfor Brendan's Marshtomp
Physical Atk: S-
Ranged Atk: A-
Status Atk: E
Phys Resist: A+
Energy Resist: A
Status Resist: B+
Agility: B+
Reactions: A
Stamina: S
Pain Tolerance: S
Overall Species Ranking:
(A+ Tier) See analyst feat and performance breakdown here (link)


Breloom
Ability:
Effect Spore
Typical Held Item: N/A
Known Moves: Tackle, Stun Spore, Poison Powder, Leech Seed, Mega Drain, Headbutt, Mach Punch, Counter.
Notes: Acquired via capture. Evolved from Shroomish. Evasive. Skilled with hit-and-run tactics but capable of sustaining and winning slug outs due to Effect Spore. Above-average abilities are magnified under Birch's command. Obedient and quick to execute orders.


Unofficial BattleNet Power Rankings™ for Brendan's Breloom
Physical Atk: B
Ranged Atk: B
Status Atk: A
Phys Resist: C
Energy Resist: C-
Status Resist: C
Agility: B+
Reactions: B+
Stamina: C
Pain Tolerance: B+
Overall Species ranking:
(B+ Tier) See analyst feat and performance breakdown here (link)


Mawile
Ability:
Intimidate
Typical Held Item: N/A
Known Moves: Crunch, Attract, False Tears, Fairy Wind, Iron Defense, Baton Pass, Sucker Punch
Notes: Acquired via capture. Dirty fighter and a skilled actor. An unusually high amount of teeth in her second mouth offer high-powered bite attacks. Obedient and quickly executes orders.


Unofficial BattleNet Power Rankings™ for Brendan's Mawile
Physical Atk: A+
Ranged Atk: D
Status Atk: B
Phys Resist: C+
Energy Resist: C-
Status Resist: B
Agility: C
Reactions: C
Stamina: C+
Pain Tolerance: B
Overall Species Ranking: (B- Tier)
See analyst feat and performance breakdown here (link)


Electrike
Ability:
?
Typical Held Item: N/A
Known Moves: N/A
Notes: Unnaturally large. Might be Giant or Alpha variation. Not yet seen used in battle.
Species ranking: (N/A)


STRATAGEMS, STYLES, & BATTLENET ESTIMATIONS
Birch takes battles slow and steady, pacing the fight to keep his pokemon fresh. Fond of baiting and punishing overextension, though tactics shift between different pokemon. Pokemon seem to execute pre-planned movements and maneuvers mid-battle with non-verbal signals (hand movements, head movements, etc) and situational cues. Site helpers and analysts have proposed that Birch also uses voice tone and vocabulary changes to relay info to pokemon. Birch has superior battlefield awareness and will direct pokemon to opportunistically capitalize on prime positioning. In the absence of prime positioning, Birch may direct pokemon to alter the terrain to better suit his plans. Birch has presumably been tutored by his father, Prof Nigel Birch, and may bring additional tactics to the field if pushed.

Birch is currently projected to collect 8 Hoenn badges and likely participate in the Ever Grande Conference with a team of 6 pokemon.

MISC
Known Sponsors & Affiliates:
Hoenn Regional Pokemon Lab
Recent Activity: See (link) for full video archive.

Page last updated by P_Jeimai (BattleNet Analyst) 3 days ago.


Nigel smiles with pride as he reads the pages and pages of worried comments from other trainers on his son's dossier. His boy is making waves and the competition is rightfully nervous. Even the finicky and egotistical staff on BattleNet think highly of him.

Naturally, Nigel types in the name of his other trainer and scans through what he finds.


TRAINER TRACKER: HENSON, LEE
Currently participating in: Ever Grande Conference Challenge
Badges: 3/8 (R Stone, R Knuckle, R Dynamo)
Last seen in: Lavaridge

TRAINER INFO
Username:
L_Henson
Age: 24
Years Active: 0.2
Home Region: Hoenn
Official Trainer: Yes
Trainer Class: Lab Trainer (Hoenn)
Trainer ID: [Hidden]

STATISTICS
Winrate (W/L/D):
65/3/1
Average Match Time Per Pokemon: 2.5 minutes
Total Badges Collected: 3
Tournaments Entered: 1
Tournaments Won: 1
Pokemon Owned (Past Evos Included): 7
Most used Pokemon: Ninetales

POKEMON
Ace Pokemon:
Ninetales
Current Team: Ninetales (f), Grovyle (m), Corvisquire (m), Shinx (f), Octillery (?)
Known Reserves: N/A

POKEMON NOTES *

Ninetales
Special Ability: ?
Typical Held Item:
N/A
Known Moves: Confuse Ray, Quick Attack, Payback, Baby-Doll Eyes, Hex, Feint Attack, Flamethrower(?), Ember(?), Fire Spin(?), Will-o-Wisp(?), Unknown Fire Move #1, Unknown Fire Move #2, Unknown Fire Move #3, Others (?)
Notes: Henson's first pokemon(?). Evolved from Vulpix using G1P1 Fire Stone (citation needed). Capabilities are unknown. Observed using undocumented moves as a Vulpix on multiple occasions. Capabilities as a Vulpix noted to be in excess of previously known upper limits of species. Total number of moves is unknown. Type spread of moves is unknown.


Unofficial BattleNet Power Rankings™ for Lee's Ninetales
Physical Atk: ?
Ranged Atk: ?
Status Atk: ?
Phys Resist: ?
Energy Resist: ?
Status Resist: ?
Agility: ?
Reactions: ?
Stamina: ?
Pain Tolerance: ?
Overall Species Ranking: (? Tier)
Pokemon cannot be accurately categorized at this time. See legacy feat and performance breakdown here (link)


Grovyle
Special Ability: Overgrow
Typical Held Item:
Miracle Seed
Known Moves: Pound, Absorb, Leaf Blade, Detect, Quick Attack, Bullet Seed, X-Scissor, Feint Attack(?), Unknown Grass Move #1, Unknown Grass Move #2, Others (?)
Notes: Acquired via capture. Evolved from Treecko.Superior combat abilities across the board. Highly mobile and strikes opportunistically even when not ordered. Leaf Blade attack presents a serious danger of OHKO to any pokemon with a Grass weakness. Total number of moves is unknown. Type spread of moves is unknown.


Unofficial BattleNet Power Rankings™ for Lee's Grovyle
Physical Atk: ?
Ranged Atk: ?
Status Atk: ?
Physical Resist: C-
Energy Resist: C
Status Resist: ?
Agility: S
Reactions: SS-
Stamina: B
Pain Tolerance: A
Overall Species Ranking: (? Tier)
Pokemon cannot be accurately categorized at this time. See legacy feat and performance breakdown here (link)


Corvisquire
Ability: ?
Typical Held Item:
N/A
Known Moves: Pluck, Drill Peck, Scary Face, Taunt, Swift, Steel Wing, Extremespeed(?), Hone Claws, Power Trip, Unknown Dark Move, Others (?)
Notes: Acquired via capture.Superior combat abilities across the board. Extremely quick, violently aggressive, and willing to battle even with debilitating injuries. Total number of moves is unknown. Type spread of moves is unknown. Not seen in use recently.


Unofficial BattleNet Power Rankings™ for Lee's Corvisquire
Physical Atk: ?
Ranged Atk: ?
Status Atk: ?
Physical Resist: B
Energy Resist: B
Status Resist: ?
Agility: A
Reactions: B+
Stamina: S
Pain Tolerance: S+
Overall Species ranking: (? Tier)
Pokemon cannot be accurately categorized at this time. See legacy feat and performance breakdown here (link)


Octillery
Typical Held Item:
N/A
Known Moves: N/A
Notes: Not yet seen used in battle.
Species ranking: (N/A)


Shinx
Typical Held Item:
N/A
Known Moves: N/A
Notes: Not yet seen used in battle.
Species ranking: (N/A)


STRATAGEMS, STYLES, & BATTLENET ESTIMATIONS *

Analysis of Henson's preferred tactics are inconclusive. Henson's pokemon possess unnaturally varied skill sets, with some of his pokemon knowing techniques previously thought impossible to use for their lines. Henson's Ninetales sometimes carries out complex attacks or maneuvers without visible instructions. Analysts cannot pinpoint the cue for these attacks. Henson is collaborating with Silph Co to bring TMs of entirely new pokemon moves to market. For this reason, it can be assumed that all of Henson's pokemon are in possession of other undocumented attacks.

Henson is currently projected to collect 8 Hoenn badges and participate in the Ever Grande Conference with a team of 6 pokemon as a Top 8 finalist.

* NOTICE: BattleNet Administration acknowledges that the listed information in these sections might be unreliable due to unusual circumstances.

MISC
Known Sponsors & Affiliates:
Hoenn Regional Pokemon Lab, Rustboro Trainer School, Silph Co, Lavaridge Gym.
Recent Activity: See (link) for full video archive.

Page last updated by SITE_ADMIN#4 58 minutes ago.


Nigel blinks. "Huh. They're really not playing around with Lee. He's really kicked the Beedrill's nest with…" The professor pauses, several of the lines he just read suddenly jumping out at him as the realization hits home like a runaway bus. Slowly, his eyes grow wide.

Unknown Fire Move #1, Unknown Fire Move #2, Unknown Fire Move #3, Others (?)

Unknown Grass Move #1, Unknown Grass Move #2.

Unknown Dark Move.

G1P1 Fire Stone

Ninetales.

"Wha…? What the actual hell?" Nigel re-reads the page, realizing he didn't read it wrong.

Lee's efforts to create new moves have apparently been moving along much faster than expected. Nigel knew Lee planned on selling some move variations to Silph, but the professor was expecting that to be something months down the line, not weeks after Lee just got done creating Convergence.

Even more shockingly, Vulpix evolved – and she evolved with the highest grade stone possible. The evolution anxiety that plagues stone-evolvers is well documented, and the Vulpix line is the best example of that anxiety. When the doubts and fears pass, however…

There are plenty of good reasons why Ninetales is still worshiped in some parts of Kanto.

'I knew Lee's Vulpix was made of sterner stuff than most and might evolve, but I wasn't expecting this for years…' Nigel gulps and silently ponders the implications of one of his trainers owning a pokemon considered to be mythical by some. 'I know the Academic Board is going to want a meeting over this. Those old coots are going to be clamoring to study the youngest Ninetales in the world,' he groans aloud at the thought. 'The only way this could have made a bigger splash is if he caught an actual legendary pokemon.'

Scrolling the page back up, Nigel looks over all the question marks and uncertain info littering the dossier on Lee and his team. The information age has changed pokemon battling as a sport in just a few years, and accurate information on foes to form countermeasures from is the new great equalizer. 'Knowing is half the battle' has never been more accurate.

For that reason, each and every question mark sprinkled on Lee's dossier is another black bell toll for the trainers who are going to flock to the page in the coming days.

Wondering if the fox has been used in battle yet, Nigel opens Lee's Recent Activity link and takes a look at the newest video with his trainer tagged in it.

#OnceInALifetime Vulpix Evolution.

'Nevermind, this is even better than a battle,' Nigel smiles and clicks 'play'.

The video starts out shaky and unfocused from the perspective of a cell phone being withdrawn from a pocket. After a moment the camera focuses, and right in the center is Lee kneeling down with a positively radiant Fire Stone in hand.

In front of Lee, Vulpix slowly walks forward, as if second-guessing herself. She stops just short and raises a paw, once more hesitating.

It happens almost too quickly to notice. In fact, if Nigel wasn't personally acquainted with Vulpix, he might have missed it. Her ears flick back, her tails frazzle, and she pulls her lips back into a grimace for a split second. Then all at once, the fox's nerves vanish and her brown eyes quite literally glow with resolve.

Her paw falls on the stone, and in a great flash of light, she transforms into a Ninetales so golden that her fur shimmers like liquid metal in the sun. The video captures everything in stunning detail for just being a phone cam.

Everyone in the video waits with bated breath. The other trainers around the cameraman, Gym Leader Moore, Nigel's son, the Draconid, the disguised terrorist, all of them are struck dumb by what they witnessed.

The inert Fire Stone drops from Lee's hand with a 'thud,' and with that hand, he takes Ninetales' still-raised paw. "Vulpix?" He whispers as if he doesn't believe his eyes. His voice is almost lost in the wind.

Ninetales smiles, her ruby-like eyes shining.

With a choked, joyful laugh, Lee abandons any decorum and pulls the gold fox into a tight hug, one she returns with all nine of her tails. Each long tail wraps around Lee's back without any overlap, covering him in a protective mantle of shiny fur. Ninetales then sets her head on Lee's shoulder, curling her neck around the back of his with a content smile.

The video cuts to black and ends.

Birch blows out a slow breath and looks at the stats of the video. "Lee, why do you do this to me?"

Uploaded: 4 hours ago
Views: 532,029



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Topic: Official Lee Henson Megathread
In: Boards ► Hoenn ► Indiv Trainers ► Lee Henson
PequsuaCustoms (Original Poster)

Posted On June 6th 20XX:

Congrats to L_Henson for taking spot #4 in the unofficial "fastest time to get a megathread" competition and thanks RunThatBack (Mod) for perms to make a mega. I'll add edits as info comes in.

Lee Henson is a trainer in his 20s serving as a lab trainer to Prof Birch in Hoenn. Other than his recorded Gym battles, a brief media appearance during the Brawl on the Beach in Dewford, and some crusty cellphone videos of his battles, not a whole lot is known about him. He hasn't published his research yet, his social media straight-up doesn't exist, and his one post on BattleNet was about a lost pokemon and that thread is dead. We do know that he's a scary-looking mfer and carrying around pokemon way stronger than they should be.

A few guys thinking he was some kind of League hitman or ringer went digging and pulled some public records to find that Lee actually is new to the pokemon battling scene. (links below). His license is less than a year old with no renewals on record. It's not that weird for a grown man to change careers and become a trainer, but it is weird just how successful he is without any formal education on record. At the time of his post, his win rate has never fallen below 90%. We went in deeper.

This is where things get bad for people competing in Hoenn this year.

Earlier today his Ace, Vulpix, evolved. (link)

That's big. That's REALLY big. Ninetales is a monster of a pokemon and loonies all over the world still call them spirits and gods and whatnot. Of the 191 (now 192) Ninetales registered to trainers, only 30 or so are actually active competitively, and most of those 30 belong to Elites, Gym Leaders, Master Breeders, Top Coordinators, etc you get the idea. If you have a Ninetales, the logic says you're a badass.

But it gets worse!

The scaling on stone evolutions is all kinds of fucky. You can think of Vulpix (and Growlithe too) as pokemon that should have three stages, but they don't have a middle one, so when they evolve, they go from 0 to 100 real hard. Henson's Vulpix was already strong enough to fuck-up Gym Leader personal 'mons, so that evolution has probably turned her into a death sentence for anything that isn't fire retardant.

But it gets even worse!

That Fire Stone? That was most likely a G1P1 dug out of Mt Chimney. We did a bit of looking around, and we saw the Lavaridge Gym put up a new batch of Fire Stones for auction. A G1P1 was put up by mistake and withdrawn. It was only up for four minutes, but we found a cached version of the auction house page. Now, who would benefit a lot from an entire volcano's worth of stored power? An Ace Vulpix already strong enough to down Gym Leaders, that's who.

It doesn't end there!

Me and some boys have been reviewing Lee Henson's battles, and we saw a few moves that we've never seen before. One of the other helpers recalled seeing an email with Lee's name on it for some reason and dug through his spam folder. He found some promo from Silph about two brand-spanking new Grass TMs, and Henson was credited as the creator of both. That very suddenly explained why Lee's Corvisquire knows Extremespeed and has these dark ball things he can whip around (link). His Grovyle also doubles as a shotgun and knows Feint Attack (link). Finally, his Vulpix seems to have a new homing technique to pull out of her ass every other battle. (link)(link)(link)

Lee Henson knows how to make new pokemon moves, and he can make them fast.

Something else we noticed was how Vulpix would just do things without being told. She would react, attack, defend, dodge, and generally fight pretty well without Lee's mouth so much as opening. Other times he's saying just one or two words, and she'd pull some insane stunt out of nowhere. We looked hard at the videos over and over, and we could not find any meaningful non-verbal signals. The only answer we could come up with? Telepathy. Either Henson or his Vulpix can use telepathy and they're good enough at it to use it mid-battle. Telepathy is rare, but we're already talking about a Vulpix that's now a Ninetales, so really can we discount anything? We entertained the idea that there was some 1000 IQ 5D chess planning going on, but that seems even more unbelievable considering some of the issues they've run into mid-battle.

His other pokemon aren't slouches either. His Grovyle often takes wins with zero damage unless it's a battle against the likes of a Gym Leader, then he busts out wild shit like the new moves and hyper-speed (link). Corvisquire is a cruise missile made out of hate, and only tricks like Destiny Bond or dropping a mountain on him will slow him down (link). We still have no idea what Lee's Shinx or his Octillery (that he didn't have until he got out of the Valley of Steel) do. I have no idea what Henson is doing to his pokemon, but it's working.

So to reiterate, Henson has a Ninetales who is in the running for strongest of her already broken species, a quadruple action machine gun/shotgun/sniper/sword Grovyle, an unbreakable Corvisquire, a pair of pokemon that no one knows anything about, and they all have deep movepools with zero documentation. Oh, and it's a coin flip if you get a verbal cue for an attack.

I'm not trying to sound like a fanboy or a hypebeast or anything, but good luck to everyone else. When the bookies open up for the Ever Grande Conference, I'm putting money on Henson taking the gold.

(Showing page 1 of 22)

V_Marlo (Verified Trainer)
Replied On June 6th 20XX:
You know what? I'm done. I give up. I'm going to Unova. I f*cking hate Hoenn.

UNDERMAN!
Replied On June 6th 20XX:
There is no universe where you convince me that this guy is anything but a league plant. Katie Huffman is going to win the EGC regardless.

KazuoKandy
Replied On June 6th 20XX:
...Holy shit that's scuffed. How are you supposed to fight back?

L_Orvert (Verified Trainer)
Replied On June 6th 20XX:
UNDERMAN! Bro what. Katie is good but not 'fight a super ninetales and win' kind of good.

F_Aulmais
Replied On June 6th 20XX:
Welp. Looks like someone is gonna give Ash Ketchum a run for his money, even with that overpowered Pikachu of his.

Glasses_Man
Replied On June 6th 20XX:
I'm looking forward to seeing how well Ninetails fights now that it naturally has some psychic abilities: If we suspected telepathy as a Vulpix, they might outright be able to talk now.

Pokéname_Bot
Replied On June 6th 20XX:
Glasses_Man Ninetails is spelled Ninetales. It's a play on words, as the nine-tailed Pokémon is the subject of many fairy tales.

Glasses_Man
Replied On June 6th 20XX:
And that's what I get for not looking over with spellcheck. Lovely.

►I3Wynaut
Replied on June 6th 20XX:
I don't care how strong Lee's team is! My super team of Wobuffet will take everything they can dish out and return it twice as hard! We're gonna win the Hoenn League this year, just you wait!

LoPwny99
Replied On June 6th 20XX:
I call Tauroshit on that Grovyle. Damn lizard is probably coked out of its mind on something illegal. No way it moves that fast naturally.

(Showing page 2 of 22)

Banh Bao
Replied On June 6th 20XX:
TOUCH FLUFFFY TAILLLL SO MUCH FLUFF I WANT A HUG LIKE THAT

LilyDancer
Replied On June 6th 20XX:
Banh Bao I know right! I heard that Ninetale's fur is soft as a cloud!

Totally gonna be at Evergrande to see if Lee would let me pet her. 3

UhNOPika!
Replied On June 6th 20XX:
YEahhh I think the Unova is really looking good this time of year. Though I can't wait to see what the Ninetales does from a distance. A FAAAR away distance

DragonExpert1985
Replied On June 6th 20XX:
Whelp, there is clearly only one thing left to do for the rest of us 'normals' hoping to compete. PANIC!

T_Hytinnen
Replied On June 6th 20XX:
God, OP (And commenters) really just come across as shills for Lee. If he makes it to the Ever Grande Conference, I doubt he'll make it past preliminaries.
He's just one man (and a new trainer at that). He's not some god figure or ace trainer.

I'd bet my money on Ketchum. At least he has experience under his belt.

I3Wynaut
Replied on June 6th 20XX:
Ketchum, that talentless hack. He just gets lucky each season. My all-star Wobbuffet team will wreck his face!

Not_Sus
Replied On June 6th 20XX:
UNDERMAN! I3Wynaut Talking about experience, what did Henson DO before ? If he's a league plant, he should appear somewhere to lessen suspicion. He might be a plant, but not from the league. At least Ketchum has a clear league track record.

T_Hytinnen
Replied On June 6th 20XX:
Talentless hack? I'd like to see you try to get to the league with your team.(Oh wait, you haven't made it to the league conference before now have you?)

Wobbuffet isn't even that great of a Pokemon anyways as a single member of a team, let alone an entire team. Its whole shtick requires opponents to hit it first, which isn't exactly a competitive strategy. The best purpose for Wobbuffet is a dedicated Destiny Bond user, and even then, other users can at least use other valuable moves.

Besides, your point doesn't even stand with Ketchum. Kid's made it to the league twice. Top 16 and Top 8. If that doesn't show improvement, I don't know what will.

S_Melody
Replied On June 6th 20XX:
Ash is the best! My family and I are rooting for him! His Pikachu will beat Henson's Ninetales no problem!

I3Wynaut
Replied on June 6th 20XX:
Ha! My team has just been taking our time to grow and learn. We'll be in the conference this year, you'll see. That's because we have the determination to win! We can take any move and send it right back at twice the power, it's the ultimate strategy. It can't be beat. You'll see that when were named league champion. You'll all see how great Wobbuffet is! Just you wait!

(Showing page 3 of 22)

J3ackson
Replied on June 6th 20XX:
l3Wynaut I got roped into cleaning up after Ash's Pikachu when he had a battle on the Dewford beach. Getting all that glass out of the sand was a right pain. Your Wobbuffet's gonna get torched.

T_Hytinnen
Replied On June 6th 20XX:
[deleted]

Leafeon_L0ver
Replied On June 6th 20XX:
Dang that team is looking better and better! Stevens a steel specialist, right? If what you guys are saying about ninetales and firestones are right, that type advantage could be a massive help to him. If he makes it that far, of course.

Miasmate
Replied On June 6th 20XX:
Devilishly good investment on Prof. Birches' part here. Two months is completely insane.

Kabu (Verified Trainer) (Galar Gym Leader)
Replied On June 6th 20XX:
L_Henson Look at your PMs.

SomeAnon
Replied On June 6th 20XX:
He's running on luck, it'll run out eventually.

platinumGuy009
Replied On June 6th 20XX:
Interesting, with Henson's Corvisquire having not been seen recently and his post about said pokemon being missing implies something happened there. Did it run away, get lost, have a scandalous affair with a local Noctowl? This Henson fellow seems to be a fairly talented trainer, maybe that bird proved too much to handle? Who knows.

BTW that Ninetales is so darn plush and majestic, I'm even more envious now that I know he has a baby shinx too! THEYRE SOO CUUTEEE! aaaaahAAAAAHHHHH *dies of cute*

Leafeon_L0ver
Replied On June 6th 20XX:
platinumGuy009 Maybe the training just got too rough for his corvisquire? Or maybe the stupidly OP vulpix (now Ninetales) scared it off? Maybe having that much firepower got to the steel type? Who knows? Plus that lost and found thread is dead, he might have found the bird and put it in timeout for running away for a bit. Arceus knows I'm not a top tier trainer, I don't know the proper dicipline for a runaway powerhouse.

Lopunny_Pancakes
Replied On June 6th 20XX:
OH! MY! ARCEUS! That was THE MOST AMAZING Evo-vid I have EVER SEEN! Seriously, I think I'm actually tearing up a bit over here!

I know I've asked this before but I think it got buried last time over the other crazy stuff Henson and his team were pulling at the time, but did we ever get an answer on what kind of care routine he is doing with his pokemon? Because I swear to all I hold dear, I don't think I've ever seen coats/scales/plumages THAT gorgeous on pokemon outside of the Pro-Contest circuit, and they are on a dedicated BATTLE TEAM of all things! ESPECIALLY on his Vulpix-Turned-Ninetales! If I could pet that fluff for just a minute, I would die happy even if I keeled over right then and there!


Nigel stands with a mighty stretch. His spine pops once, twice, three times, drawing a pleased sigh from the professor. Looking to the side, he sees the sun beginning to set through his office window and grumbles to himself.

Four hours were spent keeping his eyes glued to his computer monitor so he could run damage control if things got out of hand online. Thankfully, nothing untoward popped up that required him to step in, either by posting himself or by swinging his weight as Regional Professor around and forcing the hand of the site admins. His wife isn't going to be happy about him returning home late, though…

"You better be grateful, Lee…" He mumbles, throwing his lab coat over his shoulders. Before shutting his lab PC off for the night and leaving, Nigel pauses and opens the video of Vulpix's evolution once more.

#OnceInALifetime Vulpix Evolution.
Uploaded: 8 hours ago
Views: 1,070,921


With a sigh, Nigel rubs his forehead. "Celeb life is going to be a shocker for him…"


This chapter was contributed to directly by a number of patrons. Thank you everyone who got into the spirit of a trainer and wrote a BattleNet comment!

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Act 2: Chapter 5
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Lee hums as he looks over to the faded, digital alarm clock on the hotel nightstand between his and Brendan's beds. 'We'll need to finish up here soon if we want to go out to test Ninetales' new capabilities and check up on Octillery before dinner.' He nods more to himself than anyone else.

Several hours prior, after Lee composed himself and reluctantly pulled himself from his freshly evolved Ninetales, the pair, along with Grovyle, bid Moore and his trainers adieu. They didn't need to talk to decide that retiring back to their hotel room for some private discussion was warrented. After a promise to return and discuss Moore's commission, they left. Brendan, Zinnia, and Courtney didn't need any hints that Lee wished to be alone with his pokemon for a bit, and all three tactfully left to find their own entertainment in Lavaridge. Grovyle and Ninetales exchanged a few short words when they and Lee arrived back at the hotel, and the Grass-type excused himself by returning to his ball.

Of course, the first thing Lee wanted to do upon acquiring a new pokemon?

Give her a physical. The fox rolled her eyes with a smile and didn't fight it.

"Okay, one more time. All the way in and out..."

Ninetales slowly inhales through her nose, making the great golden tuft of fur on her breast swell and tickle the hand beneath it. Those glittering, ruby-like eyes of hers regard Lee with an amused sort of exasperation.

For a few short seconds, Lee keeps his hand on Ninetales' sternum, measuring both her heartbeat and the clarity of her breath. When she can breathe in no more, she slowly exhales.

"Resting heart rate of thirty-eight beats-per-minute, lungs perfectly clear…" Lee smiles and jots everything down in his notebook with his free hand. The too-soft hotel bed under the notebook forces him to write slowly lest he push his pen too hard and slip, but he finishes in just a moment. "Thirty-eight seems rather low, but we're more or less breaking new ground here, so…"

Ninetales physical #0 Initial Baseline

June 6th 3:34 PM 20XX:

Weight: 61.1 lbs
Height: 3'11" (Discounting ears)


Muscle formation even and consistent. Fur growth even and consistent. Temperature at 110 F. Free of illness/parasites. Ninetales alert during the whole process.

Mouth/Teeth: OK
Ears: OK
Eyes: OK
Lungs: OK
Heart: OK
Stomach: OK


Further inspections are required for an accurate baseline. Working from scratch.

"That'll do for now." Lee nods and shuts his notebook, only to feel a frown tug at his lips when he notices just how lopsided the spiral-bound book is. Only a thin sliver of pages remain. "Did I burn through three hundred pages already? I could have sworn I was barely at the half-way point."

Lee flips the book back open to a random page near the middle, finding an anatomical sketch of Brendan's Mawile, several scribbled calculations of her jaw strength, and theories on Steel TE naturally flowing in the Steel/Fairy pokemon. The page is dated over a month back, coinciding with their time in Dewford, and after reading a few lines, Lee remembers wondering how Mawile was able to wield her extra jaws without snapping the thin, delicate-looking termination point on the back of her head. Some sort of passive Steel TE reinforcement was the only thing he could think of.

"Huh, I thought I had more pages left…" Lee mutters.

'You put your thoughts to paper more often than you think, beloved. I'm glad for it, for your head seems to be filled to bursting so often that I need to repeat myself sometimes.'

The words are quiet yet attention-commanding at the same time, and hearing them sends a goosebump-inducing shiver down Lee's spine. He slowly raises his head back to Ninetales, who offers a small, vulpine smile.

'I don't want to cut your studies short, but you're not the only one excited to learn what I can do now,' the golden fox's tails flick as one, though each tail goes in a different direction. 'Also if you wish to pet me, you don't need an excuse to do so,' she looks down at the hand still submerged into her tuft of breast fur with amusement coloring her words.

Lee withdraws his hand quickly, his face growing warm in embarrassment. "Sorry…"

Offense flashes in Ninetales' eyes, so she stands on the bed and takes a single long stride towards Lee. She slips her head under his chin and drapes her forelegs across his lap as she lays down, pressing her warm, silken coat to him. Around his back, Lee feels those nine long tails curl around him, and the warmth makes him want to lay back and sleep, to push off the rest of what he wanted to do today.

'You've nothing to be sorry for, so please don't say that,' she 'says', her 'voice' firm.

Almost without meaning to, Lee wraps his arms around her and melts into the affection woven into each of her words.

Ever since her evolution just a few hours prior, the number of changes Ninetales went through has left Lee with a light head, and part of him still feels like he stepped into a vivid dream that might end any second. His ace pokemon's transformation from a cute, fire-breathing fox to a majestic kitsune of legend had so many effects, but none more profound than what changed inside her head.

The most striking is her telepathy, the words she speaks. Before, the words had meaning and Lee got the gist of what Vulpix said by meeting her understanding of human words and concepts halfway. These words were only raw meaning fed into his brain, usually accompanied by some abstract thought or emotions for context. For these reasons, Vulpix always kept her sentences short and to the point. If Lee was feeling fanciful, he might have even imagined a voice in his head when conversing with her.

Ninetales, however, exists on a totally different plane of telepathic expertise. Lee hears what she says near exactly how she intends to say it. It's like every depiction of telepathy in popular media, a reverberation of her speech inside of his skull, only so much more. Each word is honeyed with woven emotion and intent, and like a man savoring a delectable morsel, his brain eagerly takes in every single word and just knows what she means. A rich, feminine voice seems to accompany every transmission, and although Lee can't describe the voice in words alone, it's distinctly Ninetales.

Lee's 'heard' more from Ninetales in the past three hours than he has in the last week as well, for her mind is an open book to him and she delights in reaching out to him in turn. Each thought, each sentence, is interlaced with love and emotion so pure and unmistakable that Lee wonders if he ever misread Ninetales before her evolution. If he did, he silently ponders how often it happened.

Ninetales doesn't shy away from reveling in the newfound insight between them, either. The demure and quiet shell of Vulpix has split open, revealing a more outspoken, more prideful vixen with all the tender love and firm spirit of her prior form.

She's changed so much…

"God, you're soft…" Lee murmurs into the tuft between Ninetales' ears.

One of her ears flicks, and Lee's eyes are drawn to the snow-white heart mark still on the back of her ear. Against the golden fur, it's a chore to pick out under fluorescent lights, but the mark remains.

She's changed so much, yet so little.

'I think I have you to thank for that,' Ninetales makes that warm, familiar purr deep in her throat. 'Without a trainer to spoil me with homemade meals and all the grooming I could ever want, this envy-inducing coat would be beyond me.'

Lee smiles but sobers a moment later. 'Ninetales?' He begins mentally. 'How do you feel?'

The vixen shifts in Lee's arms, raising her head enough to peer at him with a ruby eye. 'How do I feel? What do you mean?' The question genuinely confuses her.

'Just… in general, I suppose.' Lee struggles to put his concerns into words, and after a moment, just opens up his raw worries to Ninetales, hoping she'll understand.

The fox takes the invitation wordlessly, reaching across the short but wide psychic channel between them to touch the deeper parts of his mind directly. Like a balm, her presence instantly soothes his nerves and returns him to relaxation.

'Oh?' Ninetales blinks, then smiles gently. 'I feel fine, beloved. Better than fine, in fact. I feel good, complete. Perhaps I was upset with Moore for springing a proposal with such a damning time limit upon us, but in retrospect, I find myself thankful.' She pauses to corral a tail Lee feels moving on its own, covering the cold spot it left on his back. 'These tails seem to have a mind of their own, sometimes…' She muses before returning to her other train of thought. 'If not for such a time limit, I might have hesitated for months, maybe years. I could feel my skills beginning to reach their limits as a Vulpix, and before long I would have begun to fall behind. I could not let that happen.' Her brows furrow and Lee finds himself surprised by the range of motion her face has. 'While you have been conversing with Mable…' The golden fox hesitates. 'I have been speaking to her Xatu regarding my own demons.'

"Your own demons?" Lee doesn't recall ever actually meeting the aforementioned Xatu, but that takes the backseat to the pit he feels opening up in his stomach. "Ninetales? You said a while back that you wanted to wait until your telepathy was better before explaining why you've been losing so much sleep. I can understand you pretty well now, so…"

Ninetales is silent for a full minute. Then she breathes out a short sigh. 'I'm still not sure I want to say,' she sends after some time, and the naked uncertainty in her voice prompts Lee to hold her a little tighter. 'I don't want to burden you with my concerns when you've yourself to worry about.'

"Knowing you have 'concerns' that warrant speaking with a therapist is already enough for me to worry over," Lee mutters. "I won't push you, but I wish you'd tell me."

The great fox's tails all quiver before settling, sending a rippling sensation down Lee's back. 'There were a few things, but now, I think I can put them to bed.' Ninetales sets her head against Lee's chest, an ear pressed flat over his heart. 'The first was my birth.'

'Your birth?'

'Yes,' she physically nods. 'I've spent weeks pondering it. How was I born? Why was I born? I know I'm flesh and blood, so I'm no Porygon, yet my appearance at your side happened just as your little game lost bits of data and ceased functioning.' She blinks her luminous reds. 'The memories of the time before we truly met are long gone, faded into a mess of alien sensations devoid of meaning. For all intents and purposes, I did not exist until you opened my ball.'

Goosebumps break out across Lee's skin despite the warm cocoon of fur around him. He barely even considered where Vulpix was before she was dropped into his lap. Was she suffering an existential crisis while he never noticed?!

'Shush, I'm the one who kept my woes hidden,' Ninetales growls and raises her head to nip the tip of Lee's nose, halting his spiraling thoughts. 'Besides, after all my sleepless nights spent looking for answers, I came to one of my own just moments before evolving.'

'One of your own?' Lee rubs his smarting nose. 'What do you mean?'

Ninetales' smile returns. It's a tender expression, one that fills the zoologist with contentment, both his own and hers. 'I decided that the hows and whys don't matter,' she declares. 'I refused to leave your side after you endured such a horrific ordeal those months ago, and you repaid my loyalty thricefold with your dedication to me. You, Lee, give me purpose in this world. Goodness deserves goodness, and love deserves love, this I know to be fact. If a greater power was involved in my birth for a reason of their own, then I spurn their designs.'

She raises her head, ruby eyes quite literally glowing. 'I exist to be here with you, to love and be loved, because that is what I have decided, and that is a choice all my own.'

Between them, Lee can almost see the psychic channel widen to a degree they've never been able to accomplish before, becoming a vast gulf. Ninetales reaches out to him, and rather than transmit whatever it is she wants, she instead reels his mind towards hers.

The distance grows shorter and shorter, until finally the channel is needed no longer.

Lee and Ninetales touch.

A flood of rapturous sensations overwhelms the man's senses near instantly. His vision swims with a kaleidoscope of colors that he can't name, his nerves thrum, his ears are filled with the sound of a waterfall, and everything but the pokemon holding him ceases to be. The world around them falls away, shattering like glass, leaving behind a strange and new place where words fail.

He feels Ninetales. He feels her for who she truly is, and he knows every bit of raw ardor she holds within her.

All of it is for him.

Unfettered thoughts and urges flow freely between man and fox, and all is laid bare without shame or judgment. A small, lucid part of Lee laughs at a stray memory where they both claimed to know everything about each other. Hyperbole at its finest.

Lee lays down all his worries, fears, insecurities, and laments. Worries for the future, fear of failing her and everyone else, insecurity over his disfigured visage, and the lament of the burned world left behind. Like weights, they all seek to drag him to somewhere low.

Ninetales bears her own hurts. The dread of losing her trainer and teammates, the gnawing disquiet of peering into The End, the nightmares of seeing the end of a world, and the lingering doubt of her evolution and how Lee might perceive her. They all pull her in different directions, stretching her sanity until tears begin to form.

Then, pokemon and trainer entwine themselves around one another, quashing what plagues them simply by being together. Hand in hand, they stand tall and invulnerable, their individual troubles seeming so laughably easy to manage. It leaves them free to lay in a bubbling basin of shared adoration for a well-deserved break from the world.

For the first time in many months, everything is okay.


Lee isn't sure how long he and Ninetales are wherever they are, for time seems like a foreign concept there, in that blissful nexus where he and his truest partner meet. Slowly, though, sensation returns to his body and the colors without names draw back as Ninetales pulls her mind away from his with great reluctance. Part of Lee wishes to reach out and stubbornly grasp her once more, but he knows just as well as she does that they can't sit here all day. He still takes a greedy sort of solace in keeping his arms around Ninetales tightly, however.

After a long moment, the golden fox chuffs out a short laugh. 'While I have no issues sitting here and cuddling all night, we should be going. We've much to do.'

"I guess…" Lee grumbles, letting her go. He watches his pokemon stand with a stretch, then a full-body shake, making her shiny coat ripple. "Ninetales?"

The fox turns her head to him after hopping from the bed to the floor, regarding him with a smile. 'Yes?'

The zoologist smiles back. All at once, a pleasant, tingling lightness of spirit that he hasn't truly felt for months fills his chest, and his smile becomes a genuine, happy grin. "Thank you for telling me what was bothering you."

'You deserved to know,' she sniffs. 'We're partners, now and forever,' she says simply.

Lee stands and raises his arms in a pleasant, back-popping stretch. He watches in amusement as Ninetales arches her back for a second in response, feeling the pop secondhand. "Partners now and forever, eh? I like it, but that's another line we'll want to keep between us, lest people get ideas," he steps into his boots and laces them.

Ninetales rolls her eyes. 'Goodness me, inconsequential strangers might have inconsequential opinions. How terrible…'

Lee lets out a short laugh and steps closer, laying a hand on her head and rubbing his thumb over the heart mark on her ear. The white fur is somehow even softer than the rest of her coat. "No more secrets between us?"

'Never,' she shakes her head. 'Now, let's be off.'

Ninetales noses Lee's hand towards the door leaving the room. Her ruby eyes take on a violet hue, and a telekinetic corona of the same color covers the doorknob. Then with a twist and a pull…

…The sturdy metal door comes right out of its frame with a jerk so violent that it shakes dust from the ceiling. The hinges make a tortured, metallic squeal before the threading of their screws gives way, letting the hinges pop free with a sound like a gunshot and leaving the door floating lopsided in Ninetales' telekinesis.

Lee and Ninetales stand motionless, both still processing what just happened.

Across the hall, the door opposite of Lee and Ninetales' opens up, and a grumpy Loudred stands with a scowl on his face. He draws in a chest-filling breath and opens his mouth, a hundred-decibel tirade likely ready, but the sound pokemon takes notice of the dislodged door. His eyes then move to Lee, then finally down to the still-surprised Ninetales.

Slowly, carefully, and with his breath hissing out through his nostrils, the Loudred steps back inside and shuts the door, the lock clicking afterward.

Ninetales hangs her head and sets the door down against the wall with painstaking slowness before letting her telekinesis fade. Even if Lee can't see it, he knows she's blushing beet red in embarrassment under her coat.

"Ahhh don't worry, I'm sure you can get the hang of it after a few hours," Lee does his best to keep his smile from being awkward and rubs Ninetales between her shoulders, though he doesn't feel her mood improve much. "Look on the bright side. You went from being able to levitate maybe twenty pounds to-" He eyeballs the door. "-to however much that door weighs and then some."

'And I just caused several hundred credits worth of damage that you're going to have to pay for…' She remarks sullenly, finally raising her head and frowning mightily.

With a sigh, Lee shrugs. "Shinx has chewed on chair legs and Grovyle accidentally carved up a lamp after he evolved." His thumb rubs a circle between the dejected fox's shoulder blades. "You were going to join the club eventually."


The visit to the hotel's front desk is less painful than expected. After confirming the damage was an accident, the young woman tending to the lobby only requires a flat 250 credit fee and a signature on an insurance form. Yet again, Lee finds himself surprised when he knows he shouldn't be, as it only makes sense for lodgings catering to pokemon trainers to hedge themselves against pokemon-related damage. The last few times (mostly from poor Shinx teething on anything she could), the damage was so minor that Lee just paid it out of pocket and insurance was never involved.

After a text message to Brendan, Courtney, and Zinnia, Lee and Ninetales begin the trek over to the Pokemon Center to both meet up with the rest of their traveling party and visit Octillery.

As they walk through Lavaridge, Lee can't help but smile with a childish sort of satisfaction as more than a few people and pokemon marvel at Ninetales as they pass.

Back in Slateport, something similar happened and they got to play witness to it. A man, obviously a pro-trainer from the medley of Greatballs and single Ultraball on his belt, strolled through town with a Haxorus at his side.

The Haxorus was a stunning pokemon to behold. Nearly seven feet tall and oozing menace with each step. He would slowly crane his head around, taking in the gaping people all around without truly acknowledging them, like they were beneath him. With each movement of his head, no matter the speed, the crimson axe blades lining his jaw would make a quiet whistle as they sliced the air with their fine edge. The prized Dragon commanded the attention of everyone who could see him like a king, and his subjects rewarded him with the flash of cameras and awed exclamations of admiration. The world of pokemon revolves around power at its core, after all, and few things so boldly declare power like a Dragon few have seen in person.

If Haxorus was admired for his plainly visible might and rugged aesthetic, then much the same is happening to Ninetales for the mysticism and beauty her kind exudes.

'Well, the beauty part I already knew, but I don't think a rare pokemon would get this kind of reaction.' Lee tries to keep his face straight, but no matter the effort, a smile remains on his lips. He sweeps his eyes around, watching as people slow down to stare at both himself and Ninetales. More than one cell phone and PokeNav is raised to take pictures along with a number of pointed fingers and murmurs, but even the annoyance of their last vestiges of anonymity being stripped away bit by bit doesn't make the zoologist's face fall.

Ninetales pays the people in the streets no mind. She walks with her head held high and prowls across the ground on silent, dainty paws. Her long tails trail behind her, each one slowly waving and flowing through its own invisible air current, but never touching the ground. In the waning sunlight, her eyes glow with a vivid, inner light, and her fur shines with a glorious luster. She cuts so magnificent and dignified a figure, no one would ever guess she clumsily ripped a door down not twenty minutes prior.

The nine-tailed fox twitches. 'I'm going to be hearing about that for a while, aren't I?'

'It's not often I get something to tease you about, love.' Lee smirks.

The annoyance radiating from Ninetales is quickly soothed when Lee reaches down and runs his fingers through the tuft of fur along her head, ending with a gentle scratch behind an ear.

They arrive at the Pokemon Center with time to spare, owing to the fact that the crowded streets parted before them without so much of a word of fuss. Walking inside, Lee and Ninetales approach the reception desk, finding Lavaridge's Nurse Joy in her usual seat diligently typing away at her computer.

Joy looks up, then smiles when she notices the pair. To Lee's admiration, she doesn't even blink at seeing Ninetales. 'She's probably seen crazier things.'

"Good afternoon Mister Henson, Miss Ninetales," Nurse Joy stands and folds her hands in front of her. "Are you here to see Octillery?"

Having seen this particular nurse several times in the last week, Lee can finally pick out the differences between her and the Nurse Joy in Littleroot, the only other Joy Lee can say he's well acquainted with. Littleroot's Joy is a bit shorter, and her voice higher. The resemblance the Joy family's women all share is still astounding, though. The genes governing their appearance must be truly overwhelming.

"That we are," Lee nods. "How is he doing?"

Joy's smile widens a touch. "Very well. Octillery's recovery is moving along smoothly, and he's remained both conscious and lucid the entire day today. After he passed some cognitive tests, we informed him of your timely rescue. He seems quite curious to meet you. Just one moment please…" Joy touches a button on an electronic badge hanging from her breast pocket, prompting the gadget to play a little jingle. "Rita? I have Lee Henson to visit patient Octillery in the aquatic ward. Can you send a technician to the front to escort him, please? He'll be accompanied by his Ninetales."

The badge crackles. "Yes, Nurse Joy. Kim is on her way."

"Thank you!" Nurse Joy sing-songs before releasing the button. "You may find a seat if you like, Mister Henson. One of our intern nurses will be with you shortly."

"Thank you, nurse," Lee smiles.

The Pokemon Center of Lavaridge is set up like most of the centers they've visited before it in that there are plenty of seats arranged in columns and aisles for pokemon owners and their pokemon without emergency ailments. In the corners are larger, more open areas with wrap-around couches along the wall forming lounges of sorts. Although Lee can't be sure if it was intentional, the different seating types are used by different sorts of people. The regular seating is dominated by average people and the pokemon in their lives, while the more comfortable corners are held by camps of road-beaten trainers.

Venturing over to one of the less occupied corners, Lee seats himself at a respectable distance away from the other three trainers there. At his feet, Ninetales sits regally and wraps her tails around her legs… Or most of her tails. One errant tail escapes and lays itself across Lee's lap, wiggling like a snake.

Idly, the scarred trainer lets his fingers run through the soft fur of the appendage, but he takes care to not fully wrap his hand around it. 'Is the curse real, I wonder? Can its activation be controlled if it's real? There's more folklore than scientific data on Ninetales as a species, so we have so much to do.'

'You're thinking rather loudly, beloved,' Ninetales angles her head to look back at Lee with a smile. 'And don't worry about any curses. I think I would know if I suddenly possessed such an ability,' she says, wrapping the tail in his lap around his hand with surprising dexterity.

'Your tails are prehensile, too. There's a lot we could do with that,' Lee feels her tail squeeze his hand lightly. Silky fur doesn't provide the best grip, but… 'Maybe we should begin working on Iron Tail again.'

'It would certainly work better now,' Ninetales comments dryly.

As he and Ninetales wordlessly communicate, Lee takes notice of the conversation happening on the other bend of the L-shaped couch from the corner of his eye. Or rather, he takes notice of how quiet the three other trainers have become. Two of them are teen boys in travel-worn clothes, and sitting between them is a teen girl maybe a year older with sun-bleached blonde hair. In the girl's lap is a small Teddiursa who suckles on one of his forepaws and peers at Ninetales with open apprehension. All three trainers sport healing sunburns, but they don't let any discomfort keep them from leaning toward one another to exchange whispers. One boy steals a glance at Ninetales, then Lee.

Lee doesn't even need to ask, as Ninetales feeds him what her much sharper ears pick up.

"If you're gonna ask, now is the time," One of the teen boys whispers to their female companion. "He doesn't look like the Contest type, though."

"Maybe, but look at that Ninetales!" She hisses back. "That fur is practically glowing even in artificial light! How do you do that? That alone could be big points if you get the lighting right in a Contest!"

"Okay, so ask Mugsy over there for hair-care tips and see what he has to say," The second boy smirks.

"..." The teen girl looks at Lee. Without even directly looking at them, Lee can tell the trio, or at least the girl, are intimidated.

'Mugsy?' Lee frowns and resists the urge to rub his burn scars.

'Perhaps say something?' Ninetales prompts Lee with a yawn. 'There were an impressive number of cameras following us here, and a drop of kindness in the sea of gossip will make bigger waves than most might expect.' She lets her eyes scan the lobby of the Center, and through them, Lee can see that more than a few conversations have petered out as people notice them.

'When did you get so people-savvy?'

'One of us has to be,' the fox teases.

Lee grumbles to himself about cheeky vulpines before speaking. "You three seem like you have something on your mind," he says, finally turning his head to face the other trainers.

All of the younger trainers jump, visibly spooked. They all exchange hasty looks, then the girl speaks up. "Yeah, uh, hi! I'm just wondering what kind of grooming routine you use for your Ninetales? I'm trying for the Grand Festival this year, which is a big pokemon coordinator thing, but uh, you probably knew that haha," her words rapidly spill out past her nervous smile, and in her lap, her Teddiursa shifts in discomfort. "The judges get real picky in the festival about a lot of things, and I heard rumors that one judge is on this fur obsession kinda thing recently, and the conditioner I've been using on Teddy hasn't done much, so I was hoping for a hint if it's not stepping on your toes or anything?" She says all in one breath.

"Is that all?" Lee blinks. "I'm not sure how well my advice will work for you, but I can share a bit before we have to go."

The girl hugs her Teddiursa close and leans forward in open interest, nerves forgotten. Even her more battle-oriented friends seem focused on Lee.

"Ninetales' grooming routine is nothing special, all things considered," Lee begins, reaching out and stroking his ace pokemon across her neck. She leans into the touch with a smile.

"I only brush her coat once a week or after a battle, whichever comes first. One pass with a slicker brush, then another with a pin brush. This'll remove dirt, loose hair, and fluff up pokemon who have medium to long overcoats with an undercoat. Pokemon are hardy creatures, so you don't need to brush them often." Lee leans forward and digs his hands into the fur on Ninetales' shoulders, giving the skin underneath a rub that makes the fox pokemon visibly relax. "There's nothing wrong with fancy shampoo and whatnot, but take care to not bathe your pokemon too often. Too many baths will wash out the natural oils in a mammal pokemon's coat, which are produced by the skin. Conditioner, shampoo, or whatever else can dry out the skin as well, and there is no healthy fur without healthy skin, so ensure you're not using products that are too harsh. It might be tempting to use the latest and greatest pokemon beautification product, but it pays big time to do your due diligence and scrutinize just what exactly you're using."

Seeing all of the kids, Teddiursa included, paying close attention, Lee smiles. "Diet plays a large role as well."

"Diet? Like what a pokemon eats?" One boy on the left asks.

"Exactly," Lee nods. "Regular Pokemart brand chow is fine… I guess…" He can't quite keep his distaste for the pre-packaged food and their lack of ingredient transparency hidden. "But every pokemon has different nutritional and caloric needs that will fluctuate based on their activity level. If you're wanting to ensure a healthy, shiny coat in mammals, then you'll want to be sure their food has an appropriate amount of protein, vitamins A, C, and E, dietary copper, dietary zinc, Omega-3, Omega-6, and other fatty acids," he lists each one off on his fingers. "Don't neglect other vitamins, minerals, and nutrients to try and overcorrect any sort of deficiency, though, as that'll only cause more damage. Deficiencies should be handled with marginal and supplemental increases of the lacking nutrients. Never whiplash back or forth, or your pokemon's health will take a nosedive."

The boy on the left is beginning to look lost, but the other two kids still pay rapt attention. The girl even pulls out her phone to quickly jot down what he's saying, though she has to hold her arm out quite a ways so Teddiursa's curious paws don't claw at the screen.

"I take it you're using your Teddiursa in your contests?" Lee asks.

The girl nods absently, still typing his words with rapid-fire thumbstrokes. "Yeah, I'm training my baby Teddy here for the contest up in Fallarbor."

Slowly, Lee rises and steps closer to the pair, making both the girl and Teddy go still until Lee bends down to one knee and catches the bear cub's eyes with his own.

"Do you mind if I touch you, Teddy?" Lee keeps his voice quiet and presents his hand, showing it to be empty.

The young Normal-type pokemon gazes down at the offered hand, then up to his trainer as if asking for support.

"It'll be fine, Teddy. He seems like a nice man," the blonde girl smiles and hugs her pokemon a little tighter.

Assurance in hand, Teddy returns his attention to Lee and offers a single meek nod.

With a smile of his own, Lee reaches the rest of the way out and gently strokes the cub across his crescent-moon-marked forehead up to the top of his scalp and between his ears. Once, twice, three times he runs his fingers through the cub's fur, feeling both the hair and the skin underneath.

Despite his earlier apprehension, Teddy relaxes under the touch. When Lee pulls away and stands, the cub even whines.

'So much easier than trying to pet a real bear.'

Ninetales holds back a foxy chortle as she watches that college memory from the back seat.

"While I haven't worked with ursids extensively, Teddy's skin and fur feel a bit dry. Otherwise, it looks like he's in excellent health." The former zookeeper comments with a grin. "Well done. That can be tricky for traveling trainers. I suggest double-checking whatever bathing products you're using to see if they're suitable for younger pokemon or pokemon with sensitive skin. If they are, then remember to not over bathe. I know it doesn't make sense that water can cause dry skin, but the shampoo is the real culprit."

"Mister Henson? Your Octillery is ready for visitors."

Lee looks to the side, finding a nurse in blue scrubs standing and waiting for him. Under the electronic badge similar to the one Nurse Joy is wearing is a nametag with Kim scrawled on it.

"I've got to get going. It's been a pleasure talking to you kids." Lee smiles at the trio of trainers one more time.

The boy on the left, the one who grew lost during Lee's miniature lecture, grins in return. His other male friend crosses his arms and nods, schooling his face into something neutral. Their friend in the middle though…

The blonde girl stares up at Lee with her lips twitching, as if she can't decide on her expression. Her slowly reddening cheeks give away her thoughts, however.

'Wonderful, another May…' Lee doesn't roll his eyes even if he's sorely tempted.

Ninetales' amusement is almost palpable as she rises and falls into step with Lee, following the nurse leading them to the rear of the Pokemon Center. 'You did well with those three,' she sends. 'The tension in the lobby lessened considerably when you spoke up.'

'Did it?' Lee wonders as they turn down a hallway leading to the different Center wards. 'I didn't even notice.'

'You were rather engrossed with your short lesson.' A tail flicks and Ninetales blinks. 'I was keeping watch, though. Your display of kindness and knowledge will go far, and people will remember it.'

Lee moves to the side of the hall along with the nurse and Ninetales, letting a Chansey escorting a hobbling and grumpy-looking Croconaw pass by. 'Not only people-savvy, but looking that far ahead? If we ever get famous for some reason, I might leave all the PR stuff to you.'

'I'm certain some nosy reporter who won't take no for an answer will appreciate me once fireballs are involved,' Ninetales wryly states.

The Pokemon Center nurse, Kim, leads Lee and Ninetales back to the Water-type ward and leads them inside. The hum of pumps and the hiss of filters are familiar by now, but Lee is glad to see none of them are for Octillery.

Sitting on a low, metal table in a shallow, rubber-lined bowl of water the size of a kiddie pool, Octillery perks up and uncoils his tentacles as Lee, Ninetales, and the nurse approach.

"Hi sweetheart," the nurse greets the octopus with a practiced smile. "Your trainer is here to visit you. I'll give you guys some privacy, okay? I'll be right outside the ward, so just let me know if you need anything."

"Thanks, nurse," Lee thanks the woman, who nods politely before heading to the ward's exit.

Octillery's sharp eyes scan Ninetales intently, obviously sizing her up. When the fox returns his gaze unflinchingly, the octopus allows himself to focus on Lee. Octillery waves a tentacle at them and gurgles deep in his throat, ending the sound with a distinctly inquisitive lilt.

"It's nice to meet you properly, Octillery," Lee offers his hand for the red octopus to inspect, and Octillery wastes no time raising a curious tentacle to meet the hand halfway. The tentacle wrapping around his hand and between his fingers is a bit cold, soaking wet, and frankly a little unpleasant, but Lee soldiers on. "You were in quite a bit of peril when we first met, and I'm happy you're looking so much better now."

Octillery's tentacle slows in its inspection of Lee's hand, and the cephalopod gives a pointed look to the pokeballs on the man's belt.

"I did have to catch you to safely move you, yes," Lee admits without any shame. "I don't know if you realized it or not, but the pond you were…" He almost says 'hiding in', but decides against it just in case Octillery turns out to be prideful "...laying claim to turned out to be toxic. It addled your mind and body something fierce, and we had to bring you here to be treated because I didn't have the tools needed to help in the field."

The red octopus's other tentacles coil and uncoil in what seems to be self-directed irritation if how he looks down with narrowed eyes are any worthwhile tell. Before that irritation can be directed somewhere else, namely the wrist Octillery is still grasping, Lee makes his offer.

"I know you didn't really get to consent on this," Lee calmly continues. "So that's why I want to make you an offer."

Octillery's eyes narrow further in suspicion.

"You're a powerful pokemon, Octillery, and my team would really benefit from your companionship," Lee struggles to not fidget when the octopus' hold on him tightens slightly. "If you want to stay and battle with us, then I promise to care for you and see you become the best you can be. If not, then say the word and I'll take you back to the Valley and let you go."

The warning grip on Lee's wrist slackens, and Octillery makes no effort to hide his confusion. He tilts his head to the side with another gurgle, and Lee feels one of the tentacle's suckers grip the underside of his wrist intently for some reason. Once more, Octillery makes the same inquisitive burble, staring directly into Lee's eyes.

"I mean every word," the scarred man promises.

For a minute, Octillery looks down, lost in thought. Then he turns his attention to Ninetales, burbling a question.

The vixen responds with a gentle smile, and from her mouth comes a rich, rolling growl that tapers off into a warm purr. Her eyes shine, and Lee feels her affection for him bubble for a second.

The octopus's eyes widen, almost bugging out before he composes himself. Gently, he pulls his tentacle away from Lee and settles back in his pool of water. He stares off at nothing, tentacles stilling in thought. He remains so for almost ten minutes, and just as Lee begins to wonder what is troubling the Water-type, Octillery snaps out of his little trance. He smiles as best as he can with his nozzle-like mouth before giving Lee a cheery nod of his large head.

"You want to stay?" Lee asks hopefully.

Octillery nods once more, actively reaching a tentacle out to the pokeballs on the man's belt.

"I'm glad to hear it," Lee intercepts the tentacle with a grin. "But the Center is wanting you to stay a few more days, and I'm in agreement. You were in serious danger of death or some permanent condition when we found you, and if there is anything I don't want, it's you suffering some sort of complication from being checked out early."

Octillery scowls and the tentacle in Lee's hand waves its tip in annoyance.

"I know it's boring in here," Lee soothes his newest pokemon as best he can with a sympathetic smile. "We'll visit every day until you're ready to go, okay? I'd introduce you to the rest of the team here, but the nurses might be a little irate if more pokemon popped in out of nowhere."

Octillery lets out a gurgling, long-suffering sigh, one that inflates and deflates his body from the breath, but he draws his tentacle back and sinks into his pool.

"Tomorrow's visit will be longer. We'd stay longer today, but there is a lot on our to-do list tonight," Lee steps a bit closer and lays his hand on Octillery's head, making the octopus look back up at him. "Hang tight, okay?"

The Water-type waves a tentacle in farewell as Lee and Ninetales step back and turn to leave.

Walking back to the front of the Pokemon Center, Lee reaches his mind out to Ninetales. 'Hey, love? What did Octillery ask you?'

'He wanted my opinion on you. I told him exactly what I thought.' She says simply.


Stepping outside the Pokemon Center, Lee and Ninetales come face-to-face with Brendan, Zinnia, and Courtney just as the trio is approaching.

"Hey, you two!" Brendan greets with a large grin. "You got here fast."

"Or maybe you all were just slow," Lee jokes. "Well, I'm happy to report that Octillery is on the home stretch of his recovery, and after talking with him, he agreed to stay on the team."

"Alright!" Brendan cheers. "It's about time you join the ranks of the best type!" Then he looks at Ninetales' narrowed eyes and amends himself. "Er, no offense, Ninetales."

Lee chuckles to himself. "Is now a good time to tell you that Ninetales can learn Solarbeam?"

Brendan's face goes white at Ninetales' smirk. Behind him, Zinnia holds her stomach and openly guffaws.

Beside Zinnia, Courtney blinks. "Can they actually learn Solarbeam?"

Lee realizes he misspoke a second later. In video games, Ninetales can learn Solarbeam no problem from a TM, but here where her kind are almost mythical? Knowing such a thing is going to look suspect.

"I have a few theorems on the subject of near-dual-type moves like Solarbeam that point to why other Fire-types like Charizard can learn it," Lee doesn't fumble for an answer on that one since he actually does have a few pages of thoughts on Solarbeam. "Ninetales is officially a Fire-type, but she can flex pretty well into Ghost and Psychic as well, so I see Solarbeam as perfectly possible."

'Remind me to not blab too much on your species, love. We need to wait a few weeks before I can pretend I know what I'm talking about.'

'By then you'll actually know what you're talking about, but I'll remember regardless,' she answers with a snuffle.

Lee inwardly scoffs even if her genuine confidence in him makes his chest warm. "Anyway," he returns back to talking with the others. "Ninetales and I were going to go test out her new abilities before dinner. My Pokedex says she learned Double Team and Extrasensory upon evolving-"

'Along with a wealth of "Unknown" moves. We'll test those in private.'

"-So I was hoping to practice them along with her other moves to see if anything has changed."

Zinnia grins a savage grin at his words and steps closer. "Testing everything out, huh?" The purr of her voice is grossly out-of-place with her expression. "Why not try everything out in a battle?"

Lee's brows furrow. "A battle with a totally untested roster of techniques?" He crosses his arms. "I'm not sure about that. It took Grovyle a week to get back up to his rigorous standards after his evolution. I imagine Ninetales will be much the same."

"Sometimes it's better to learn how to run before you walk, and you've got a Gym battle here in about a week," Zinnia points a finger at Lee, and in the hand pointing the finger is a shrunken pokeball. "Don't tell me you aren't eager to find out how well Ninetales fights."

"I do want to know what she's capable of, but I want to do so in a controlled manner," with his arms still crossed, Lee drums his fingers along his arms in thought. "Zinnia," he starts carefully. "I'm not throwing shade at you or your pokemon, but I genuinely don't know how strong Ninetales is. She might injure another pokemon more than she intends to unless we know what we're working with."

"You're worried about a Dragon getting beat up by a Fire-type? Really?" When Lee doesn't budge, Zinnia slumps her shoulders. "Dolittle, you're such a stick in the mud sometimes," she moans, throwing her head back. "C'mon. Just a one-on-one, Shelgon versus Ninetales?"

'It's high time I repay Shelgon for the loss in Oldale, so I've no objections.' Ninetales supplies to Lee. 'I'll take care to start slow, and if you decide the match is over for any reason, I'll bow out.'

'Are you still upset over that?' Lee wonders. He's already put the event long behind him.

'Perhaps a little.'

With both Ninetales and Zinnia's desires in mind, Lee mulls everything over once more. "If you insist, Zinnia…" Lee reluctantly agrees. "But we're going to take it slow from the start, and if it gets out of hand then the battle is over, okay?"

"Lee…" Zinnia puts her hands on her hips and levels him with a harsh glare.

Lee sighs and raises his hands in surrender. "Fine, we'll do as best as we reasonably can."


Zinnia can't help but shiver under her cloak. Not from the cool evening air, but from the sheer anticipation of what might be her and Shelgon's toughest battle to date.

She knew Lee would become something special, and here he is proving her correct. The crazy man got his hands on a million-credit Fire Stone and sent the potential of his ace pokemon into the stratosphere. To think they're only going to go up from here is both humbling and excitement-inducing. How kind of him to aid her on the endless quest of Lorekeeper power consolidation, even if it's by accident.

Battling with Lee and Brendan nearly every day for months has done more for Zinnia's pokemon than years of wandering have. Swablu's evolution can't be more than a month away, Goomy is finally coming into his own as a Dragon, and Shelgon…

Shelgon has never been more determined in his life. He's thrown himself into each spar, and his place as the strongest pokemon of the group has been under attack by Vulpix and Marshtomp every single day. The pressure to remain at the top has magnified his growth to such a level that Zinnia finds herself awed by him sometimes. It's still far too early to tell, but Zinnia's instincts whisper in her ear, pointing out patterns and reminding her of just who Shelgon is.

The dragon blood rushing through her veins tells her that Shelgon could be a Yearling, a Dragon that sees his third evolution from the first in less than a year. All he needs to do is go just a little faster. The only thing that could motivate him more is being knocked from his place as the mightiest of their traveling band of misfits.

Ninetales… she might be the one to do it.

Across from her, Lee stands with his hands held in his pockets and his face masked with neutrality. Zinnia knows the dork is probably nervous under his torn-up mug and his hands are out of sight so he doesn't twiddle his fingers.

She can see why he's nervous. Off to the side with Brendan, Courtney, and the rest of the group's pokemon are more than a few onlookers from Lavaridge who followed along. Watching a group of obvious trainers and a gaggle of rare pokemon strolling through town towards a battleground gathered a small crowd of twenty or so people to watch. Lee, being so polite it straddles the line of being awkward, refused to tell anyone to buzz off.

On Lee's side of the rocky battlefield, Ninetales mirrors her trainer's faux-cool perfectly. She sits, aloof and almost bored-looking with all those tails waving around her. Despite how non-threatening the fox presents herself as, Zinnia's heart beats a bit faster, a bit harder, and those instincts in her dragon-rich blood hiss warnings into her ear with an urgency previously reserved for rampaging Dragons.

Danger hangs around Ninetales like a cloak, and Zinnia couldn't be more eager.

In front of her, Shelgon stands ready to fight. Even now, the stoicism of his species refuses to break, but Zinnia still sees the slight, anxious bounce in his thick limbs. For any Shelgon, it's akin to openly growling.

"Everyone, move back away from the edge of the battleground. This match may get out of hand and we don't have a Psychic to maintain a barrier!" Lee calls out to all the onlookers, swiping a hand through the air.

Wisely, everyone heeds his words and takes a few steps backwards, Brendan and Courtney included.

"Brendan!" Lee turns to the kid. "Ref for us?"

The kid grins and runs up the side of the arena, his Marshtomp stomping along. He clears his throat into his fist. "This'll be a one-on-one match! Lee and Ninetales versus Zinnia and Shelgon! The battle will go until one pokemon cannot fight any longer! Are both sides ready?"

Zinnia's blood is beginning to scream for the battle before her, and she shows it to everyone. "Ready!" she roars, clenching her fists as a plan takes form in her head.

Shelgon growls.

Lee's nod is short. "Ready."

Brendan raises an arm, Marshtomp mirroring him. Then as one, both chop their arms down. "Begin!"

"Rollout!" Zinnia's command is almost instant. 'Ninetales was always a ranged attacker as a Vulpix. Close the distance and stay relentless.'

Shelgon goes from still into a whirling steel ball kicking up gravel in less than a second. A second later, he gets traction and shoots across the ground like a cannonball, aiming to flatten Ninetales.

Ninetales' eyes narrow into hateful red slits, and with a shimmer, a dozen illusionary clones surround her. Each fox rises to its paws and scatters around the arena with lightning swiftness.

"Abort and sweep with Dragon Pulse!" Zinnia switches gears seamlessly. 'No command.' She looks up to Lee, but he simply stands there with unfocused eyes. 'Telepathy from the gate? Lee is getting bold.' She tries to follow his eyes to divine the real Ninetales, but he keeps his gaze locked forward.

Shelgon throws his limbs out and stops himself cold, his claws pulverizing the ground. He opens his mouth, a tornado of dragonic blue energy forming in his throat. He spins in a tight circle, throwing the beam of Dragon Pulse in every direction.

The beam is fast, too fast for the doppelgangers. Some try to jump away, but Dragon Pulse shreds the flimsy illusions, leaving fluttering sparkles of Normal-energy that wink out like embers.

Zinnia grins madly when she sees the last Ninetales get enveloped by Dragon Pulse. 'First blood goes to us!'

Then the Ninetales vanishes like tissue paper in a blender, rent down to nothing.

'...What?'

Shelgon blinks in surprise as well and cuts off his attack. He whirls around on his feet, searching for his foe frantically.

Zinnia blanks out for a moment, scanning the field intently for the fox, only to find nothing. She doesn't notice the ever-so-slight shimmer in the air behind Shelgon until it's too late.

Ninetales reappears from nowhere, dropping her Feint Attack cloak directly behind Shelgon. The coat of light-bending Dark makes a slight crackle as it falls, and Shelgon whirls around so violently that he tears into the rocky ground.

He turns just in time to stare into sinister red eyes that glow - no, beam with unnatural power.

The encased dragon grunts as his limbs fail him and he falls to his side, helplessly seizing.

"Shelgon, snap out of it!" Zinnia orders as loudly as her voice will allow. People on the other side of Lavaridge probably hear her, but Shelgon remains squirming like a Wurmple at Ninetales' paws. 'Shit! Was that Confuse Ray?'

Before Shelgon can fight back. Ninetales' eyes glow again, this time a sickly purple. An aura of the same purple surrounds the Dragon-type as he's levitated right off the ground, held in the air several feet above Ninetales.

Shelgon strains against the telekinesis, but with Confuse Ray scrambling his motor functions so thoroughly, he can't muster the strength to break free.

"Shelgon, listen to me and break free! You have to get out of there!" Zinnia orders once more, but in her gut, she knows the battle is going downhill fast.

With a flare of Ninetales' eyes, Shelgon is slammed into the ground like the toy of an uncaring child, throwing shards of volcanic rock and knocking the breath out of the dragon with an explosive gasp. He's raised up again, slowly, then driven into the ground like a volleyball being spiked again, rattling his bones and innards.

As he rises a third time, Shelgon's pained eyes regain their lucidity and his struggles redouble, pushing hard against the telekinesis holding him aloft.

Ninetales growls and narrows her eyes, fighting to keep Shelgon in place.

'Think, Zinnia! Shelgon is out there getting stepped on!' Zinnia grits her teeth. "Shelgon! Crunch! Disrupt the TK!"

Motes of dark purple and black erupt from Shelgon's throat and coat his teeth at the command. Although his mouth is too far recessed in his shell for Crunch to be worthwhile as an attack, he still bites down.

Shelgon's Dark-infused fangs slice through the Psychic aura like butter, the Dark-type energy easily destabilizing the telekinetic hold. The entire purple aura buzzes and shatters like glass, letting the Dragon fall to his feet and turn to Ninetales with a roar…

…Only to meet a pair of glowing red eyes less than a foot away.

"Protect!" Zinnia screams, gripping Shelgon's ball so hard her knuckles go white.

The order comes far too late, as Shelgon chokes and seizes on his feet, giving Ninetales ample time to leap back to her side of the field in a flourish of tails and fur.

'...This is so fucked. How is anyone supposed to realistically fight against something like this?' The clash of titans Zinnia was expecting isn't playing out. Shelgon is still going to lose and find that motivation to break his limits, but…

…This isn't quite how Zinnia imagined it, and that's the most polite way she can put it. She glances at the onlookers.

Many of the random spectators have phones and what-not out to save the battle. A bright-eyed kid with a Pichu beside him even has a little handheld game-thing with a camera recording the fight.

Courtney, being a stoic, unflappable bitch, watches with that same flat expression she always has.

Brendan and Marshtomp both look on with dropped jaws, seemingly not believing what they're seeing. Marshtomp, however, stands partially in front of his trainer with his arms held at a low ready, still prepared to act if things get crazy despite his amazement.

With the pokemon, Lee's Grovyle watches the fight with twitching lips, as if he can't decide if he wants to smirk or frown. It makes the twig hanging from his lips dance. Shinx isn't with him, as Lee said something about wanting to introduce the baby to Ninetales somewhere calm.

Swablu, being made of sterner stuff than any would expect, watches the battle neutrally. Not yet a Dragon, seeing her Flight Lead lose isn't devastating for her.

Zinnia's heart sinks a little when she sees Goomy.

Goomy, her little booger, has never seen Shelgon in a fight so one-sided. Even back as a Bagon, Shelgon always gave as good as he got and made his few losses into pyrrhic victories for the other guy. Goomy sinks into a low puddle the longer he watches, his soul seemingly sucked out.

"Shelgon, focus on my voice and win this!" Zinnia barks at her maximum volume. "Don't go down!"

Shelgon's standing seizure comes to an end at the command, leaving the Dragon panting and stumbling on his feet, the confusion not fully passed.

Before the armored Dragon can get his bearings, Ninetales' eyes flash orange and all of her tails whip around violently. Behind her, Lee's face twitches before scrunching in focus.

In front of the nine-tailed fox, two fireballs bloom to life from nothing. The fires are fueled by nothing, and they roil and writhe more like liquid than anything else.

Then the fireballs begin to change shape.

From each one, four downward protrusions slowly drip out like melting wax. Then from the rear and front of the orbs of flame, another protrusion begins growing from each end, coaxed out by an unseen force. The balls themselves begin to elongate, then like clay being molded, details begin to carve themselves out in the not-fireballs.

From the front, a head adorned with a thin muzzle and pointy ears is shaped from pure fire. The muzzles split open, revealing jagged, flaming teeth and mouths with a white-hot glow.

Under them, the four waxy drips form joints, legs, and paws.

At the rear, a single tail with a curled tip forms an unmistakable calling card.

Finally, on the faces, two perfectly round eyes of blazing white snap open.

After seven seconds that feel like an eternity, Ninetales is flanked by a pair of single-tailed Vulpixes that look as if they crawled right out of hell.

'What the fuck kind of move is this?' Zinnia just isn't sure what she witnessed, and in her uncertainty, she hesitates to issue Shelgon an order.

Both of the flaming foxes snarl and rush at Shelgon, their paws leaving hissing burn marks in the dirt as they race across the ground at an alarming pace.

"Protect!" Zinnia calls the first move to come to mind.

Shelgon, now shocked out of his confusion, snarls back at the foxes as a translucent dome of protective green is erected around him, shielding him from harm.

Rather than crash into the emerald shield, the pair of foxes actually abort their charge and circle around like growling, glowing Sharpedos. Both open their muzzles wide, and from each one comes a cavalcade of Embers.

The Embers smash into Protect like a storm of explosive bullets, each one making a tooth-ratting pop that is certainly ear-ache inducing in a tiny dome.

The pair of faux-foxes keep running a tight circle around the protective dome, their Embers seemingly endless. With every second that passes, the Dragon trapped inside falters more and more under the barrage. The more he falters, the more Protect begins to waver.

'Fuck! Did evolving really make that huge of a difference?!' Zinnia growls, frantically trying to think of something. Her eyes jump to Ninetales.

The great fox stands perfectly still, her eyes blazing orange and twitching tails spread out. She hasn't moved at all since firing off this insane attack.

'Can she not move and control the Vulpixes at once? We have to break her focus. Once Shelgon gets out we'll use Smokescreen th-'

Before Zinnia can finish her thought and try to form a new plan, one of the fiery foxes backs off as its sister rushes headfirst at Shelgon's weakened Protect.

The fox smashes into the dome and explodes with such force that Protect shatters like a glass bauble, kicking up a plume of dust and rattling the ground as if an earthquake struck for a single second. Much of the shockwave and its bone-shattering concussive force is lost breaking the luminescent green shield, but Shelgon still cries out and stumbles to the side, trying to regain his balance.

The remaining fox jumps through the dust cloud, and before Zinnia or Shelgon can even think of countering, it rams its skull into the Dragon and explodes in a spectacular suicide attack.

Zinnia raises an arm to cover her eyes as dust and shards of rock fly past. When the dust clears and the ringing in her ears eases, she lowers her arm.

In the field, laying in a blackened crater and breathing in short, harsh gasps, Shelgon sits prone with deep cracks and chunks missing in his armor. His legs sport burns, and the Draconid tribeswoman can see a deep, bleeding cut on his forehead.

Slowly, almost painfully, she looks back up to Lee and Ninetales.

Ninetales sits there, back in her aloof starting stance without a speck of dirt on her. Behind her, Lee rubs his forehead with a frown. "Brendan?" He says quietly, and that's when Zinnia realizes all the onlookers are stunned silent. "The call?"

"Uh… Oh!" Brendan finally shakes his head and comes to his senses. "Shelgon is unable to battle! The winners are Ninetales and Lee!" He declares, raising a hand high.

One person in the crowd, a young man, works up the courage to be the first one and slowly claps. Someone else follows, then a second later there is roaring applause.

Lee grumbles something under his breath and rubs his head again. As he does so, Ninetales turns and gives the man an apologetic smile.

Mechanically, Zinnia raises Shelgon's ball and recalls her injured dragon in a flash of red before cradling the ball to her chest.

She joined her friends on their journey looking for worthwhile mountains to climb, but she didn't expect to fall off of the newest one so spectacularly. Unbidden, a thought comes to mind and she lets the words fly.

"That sucked."


A big thanks to NurseBold, Nicolas H, Tim M, ncskeeter56, Thomas D, Avo, S. Nutter, Drew6, Lucy B, Lars H, Jesper B, Frogsamurai, Ethan S, Kalafalafakah, Fabhar, Zach C, Dicky W, Sashank U, Patrick I, MidnightJayguar, Tyric Gaias, No Thanks, Alex G, Meadow, Spencer S, Taylor V, Jeremy H, Scott E, Johnathan C, Josh T, marcellis97, Powernap, rooster196, Johnathan D, Sukaleska, Ampharos3, Tiemi, Irene, Xegzy, Earthpatriot117, CheesePie25, Thundatwin, TwentyThousandCats, itsawaffle, Esquire, Spencer K, Mrbucky92, wishindo, Sandesh, Obsidianking, ToolsOfTrypticon, Jorge B, Kyle P, Cynicalto, Friendship is Carrots, Tayler, Dominic M, Aidan S, Duncan K, Webmaster, Planetace, xydra22, Aros, Argent E, Orion D, Chris C, Vitruvius, Reviv3pls, Kiri, Michael S, Chaz, Swinter, Patroncrad, James M, Phillip N, Grant G, Remi C, Zachary, VoidPhoenix, Kirsendarken, Brendan Mewburn, BlastwaveNorth, Faolen, Harp, Brad P, MetallicDragon, Evan F, The Last Pucci, Anemone221, GaryD12, Kris N, Duncan, Sage B, Night Drifter, killbot E, Pearly, dakota j, MentallySauced, Tessa, Jan Z, Peter D, Spencer S, David B, CynicalDeviant95, Miguel, Straven, Emilowish, Colby, ShaRose, V3Lithiun, Omega753, Omakehell, Anna F, Jimmie L, Adam M, Greenboy676, Derek Q, Lennea, Evan P, Quinlan S, REPOsPuNKy, Fisch, M4kl9H7, Ultra Director, Nitrus_Hail, t3chn0fr34q, Studmuffin, Tzeneth, Azunth, Stephen B, Chris N, WhataGreatNamelol, Decibel, Wyatt S, Nekusar, Goggy123, Sun Ting Wong, Lictor Magnus, Caleb A, Jordan, Satanael, Reese H, D. Quinn, Lolop 12, James R, Pseudo Nym, Nameisrequired Thuss K, speedyzman13, Dylan P, BlainX, Yisra H, Teh One & TrueTabi, CB-Otaku, Elias B, LSauchelli, Sleet Rain, Arthur C, John I, Rakkis157, Baelor Hollow, greatdavid0, Michael L, Crew6, Prinny, ht1318, Jesse C, ZakenKun, Geoff M, Dragonin, dvd1442, heisnotyoursavior, Cindermoth, Thomas H, Nets Pulse Podcast, Vaendann, Maestro, Chase K, Civer, Alex, Xiaoding W, KiKap, Rodney M, Haschen, Munirah H, Mike, W01F, Derek P, Rooker, LagoMate, James D, bibglo, BlindMoon, Tyler T, Matthew, Leander, Richard, Anosufan62, Gavin T, Ben, Jared, Noone, Seadrake, Arcaryx, and everyone who wishes to go unnamed for being patrons.

Thanks to Bloody Eclipse, Teigen S, K, Stays Secret, Paul F, VandheerXLorde, Dusks_Lantern, Sprektomegankai, Berd, Cristobal A, Uratan, Enderchangeling, Rincewind, Alejandro G, MrPerson0, DukeDandelion, BunnyWaffles, Matt, Aaron M, EZfyr, Ethan R, Incraze, xIron Gamerx, Definitely not a racoon, Russell T, Sean, Happy Buddha, Emeraldleafeon for being high-level patrons.

A special thanks to Spartanstoryteller, Eriermence, Dewey08, CMDR Dantae, pa77y, and Nikolaj K for being mad-lad-level patrons.

Last but certainly not least, an exceptional thanks to BrokenOlive, Gomical, Cait R, MajinSM, SunBurntIcarus, and TheDaemonCatJr for being top-level patrons.
 
Act 2: Chapter 6
Take a look at this.

I'm at the end of my rope with my job. We're going hard on writing until I can afford to do this as a part-time (or maybe full time) job and produce more stuff more often. If you'd like to help, you can keep the fast pace for this and other projects going possibly forever. We've got a guaranteed update schedule planned if all goes well. See below.

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With a jaw-cracking yawn, Lee lets his eyes creep open as the last vestiges of sleep drain away from him. The blanket covering him is luxuriously soft and warm, so he turns his bleary eyes away from the drab ceiling and snuggles a little deeper into the covers. Being so comfortable, it takes his sluggish brain a moment to remember where he is.

The blanket covering him twitches a little, drawing his attention.

'Ah. That's no blanket.' He breathes a little deeper through his nose, catching a spiced, yet not too sharp scent that he knows by heart. 'Blankets definitely don't move… or smell like Ninetales. No wonder I slept so well.'

Covering him neck-to-toe are golden fox tails. The actual comforter and whatnot have been pushed off to the foot of the bed. The memories of the day prior hit, and Lee smiles. 'Vulpix evolved. Vulpix evolved and she's all the better for it.'

Reluctantly, Lee turns away from the fluffy fox tail serving as his pillow to face Ninetales. She lays beside him cuddled into his side, her head turned and laying chin-down on her pillow as she sleeps. Ninetales' muzzle is cracked open just the slightest amount, and in the stillness of the early morning, Lee can hear her quiet breaths. The mane-like tuft on her head is mussed from turning in bed, and when one of her ears twitches, a bit of the tuft is flicked with it.

Slowly raising his head to look over his pokemon, Lee spies the bright red display of the nightstand alarm clock reading 9:04 AM back to him.

'We slept in quite a bit…' He blinks the last bit of bleariness from his eyes. 'I hope Grovyle isn't too upset that we're going to get a late start on our morning training. We still need to visit Moore and Flannery, after all.'

Beyond the nightstand and over in Brendan's bed, he finds the boy and his jumbo Electrike both laying dead to the world in a mess of wrinkled covers. Electrike snorts in his sleep and kicks a little.

It's taken Brendan and his infectiously upbeat self only two weeks to break the nervous shell around the young Electric-type. After constant pleasant treatment and support from Brendan and his team, the pup quit sitting and sending mournful looks to the south, back to the valley where his mother left him with them. He shed his nervousness and jitters, even befriending Goomy and Shinx, forming a trio that makes Lee smile every time he sees them trundle off to find mischief. Thankfully, Mawile seems to have taken it upon herself to keep an eye on the three youngest pokemon when no one else was watching them, and it's a duty she takes seriously.

As is only natural Lee's baby girl took the role of fearless leader of their troupe. But that seemed to make Electrike painfully conscious of how large he is compared to his much-smaller friends, and the pup treads as if he were on eggshells around the kitten and mucus-coated dragon.

'I didn't realize it was Electrike's turn to play throw-pillow. I'm glad Brendan got him to open up. I don't think I would have the time to care for two babies.' Lee hums to himself, idly noting that he seems to do that a lot. 'Electrike is already weaned and eating solid food without any issues, yet he can't be any older than two months. Shinx is around the same age, but I estimate she's still got two or three weeks before I can start taking her off her bottle. A side effect of Electrike being a Giant? Does being a Giant cause accelerated developmental growth as well? Or is it something simple like the Electrike line maturing faster as a species? I might have to see if Brendan is willing to let me borrow Electrike for an afterno-'

'Beloved,' a voice not belonging to Lee starts, interrupting his mental monologue. 'You're thinking rather loudly.'

Ninetales cracks a red eye open, staring up at Lee with an exasperated smile.

Lee returns her stare with a sheepish grin. 'Sorry about that. I didn't realize I was going to wake you up.'

'It's no matter. We've slept late and the day's duties call to us, so now is as good a time as any to rise.' Ninetales withdraws her namesake tails, drawing a shiver from Lee as the chill of the air-conditioned room is allowed to flow over his bare chest and the parts of his legs left uncovered by the shorts he wore to bed. The fox then stands on the bed and yawns with a mighty, full-body stretch that makes her tails stand straight like a frayed fan. 'Did you sleep well?' She asks, finishing her stretch.

'Best sleep I've had since…' He pauses, then wonders why he bothered hesitating when he knows Ninetales is perfectly aware of why he stopped. 'Since we came here. How about you?'

Her answering smile is small but no less pleased for its size. 'Wonderful. I've not felt this rested… ever, I believe… Or, at least I rested well once you turned your cell phone off.'

A small grimace flashes across Lee's face. As they were preparing for an early rest last night, his phone started blowing up with notifications out of nowhere. After taking a look at the first few and seeing none of them were from Nigel Birch or someone else important, he simply turned it off. "I think someone signed me up for a spam service or something," Lee grumbles, leaning back into the pillow and wishing it were a fox tail. "If it's all spam, then a Porygon who can backtrace and blow up whatever server it's coming from is going to look like a mighty appealing teammate."

Ninetales huffs out a vulpine laugh, and her radiant happiness bleeds over to Lee, putting a wide smile on his own face. 'Perhaps we should start our day together?'

Together. The reminder that he's never truly alone makes everything seem so easy. With a cheerful nod, Lee rises out of bed as Ninetales hops down to the floor.

The room is much like any other for inns marketed towards trainers, as there is a small-ish kitchen unit that sits in the corner. After throwing on the shirt he discarded the night prior and grabbing his backpack, Lee makes his way to the kitchenette with Ninetales following along. In short order, he has a pan of water with a baby bottle of Miltank milk inside warming up on the stove, a pair of buttered skillets beginning to sizzle, and coffee beginning to brew in the small, hotel-supplied coffee pot.

It doesn't take long for the smell of breakfast to wake up Brendan, who mechanically sits up in his bed and yawns a jaw-popping yawn. The movement jostles Electrike enough that the electric pup blinks open his eyes and stands with a stretch not unlike how Ninetales did, and after a quick sniff of the air, sits up and sends a longing look toward the skillet Lee is placing several strips of bacon into.

"Morning," Lee calls over his shoulder, as he starts mixing several eggs in a bowl. "What do you want in your omelet?"

"Morning…" Brendan groggily greets back, scooting his legs over to sit on the edge of the bed. The boy takes a moment to think before answering. "Cheese, bacon, and mushrooms if you've got 'em."

"Mushrooms too, eh?" Lee smirks as he pours the mixed eggs into the still-free skillet, making the mix hiss and sizzle. He looks down at Ninetales. "Look at mister refined palette over here," he says, jerking his head towards Brendan.

The fox laughs once; It's a short thing, just a sharp exhale through her nose.

Brendan flushes at the unexpected ribbing and doesn't seem to have a reply ready, so instead, he just huffs.

Before he turns back to the stove, Lee spies the piteous look Electrike is sending to him—or rather, to the pan of bacon. With a roll of his eyes, the man lifts a strip of mostly-cooked bacon from the pan with his spatula, lets it cool for a moment, then takes it between his fingers and holds it down at waist level. "C'mon, little man. You can have one, and only one, as a treat."

Electrike perks up, his stubby tail wagging. The wagging comes to a halt, though, as the pup looks over to Brendan for permission. Since the pup is so large, he's actually looking down at his trainer.

Brendan's grin is answer enough.

The pup jumps down from the bed and zips over, tail wagging in a blur as he takes the greasy treat from Lee's hand and scarfs it down in three messy bites. He licks his chops to get every bit of delicious grease as he trots back to sit at Brendan's feet.

Smiling, Lee wipes the fat off his fingers with the hem of his shirt and returns his attention to the stove. 'Oops. Left that on too long.' He takes Shinx's bottle from the nearly boiling water it's sitting in and turns off the heat. 'We'll let that cool for a bit before I feed her.'

For a while, everyone is content to sit in an easy silence as Lee cooks. He finishes Brendan's breakfast, plates it, and hands it and a cup of coffee off to the smiling boy, who heads over to the small table in the other corner to eat. Electrike, meanwhile, hops back up on Brendan's bed and makes himself comfortable, patiently waiting until he and the other pokemon are fed.

Halfway through his morning meal and just as Lee is plating his own food, Brendan speaks up. "Lee?"

"Hmm?" The zoologist asks, sitting down with Brendan and cutting into his omelet with the side of his fork.

"You seem…" Brendan sets his fork and rolls his hand as he looks off to the side, trying to think of a word. "Happy?" The world comes off as more of a question than an observation, and Brendan cringes. "Happier, I mean! Uh, sorry, I don't think that came out right…"

Lee chuckles and takes a bite of his food. "Don't worry about it, Brendan. I am happier," he says after swallowing.

Brendan sends a sidelong glance to Ninetales, who dutifully sits at Lee's side. She gazes back at Brendan cooly.

"Hmm…" Lee twirls his silverware between his fingers. "I told you how Ninetales and I use her telepathy to communicate, right?"

The Birch heir nods and leans forward, the last traces of sleepiness chased away from his face.

"Well, there are some pretty profound differences between the mind of a human and a pokemon. Not only is our brain chemistry itself totally different, but so is how we interpret concepts, ideas, emotions, and views of the world. Pokemon have such a different way of approaching life that their minds are optimized to think in ways most people can barely understand, even if they readily live with humans all the time." Lee begins. 'I seem to be doing these lectures a lot.'

'Such is the nature of those who nurture.' Ninetales' reply is as quick as it is fond.

Lee's smile grows just a touch. "It really becomes apparent with telepathy. Now, these are just my experiences, and a data set of one should be regarded with all due skepticism, but bear with me." Seeing Brendan nod resolutely, Lee continues. "Telepathy with Vulpix was a confusing muddle at first. We were two different creatures trying to communicate with a psychic tether of sorts. Oftentimes, what I had to relay to her and vice-versa got lost in translation, as there was a near-total disconnect between our understanding of how the world worked. We started off with simple stuff, like sharing images."

"Sharing images, huh? How does that work?" Brendan polishes off his coffee and tosses the paper cup into the distant trash can. When it hits the rim with a hollow thunk and drops to the floor, he groans and makes to rise.

Before Brendan can get up, the cup is enveloped in an aura of purple—and crushed into an impossibly small ball of coffee-stained paper pulp. The ball then levitates itself and shoots into the trash with more force than necessary, rebounding off the side of the can with a ping!

'I've got exercises in mind to help your control, love, don't sweat it,' Lee sends to Ninetales as her faint embarrassment washes over him. "Yeah, sharing images," he answers Brendan, pulling the boy's wide eyes away from the display of telekinesis. "It works just like you see in TV shows and games. One of us thinks of an image, and the other sees it in their head as if they imagined it. From there, both of us slowly began to change and morph our mindsets: mine to be more pokemon, and hers to be more human."

At Brendan's unsure frown, the zoologist mulls over how to best explain what he means. "This is how I visualize it…" Lee lifts another bite of his food to his mouth, eating between sentences. "Imagine taking a thousand different data cables that all have different prongs, then trying to plug these cables into a thousand ports on a big computer. The problem here is that the prongs on the cables don't match many of the ports. Since not all the wires are connected, some of the data isn't going to flow correctly and will be lost, right?"

Brendan nods again, still paying rapt, if slightly unsure, attention.

"So what we did," Lee gestures to himself and then Ninetales with a hand, "is we both shifted our mindsets around and tried to think like the other, in essence changing the ports and cables so everything connected better. Get it?"

"I guess." Brendan leans back and folds his hands behind his head. "So by thinking differently, telepathy works better?"

"In broad strokes, yes," Lee answers with a smile. "When Ninetales evolved, it increased all of her abilities by…" He pauses, trying to puzzle out just how large an increase all of her various attributes received, only to realize he isn't sure. "Huh, I'm not really quite sure just how strong Ninetales is now, but the point here is that all of her abilities grew stronger, telepathy included. Before, things were sort of stilted and words were still lost in translation, but now?" Lee grins. "Ninetales and I can speak to each other even more clearly than you and I are speaking now. Her telepathy conveys exactly what she means to say perfectly, and in a way a human mind can interpret."

If his blank look is any worthwhile signal, the younger trainer doesn't seem to understand the significance of what he's being told, but Lee can't really blame him; being told and experiencing it are two wholly different beasts.

"Ninetales and I have been meaning to have a heart-to-heart talk for a long time, and we cleared up just about everything last night thanks to her newfound talent." Lee stands, taking his and Brendan's empty paper plates and walking them over to the trash can. "It took a lot off my mind, so yeah, I'm much happier than I was yesterday." He tosses both plates into the can and makes his way back to the backpack on his bed.

Brendan is silent for a moment as he mulls over what he's been told. "So…" He begins, only to cut himself off. "Are you…" He stops again. "Are you feeling better?"

Ninetales gives the boy a sharp look of warning, and Brendan raises his hands up in surrender.

Lee is halfway into pulling out a fresh set of day clothes from his backpack when he dissects the inflection behind better. He bites his lip and taps his bare foot on the carpeted floor. "Better? Most certainly. I'm still going to keep seeing my therapist, though. I feel like I should stick it out until she says so, not quit halfway."

Brendan just grins. "Good."

The ire Lee feels simmering within Ninetales drains away like a basin with its plug pulled, replaced with a gentle smile and a flare of approval—both for Lee's decision and for Brendan's answer.

Lee huffs out a laugh as he sets clean clothes out for himself. "I said it to your father, Brendan, and I meant it: when I have kids one day down the line, I hope they turn out as good as you did."

His face breaking out into an embarrassed flush, Brendan suddenly finds the floor fascinating and looks away.

Ninetales just lets out a vulpine chortle.

Both Lee and Brendan clean up the room, take turns showering, then one by one, release their pokemon so each team can have their own breakfast. Brendan's bunch dominate the table the two trainers vacated, noisily chattering over their bowls of food. Or at least Marshtomp is noisily chattering, and failing to close his mouth between bites as he does so.

Mawile, who sits across from Marshtomp, cringes as she sees flecks of half-chewed food hit the table. She levels Marshtomp with a look, then croons a sickly sweet note as her face takes on an obviously false smile.

Marshtomp clams up, swallowing his bite with a heavy gulp. His beady eyes regard Mawile with both a bit of fright and barely hidden infatuation.

The smile on Mawile's face takes on a much more genuine tone, and Marshtomp practically melts in his seat with a goofy, lovestruck grin.

By Lee's bed on the floor, Ninetales and Grovyle eat their meals with much more reserved energy to them, conversing quietly as they do so. Whenever Ninetales isn't looking, Grovyle scrutinizes her intently.

Leaning against his bed, Lee rolls Shinx's ball in his hand. Inside the pokeball, the kitten is likely still sleeping or just now beginning to awaken. 'Do you think Mawile is actually sweet on Marshtomp or is the poor guy getting played?' He asks Ninetales.

Raising her head from her bowl, Ninetales licks a few stray grains of rice from her lips. 'I'm uncertain. It's my understanding that the intentions of Fairies are difficult to divine, and natural actors like Mawiles muddle most attempts at being read.'

The ball in Lee's hand shakes a little. It seems Shinx is awake and wants out.

Last night, after the one-sided fight between Shelgon and Ninetales, everyone gathered in their room in a rowdy bundle to crowd around Ninetales. Not wanting to stress out Shinx with all the commotion, Lee released her outside, fed her, and kept an eye on her as she and Electrike played until she tired out. Afterward, she was returned to her ball for bed. She's yet to actually meet Ninetales since her evolution.

'Shinx gets her heart from you, Lee. I don't think she'll react poorly to me,' Ninetales assures, finishing her meal. Her bowl is cowled in an aura of violet before levitating over to the other dirty dishes in the sink with measured slowness. 'If you wait much longer, her milk is going to need to be reheated.' Ninetales jumps up onto the bed and seats herself, folding her tails around her front legs. 'I'm ready when you are.'

'I know, I'm just being nervous over nothing. Here goes…' The zoologist taps the button on the pokeball, letting it open with its iconic flash and snap-hiss. As the light fades, Shinx is left blinking her luminescent yellow eyes on the bed. She takes in Lee's face and purrs in her throat. The purr grows and her claws knead the bed when she spies her bottle on the counter of the kitchenette.

Brendan doesn't even need to do anything, as Mawile sees what's happening and shushes her teammates. Which is to say she shushes Marshtomp.

Lee smiles and cups the kitten's chin, making her nuzzle happily into his hand. "Before your breakfast, baby girl, there's someone I want to re-introduce you to."

Though her grasp on human speech is coming along fast enough to fill Lee with pride, Shinx tilts her head, visibly puzzled by his words.

Rather than say anything else, Lee coaxes her to turn around with a finger that she follows without any hesitation. Upon seeing a pair of gold forelegs, Shinx tilts her head and looks up.

Bright yellow eyes meet gentle red.

"Vulpix evolved, baby girl. She's a Ninetales now. Neat, eh?" Lee smiles down at the little Electric-type.

For a worrying moment, Shinx does nothing, just blinking up at Ninetales.

Ninetales purrs in her throat much like Shinx did a moment prior, lowering her head to better meet the kitten's eyes.

The blue and black cub steps closerThen dives headfirst into the mound of tails around Ninetales' forelegs, purring up a storm as she snuggles into the vixen.

Ninetales recoils and almost jumps back, but catches herself at the last moment. A laugh bubbles out of her muzzle as she leans down and noses the top of the cozy kitten's head. Shinx raises her head and nuzzles Ninetales back without a hint of fear or discomfort.

'I told you that there was nothing to fear, Lee.'


After everyone is fed, washed, dressed—and in Shinx's case, reluctantly pulled out of a mound of fox tails—Brendan, Lee, and Ninetales step outside into the outdoor concourse of the hotel.

Lee sighs and pulls at the collar of his shirt, feeling it already clinging to him in the humidity. "Ever lovely Hoenn…"

"Aw, you know you love it here." Brendan grins and locks the hotel door behind them. He drops his key in his pocket and looks over to the door of the room adjacent to theirs. "Where are Zinnia and Courtney?"

"Not too sure," Lee admits, pulling his phone from his pocket, only to realize it's still turned off. He taps the power button and waits a moment for it to boot up. After watching the same over-stylized boot intro ending with a PokeGear! logo for the hundredth time…

Ding-ding!
Ding-ding!
Ding-ding!
Ding-ding!
Ding-ding!


Notifications pop in seemingly without end and so quickly that the phone screen begins to flash, lasting long enough for Lee to begin worrying that his phone might be broken. After a long twenty or so seconds, the flood comes to an end.

2 Missed Calls
3 New Text Messages
354 New Emails


"What…?" Lee squints and rubs his eyes, but the numbers remain unchanged. "Three…" He double-takes. "Three hundred fuckin' emails?!"

"Wha?" Brendan steps over to Lee's side and tries to peer at the screen, so Lee lowers his hand so both he and Ninetales can see. "Wow…" Brendan murmurs. "That's a lot of emails."

'Perhaps deal with the calls and the text messages first, Lee,' Ninetales suggests, sitting and making herself comfortable. She pokes his side with her muzzle. 'They might be more urgent.'

'Right, right…' Lee dials his voicemail and waits for it to connect. As he waits, he turns to Brendan. "If you want, you can go ahead. We need to stop by the Gym to talk to Leader Moore, then we can meet up at whatever battleground you find. I might be here for a bit…"

"Can do." Brendan folds his arms behind his head without a care and starts walking. "I'll send you a message when I find a place, okay?"

"Stay safe!" Lee answers as his phone finally connects to his voicemail box. He holds the phone up to his ear, and as he does so, he offers his hearing to Ninetales so she can listen without him putting the phone on speaker. There aren't many people walking along the sidewalk of the road running parallel to the hotel, but the few out and about all slow down to peer at Ninetales.

The great fox's mind edges a bit closer to Lee's as she listens in to the cellphone through him.

"You have 2 unheard me-" Lee hits the button prompt he already knows is coming to skip ahead. "First unheard message, sent today, at eight-O-one AM." The phone is silent for a moment as it loads the recording.

"Hey Lee, it's Nigel," the cell phone begins playing. "First off, if Ninetales is listening, congrats on your evolution. That's a huge step to be taking this early in life."

Ninetales smiles. 'I'll have to offer Nigel my thanks when we next see him.'

"Someone captured her evolution on camera, though, and you two have become viral celebrities overnight. Forums and social media have been lighting up with your names since yesterday, and the Littleroot newspaper even murkrowed about you and Brendan being the best thing since the invention of the pokeball. I know you're not the type to be active online and all, but keep an eye on things. I know you're probably busy, so don't worry about calling me back right away. If it gets too overwhelming, call me and I'll have the lab's PR guy start managing your image in the news. I've already got him keeping Brendan squeaky clean online… Not that there is much work to be done there." The message is quiet for a second. "I'm not sure how long this popularity is going to last, but a Ninetales' evolution is a huge event some people might only live to see once, and the video of that fire clone move is making the rounds this morning too. I'm not worried about your safety since your pokemon are with you, but please be wary, Lee. People might try to manipulate you."

A scoff leaves Ninetales' muzzle. 'Let them try.'

"Stay safe out there." Cla-click! The recording ends.

"..." Lee swipes down on his phone's screen, taking a look at the emails sent to him.

BattleNet: You were mentioned in the thread: Official Lee Henson Megathread
BattleNet: You were mentioned in the thread: Official Lee Henson Megathread
BattleNet: You were mentioned in the thread: Newcomers to look out for this year
BattleNet: New PM from Kabu
ContestCorner: Guest of Honor invitation
BattleNet: You were mentioned in the thread: Official Lee Henson Megathread
BattleNet: You were mentioned in the thread: Rare Pokemon and where to find them
BattleNet: You have been invited to join the private group: Seekers of Hoenn
Alec Aarons: Exclusivity deal.
BattleNet: New PM from SITE_ADMIN
BattleNet: You have been invited to join the private group: 9TT
BattleNet: You have been invited to join the public group: FoxFriday


"…" Lee pinches the bridge of his nose with his free hand, takes a deep breath, and mentally counts backward from ten.

'Easy, beloved.' Ninetales stands and presses herself into Lee's side, curling her neck around his torso to peer up at him. The added warmth is a little much in Hoenn's muggy heat, but Lee says nothing. 'We'll approach this at our own pace. If the world wants our attention, they will have to learn to be patient. They dance to our tune, never the other way around.' She licks her lips and wets her nose with her tongue. '...Yesterday, did I push too hard to use that technique? I didn't intend to create a larger headache for you…' Her final few words are laced with regret.

'It's fine, love.' Lee shifts his phone to his left hand and reaches down with the right to pull Ninetales into a one-armed hug. The action earns him a flash of telepathic affection. 'I knew your evolution was going to make waves, and with Grovyle's TMs out there branded with our names, it's only going to be a matter of time before people figure out we've got more than a few tricks up our sleeves.' Lee releases her, and the fox pulls herself back a step. A sardonic smirk pulls at Lee's scars. 'Maybe pick something less flashy, next time? Or something that has at least hit the prototype stage first? Fox Fire jumped from mostly theory to live battle in one step and that makes me want to scream. It has critical flaws, too. If we didn't end the match when we did, Zinnia would have figured them out.'

Lee recalls vividly how he had to pilot one of the little flaming foxes through Ninetales, as she just couldn't direct two at the same time. Shaping them, as crude as they were, was still an awe-inspiring display of her pyrokinetic abilities. Each clone was filled with so much Fire TE that they were practically walking C4 charges, with plenty of gas in the tank for their own attacks.

The biggest issue is that the clones have no will of their own, needing manual direction from Ninetales. One was already nearly too much, so Lee assumed control of the other, only to realize he didn't actually know how to make it move; it was a solid construct with actual articulating limbs and everything. Ninetales had to open her mind to some of its deepest layers and allow Lee to reference her own motor controls to make his clone move. The sheer concentration of guiding her own fiery proxy and letting Lee piggyback off of her muscle memory left her paralyzed in the field. To top it all off, the clones consume a worrying amount of energy, even with Ninetales' new well of power, and take far too long to actually create.

Not good. Fox Fire won't be the viable, expendable fighting force the pair imagined for quite some time.

'Perhaps using two clones was asking too much for Fox Fire's first use,' Ninetales sniffs. 'We'll use only one until I can control them better and refine my skill with their creation. I can then hand control to you afterward, as I'm confident I can help sustain one and fight at the same time so long as I am not the sole puppetmaster. It'll be as if we're battling side-by-side.' The final thought puts a grin on her muzzle and makes her do a little, delighted wiggle.

Unconsciously, Lee raises an eyebrow. 'That has to count as some kind of disallowed interference from me.'

'I read that dusty rulebook with you and I saw no such rule,' Ninetales turns her nose up.

'If there isn't one, they'll make one when they realize how it works.' Lee returns.

'Then we just won't tell anyone.'

'I suppose…' Lee puts the emails out of his mind for now, ignoring the alert as another one pops in. Swiping back over to his voicemail, he raises the phone to his ear again.

"Second unheard message, sent today, at eight forty-one AM." There is a crackle, then the message starts. "Lee, pal. I hope I didn't catch you at a bad time, but I've got some news for you about your TMs." Even if it's a recording, each one of Aarons' words is slick with sleazeball grease. "Sales are looking fantastic. We've got tons of preorders, so many that it looks like only the second batch is actually going to make it to the shelves. You're in the money, pal. Things are looking grand, aren't they? You'll get your check for everything here in a few weeks. Now, I've also got another proposition for you. I spied a curious move on BattleNet used by a curious pokemon owned by a curious man, and I think you know what I'm talking about. The Committee? They were salivating." Once more there is that hungry purr Lee heard when Aarons saw Convergence for the first time. "I'm not at liberty to discuss numbers and terms over a voicemail, but I'll shoot you an email with a bit more, then you can call me, okay? I'll catch you later, friendo. Keep doing Hoenn proud out there." The recording ends with a Ca-click!

"Right, that'll be the last email I answer then." Lee moves on to the messages left to him.

The first is just Courtney saying she's going supply shopping and will be back in the afternoon. As much as Lee doesn't want to leave the Magma admin alone to her own devices, he and Zinnia can't follow her everywhere, or it will tip her off that something is amiss.

The second one is from Zinnia just a few minutes before they left their room.

Zinnia: Hey lee. heading to the poke cent to check on Shelgon. back later. The message is punctuated by a little smiley face blowing a kiss.

Lee winces. 'Love, did you have to be so rough on Shelgon?'

'Shelgon is a tough pokemon. He'll recover without issue,' Ninetales insists.

'I'm less worried about his physical condition and more worried about inter-team relations following that battle.'

'Well, I don't think you would have preferred him to hit me, so I put enough effort in to keep the battle on our terms,' she huffs. '...But if you insist, I'll offer an olive branch and apologize. That may harm Shelgon's pride more than the loss itself, however.'

'We'll talk more on it later.' Lee types out a reply to Zinnia.

You: Zinnia, about yesterday. No hard feelings?

After a moment, a trio of dots bounces in the corner of the text field, telling him the Draconid tribeswoman is formulating a reply.

Zinnia: nah dont sweat it dolittle. i went into the battle kinda expectin to lose. didnt expect it to be a stomp but thats just more motivation for shelgon. before you ask hes recovering fine and might get to keep a rad little scar on his forehead.

Lee frowns.

You: Is a mentality like that healthy? I don't think it is.

The reply is quick.

Zinnia: dragon thing dont worry your little mammal head over it :^)

Lee rolls his eyes and continues to the last message.

(3200)-2333-9586: Hi Lee! It's Flannery at the gym. Grandpa gave me your number. He's wanting to know when you plan on stopping over so he can clear his schedule.

'Flannery?' Lee blinks, but adds the number to his contact list.

You: I'm free all day. We can head over now if you'd like.

Flannery must have been sitting there glued to her phone with a reply already typed up, because her response is near-instant.

Flannery: That sounds great! C'mon over!

Nodding to himself, Lee tucks his phone away into his pocket. "Everything else can wait until I've been awake for more than an hour."


Once more, Lee finds himself and his ace pokemon sitting in the Lavaridge Gym. He and Ninetales, along with Moore and Flannery, are all seated in the sitting room Moore and Lee first conversed in a week prior. Rather than sit in his lap, Ninetales now has her own cushion to Lee's right.

"Madam Ninetales, Lee, thank you for taking the time to come in so soon." Moore clasps his hands together with a bright smile, one mostly directed at Ninetales.

'Madam Ninetales?' The vixen thinks to Lee in bemusement.

Lee smiles. 'I'm pretty sure Moore is from Johto or Kanto. Some of the smaller towns and villages there still worship your species.' He clears his throat. "We're delighted to be back, Gym Leader Moore. We haven't had time to truly test out Ninetales' upper limits, but I can already tell your Firestone has done a lot for her."

"We saw." Moore's eyes twinkle. "To beat a Dragon with a never-before-seen Fire technique? The town will be talking about this one for years to come." He chuckles. "Now, I was wondering how you wish to go about your side of our trade. I admit I have no experience with something as outlandish as commissioning a brand new pokemon attack."

Lee hums to himself. "Well, first off, I'd like to do a test run to confirm that moves created by Ninetales can actually be captured by TMs, as I've yet to determine if her prodigious control over her Fire is something inherent to her. I'm happy to workshop the idea today, though, and return when we have a working example."

Both Moore and Flannery blink, then understanding dawns on Moore's face. "Ah, you're thinking we need to go have some bozo with a big confuser to make the TMs, do you? Wait here." Moore rises and exits the sitting room, sliding the door closed behind him.

Lee watches him go with surprise, then turns his eyes to Flannery. "You have a TM copier here?"

The redheaded woman nods. "Yeah. It's old, but it still works. Grandpa has had it for years to make the TMs he hands out as prizes. It's only got enough memory to hold one move at a time and it's kinda slow, but that's all we really need it for."

"Do you know how the copier works?" Lee leans forward a bit. "I thought Gym Leaders just had batches of their prize TMs made by Silph or Devon."

Flannery crosses her arms with a scoff. "Yeah, if we wanted to pay an arm and a leg for 'em. Gyms have to be self-sufficient, and grandpa has kitted the Gym with everything Lavaridge would ever need if the League vanished overnight."

Before Lee can ponder the politics behind a Gym being ready for government collapse, Moore returns. The elderly trainer trots in with a large, ugly machine that looks like a cross between a heavy-duty laptop of yesteryear and a briefcase, holding it by faded and cracked handles mounted to the side. He sets it down heavily upon the table and opens it. From Lee's angle, he can see a cracked green CRT monitor flicker to life in the upper half of the case.

"Alrighty…" Moore slowly types a command into the keyboard recessed into the case of the supposed TM copier, and upon hitting Enter, the machine shudders and whines as cooling fans spin to life. "I think the old girl is warmed up." He lifts the old, faded keyboard and pulls a headband from behind it, one with copper electrodes lining the inside and a wire leading back to the machine. "You were saying something about a trial run?"

Lee nods, silently wondering how much a TM copier would cost. "Yeah. Ninetales has a handful of custom moves made redundant by other ones and a few that never made it out of the prototype stage. I'm wanting to copy one of these and teach them to one of Flannery's pokemon as a proof of concept. If you can find a use for the move, then consider it on the house."

Flannery frowns. "Lee, we agreed to one move, not two. You can't just give us that much!" She argues.

Lee glances over to Ninetales, silently asking for her input.

'Perhaps ask for help when it comes to the tests you wish to run on me,' she offers. 'A Fire Gym must have the equipment necessary to train Fire pokemon. The TM printer is proof enough of that.'

"Well, if being given a prototype move is too much, maybe Ninetales and I could bother you to assist us in testing her powers?" Lee speaks his pokemon's proposal in her place. "As I said, we still don't know what we're working with."

"Two custom techniques and the chance to assist Madam Ninetales in her growth? My my, Lee, keep this up and Clan Moore might have to propose a formal alliance between our families." Moore smiles, but for some reason, Lee feels as if it's not entirely a joke.

At Moore's side, Flannery's face grows a little pink and she shoots a glare at her grandfather that goes ignored.

'Alliance? Oh…' Some half-remembered history lessons remind Lee what a traditional 'alliance' usually means to old money and nobles. His face warms up slightly. 'Flannery is good-looking and all, but I hope Moore is just kidding around…' Lee catches Flannery's eyes, and the redheaded Gym heir just blushes a bit deeper and shrugs helplessly.

Moore ignores the silent conversation between Lee and Flannery, either not noticing or pretending he saw nothing. He definitely ignores the smoldering look from Ninetales. Instead, he holds the headband wired to the copier out to Lee like a giddy child. "We can accept those terms. Would you like to do the honors?"

Taking it, Lee carefully fits the headband to Ninetales, taking care to muss up as little of her head-tuft as he can. The end result… is a little messy, as she's forced to flex her ears to the sides so the electrodes of the stretched-out band remain in contact with her forehead. Lee silently promises the now-grumpy vixen a good brushing later.

'Let's give them that Ember shotgun blast we made a few weeks ago,' Lee relays to Ninetales. The move turned out to be a bit of a dud. It's an emulation of Seed Blast, but it ate much more stamina than a regular Ember and was generally a worse 'get off me' option than even a brainless Flamethrower.

Ninetales brings the move to the forefront of her mind and closes her eyes in concentration. Through her, Lee can feel the Fire TE in her body molding in preparation for the attack. 'Ready.'

"Okay, hit it," Lee tells Moore.

The Gym Leader hits a key on his keyboard. The copier groans and shakes, but a progress bar begins to fill on its screen.

"As we wait," Lee begins, resting his arms on the table. "What sort of equipment does the Gym have to train its Fire-types? I imagine you've got quite the array of specialty items."

Flannery takes the lead on the question. "We've got the standard stuff. Thermometers and thermal cams, targets that burn at different temperatures, all that. For more general stuff, we've got weights, force… sensory things," she can't seem to quite find the name of what she's looking for. "Targets and target throwers for accuracy training… really, if it exists I'm pretty sure grandpa has one downstairs."

"My dear, it never hurts to be prepared!" Moore insists, pushing his glasses up the bridge of his nose.

The copier chooses that time to chime and shudder once more. From a thin, slit-like slot on its side, a disk with a strong resemblance to an unmarked CD is spat out.

"Had to delete Overheat, but I'll have Ty make a fresh copy later," Moore smiles and takes the disk, handing it to Flannery. "Let's head to the courtyard, shall we?"

The old copier is closed back up, then as a group, Lee, Ninetales, Moore, and Flannery walk their way through the Gym to the same courtyard where Ninetales evolved just yesterday. As they go, Lee notices they don't pass anyone in the Gym. No trainees, no assistants, nothing.

'Did they clear the Gym out for this?'

'It would be the safest option,' Ninetales inspects a wall tapestry depicting various Fire pokemon in a very traditional Japanese style as they pass. The centerpiece of the art is a Ninetales and Arcanine standing back to back, both peering up and away from each other. 'The implication here is that we should remain quiet about our involvement and pretend Flannery created the technique on her own.'

'Hmm…'

In short order, the courtyard is upon them. Flannery steps up into the center of the courtyard with the TM in one hand, while the other hovers over the pokeballs on her belt. "I'm not really sure who to pick…" she admits, looking to Lee for guidance.

"Your ace," Lee crosses his arms as Ninetales sits herself to his right. "If the whole point of the move is to be impressive, then I'll want to build around your ace, and confirming they can use a pure Fire attack made by Ninetales is how we begin."

Flannery takes a deep breath and nods. "Okay, Torkoal, here we go…" She takes a ball from her belt and slots the hole of the TM around the pokeball button. The disk shines a faint orange and spins around on a thin cushion of Fire TE, gaining speed until…

Vvvvrrrrr crack!

The disk spiderwebs into cracks before crumbling and falling away. The shards that hit the ground practically disintegrate into dust.

"Back in my day," Moore grumbles, "TMs had to use this great big ugly contraption that scratched your pokeball like there was no tomorrow. Kids nowadays don't even need a machine to read the disk and everything is all green and biodegradable…"

Lee suppresses a smile.

Flannery beams, tossing her pokeball high. "Torkoal, let's see what you can do!"

The ball pops open with a snap-hiss and drops a tortoise-shaped energy mass to the ground. As the light clears, Lee is given his first look at the ace he and Ninetales will be fighting in a week's time.

Standing on the grounds is a tortoise with rusty red skin, with eyes squinted almost shut, and a dark brown, nearly black shell with the same color and texture as volcanic rock. For a pokemon, Torkoal is rather tame appearance-wise until one considers the hexagonal holes in his shell, where anyone looking inside can see a blazing-hot coal base. Lee clearly recalls the video game pokedex stating Torkoal was small, maybe one-foot something, but Flannery's pokemon is roughly three feet tall at the highest point of his shell's hump. Flannery's care for the pokemon is apparent in how his shell shines with a polished gleam.

Surreptitiously, Lee withdraws his Pokedex from his jacket pocket and checks the entry for Torkoal, finding the real-world average height is closer to two and a half feet.

Torkoal groans and expels a snort of black, ashy smoke, dutifully waiting for instruction from Flannery.

"Okay, Torkoal," the redhead puts her hands on her hips. "I just used a TM and you should know a new move, so let's try it out!" She pumps an eager fist and points to a boulder off to the side of the courtyard. "Use…" She pauses. "Erm… What's the move called, and what does it do?"

"Ah… We never gave this move a name," Lee looks away, embarrassed for having glossed over that. "It's a variation of Ember. Rather than shoot a stream of fireballs, it's a wide-spanning blast of them. The name can be whatever you want it to be, I guess."

"Right, right," Flannery clears her throat and regains her composure. "Torkoal!" She begins dramatically. "Use your new move, Ember… Ember… Blast? Emburst?" She ends unsurely.

If Flannery's antics perturb Torkoal, he doesn't let it show. He draws in a deep breath, his throat glowing a flickering orange, then he throws his head forward. From his maw shoots an explosive blast of Embers that fly like the pellets from a shotgun, as each one crosses the distance to the boulder Flannery is pointing out in a flash. Most of them impact with a staccato of pops, blowing holes into the face of the stone. A few fliers singe the wall behind the rock.

"Holy crap, that was the coolest…" Flannery murmurs, looking star-struck at her Torkoal, who puffs up proudly under the praise.

"My stars…" Moore murmurs, adjusting his glasses. "Another one right out of thin air…"

Lee smiles. 'I guess that confirms it. Moves made with the aid of pyrokinesis can indeed be passed on. It seemed weaker than what you can do, love, but maybe Torkoal just doesn't have the guff to use it at full power.'

'It passed on my experience, though.' She flicks one of her tails. 'I could barely keep the spread contained when we first began our tests, yet Torkoal accomplished it well.'

'That'll be something to keep in mind.' Lee nods. "So," he begins aloud, drawing Flannery, Moore, and Torkoal's attention. "I've got some exercises in mind for Torkoal to determine what sort of move he would benefit best from, then we can workshop some ideas. Sound good?"

Flannery's grin lights up the courtyard.


High up and nearly at the top of Mt. Chimney, Courtney leans against the rails of the cable car steadily bringing her up the mountain, staring down at the town of Lavaridge as she does so.

Slipping away from her traveling partners proved to be quite the chore, but the Ninetales' evolution provided enough commotion for her to escape the careful eyes that always seem to watch her.

On the next six cars behind her are members of Magma devoid of their uniforms, all of them forming a covert task force. With each part of the team is a crate of supplies, each crate containing a part of a machine being quietly assembled within the volcano.

Having left the Magma science division for her administrator position before the device was unveiled to senior leadership, the workings of the machine are a bit of a mystery to her. She knows it will somehow resonate with their champion and awaken him, but little else. It doesn't matter too much, however, as she knows the gist of what is going on and is content with that.

Groudon, the Ancient Pokemon of Continents and Lord of all that is Earthen, slumbers somewhere deep under the crust of the planet. Groudon has vanished from all but the most obscure of tomes, and even in those rare volumes, each more precious than gold, the insights provided by the people of ancient Hoenn are as sparing as they are mind-boggling. It's no wonder to her that the Ancient Pokemon have vanished from the minds and imaginations of the people. To most, Gods should be peaceful, benevolent things who maintain some sort of balance in the world.

Most would find the idea of a God who can shatter the world in anger to be an unpleasant thought. The few startling texts Courtney was privy to said the same thing.

Twas no mercy or tiding done unto thou from the Greater Blue and Greater Red. Thou live in the shadow of their ignorance and violent hate.

The best they could glean from the ominous passage was 'Groudon and Kyogre formed the oceans and continents while trying to kill each other in an uncontrolled rage. It was only a pleasant side-effect that people got to live here afterward.'

Ye orbs of Red and Blue, with a fell light, do they quell the Greater Blue and Greater Red. Slumber now, titans, and clash none more in this age.

The next passage was more difficult. It clearly referenced some type of artifact, an orb of sorts. The wording suggests the blue orb controls Groudon, and the red one controls Kyogre.

Last Courtney heard, her fellow Magma Admin, Tabitha, was keeping an ear to the ground for mention of archeological digs recovering any such artifacts. In the meantime, Magma R&D was hard at work advancing the field of Type Spectrology by years at a time. All the effort was going to locate anything giving off intense readings akin to Ground or Water Type Energy. Magma needs their orb ASAP, or at least they need to deny the dogmatic Aquas the red orb.

It makes an ironic sort of sense that the Ancient Pokemon could be controlled by the power of their rivals.

Courtney frowns in distaste as she thinks over Magma's own 'rivals.' Magma is trying to save the world, to ensure peace and growth for a hundred more generations, but Aqua seems determined to drown all life on the planet with a religious, moronic fervor. Why they want to raise the seas is something she just cannot understand. Is there even a reason? Will they try to hold the world as ransom? Or has Aqua just transformed into some insane doomsday cult?

Bah…

Rather than drill into the planet, a time and resource-intensive effort, Magma will use an already open pathway like the volcano of Mt. Chimney to rouse their champion pokemon. Once roused, they'll use the blue orb to control him, and with that control, reshape the world into something that will sustain the lives of people and pokemon for thousands of years.

Courtney's phone rings right on time, and she expected no less. Here in a lone cable car on a mountain is the only place she feels safe speaking to him. She raises it to her ear.

"Courtney…" The voice from the speaker is magnificent: learned, cultured, and so reassuring to hear. "How goes your pet project?"

"Well, sir," Courtney pats herself on the back for keeping her worship out of her voice. "There are roadblocks on some objectives, but I have integrated well with the group. I… know they are suspicious, but I suspect it's natural rather than blown cover."

"I see…" There is a pause. "Tell me again, Courtney, your evaluations of them. I have your reports, and as detailed as they are, they lack the touch of a personal conversation. Keep it brief if you would. I know you're only minutes from the volcano."

The magenta-haired woman kicks herself mentally. Was a ten-page dossier on each of her marks not enough? She'll do better next time.

"Sir, regarding the Draconid Tribeswoman," she begins. "The Draconid is of moderate concern. She is a talented trainer of Dragons, but she is too headstrong and violent to be of significant use to Magma. Her current roster is Shelgon, Swablu, and Goomy. She has no tactical resources I can determine. I will strive to make her a non-factor in the least violent way possible, owing to the possibility of one of her pokemon undergoing stress evolution and generating an incident if she is dealt with too harshly."

"A Shelgon… Well evaluated. We do not have the resources to spare to deal with a grieving Salamence. Relevant details, indeed. The next one?"

"Regarding Brendan Birch," this one is easy. "Brendan is of low concern. He is the most talented and tactical of the three as a trainer, as well as noble in a way rarely seen. His pokemon are obedient and well-raised. His roster consists of Marshtomp, Mawile, Breloom, and an Electrike possessing the Giant's Gene. I have rated him as a low concern due to how I intend to sway him into Magma. He is the sort of person who can aid in the governing of a new world."

"First names? Goodness, Courtney. You sound almost fond of the boy." The voice chuckles. "Don't forget your most important mission during your fun, however. I need you at my side if we are to safeguard the generations of the future."

"I would never forget, Leader Maxie. Not now, not ever," she breathes.

"I know you won't," Maxie's smile can almost be heard over the phone, and it fills the Magma admin with wondrous purpose. "And the last one?"

"Regarding Henson," Courtney hesitates. "Henson is of… significant concern. His performance as a trainer is merely above average, but he boasts a roster of powerful pokemon with varied abilities. He has demonstrated prodigious talent in creating pokemon moves, as I've observed a number of undocumented attacks used by his pokemon. His current roster is Grovyle, Shinx, Octillery, a Corvisquire I've yet to see, and… a Ninetales."

The line is silent at the revelation. "I see…" The answer is slow and measured. "Continue."

"Henson is kind, perhaps foolishly so, but I believe… he could be convinced to see things Magma's way. At this time, I highly advise against his elimination in any form, as his Ninetales presents a serious retaliation risk," Courtney finishes.

The way that fox stares at her sometimes…

"Courtney, Gamma-pi-gamma-delta-beta."

With a blink, Courtney rattles off the requested ID check code. "One, seven, nine, zero, six, six, four, three, four, one, eight."

"Good…" The voice over the phone sighs. "You have felt no breaches on your mental blocks?"

"None."

"Good. If at any time you feel you've been mentally compromised, you are to consider yourself recalled immediately and will be intercepted for quarantine and treatment. From now on, failure to report in and defeat a security check in a timely manner is grounds for declaring you a lost asset, understood?"

Even so close to a volcano, a cold shiver runs down Courtney's spine. "Leader Maxie?"

"I will not be questioned on this. Good luck with your project, Courtney. Bring pride to Magma."

The line goes dead.


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Act 2: Chapter 7
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Lee's pen dances across his notebook as he watches Flannery's Torkoal struggle to keep Ninetales in his line of sight. The tortoise pokemon is obviously used to dealing with opponents who boast greater speed, as he turns his head and neck to keep a bead on Ninetales with admirable accuracy. Once the vixen is at too harsh an angle, though, Torkoal is forced to turn on his feet to follow and falls behind. The Gym courtyard is littered with blackened soil and cracked ground, though Gym Leader Moore seems unbothered by the destruction as he watches from the side of the Gym proper.

Ninetales blurs into a spear of yellow once more and darts into Torkoal's blind spot directly behind him. Her red eyes flash and her jaws open. From her maw comes a single bolt of flame that crosses the distance between her and the tortoise pokemon with a whistle.

"Torkoal, behind you!" At Lee's side, Flannery grimaces and tries to direct her pokemon as best as she can.

The nameless fireball splashes across the back of Torkoal's shell without doing any real damage, but it does startle Flannery's ace into retaliating without instruction. Grunting, Torkoal shoots a cloud of hot, ember-filled ash from the holes in his shell, covering him in a burning, protective cloak.

'Burning Ash, one of Moore's own moves,' Lee eyeballs the cloud, guesstimating the circumference of the black, sooty defense. He jots the number down next to the three other numbers he observed in the spar. 'Twenty feet or so, definitely good enough to keep melee attackers at bay.'

'But not quite enough to deter ranged foes,' Ninetales adds, already charging Quick Attack as Torkoal begins to turn to her. 'In all other regards, Torkoal would be a serious opponent for most, but this blind spot and his inability to cope with projectiles approaching from behind is a notable weakness, one we figured out within minutes. I feel the ideas brewing in your head, beloved. What do you have in mind?' She charges Torkoal head-on.

'A few things-'

"Torkoal, Smokescreen!" Flannery's voice cuts off Lee's train of thought. "Then back up and use Stone Edge!"

The orange tortoise inhales, then spits out a rolling cloud of opaque, black smoke as he shuffles backward. Once the last puff of smoke passes his lips, his squinted eyes open ever so slightly. Torkoal raises a leg and stomps upon the ground of the Gym's courtyard, spider-webbing the ground with cracks. A barrage of razor-sharp stones breaks free from the ground at the stomp, quiver mid-air for a moment, then scream through the smoke at Ninetales.

Lee's eyes tickle, and he feels his fox drawing upon his clearer point of view, focusing on a spot behind Torkoal.

Ninetales leaps over the entire Smokescreen, easily clearing the distance as Stone Edge flies harmlessly under her. She twists midair, tails billowing like a cloak, then fires another nameless bolt of flames at her foe.

Neck craning back as far as it can, Torkoal tries to line up another Stone Edge, but the fire bolt tags him in the rear of his shell once more, drawing an annoyed grumble from him.

Ninetales lands neatly on her paws behind Torkoal without much of a crouch, but the shock that runs through her paws and up her legs doesn't bother her.

"I think that'll be enough for now, Flannery," Lee gives the redhead beside him a smile. "Thank you for allowing Torkoal to spar with Ninetales. We've got an idea of what would work best for you two now."

The Gym heir sighs and wipes her forehead with the back of her hand, seemingly relieved that the practice match is over. "No prob. Torkoal! C'mon back, honey!" She raises her hand and beckons her pokemon over. "Not even one hit…" She mumbles.

Lee does his best to not let his smile become awkward. "Ah, it was just a practice round is all, and a bad matchup at that. If Stone Edge had hit, that might have ended the fight…" He observes the far wall surrounding the courtyard.

The rocks hurled by Torkoal's Stone Edge are embedded into the wall like steel knives driven into soft wood. The Stone Edge projectiles must have been charged with an impressive amount of Rock TE, as a brown sort of 'rot' radiates an inch or so from each razor-stone, causing the rotted bits of the wall to crumble like loosely-packed dirt.

'Torkoal is not a pushover despite his weaknesses. Honestly, I think Flannery's fears about not being able to fill Moore's shoes are unfounded.'

As Torkoal leisurely lumbers back to Flannery with Ninetales padding along beside him, Flannery turns to Lee. "So I'm going to guess you already figured out Torkoal's biggest issue?" She asks glumly. "My Magcargo and Numel are both in the same boat."

"It's certainly no fault of you or your pokemon, and I've got a few ideas on how to fix that," Lee smiles back. "Lemme collect my thoughts here for a moment before we move on."

Flannery returns the smile with one of her own.

Ninetales returns to Lee's side and sits, looking up at him. 'You were saying?'

'Ah, right.' Lee flips back to the previous page in his notes, one filled with observational notes and a sketch of Torkoal. 'If I'm being honest, the most pragmatic answer here is to teach Flannery's pokemon Protect and drill them until they can instinctually guard their rear. I think Torkoal learns Protect naturally anyway.'

'I had similar thoughts,' Ninetales blinks and turns her eyes skyward, peering up at the clouds. 'Though that doesn't fill the commission very well.'

'It doesn't.' Lee agrees. 'I was thinking of something else. At first, I wanted to go for something fancy, like a loitering munition set to float behind Torkoal that attacks enemies that purposefully try to go for his rear, but…'

'But weaving such advanced instructions into a move is beyond me,' Ninetales huffs in self-aimed annoyance.

'We'll figure it out,' Lee soothes. 'We just need to crack the secrets behind complex moves. Normal TE has no built-in homing, so moves like Swift are doing something in the background. Corvi and his efforts with Swift prove there is underlying 'programming' to moves and that we can alter said programming. With your expertise, I know we can figure it out.'

Ninetales' ire rises briefly at the mention of the still-missing raven pokemon, but she pushes it aside. 'More like your expertise. My feats might look impressive, but they would have never come to be if you didn't figure out that my Fire isn't truly tied to biological cues.'

'It was a fluke, really.'

'Some discoveries require luck just as some require skill, but it's a discovery all the same,' Ninetales refutes him. She looks away from the sky and back up to Lee, curiosity apparent. 'Your mind is whirling again. Credit for your thoughts?'

'Just thinking on what Corvi did to alter Swift's target mid-flight.' Lee raises his pen to his mouth and taps it against his lip as he stares at his notes. 'When we were working on it, he had no progress, then suddenly began to demonstrate the properties we wanted with slow but measurable improvement. Maybe it's like muscle memory? The repetition might train a pokemon's brain to mold their TE differently, changing the programming of the move? I know you can freely mold Fire TE into almost any form you want now, so I'm wondering if this commission is going to be as simple as dreaming up a new move, then repeating it until the molding steps cement themselves in your subconscious enough that you don't need to think about it anymore. With enough training, we might even be able to make Fox Fire fully autonomous or make something even more outlandish. Honestly, love, you open so many doors that I almost don't know where to start.'

Ninetales is silent for a moment, pondering Lee's words. 'The idea certainly has merit. I myself cannot rightly explain just how I know a move is a move, but…' Inside of her, Lee feels raw Fire TE churning, running up and down her limbs like the blood in her veins. 'My Fire jumps to my command much faster when you call a move for me to use. It must be some form of instinctual, predetermined molding. Back to our commission, however…'

Lee turns the page in his notebook back to the one he was previously writing on where there are a number of ideas, some crossed out for being too complex or ridiculous. 'Right. If it needs to be flashy, cover the shared weakness between Torkoal, Numel, and Marcargo, and needs to work within current limits, then my plan is to go with something that simply attacks in every direction at once. Do you think you can manage a sort of air-burst fireball that rains down on the field?'

The fox at his side smirks. 'Not exactly elegant, but it'll do for the first of what will be many commissions. If it is only two uncomplicated steps, then I believe we can have this whole deal wrapped up in a single afternoon.'

'That's assuming Flannery accepts our proposal. Do you think we'll get more? Commissions, I mean.'

'Beloved, you're going to need to put a price tag on even talking to you.'

With an unsure smile, Lee clears his throat and turns to a hopeful-looking Flannery with her Torkoal at her side. "So after some thought," Lee begins, "Torkoal's biggest weakness is the spot behind him where ranged attacks can get him before he can turn. We know powering up Flame Wheel takes too long to be a viable dodging technique, so in lieu of that, my thought here is to keep it simple and provide Torkoal with an attack that can strike all parts of the field simultaneously."

"All parts of the field simultaneously?" Flannery parrots with a confused blink. At her side, Torkoal tilts his head.

Lee nods. "Yep. Our proposal is this; an airburst fireball that saturates the ground with multiple smaller projectiles. After some tweaking from Ninetales, your team should be able to cast this move and cover large parts of the field in flames." As he speaks, he can feel Ninetales idly twiddling her Fire TE as she follows the image playing out in his brain. "Torkoal could either cast it directly upward to nail most of the field, or behind him to punish anyone trying to exploit his blindspot. It'll probably take practice to get it just right, but I think with some time to prepare, you and Torkoal will have a new and viable move ready for your appointment as Gym leader."

As he talks, Flannery's eyes grow wider and gain a mystified sort of shine to them. "A new move just like that? That fast?"

"Ehhh…" Lee closes his notebook and stows away his pen in the spiral binding. "As I said, it's going to take us some time to really prototype your move, test it, work the bugs out, then present a working copy to you. Having it ready before you take your place as Gym Leader is the only thing we can really promise. It could be ready tomorrow, it could be ready a day before the turnover. Do you have any input on what you want? This proposal is just our suggestion, and you're free to ask for something else."

Flannery crosses her arms and tilts her head back, looking up at the sky in thought. "I mean… I'm not really sure what to ask for. I never really considered the possibility of a move of my own just popping up out of thin air like that. You said your idea is, like, a bunch of falling fireballs that hit the whole field?" At Lee's nod, she continues. "It sounds cool to me. What's the next step?"

"Next, we should…" Lee pauses. "Hrm…"

'Perhaps we should baseline just how much stamina Torkoal has?' Ninetales silently suggests. 'Energy consumption is an important factor to consider.'

'Not a bad idea at all, love. I think I know just how to do it, too.' Lee nods. "Next," he addresses Flannery out loud. "Let's get an idea of Torkoal's total Fire output and try to gauge how much we're wanting this new move to cost him. If we make it so powerful that Torkoal can only cast it once, that's time you'll have to waste learning how to modulate the power. In a worst-case scenario, the move might not even work under a certain threshold if it's made with too high a predetermined level of power."

Flannery smiles. "Gotcha. So what do we do?"

Lee leads Flannery, Torkoal, and Ninetales to a boulder sitting at the edge of the field as he explains. "How many times do you think Torkoal can use Flamethrower going full-tilt in a match before he exhausts himself?"

The Gym heir and her pokemon lock eyes for a second. "All out? Ten or eleven times I think," she replies, turning back to Lee.

"Alrighty," Lee reopens his notebook and readies his pen as the group comes to a stop. "Have Torkoal use Flamethrower on the boulder there," he gestures with his pen, "and Ninetales is going to match him as best she can. That'll tell us how much energy the new move can consume without being a burden."

"You heard the man, Torkoal," Flannery smiles and dramatically points a finger at their rocky target. "Flamethrower, and give it all you've got!"

Torkoal takes a deep breath, the coalbed in his shell blazing orange and making Lee uncomfortably warm as he does so, then from the tortoise pokemon's mouth comes a spiraling pillar of near-white flames. The heat is so intense that Lee is forced to blink as his eyes dry out.

The Flamethrower strikes the distant boulder almost like a physical object, throwing chips of rock away. The face of the stone rapidly heats to red-hot, and parts of the boulder pop and explode away as it heats unevenly.

'Torkoal was certainly raised by a Fire-type master…' Lee grimaces and ignores the discomfort of open flames not under Ninetales' careful control. His scars tingle unpleasantly before the heat. 'Does the spiraling motion of the flame do something for the attack? Added stability?' He jots the note down. 'Alrighty, Ninetales. Match him as best you can. Start small and ratchet up until you're on par with him.'

Ninetales steps up beside Torkoal, wholly unbothered by the air-distorting heat the other Fire-type is putting off. She takes no breath and performs no flourish, merely opening her jaws and letting a stream of whooshing fire spill out. The new attack washes over the boulder, and the rock hisses as it starts melting into a puddle of molten stone.

Ninetales' Flamethrower is already the near person-engulfing size of Torkoal's, but the flames are a searing white that hurt to look at. The heat never reaches Lee, but Flannery winces and steps back.

The fox pokemon's brows furrow, and slowly the intensity of her Flamethrower dials back, matching Torkoal's near perfectly. Out of curiosity, Lee snakes his way a little deeper into Ninetales, touching that nebulous dynamo of pure, raw Infinity Energy deep inside her.

Sustaining this Flamethrower pulls at her reserves, but the drain is lethargic, almost unnoticeable at first glance. She could melt twenty boulders like the one here in the Gym courtyard before needing a breather.

'Remember this level of drain, love,' Lee orders. 'Ideally, we don't want to go over 200% of what this Flamethrower costs. That'll give Torkoal five or so casts of this new move.'

'Understood,' is Ninetales' short reply.

"Okay, that's good!" Lee's voice is almost lost over the roar of the twin Flamethrowers, but both Ninetales and Torkoal abate their attacks, leaving the half-melted boulder to crackle and cool. "Ah, sorry about the rock. I guess I didn't expect it to melt so easily…"

Flannery waves the apology away. "No worries. Torkoal can put a new one there no prob," she says. "What's next?"

"I think that's about it…" Lee shuts his notebook once more. "We'll begin prototyping the move and report back with our progress. Thanks for taking the time to work with us so we could get an idea of where to go from here."

Off to the side, in the shade of the Gym, Moore picks that time to speak up. "Well now," he rises and pushes his glasses further up his nose, slowly making his way to Lee and Flannery. "Quite the process you have there, my boy."

"We're just following the same steps we use for moves we intend to use for ourselves," Lee says with a shrug.

"I see…" Moore digs in his pocket and withdraws a pokeball. "Now that you've completed your assessment, would you like to test Madam Ninetales' powers now, or later?"

Lee looks down just as Ninetales looks up, their eyes meeting and a conversation passing in less than a second. "If it's all the same to you, may we come back in a day or two for advanced testing? I think we can get baselines on our own, and we've got an appointment to see my Octillery at the Pokemon Center."

"Of course. No problem," Moore grins and puts his pokeball away. "Thanks again, my boy. I know you've got Flannery's number, so give us a ring when you want to visit. We're also looking forward to your match here soon!"

"See you later!" Flannery smiles and offers a wave.

Lee waves back, and after tucking his notebook under his arm, he and Ninetales make their way through the empty Gym and back through the front door.

'Do you think we can really finish this move in an afternoon?' Lee asks his ace as they begin the trip back to Lavaridge.

Ninetales flicks one of her tails as she pads along next to Lee. 'Perhaps one afternoon is hyperbole, but I don't believe it will take long. Two or three days at most. You recall how Convergence destabilizes when I add too much power too quickly?'

'I do.' Lee's mind works as she reminds him. 'You're intending to use a hollowed fireball with an induced instability as the delivery method for the other fireballs?'

'Indeed.' Inside Ninetales, Lee feels her Fire TE stir and form up into the complex molding that would be needed.

Lee mulls over the idea. 'Perhaps add another unstable fireball in the core with the projectiles situated around it, one that explodes after the shell. It could scatter the fireballs without needing to add a more complex step to the mix.' Like someone laying their hands upon the hands of another, Lee focuses and exerts a gentle touch on Ninetales' control of her Fire. The great fox lets herself be guided along, and the Fire TE is shaped like warm clay between their combined wills. 'Something like that, maybe?'

Ninetales inspects the beginnings of the still nameless attack, then she smoothes out some of Lee's changes. 'I see what you intend to do. If we thin this part, however…' The unseen hands move once more.

Just a week ago, Lee would have never been able to tap into the psyche of Vulpix so deeply. It pushed their bond nearly as far as it could go, combining their wills to control attacks mid-flight. But now, as a Ninetales? Nothing about her is hidden from him, and even if the mysteries around her powers befuddle him, the borrowed instincts from Ninetales smooth over the gaps in his understanding. Ideas and refinements flow between them as if they've always been able to do such things.

The new and exciting experiences only make his questions about the deeper nature of pokemon burn even more. What is the true relationship between a pokemon's lifeforce, Infinity Energy, and the Type Energy they command? How do they make TE bend to their will? Why does TE do what it does to the world outside of a pokemon's body? Physics as he knows them just wouldn't work with IE and TE thrown into the mix.

'I guess that decides what I'm going to study in school,' Lee rests his hands in his jacket pockets as he and Ninetales walk. 'I'll need to get in contact with Roxanne and see if any of the Rustboro university courses offer majors in the study of IE and TE, or at least advanced pokemon biology. I can probably pull a double minor in pokemon nutrition and psychology, too.'

'Be careful to not stretch yourself too thin, beloved.' Ninetales warns, still engrossed with the preliminary prototyping of their commissioned move.

As they walk back into Lavaridge proper, Lee leaves the ponderings of their commission to Ninetales as he withdraws his phone from his pocket. Once more, the hundreds of emails stare at him, demanding attention.

Wordlessly, he opens his mailbox and begins sorting through everything.

The first and most prevalent is that someone made an entire thread about him in the BattleNet forums, and every time someone mentions him, it generates an email. For a moment, he debates going and reading the thread, then he looks at the page count.

Page 1 of 89

'Maybe later…'

Another thread mentioning him is one frequented by rare pokemon enthusiasts. A glance at some of their pinned posts tells him Ninetales is apparently the 27th rarest pokemon in the world, with Sylveon at spot #28 and Relicanth at spot #26. Spots 1 through 10 are dominated by legendary pokemon with a confirmed capture, and the teens are mostly fossil pokemon with a third-stage Dragon or Fairy here and there. To Lee's relief, none of the legendary pokemon with a confirmed capture are godly, unique legendaries. The number one spot is held by Suicune, of which there is only one recorded to be in the care of a trainer.

Apparently, a Sinnoh native named Tobias caught a Latios recently, as that section of BattleNet is aflame with intense speculation on where he found the legendary dragon. Tobias commented once, simply saying 'Latios doesn't want me to say. Sorry.' when pinged relentlessly on where he got the Eon Dragon.

Someone did invite Lee to a private group of Hoenn-based rare pokemon hunters, the aptly named Seekers of Hoenn. Rather than join right away, Lee marks the invite as read and moves on.

One email is a private message from one of BattleNet's admins. Slightly worried, Lee opens it and reads what's inside.

From: SITE_ADMIN

Hello L_Henson.

This is official notice that you are the subject of a BattleNet megathread (link). A megathread is a sub-type of thread on our forum dedicated to any discussion of a given topic or person, such as pokemon or trainers. BattleNet prides itself on being the largest and most accurate hub of news and information for all things pokemon, so we wish to assure you that your megathread will be policed by site administration just as all other megathreads are. We have no tolerance for harassment, misinformation, or illegal activity on our website. We at BattleNet are proud advocates of free and open information, but we still draw hard lines at such inappropriate activities.

As a trainer who is the subject of a megathread, we encourage you to interact with our community in a positive way and to offer corrections to your thread to ensure the accuracy of posts within.

If at any point you have questions or concerns, please contact BattleNet staff and we'll be happy to assist.

Under the body of the email in text so small Lee has to zoom in to read it, there is something else.

BattleNet is obligated to inform you that under the Safe-&-Sound Act of the Hoenn civil government, you are entitled to request the removal of some or all information relating to you, your family, and your pokemon if you believe yourself or your loved ones to be in bodily danger due to the public posting of said information. Upon submitting such a request through proper channels, BattleNet administration will temporarily suspend the viewing of your information to all users as we assess your complaint. A formal reply with our decision will be sent to your email on file upon the conclusion of our assessment, which will be no more than 48 hours after the submission of your complaint.

With a worried frown, Lee opens the thread dedicated to him and scans the opening post. What he finds isn't too outrageous, but he grumbles to himself as he realizes that being anonymous is well and truly a pipedream now. Millions of people have seen the video of Ninetales' evolution, and the megathread screams to everyone that his team is loaded with custom moves. He and his pokemon have effectively become minor celebrities overnight. After taking a few minutes to comb some of the boards belonging to other regions, Lee is glad to say the burst of fame is mostly isolated to Hoenn.

'That offer from Nigel to use the lab's PR guy is looking mighty tempting now…' Lee sighs and moves on to the next email. For a moment, he debates asking BattleNet to take down his thread but ultimately discards the thought. 'The damage is already done and trying to hide it is just going to look bad. I can't say I was huge on social media back home. Didn't really make sense to me, I guess. Who would care what a nobody like me was doing? A PR guy to manage this mess is a must.'

'Don't be too hasty in that regard, beloved,' Ninetales speaks. Lee feels her mentally shelve that half-made move so she can focus on him. 'While proper public relations are important, using a proxy for everything is going to come off as sterile. A bit of fun here and there won't harm us.'

'A bit of fun, eh?' Lee hums and takes a look at the next email, yet another group invite. 'Fox Friday' looks innocent enough, the members being simple fans of vulpine pokemon for no reason deeper than personal taste, so he accepts and joins the group. Just in time, too, as the latest topic of their little slice of forum fits Ninetales' concerns perfectly. "Hey, Ninetales?" He points his phone at her.

Ninetales looks up at the phone, or more specifically, the camera of the phone with a tilt of her head.

Click!

Lee saves the portrait shot of Ninetales and smiles, camera still raised. "I love you."

The vixen's ears stand up in surprise, then her surprise melts into a tender smile. The sudden return flow of love from her mind to his nearly makes Lee forget to hit the capture button.

Click!

Prize saved, Lee shuffles his phone into his off-hand and strokes Ninetales' neck when she presses her head into his side. The warmth bleeding into him is more than just physical.

Welcome to Battlenet! The Pokemon Battle Authority!
You are currently logged in, L_Henson
You are viewing:

All Public Groups you are a member of
AND all Private Groups you are a member of.

Group Name: FoxFriday
Topic of the day: Phriday Photo-shoot


Today at 9:06 AM
Zororororo: Photoshoot time! We're going with a classic. Post a fox before and after you say something!


Unlike the open forum style of BattleNet's boards, the groups are structured more like chatrooms for faster and looser conversations. Lee posts the pair of pictures, releasing Ninetales as she composes herself and steps away.

Today at 1:55 PM
L_Henson: Before and after I said "I love you."
(Attachment #1) (Attachment #2)


Multiple people are typing…

Then the group is promptly muted. He'll check on it later.

"Organic enough for you, miss PR?" Lee shows his phone screen to Ninetales, who just rolls her eyes.

Now crossing into the limits of Lavaridge and the throngs of people who slow down to peer at Ninetales, Lee sorts through the rest of the flood of emails.

Most of it is nothing worth looking into and, after adjusting his email preferences on his BattleNet account, the steady stream comes to a halt. One email is from the smaller, Pokemon Contest-oriented sister site of BattleNet (Which makes no sense to Lee as BN has a contest section). This sister site, Contest Corner, is inviting him to attend Pokemon Contest exhibitions as either a participant or a VIP. That's another one he puts on hold.

There is Aarons' email, which goes into detail on how Silph would love to enter an exclusivity deal with him. Since the email very specifically mentions that Lee would not be allowed to produce TMs without them, the reply is a short I'll think about it.

A different part of BattleNet apparently took notice of Grovyle, as a small private group of Grass specialists, cheesily named Nature Warriors, invited him to join. Once more he marks the invite as read and resolves to come back later.

Several people have directly messaged him on BattleNet, and most are just spam, but one jumps out at him.

From: Kabu (Verified Trainer) (Galar Gym Leader)

Hello Lee.

Let me introduce myself. My name is Kabu, and as you've probably seen, I'm a gym leader here in Galar. I myself am from Hoenn, and I always keep an eye on my birth home for different news and happenings. I happened to retire for the night and check my computer at just the right time, as I saw the magnificent video of your Ninetales evolving. I'm reaching out to you for a few reasons and hope to hear back from you soon.

First I would like to congratulate you and your Ninetales on her evolution. For many trainers, pokemon like Ninetales, Arcanine, Charizard, Typhlosion, and a small handful of others stand at the apex of Fire Types, and I am blessed with both an Arcanine and a Ninetales of my own. My Ninetales has expressed an interest in meeting yours should you ever visit Galar, and I won't beat around the bush and say he's strictly looking for friendship. If your Ninetales doesn't object to the idea, I would like to discuss the possibility of breeding between her and my own Ninetales.

Secondly, I would like to be the first to give you your dues and recognize you as a proper Fire specialist, as your Ninetales' abilities speak volumes. The private group Fire Master is where we gather to discuss our shared pokemon and passions. As your career as a trainer progresses, you'll find more groups like ours. We try to have meetings in person a few times a year, so if you are interested, the dates are marked on our event calendar. You will find the invitation link below.

EDIT: While not originally planned, I've been asked to offer you an invitation to 9TT. 9TT is a smaller group exclusive to a few Ninetales trainers. The admin, who asked me to invite you, is a Pokemon Master as picky as she is knowledgeable on everything related to Ninetales as a species. She's been passing out her knowledge to a selected few over the last year. If you have her notice, your collective feats are truly something to behold. I look forward to speaking with you, Lee.

9TT: (link)
Fire Master: (link)


Regards,
Kabu.
Proud Gym Leader of Motostoke City, Defender of the Realm of Galar, and Fire Type Master.


Lee re-reads the message twice before he begins to type up his reply. 'Awful formal for a forum message.' He clicks his tongue, realizing the politics game is going to follow them as he and his team keep rising. 'I'm going to guess your answer to breeding proposals hasn't changed with your evolution?'

'It hasn't,' Ninetales wrinkles her snout in distaste. 'I have entire lifetimes before I need to worry about such things.'

With a nod, Lee pens his reply. 'Certainly not shy, is he? Or did he say that quiet part out loud to distract from something else?'

Hello Gym Leader Kabu.

Thank you for the congratulations, as it means a lot to both myself and Ninetales. Her evolution is a moment I will never forget. Regarding your offer, I must decline the breeding proposal at this time. Ninetales does not wish to breed for profit, and I will stand beside her in her decision. Who knows what the future holds, however? If she changes her mind, I will message you.

Secondly, thank you for the invitations. I will join them here shortly. As I am a traveling trainer, I cannot say how active I will be, but I will attempt to add to discussions when I can. I'm certain there is much to learn from respectable peers such as yourself.

Kindly,
Lee Henson.
Trainer and Pokemon Researcher of the Hoenn Regional Pokemon Laboratory.


Once done, Lee nods to himself and silently offers his eyesight to Ninetales. 'What do you think, love?'

Ninetales reads the draft through Lee's eyes, approval radiating from her. 'Respectful, but still firm. It will do well,' she says, pulling away from his senses.

Lee's thumb falls on the 'send' button, and the message is off. Eyeballing the pair of invite links and resigning himself to fate, he taps the first one.

Group Name: 9TT
Topic of the day: N/A


Inside, the group is somewhat barren, with the last sent message being four days ago. Scrolling up, there isn't much there either, as it looks like whoever administrates the group deletes the message history every month or so. None of the twelve other members seem to react to the join message generated when he hit the link.

Lee recognizes a precious few of the members. There's Kabu, for one. Then there's Blaine, a man regarded as one of the strongest Kanto Gym Leaders and a world-renowned Fire Specialist. Rudy rings a bell, and after a moment Lee remembers the man is an Orange Island Gym Leader. The others, he has no idea, but all of them boast impressive trainer classes like (Verified Elite), (Master Breeder) and even one (Veteran PKMN Ranger). The admin of the group, though…

Lokoko (9TT Administrator)

'Where have I heard that name?' Lee taps the edge of his phone against his chin as he thinks, but can't seem to recall such a woman anywhere in the pokemon canon. It's frustrating, as he can almost feel the answer tickling his brain, but he just can't remember. 'My meta-knowledge is so out of date by this point I should probably toss most of it.' He taps on Lokoko's name to pull up her profile, only to frown at what he finds.

Which is nothing. Literally.

Lokoko's profile has zero posts, zero comments, and is missing nearly all the info required for a profile, even the mandatory parts. No date of birth, no region, no pokemon or trainer class, nothing. It's as if she exists in name only.

'How odd… What kind of strings did she have to pull to do this? BattleNet made it pretty clear they hate taking down anything on their site. Kabu was specific in calling her a Pokemon Master, so is that it?' Before he can ponder further, his phone pings and he taps the notification on reflex, taking him back to 9TT.

Today at 2:04 PM
Lokoko (Admin): Good Afternoon, Lee Henson, and thank you for joining. I've taken notice that you are a caring trainer for a fine young Ninetales. If you need any guidance on how best to raise her or manage your relationship with her, please do ask. I am here to help you and everyone else.


For a reason Lee cannot place, reading the message makes the hair on the back of his neck stand up. Slowly, he types a reply.

Today at 2:05 PM
L_Henson: Thank you, Lokoko. Kabu speaks highly of you. If I have anything to ask, I'll consult you.


Lokoko doesn't reply, and taking it as a dismissal, Lee goes back to Kabu's message and clicks the other link.

Fire Masters is much more active, boasting fifty or so members and messages from only a few moments ago. Lee reads down the member list.

There's Kabu, of course. Blaine again, Flannery and Moore, Flint of Sinnoh's Elite Four, Malva of Kalos' Elite Four, and a host of other people. Nearly all of them have some sort of professional trainer class, but one above all others takes the cake.

Leon (Galar Champion) is typing…

…And he's the first one to begin typing as soon as the welcome message is announced.

'Yeah, no. Fuck that.'

Lee shoots in a message as quickly as he can, barely able to keep his spelling straight in his haste.

Today at 2:05 PM
L_Henson: Hello everyone and thank you Kabu for the invite. I cannot say how active I will be due to being a traveling trainer, but I'll do my best to contribute where I can. I'm actually about to lose service now, so I hope to be back soon.'


He closes the website and stuffs his phone in his pocket. "PR, politics, social media…" Lee's voice is so quiet only Ninetales can hear him. Both man and fox turn down a side street, bringing the Pokemon Center into view. "When we're done with all of this league tournament shit, we're building a nice cabin somewhere in Sinnoh and I'm throwing my phone into a lake."

Ninetales' reply is a comforting set of tails wrapped around his back. 'No need to stress. You have myself, Grovyle, and everyone else with you.'

With a cross of his arms, Lee lets his worries go. 'Sometimes I hate that you won't let me bellyache about things.'

'It's a full-time job, I assure you,' the golden fox smirks.


"Come now, fool! Angle your shields! Do you want to be struck!?"

Below Corvisquire in the forest clearing, Ralts cries out and raises another shield of translucent psychic energy, this time angling it to the right slightly.

Corvisquire's latest barrage of Swift stars smash into the pink shield, which cracks like glass, but as the last star detonates with a bang, the shield barely holds. If the psychic moron had dared try to block the attack head-on, Corvisquire knows the shield would have broken.

Mercilessly, Corvisquire swoops down, racing for the ground at a near 90-degree angle, then inches away from crashing, he pulls up and races towards Ralts so fast his sight begins to blur. The power of Steel flows into his wing, and with a tilt, he's poised to take Ralts' legs out from under him.

"Ralts!" The voice of the boy, Wally, rings out from the side of the clearing. "Teleport!"

With only a second to spare, Ralts vanishes in a flash and escapes Corvisquire's Steel Wing.

Clicking his beak in annoyance, Corvisquire pulls up, filling his vision with the sky. He feels a Confusion attack from Ralts try to yank at his wings and jostle him, but all it takes to break the psychic hold is to flex his wings with force.

Leveling out in the sky and looking back down, he meets the determined eyes of the Ralts below him. Off to the side, the green-headed brat Wally does a decent job keeping his face clear of worry. The boy and the tiny psychic break their eyes away from Corvisquire to look at each other, no doubt trying to form a telepathic plan.

'I didn't expect them to come this far in just a week or so,' the raven pokemon muses to himself. Day in and day out, Wally and Ralts have come to him, bringing him tributes in return for training. The first days were pathetic, with Ralts unable to do more than run away like a Ratata before a Fearow. His attacks were weak, his defenses were laughable, and Corvisquire thought his plan of making an ideal foe to push his own evolution was going to fall flat. It made his blood boil, that this weakling dare waste his time and good faith instruction.

Then slowly, Ralts began to get better.

He dodged quicker, looked for openings to strike from, and started utilizing his powers in creative ways, something Corvisquire ordered him to do every single day, in every single spar.

It was a surprise to the raven pokemon when Ralts admitted that it was Wally coming up with half the plans and ideas. "Sometimes when we go home, Wally and I will go to the backyard and practice on our own," Ralts said proudly during a break a day ago. "We want to get strong like you!"

Wally nodded along as Ralts spoke. "We know you've probably got other things to do, Mister Corvisquire," the green-headed child mirrored his pokemon's sentiments. "So we're doing our best to catch up. I don't want to be a burden on everyone around me!"

Corvisquire's stomach did not clench when the boy's over-excited words were punctuated with a short coughing fit.

"Hmm…" Corvisquire pulls himself out of the memory and takes his eyes off of the little fool and his child, instead looking at the falling sun. "We're done for the day!" He caws to Ralts and Wally. "I will be busy tomorrow, and Friday next week. Do not seek me out or you'll be wasting your time!"

Ralts' eyes lose their psychic glow as the foolish little pokemon allows himself to relax and rub one of the bruises dotting his form. "Okay!" He replies with obnoxious cheer. "Thank you for today, Mister Corvisquire!" Both Ralts and Wally mirror each other, smiling and waving before they turn and begin the short trip back to the town of Verdanturf.

Corvisquire ignores them both as he dives into the trees, flying past branches and zooming along a path that's quickly becoming familiar. In short order, he finds the right tree and pulls up, slowing to a stop before he lands on a thick limb.

Folding his wings, Corvisquire shuffles along the branch to a small knothole in the tree, where his beak dips in. He bites down on what he's looking for and pulls it free before setting it down on his perch.

Sitting before him is a crumpled Devon shipping manifest, one stolen from Verdanturf's small outskirts warehouse.

Holding the packet of paper steady with a talon, Corvisquire bites the first page and flips it, taking in the second page with a crooked smile.

He can't steal something too high profile, as he already knows Pokemon Rangers are prowling around Hoenn looking for him, and every wild pokemon is a mouth that might potentially squeal. He cannot afford to add more heat to himself.

His talon taps down the page, past bulk pokeball shipments, an entire crate of Lum berries, and past several evolution stones.

No no, one never goes for the big-ticket items for goals such as this. What is taken has to be not worth pursuing.

His talon stops on his mark.

'The fool is progressing. Once he evolves, a gift from his dear mentor will be too much to resist.'

In a week's time, Verdanturf will be receiving a handful of evolution stones, and among that number are six middling-grade Dawn Stones. It just so happens that Ralts will evolve into Kirlia, and Kirlia evolves into one of their two final stages with a Dawn Stone.

Corvisquire can either wait for the little fool to evolve naturally after he hits his Kirlia stage, or outside factors can speed things up.

Corvisquire was never the patient sort.

'They won't miss one stone. I'm sure of it,' he smirks to himself.


Below are the names of some patrons who got to view this chapter early and felt like signing it. A huge thanks to them and everyone else who supports this story and everything else I write.

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Act 2: Chapter 8
Want to support me? See Fuggmann is creating Transformative fiction and other things | Patreon on the place of patrons. I do have goals on there that will hopefully allow me to cut back on work in favor of more writing. As thanks for donating, patrons get to see updates a few days early and suggest edits to the final draft before it goes live.


"Happy to be free of the Pokemon Center and out training?"

At Lee's side, Octillery bounces in place with a delighted burble, his smile obvious even if his nozzle-like mouth does not move. A few feet away, Ninetales smiles at her new teammate's enthusiasm, while Grovyle simply nods his approval.

Shinx could probably match Octillery's energy like the electrified ball of fuzz that she is, but alas, Lee has reluctantly left her in Brendan's care for today so that she won't be dangerously underfoot during training of this level. 'Sorry, baby girl. I'll make it up to you.'

Four days after meeting Moore and Flannery to discuss their commissioned Fire move, Octillery is finally free of the Pokemon Center he now seems to loathe with a passion. The poor octopus pokemon seemed bored to tears until Nurse Joy came into the aquatic ward with discharge paperwork for Lee during their visit today. Octillery clung to Lee like he was some sort of savior the entire way out the door, not at all caring that they were marching into the fields outside of town to train ASAP.

Lee smiles and places a hand on Octillery's head. The octopus' skin is still slick and cool despite the heat. The Water-type seems unbothered by the early morning sun in the shadeless clearing Lee found several miles outside of Lavaridge for today's training.

"I'm glad that you're feeling better," Lee says with a smile as he withdraws his hand and lets it slide into his pocket with his pokedex. "I'm sorry to ask so much of you so soon after you've just left the Center, but are you willing to help us in the Gym battle here in a few days? We'll be fighting Fire-types, but you might still get a bit banged up."

Octillery blinks once, an inquisitive gurgle bubbling from his throat.

Lee had noticed the red cephalopod lost his focus a bit when Gyms were mentioned before, and takes a guess as to where the confusion might stem from. "Never heard of a Gym before?"

Octillery shakes his head in the negative.

'How odd. He's got a solid grasp of English, but doesn't know what Gyms are? Could Octillery have been wild the whole time?' Lee hums. "Well, Gyms are places where pokemon trainers pit themselves and their teams against the strongest pokemon team in a given area. If you win, you're given a badge as a token of your victory along with some prizes, and any team who beats all eight Gyms will be eligible for a tournament against other teams who've done the same thing. If you win the whole thing, you can challenge the Elite Four, who are trainers and pokemon of immense skill. By beating them one by one, you can then challenge the regional champion, the finest trainer partnered with the best pokemon around. Make sense?"

'Although, I'm not sure I actually want us to win. I know the title says 'Champion', but since the whole sport is so deeply intertwined with politics and regional military might, 'Champion' and 'Governor-General' are interchangeable terms here. Honestly, I don't think being Champ would be fun.' Lee is reminded of the card from Steven Stone still in his wallet. The card has both an email and an office phone number, but the idea of phoning a champion for idle chit-chat isso laughable that he puts it out of his mind. 'Oh, right. I haven't checked BattleNet in a few days… Oh well, they can wait.'

Octillery follows the explanation easily and nods, his tentacles waving and ready.

"Glad to hear it." Lee grins and withdraws his pokedex. He flips it open and points it at the water-type. "First off, let's get an idea of the moves you know and work from there. I've heard your kind have a talent for learning many types of attacks, and that's going to be a huge help, not only to the team but to the research I'm conducting on Type Energy." Lee's thumb falls on the pokedex's confirm button.

"Octillery, the Jet Pokemon," the mechanical voice of the pokedex drones. "The suckers on Octillery's tentacles grip prey so tightly that few can escape. It will then daze prey with a strike from its rock-hard head before eating." Once the 'dex is done with its blurb, a slew of more helpful info is displayed on the screen.

"Rock hard head?" Lee frowns. He looks over to his newest pokemon, a hand raised. "May I?" When Octillery nods, Lee places his hand on the octopus's head and gently presses down, finding that Octillery's head lacks a skull as expected and gives way. "Well then. I recall other 'dex entities also saying your species can squeeze into nooks and crannies too. I'll have to see about getting this bogus blurb corrected, then."

Octillery chortles in amusement, a curious sound similar to churning water. Then he seemingly sucks in a breath and…

"Eeh!?" Lee pulls his hand away when Octillery's head suddenly hardens under his palm and pushes out the dimple he made. "Wha? How did…?" The zoologist tentatively touches Octillery's head again, finding it totally unyielding as if a skull manifested out of nowhere. Lee closes his pokedex, Octillery's moves forgotten for now. "How did you do that?"

The red octopus raises a tentacle and looks at the barren ground, his head swaying back and forth as if hemming and hawing over how to explain. An idea seems to strike him, as Octillery's tentacle deftly moves like an inspired artist's brush. In the dirt, he draws a rough sketch of himself with a large, balloon-like head and eight tentacles. He gives the sketch a face, then draws a thin circle around the face. Another circle is drawn around the first, this time larger and almost touching the edge of the sketch's head.

Lee can feel Ninetales' curiosity, and Grovyle must be curious as well, as he and the fox step closer to watch Octillery work.

Circles drawn, Octillery then digs his tentacle into the space between the circles, carving out a trench maybe half an inch deep. He tosses the dirt away, then leans over his drawing and lets a dribble of water flow from his mouth into the trench, filling it up. With a gurgle, he scuttles back half a step and points at the filled trench.

Lee scratches his chin as he tries to puzzle out the cryptic explanation. 'How interesting…' If his backpack wasn't up against a distant tree, he would be tempted to get his notebook out and record this. 'What a remarkable way to relay information. Of course, most pokemon are smart enough to get simple points across a language barrier, but a full pictogram using abstract informational media like water is something else.' He looks up away from the pictogram to Octillery, who stares at him expectantly.

Ninetales' mind works as she tries to figure out just what the octopus means, and Lee can feel it. She looks up to Octillery with a short, questioning purr rolling from her throat.

Octillery stubbornly says nothing, putting a frown on Ninetales' face. 'Rude.'' The vixen mentally sniffs. 'He could at least say he does not want to answer.'

Grovyle looks like he's trying to figure it out as well, but the slight crinkle of his eyelids and the impatient twiddle of his twig tells Lee the gecko pokemon isn't any closer to finding the answer.

'Let's see. How could he suddenly harden his head, and how would it fit in the context of the drawing?' Lee studies the drawing again, trying to draw on his limited knowledge of cephalopods. 'Obviously, water has something to do with it, but is this in a biological sense or a TE sense? I feel like this drawing would be more outlandish if it was strictly TE, so let's assume it's biological for now.' He looks at the circles and how they're placed between the watery trench. 'Are the circles meant to represent some kind of container? A container for the water? It's inside the body of the sketch, so…' Lee clicks his tongue. "Octillery, may I touch your head one more time?"

Octillery leans in, giving the man his silent permission.

Lee places his hand on Octillery once more, this time pressing down more firmly. There isn't much—almost none—but there is just the barest hint of give. Lee's fingers sink maybe a millimeter or less into the octopus' head.

Withdrawing his hand and rubbing his fingers together, Lee ponders the new info. 'So still not a solid skull, but so close that it wouldn't matter much in combat.' Looking back at the water, the circles, and how they're arranged in the octopus sketch, the answer hits him. "I'll be damned." Lee grins and turns to Octillery. "Is it a subdermal sac that you can pressurize with water at will?"

Octillery's eyes widen to a near comical degree, then he burbles happily, his front two tentacles meeting each other in wet, delighted applause.

'It's one thing to use a pictogram, but another thing entirely to use said pictogram to relay advanced biological information in a manner understandable to others. Octillery is quite something.' Lee's grin is wide as the few doubts he has about Octillery fade away. "Now, that's nature at its finest. Both your brain and the pressurized sac."

The octopus nods like he expected nothing less.

"Now I have to know what moves you know." Lee flips his pokedex open once more and points it at Octillery. "I know I told you I was a researcher during yesterday's visit, but I didn't go into any detail, did I? On top of pokemon biology and psychology, Type Energy and its dynamics have been endlessly fascinating to me recently. I'd love it if you'd be willing to help me with my research with your huge movepool, Octillery."

The red octopus' eyes light up at the thought.

'Definitely the brainy type.' Lee smiles and scrolls down his 'dex to Octillery's moves. 'No wonder he hated the Center so much. I doubt they kept him stimulated enough. I'll have to make a note to get some puzzles and brain teasers for him so he has something to do in his downtime.'

When he finally sees the Water-type's movepool, Lee lets out an impressed whistle.

Scan Complete

Known Moves:

Wrap
Headbutt
Water Gun
Octazooka
Psybeam
Gunk Shot
Rock Blast
Charge Beam
Aurora Beam
Signal Beam
Ice Beam
Bullet Seed
Focus Energy
Lock-On


'Good God. Octillery has some insane coverage and knows how to mold nine of the eighteen different types of TE with the potential to learn more. I know for sure he can learn Dark, Steel, Flying, Fire, and Ground moves too. If he could someday learn how to use every TE…' Lee flips his pokedex closed and returns it to his pocket. Part of him suddenly wants to capture a Kecleon to use in conjunction with Octillery to study TE, but the thought is shelved for now. 'Only having two melee moves might be an issue, though. I understand Octillery is going to end up being a ranged attacker, but Wrap and Headbutt alone aren't going to be viable back-ups.'

Ninetales takes the moment to chime in. 'Iron Tail, perhaps? There is no reason he cannot learn to apply the move to his tentacles.' She tilts her head and meets Octillery's eyes. 'If he knows Bullet Seed, then Seed Blast is also on the table.'

'True.' Lee clears his throat. "So, Wrap and Headbutt are rather self-explanatory. Let's test out your other attacks and see what kind of things we can discover. Since Octillery is the newest member here—" he looks over to Ninetales and Grovyle "—I'll likely spend most of today with him to get a better feel for how Octillery likes to battle. We've already discussed our basic game plan for the gym: Grovyle goes in to wear down everyone he can, then we switch to Octillery for clean-up duty, then Ninetales if things go really south. Flannery's team is strong, but I think we can take her for a fairly clean win."

Grovyle smirks.

Octillery nods along.

And Ninetales… frowns at being sidelined. Silent, telepathic assurance from Lee soothes her, but her frown remains. 'I understand your logic, Beloved… I simply don't enjoy it, is all,' she sends back.

Part of Lee still cringes at essentially offering Grovyle up as a buffer to make Octillery's job easier, but being the level-headed 'mon that he is, Grovyle has taken no visible offense to the otherwise logical plan. If anything, he seems emboldened that he is being chosen as the first pick in a Fire-type gym. 'I wish I had that kind of positive outlook. I know Grovyle is getting frustrated at his lack of inclusion in Gym battles, though. He was skipped over for both Rustboro and Dewford, then went down to the Baton Pass trick in Mauville. I hope this is a good confidence booster for him and not a letdown.'

"Right, let's begin, everyone!" Lee points a finger at the gecko pokemon. "Grovyle, you already know what you want to work on today. Once you feel good and warmed up, come to me and we'll give you Roxanne's Rock Tomb TM to even the odds for the Gym match. After that, we'll use today to get a feel for the new move and brainstorm uses for it, okay?"

Grovyle crosses his arms and nods, not quite keeping the eager gleam out of his slitted eyes.

"Ninetales." Lee's finger moves to his ace and best friend. "We're making good progress on the commissioned move. Keep that up for the first half of today, then we'll test your upper limits to see how long we need to keep our control exercises going."

Ninetales shifts on her paws. 'You've informed the Rangers of our intentions here already?' She vocalizes her question as well with two short, inquiring yips for Grovyle and Octillery's benefit.

"I have," Lee nods. "I gave both the local Pokemon Ranger station and Lavaridge emergency services a call this morning to inform them that we'll be out here and that things might get… noisy. They said to keep environmental damage to a minimum and keep wild pokemon out of any crossfire, and they won't have any reason to step in. Both seem reasonable to me."

Ninetales looks around at the barren 'training ground'.

The spot they found several miles outside of Lavaridge is sooty and devoid of life, having been subjected to a wildfire a few months ago according to a short chain of text messages with Flannery. The ground is bare dirt, the trees are husks, and there are no pokemon around. The edge of the burned area is recovering, but even then, the new trees are small and the greenery is thin.

All in all, the perfect place for a Fire-type to go wild.

Ninetales smiles. 'I think we can manage under the Rangers' rules.'

"Finally—" Lee turns to Octillery "—we're going to run you through some exercises, move tests, and a physical to benchmark your health. I have no doubt you'll perform well; this is more for my peace of mind than anything else."

The octopus puts on a determined expression, clearly eager to begin.


As the day drifts into the afternoon, Lee sighs and wipes at his sweaty forehead with the back of his hand. "What a day, and we're barely halfway done."

With the impending Gym match just three days away, all three fighters on Lee's team have thrown everything they have into honing their skills.

Grovyle, with his mastery of Leaf Blade and X-Scissor, has been combining his know-how of Feint Attack and cutting moves to try and recreate Night Slash and expand his coverage. Much like Feint Attack, Night Slash is not a move anyone in the Sceptile line can normally learn. The limitation shows considering how much the savant-like gecko pokemon has been struggling to reverse-engineer the move over the last two weeks. He can mold Dark TE, but the energy only sometimes holds an edge when channeled into the leaves growing from Grovyle's wrists. It's much the same with his claws as well. 'There must be a trick to getting the energy to hold an edge. Dark TE certainly doesn't behave like Grass or Bug, but I guess that's to be expected,' Lee muses.

Between frustrating failures, Grovyle alternates between furthering his mastery of Quick Attack and getting used to Rock Tomb. Quick Attack's progress has begun to level off, leaving Grovyle somewhere between Andre's Absol and Wattson's Jolteon in speed. That's not the most impressive part, however. No, his ability to near-totally arrest his momentum and accelerate in another direction is what's truly impressive. Grovyle must be putting several Gs worth of stress on his body making such sharp turns or coming to abrupt stops with Quick Attack… Or Quick Attack is somehow shielding him from the worst effects of moving at such speeds. 'If that's the case, then I might have a newfound appreciation for the flexibility of Normal TE… Or maybe a better term is Neutral TE? No, don't worry about that right now. Normal TE is fine.'

Lee takes a moment to admire Grovyle as he trains.

Brows furrowed, the pokemon hisses and draws an arm back from his place about thirty yards away. In front of his open claws, a small rock begins to form from sand that appears from seemingly nowhere. The sand collects into a mass, forming a solid brown rock that grows larger and larger. Before three seconds have passed, a stone as large as Grovyle floats before him. Then with a grunt, he thrusts his forearm forward.

As if thrown by a pokemon thrice Grovyle's size, the stone quickly flies forward in a lazy arc, crashing down into the dirt with a mighty thud that can be felt in the soles of Lee's boots.

While the attack is a far cry from his usual blistering-fast assaults, the simple yet destructive power of hurling a large rock cannot be denied. If a pokemon were struck by the boulder, the resulting powdered bones would make for a very bad day.

With a deep sigh, Grovyle raises his arms, the green leaves of his wrists darkening with the power of his bastardized Night Slash. Then, with a movement so fast Lee almost doesn't see it, Grovyle races forward and slices into his newly created boulder as little more than a flicker of green.

Schink-crack!

The top half of the boulder slides away from the bottom to tumble on the ground, revealing a rough, uneven cut through the stone.

Grovyle huffs and shakes his wrists, which must be smarting after powering through solid rock.

Lee hums to himself and inspects the aftermath of Grovyle's other Rock Tomb attacks.

Around the field are a few other boulders, but the oldest ones have crumbled away into piles of sand. The newer ones all feature rough cuts and slices in their faces, all of which leak slow trickles of sand.

'I wonder… Is it Grovyle's inexperience with the move, or with molding Rock TE causing that? Or do all TE constructs decay rapidly? I don't recall water produced by pokemon evaporating quickly. It feels like the more I notice, the less I understand.'

Lee then turns to Ninetales.

Like Grovyle, his oldest partner is flexing back and forth in her training. Between bouts of honing her skills, she's been working on their commission for Flannery. After some back and forth over the last few days, they agreed on the move to present to Flannery and how best to create it.

Nearly on the other side of the field, Ninetales angles her head back, a sphere of rolling fire the size of a beach ball manifesting before her open jaws with a whoosh of hot air.

She narrows her eyes, leaning back a little more, then she lets go.

The fireball races up into the sky, then explodes like a magnificent firework. From the burst of orange flames comes a rain of smaller, fist-sized fireballs that scream as they fall to the earth.

Nearly all of the fireballs hit the ground behind Ninetales within a huge radius, each one exploding like a grenade and throwing blackened dirt everywhere. The staccato of explosions rolls off Mount Chimney and echoes back at the group, letting them hear it over and over until the sound finally fades. When the smoke and dirt clear, Ninetales is left standing in a field of shallow craters.

At first, Lee wished to make something tailored for Torkoal, but then realized that to make the move in a reasonable timeframe, Ninetales would need to do most of the heavy lifting and actually make it usable for herself. The restriction left them with moves that are forced to work within the confines of Ninetales' biology, but perhaps that's for the best for their first time creating a move for someone else.

The airburst fireball is what they went with. Working together, Lee and Ninetales formulated an attack that needs no 'programming' in order to accomplish its task. The initial fireball is little more than a weak shell to hold the actual projectiles inside while the attack rises to a target height of about twenty yards up. The outside of the shell is nice and stable, but the inside needs only a forceful touch to destabilize and collapse into harmless embers.

Inside that shell are numerous smaller fireballs not unlike the projectiles of Convergence. The tightly-wound balls are filled with dense, volatile 'liquid' Fire TE that is only kept from going critical by their more 'solid' shells. These smaller shells are hardier than the thin one keeping them all in a tight bundle, but a harsh enough impact, like, say, with the ground, jostles their contents enough to explode.

In the center of the firework-inspired attack is a much less stable fireball, one that, after some trial and error, Lee and Ninetales have successfully configured to pop at the apex of the attack's flight, bursting the outer shell and propelling the multi-ball payload to spread before gravity takes hold. The user only needs to angle the attack in the direction they want to saturate, and after flying up, everything takes care of itself.

…Though, maybe saying they have 'configured' the central fireball acting as the propelling charge is too much. It's more like they've figured out how to make a purposely flawed fireball fail and detonate at the most convenient time. True configuration would be learning how to put a timer on a stable fireball, something that eludes Ninetales when the move lacks her direct pyrokinetic control.

The move failed over and over in the beginning. Sometimes the central fireball was too violent and destroyed the payload in a gigantic conflagration. Sometimes the outer shell was too solid and Ninetales had to hastily 'toss' the ball away with her pyrokinesis before it came back down and exploded in her face. Sometimes something else happened and things went sideways. Despite all their failures, though, the move was finished in only a few days. Now all that's left is to refine it as best they can before presenting it for copying.

All in all, it is a functional and powerful move, even if its 'no programming' nature means it cannot be modified much. The discovery that Fire TE can exist in multiple states like liquid and solid is a worthwhile reward for the grief, in Lee's opinion.

Ninetales sighs and looks at her golden pelt, which is stained with dirt and soot. 'Lee, please tell me some of our upcoming training involves the creation of psychic barriers.' She wrinkles her snout in a display that makes Lee smile. 'Now that my fur is thicker, cleaning up at the end of the day is such a pain… I'd prefer to just block the grime before it hits me.' She shakes herself head to tails, dislodging only a minimal amount of dirt.

'I did look up methods used to train young psychics in making barriers, but…'

'But?'

'But it requires holding something flat and delicate like paper taut without ripping it as the first control exercise. That trains your brain to make stable surfaces midair.'

Ninetales audibly growls, her gleaming eyes turning to send a sour look to a mess of broken eggshells, yolk, and paper egg cartons ripped up in frustration. The mess has since been tossed to the greenery for nature to reclaim.

One exercise Lee has been having Ninetales work on is a simple one he read about online. Telekinetic control can be honed with simple, repetitive exercises that don't require much force. Something simple like moving eggs between cartons without crushing them is where many psychics too strong for their own good begin.

So far… It's not been terribly fruitful for Ninetales.

'You'll get the hang of it, Love.' Lee closes his eyes and pulls his fox into a mental hug, siphoning away her dissatisfaction with her progress. The channel between them shortens, and their raw minds touch as Lee wraps her in assurance. He's careful not to touch too much of his mind to hers at once, though, lest he trigger a mind-meld like they shared shortly after her evolution.

Telepathically, Ninetales melts into the embrace with a half-hearted huff. 'You evolved less than two weeks ago,' Lee continues. 'Don't let it get you down. You'll master your powers and I'll be there every step of the way to help.'

Ninetales is content to bathe in Lee's affection, then reluctantly pulls herself free to resume her training. 'Of course. I won't let you down.'

'You really believe there is anything you could do to make me think you let me down?' Lee physically chuckles.

The fox doesn't answer, but the surge of love that flows from her to Lee says more than words could anyway.

Something wet taps Lee's hand with annoying persistence, and re-opening his eyes, Lee looks down to see Octillery leveling him with a narrow-eyed stare.

"Oops…" The zoologist gives the octopus an awkward grin. "Sorry for spacing out there, Octillery. Let's use up the last of our targets then we'll all break for lunch, okay?"

Pacified, Octillery gives his tentacles a wave that Lee has learned means 'I'm ready'.

Testing the red octopus has been nice and smooth. For the past week, Lee has been brushing up on his knowledge of cephalopods and their health, and as he expected, Octillery passed this morning's physical with flying colors. Not that the lack of issues is surprising or anything, considering that he's spent over a week in a Pokemon Center. It would be surprising if anything was wrong with him after that.

Octillery's performance lives up to Lee's initial expectations as well. The three-foot-tall octopus is an utter terror at range, but cracks begin to show when he's asked to perform melee feats. The poor guy is by far Lee's slowest pokemon, as crawling about on his tentacles is the best he can do mobility-wise. With a windup, Octillery can jump a decent distance, but it's not entirely viable as a dodge unless Octillery has already read his foe's attack well in advance.

'Though, maybe reading an incoming attack and figuring out the best place to dodge to isn't that big of an ask for him…' Lee muses to himself.

Lee reaches down to the cardboard box at his side, seeing only five targets left. He picks two up and flips them between his fingers.

The targets are nothing special, being clay disks rather similar to the ones used in shotgun skeet matches. It was a surprise to learn that skeet is indeed a sport here on this alternate Earth, but like all other sports, everything pokemon related eclipses it by an absurd margin.

It makes sense to Lee. Sports like football can be thrilling, but even a mid-level pokemon battle beats out all but the most insane football plays.

Before Octillery can become irritated with him standing idle and not throwing targets, Lee clears his throat and winds an arm back. "Octazooka!" He lets the disks fly. One flies straight, and the other flies at an awkward angle off to the left. The left one is a bad throw, and it's heading towards the ground fast.

Octillery's eyes instantly snap to the spinning disks of orange flying by. He gurgles, and just before he fires, Lee covers his own ears.

BANG-NG-NG!

Octillery leads the shot perfectly. The bolt of ink shatters the leftmost clay disk into a thousand pieces before it can hit the ground. His eyes then take in the easier shot, and rotating himself slightly, Octillery sucks in another breath.

BANG-NG-NG!

The second disk is hit dead center and vanishes in a spray of ink and clay shards.

Lee picks up another disk and lets it fly. "Gunk Shot!"

Lee can almost see the ballistic calculations playing themselves out in Octillery's eyes. The octopus leans back slightly, then he puckers his mouth and spits a sickly purple orb that fills the air with the noxious scent of toxins.

Unlike Octazooka, Gunk Shot is far slower and heavier, arcing through the air like a baseball launched from a pitching machine. Regardless of its speed or less than flat trajectory, Gunk Shot collides with the clay disk with a hiss, coating the target in a mess of noxious purple goop. The mess falls to the ground with a splat, where it bubbles. The harsh poison of Gunk Shot strips the orange paint right off the disk before it eats through the clay itself.

Mindfully, Octillery looses a spray of water from his mouth into the poisonous puddle, diluting it into something much less harsh on the nature around it. Once the purple color is barely visible in the now larger puddle, Octillery cuts off the fire-hose of water with a satisfied gurgle.

"Thank you, Octillery," Lee smiles and places a hand on the octopus' head. "Even if the land here is already good and destroyed, we don't need to make it worse."

Octillery nods, then sends an impatient look at the remaining clay targets in the box.

"Right, right, sorry." Lee picks two more up. "Last ones. Ice Beam!" He throws both high.

Octillery responds near-instantly. From his mouth shoots a frigid beam of light blue energy that quickly lowers the temperature around himself and Lee. The sudden drop draws a shiver from the man despite the beating sun overhead.

Ice Beam isn't an instant laser, and the beam quivers as if experiencing some kind of instability, but it flies quickly and in a straight line for a hundred yards easily. In a burst of crackling ice, the first clay disk is struck and instantly shatters from the thermal shock.

Then, rather than end Ice Beam and fire again, Octillery simply sweeps the beam over the second disk, once more leading his attack so perfectly that there is almost no wasted movement. Ice Beam washes over the second disk, and it shatters into frosty shards like the first.

Octillery cuts off the beam and looks up to Lee expectantly.

"Fifty out of fifty," Lee chuckles and gives the empty cardboard box at his side a kick. "A hundred percent accuracy rating. Well done, Octillery."

The Water-type waves a tentacle uncaringly, as if saying that was nothing.

"Well, I found it impressive, at least." Lee smiles and picks up the box, tearing it down so he can stuff it with the other bits of kindling he keeps in one of his backpack's pockets. "I bet you're hungry after all that, so let's eat."


After a late lunch and a bit more training, Lee makes the decision to call it a day. Even if both pokemon hide it, Grovyle and Octillery are tired after a long day. It's only made more apparent when neither protest being recalled back into their pokeballs for a well-deserved rest, leaving Ninetales and Lee alone. Before they clean up and leave, Ninetales noses at Lee's hip.

'Lee,' Ninetales begins. 'We've been working on my finesse for the last few days. Now that we have this unused land, should we try to find my new limits?'

'That's right. I nearly forgot,' Lee responds. He snakes a mental thread into Ninetales, touching her core and realizing she's not even winded after today. 'I guess using the same move over and over, broken up with breaks, isn't the most taxing thing around. I'm game to stay a bit longer to help you try everything out.'

Ninetales' namesake appendages wave about with an eager enthusiasm to them. 'What first?'

"First…" Lee hums and slowly turns his head, spying a mostly intact, if dead, tree close to the edge of the greenery. The tree is wide enough around that it would take two men his size hugging the hunk of wood to barely meet fingers around the trunk, and it's easily eighty feet high. 'I'm no arborist, but I'd estimate a tree that size is at least a few tons, even if it's totally dry. Ninetales ripped a heavy door off its hinges by total accident, so shifting a dead tree should give us an idea of where she lies power-wise.' With a nod, Lee points to the dead tree. "Let's give your telekinesis a try. Give that tree a telepathic once over, and if nothing is living in there, give it a pull with everything you have."

Ninetales nods, her eyes glowing. Like a creeping stain, an aura of deep purple covers the tree, starting from the base and moving up. The distance of over a hundred feet doesn't seem to bother her at all. The aura slows slightly when it has to envelop the rickety branches, but in a matter of moments, the entire tree is covered. Some of the burnt bark crumbles and a few branches break when the telekinetic corona tightens into an ironclad grip, but the tree remains stable for the most part. Ninetales narrows her eyes, then with an effort Lee can feel secondhand, she pulls.

The tree groans and the ground rumbles as the dead roots fight to keep the tree in the dirt, but it's a losing battle. Ninetales screws her eyes shut, growls, and yanks as hard as she can once more.

With a ground-shaking bang, the tree, roots and all, comes free in a plume of dirt. The tree is dislodged so violently that Lee has to raise his arms and shield his face from flying clods of dirt that smack into him.

In Ninetales' ethereal grip, the dead tree hovers twenty feet over the hole its roots once lay inside, the network of gangly roots beneath the mass slowly dribbling soil back into the hole.

Lee lowers his arms, taking in the sight with his jaw slowly dropping. "God damn…" he curses to himself. "Nine, I expected you to shift the tree around a bit, but ripping it right out of the ground?" He shakes his head. "I didn't see that coming."

Ninetales clears her throat and slowly sets the tree down like a child might do a large branch. 'My apologies… I didn't realize I could do that,' she says, sounding faintly embarrassed.

"No, no; it's fine. It's a learning experience for everyone," Lee assures with his hands raised. "Was keeping that much weight aloft hard?"

'Not… hard, per se, but I don't think I could keep something of that weight up indefinitely. Perhaps several minutes before the strain begins to cause a headache.' Ninetales tilts her head.

"Alrighty." Lee looks over the uprooted tree and lets out a low whistle of amazement. "Okay, as for physical strength… We're probably going to need something more specialized than what we can use in the field. I've been meaning to get a radar gun for Grovyle too, so we'll put a number to your speed another day. For the last obvious test..." Lee looks around, finding no worthwhile or sturdy enough targets. "For your fire abilities, let's keep it simple for now. Try out a Flamethrower with as much force as you can put behind it. Aim it straight up, as I don't think there's really a good target out here."

Ninetales nods and takes a few steps away. She takes a deep breath, one that makes her tuft of breast swell, she leans her head back and-!

Lee hisses and turns away, the sudden light blinding him. Blinking, he reopens his eyes and gapes at what he sees.

ninetails_fire.png

(Credit to @OhKayArt for the stellar fanart)

From Ninetales' maw comes no simple Flamethrower. A roaring, billowing pillar of white-hot flames races into the sky, drying the air out and making the dirt around Ninetales' paws hiss and crack. The firestorm has enough circumference to swallow three men standing arm's length away from each other with room to spare, and it only widens out the further it flies up.

The Flamethrower keeps going and going, cooling into orange flames as it gets further away from Ninetales, before finally losing steam and sputtering out hundreds, maybe thousands of feet up.

Ninetales shuts her jaws after fifteen seconds, cutting off the raging fire.

The pillar of flame wavers, the last vestiges rising up before going out. Although the fire never actually reaches that high, Lee watches as the residual heat in the atmosphere eats away at the edges of several clouds. It's almost like watching cotton candy being sprayed with water.

Ninetales lowers her head and pants, the first pangs of exhaustion she's felt since evolving hitting her like battering rams. 'Ah, overexertion, my old friend…' she begins, sarcasm dripping from each word. 'How lovely of you to visit.'

'Love, if it's any consolation, then I don't think there are many pokemon that could take a blast like that and remain standing.' Eyes still skyward on the lazily evaporating clouds, Lee steps over to Ninetales. The dried-out dirt crunches underfoot as he kneels next to her and pulls the golden fox into a one-armed hug. 'Stamina might have been an issue as a Vulpix, but a Flamethrower only a tenth as powerful as that would have floored anyone you've faced in the past.'

The fox smiles and presses her muzzle under Lee's chin, tickling his cheek with her ears. Then one ear quirks and she turns to look at the horizon.

Lee follows Ninetales' eyes.

Coming in hot on the broad back of a smiling Togekiss is a woman garbed in the signature dress of a Pokemon Ranger. Even so far away, the irritation her tense form radiates is plain to see.

'I guess burning away the clouds counts as damaging the environment. Swell…'


Another three days' worth of training sun-up to sun-down pass, and the day of Lee's fourth Gym match finally arrives. The past days spent helping his pokemon hone their skills have left the whole team brimming with confidence for the fight ahead, and with Flannery's custom move done and ready for copying well before the deadline nearly two weeks from now, team stress has been at a minimum the whole way.

Zinnia and Courtney left a sleepy Brendan behind to secure a few of the Lavaridge Gym's sparse seats, leaving Lee to rouse Brendan and Marshtomp for the trip to the Gym, which they're on the way to now.

"So, you nervous?" Brendan asks, looking up at Lee.

The zoologist shakes his head. "Not really. Maybe a little anxious, but it's not anything negative. This'll be a fun match, I think."

When Lee says he's not nervous, Brendan's eyes drift over to Ninetales, who is nodding along to Marshtomp as the mudfish pokemon adamantly croaks about something. "I guess I understand why."

"Ninetales is impressive, but she's not the only member of the team," Lee clicks his tongue. "Grovyle keeps on improving with no end in sight, and Octillery has more than proven himself competent. He seems to have a different beam attack for every occasion, and that's assuming he doesn't just put the other pokemon through a wall with a tank shell made of ink."

Brendan grins at the imagery. "You know, you don't actually need to tell me how your pokemon are doing. I stopped by the Lavaridge Ranger station to take a look at local migration reports and was just in time to hear a lady ranger complain about "that son of a bitch Henson and his fox forcing me to fly out again." That tells more than you ever could."

Lee blushes and looks away in embarrassment. "They should have defined what counts as 'undue environmental destruction' better. I had Octillery cool off any slag we made before it could start any fires."

"Uh-huh, sure…" Brendan laughs. "So now that your super secret gym-prep training is done, when are we having a Water versus Water match? I bet Marshtomp can take Octillery!"

Marshtomp breaks away from his conversation with Ninetales to croak in agreement.

"Isn't your match tomorrow?" At Brendan's nod, Lee continues. "Let's give it a week, then. Don't think Flannery is a pushover or that your team will get away without injuries just because your ace is a Water-type. I'm already counting on taking a few days of recovery time for my team."

"I know that," Brendan crosses his arms and mockingly sticks his tongue out at the older trainer. "We'll win, though."

The two trainers and two pokemon make their way through town. By now, Ninetales is a common enough sight around Lavaridge that not too many people stop to take pictures or immediately get out of the way, so they navigate the crowded streets a bit more slowly than usual. After a while, they turn off down the unpaved route leading to the Gym.

On the quieter road leading to the Gym, Brendan suddenly speaks up once more. "Hey, Lee?" The boy asks. "What do you see yourself doing after the Ever Grande Conference?"

Lee blinks. "That's quite a bit away, so it's hard to say. Why do you ask?" He gives Brendan his full attention.

"Well…" Brendan rubs one of his arms with the opposite hand, seemingly unsure of what to say. "When we first started out on this journey, I kind of didn't have a goal in mind. I always figured I'd wander around, find neat pokemon, and discover something I loved doing like my dad did with pokemon and their habitats. Dad could have been the Champion if he decided to take on the Elite Four after his Ever Grande Conference win." Brendan's words stop as he looks down at the pokeball belonging to Marshtomp in his hands.

Off to the side, both Ninetales and Marshtomp let their conversation die out to listen.

"I did a lot of thinking since we got out of the Valley of Steel, and a lot of talking with my pokemon. From there, it became obvious. I've figured out what I want out of being a pokemon trainer." Brendan stares up at Lee with an intensity that feels out of place in the eyes of a child. "We're aiming for the throne of Champion. We're going to go all the way and use everything we have to get there. We're going to take dad's legacy and finish what he started."

Marshtomp pumps a fist and practically roars his support for his trainer with a bellow so loud it echoes off of Mount Chimney. His beady eyes shine with the same intensity as Brendan's, and if Lee didn't know any better, he would have said the pair are mirroring each other's emotions with telepathy.

Lee almost steps back. "Jeez, Brendan…" He can't manage any other words.

"And the reason I'm telling you this, Lee…" Brendan's fingers clench around Marshtomp's ball. "I know you're not the kind of guy who wants to be Champion no matter how strong your pokemon get. You're like my dad in that regard, so if we don't face off in the Ever Grande Conference, then I want a real battle with you, no holds barred. No matter how far my team gets in the Conference, or the Elite Four challenge, or even the Champion Title match, I know that once everything is said and done…" Brendan's eyes pin Lee in place. "A real battle against you and your pokemon will be one of the hardest challenges we could ever face. It'll be proof of how far we've come."

It takes Lee a moment to find his words. When he does, he gulps. "If a battle with everything we can offer is what you want, then consider it done… But you're putting a lot of faith in me there, Brendan…"

Like a flipped switch, Brendan grins and goes from frightful trainer back to happy-go-lucky boy. "Maybe, but I believe in you. You're a tough guy and a crazy good pokemon trainer. Some rivalry is good for everyone. Also, you never answered me about what you want to do after the Conference."

'Rivalry is good for everyone? Bah. Nice way to justify the threat to kick my ass.' Lee inwardly rolls his eyes."You're right on me not wanting the Champion title. If we somehow make it to Steven Stone and eke out a win…" He looks over to Ninetales, a quick conversation passing between them. "I'd probably turn the title down. I know neither myself nor Ninetales would want to be tied down, and Grovyle is in it for the glory of beating tough pokemon, not a title. I imagine Octillery would be neutral on the matter and Shinx probably won't care one way or another once she's old enough to understand. Whether or not we enter the Ever Grande Conference is still up in the air, really."

Brendan slumps and groans as they pass the open gates of the Gym and begin the final approach to the main building. "Maaaan, really? I think you should enter! It would be a huge prestige boost to the lab if we both make it!"

"I never said we won't, I'm just saying it depends on how the team as a whole feels about it once the time comes," Lee replies, taking the front door of the Gym and holding it open for Brendan, Marshtomp, and Ninetales. Following in after them, he nearly bumps into his fox when he finds her standing stiff with surprise in the doorway. "Ninetales? What's up wi-..."

Then he sees why she, Brendan, and Marshtomp were stunned into stopping.

In the lobby being sold a last-minute ticket by a flustered Gym aide is Steven Stone, the Hoenn Champion.

'Are you fucking kidding me?' The nervousness that Lee denied to Brendan suddenly rises up and digs its claws into Lee's stomach. 'I know he and the other Gym Leaders keep an eye on my matches, but coming here in person?'

The jingle of the bell over the door makes the Champion look over his shoulder, and when he spies the group behind him, he smiles. "If it isn't Lee Henson and Brendan Birch!" He takes the offered ticket from the Gym aide running the front desk and tucks it into his suit's breast pocket before stepping towards them. "You certainly took your sweet time, Lee. Your match is beginning in just a few minutes!"

"Steven, it's a pleasure to see you again." Lee sighs. "The streets were a bit congested, I'm sure you understand."

"You, uh…" Brendan stutters, looking up at Steven with stars in his eyes and a grin barely contained. "Y-you know who I am, Mister Stone?" He asks as if he can scarcely believe it.

Steven waves Brendan off. "Just Steven is fine, Brendan, and of course I know of you! You were one of the first trainers on the radar of myself and the rest of the Hoenn League this year. We've got high hopes for you."

Brendan looks as if he'd just died and gone to heaven, but before he can space out too hard, Marshtomp elbows Brendan's side and pulls him back to reality. "Oh," Brendan grins and scratches the back of his head. "Er, I'll do my best!"

"I know it," Steven smiles in reply.

"What brings you to Lavaridge, Steven?" Lee asks, wondering just why a Champion would be here and hoping to God it's not just to mess with him.

'I have doubts he's here just to stress you out, Beloved,' Ninetales sends to Lee.

"I wanted to see your match, of course!" Steven says brightly.

'You were saying, love?'

'...'

"Or maybe it's more accurate to say I was in the neighborhood and happened by at an opportune time," the Devon heir corrects himself after a moment. "My pokemon and I were taking a short vacation in the Valley of Steel, and after our R-and-R, stopped by Lavaridge to refresh ourselves before heading back to Ever Grande City." Steven reaches up and rubs the Mega Keystone in the pin of his left breast pocket with a drawn-out sigh. "If I had known just how many meetings and stacks of paperwork were involved with being Champion, I might have passed on taking the office."

Lee nods, then a thought strikes him. A risky one, but one that might save lives down the line. "Say, Steven? If you aren't terribly busy, can you spare a bit of time to talk after my match? I've got a few things you might be interested in hearing. I would have sent an email or something, but you never know what email filters might catch nowadays."

'Translation: I don't want anyone to know about what I have to say.'

Steven's smile remains on his face, but it cools into something more professional, telling Lee the man is plenty adept at reading between the lines. "I can make time, sure. I'll be here in the lobby when you're ready."

Lee glances at Brendan, who still seems to be so star-struck by Steven that he missed the unspoken words. "Well, off we go. Wish us luck."

"Good luck!" Steven smiles and ushers Brendan and Marshtomp along through the doors to the spectator seating.

Meeting Ninetales' eyes once more, the pair head through the doors to the arena. Already used to the routine, Lee takes a lapel microphone off of a wall-mounted rack of chargers and fits it to his collar without the young aide by the arena door needing to say anything.

"Erm, sir? And ma'am?" The aide says after a minute of staring at Ninetales. "All pokemon need to be in their pokeballs prior to entering unless Ninetales is going first. Master Moore's rules."

Rolling their eyes as one, neither Ninetales nor Lee fight the rule, and Ninetales is returned to her ball in a flash of red. Where her telepathy was dulled by the pokeball before, Ninetales' mental presence is powerful enough now that she only needs to put moderately more force into remaining connected to Lee.

'An asinine rule if you ask me…' Ninetales grumbles from within her ball.

Lee just pats the ball on his belt in sympathy.

They only need to wait a few minutes, as the aide by the arena door raises a hand to the radio in his ear and nods. "Right, sending him in." The young man's hand drops. "Mister Henson, you're up. Good luck!"

Lee gives the younger man a nod and steps through, blinking at what he finds.

The Lavaridge arena is made of packed dirt like the other arenas in the previous Gyms, but is larger than regulation, maybe thirty percent or so larger, and at the expense of seating room to boot. There are only four rows of seats on either side of the arena and they're utterly packed. Scanning the room, Lee finds Brendan, Courtney, and Zinnia up in one corner.

Brendan and Zinnia smile and wave down at him, and after a moment of watching the two next to her, Courtney offers her own short wave. 'For being in the same room as the Champion…' Lee sends a sidelong glance to the other side of the room. 'Courtney has a damn good poker face.'

Off to the right in a prime spot front and center is Steven. The people around all gape and try their hardest to pretend they're not staring at the Champion, and all of them fail miserably. If the Steel-type master is bothered by the attention, he hides it like a pro.

Finally, on the other side of the arena, Flannery stands with a severe expression on her face. The way her fingers twiddle with a pokeball gives away her true thoughts, however.

Unlike the other arenas that were always filled with chatter, Lavaridge is quiet as Lee takes his place in the challenger's box. 'Maybe it's from how traditional the Gym is? I wouldn't want to look out of place by making noise in a place like this, either.'

Off to the side, the referee, an older man in dark, striped robes steps forward and clears his throat into the microphone in his hand. "Good afternoon ladies and gentlemen," The spectators go totally quiet as the ref's voice reverberates through the overhead PA system. "Thank you for joining us for our latest match here at the Lavaridge Gym. Today, Gym Heir Flannery will be facing Lee Henson of Littleroot in a three-on-three standard battle for the Heat Badge. We're pleased to have you all here as witnesses for fine young trainers and pokemon testing their mettle in the ring of honor." The intro is precise and without any fanfare.

"One moment, if you would!" A loud voice followed by clinking footsteps breaks the calm.

The double doors behind Flannery open, and out steps Moore.

Flannery turns away from the arena, and Lee can almost imagine her confused blink. "Grandpa?"

There, standing behind Flannery on the defender's side of the field, is Mura Moore dressed in a full suit of polished armor fit for a samurai. Much of the armor is red, with the chest plate painted to depict rolling flames. Under his left arm is a full helm with a faceplate in the exact image of a snarling Typhlosion, and on his right hip are six full-size pokeballs held in holsters of woven straw. The elderly man's glasses are gone, and on his face is a stern, stone-hewn visage that truly emphasizes his age.

"Flannery, my dear," Moore allows his face to soften. "After a last-minute decision, I will be handling this battle. If you would, please?" He gestures to the space behind the defender's box.

Flannery, who seems too shocked to argue, nods and steps away.

Moore smiles at her, then turns to glare at Lee as his face hardens once more. "Lee Henson!" He calls. "Know this before all else: you are recognized."

Sweat rolls down Lee's brow. "Recognized?"

Moore nods once. "In you, I see vast potential. The passion and love you put into your pokemon has already taken you to new and grand heights, and you've still so far to go! Your passion has touched something long dormant within me, within my pokemon, and only now do I realize how I have brought shame upon this Gym."

'Shame?' Ninetales questions, her ball wiggling in agitation. 'What is he talking about?'

Lee looks over to Flannery, then to Steven.

Both wear open surprise on their faces, so this wasn't scripted. Steven meets Lee's eyes for just a moment, but what Lee sees makes his blood run cold.

Steven looks concerned. Concerned for Lee. The scarred man swallows thickly. Even through her ball, Lee swears he can feel Ninetales' hackles rise.

"I have allowed apathy and age to form rust upon both myself and my pokemon," Moore continues, slowly raising the helmet under his arm. "My dearest granddaughter Flannery has already surpassed me in so many ways. Once this Gym is hers, she will take it to a level of glory unseen before, and this is something I know to be true in my heart of hearts. Truly, the youth of this era are titans that we old ones can only stare up at in awe. Nevertheless, I have shamed the Lavaridge Gym by halting our own progress in favor of the dreams of the young and inspired. My team, my first pokemon, Ty… I have done them all a grave disservice by letting their fire dim. We are old now. Twilight years are upon us, and no lamentations will allow us to do them over."

The helmet comes to rest on Moore's head, and slowly, he fastens the strap under his chin.

"We will not go quietly, though," Moore's voice reverberates hollowly through his helmet, and goosebumps break out along Lee's skin. "It's our time to step aside, to allow fine trainers such as Flannery and yourself to take the stage. We will not simply burn out, though. No, we will go out as true masters of the flame should! With a bang and a grand plume of fire!" Moore's voice rises the longer he speaks. "We have fallen from the ranks of the Elite, but the world will hear us roar one last time! Lee Henson, he who stands so readily beside the mythical, accursed Ninetales, I, Mura of the house of Moore, challenge you to a three-on-three battle for the Heat Badge!" In his helmet, Moore's eyes shine. "The full might of Gym Lavaridge beckons, Lee! Will you be found wanting?!"

'God damn it all with this clan and nobility shit…' Lee mentally curses. 'I knew this deal was going to come back to bite me somehow.'

Lee palms Grovyle's ball in a clammy hand. "Well, I can't really run away from this, can I? You're on."

Moore takes his first pokeball, holding it aloft with a toothy grin visible under his helmet. "Splendid! Most Splendid! Give me the honor of showing you what awaits!"

Both Lee and Moore draw back their arms as one, then two pokeballs fly into the arena.


Borne of Caution is next in the update cycle. I hope to have it ready by or before 10/1/22.

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Act 2: Chapter 9
We're getting close to the final goal, the one that will for-certain allow me to keep this pace going. See below if you'd like to help out.

Want to support me? See Fuggmann is creating Transformative fiction and other things | Patreon on the place of patrons. I do have goals on there that will hopefully allow me to cut back on work in favor of more writing. As thanks for donating, patrons get to see updates a few days early and suggest edits to the final draft before it goes live.


Lee feels a bead of sweat roll down his neck as he watches the Pokeballs fly into the arena. 'Why do we always seem to run into situations like this?'

Grovyle's ball flies a bit faster than Moore's, and pops open first with a snap-hiss. In a flash of light, Grovyle stands ready on Lee's side of the field. The gecko's legs are tense, his arms are raised, and his yellow eyes glow faintly in the old fluorescent lights of the Gym. When he sees Moore rather than Flannery, his mouth quirks into a slight smirk.

Moore's pokeball pops open next, dropping a large mass of light onto the ground. The light takes a tall shape with four legs before the white glow fades, revealing a magnificent Rapidash standing tall on the field.

Moore's Rapidash bears a resemblance to the mundane horses Lee is familiar with in shape only. The equine pokemon is covered in pale yellow hair faded with age, broken up by scars here and there, but the rolling muscle beneath is fit for a stallion in its prime. Billowing flames of orange and red form Rapidash's mane and tail, along with crests of fire just above his deep-blue colored hooves. Below the short unicorn's horn on his forehead, Rapidash's red eyes regard Grovyle with clear dismissal. The stallion snorts and throws his head, looking down upon the Grass-type before him.

Grovyle's smirk sours.

Off to the side, the referee overcomes his shock and clears his throat into his microphone. "Ladies and gentlemen," his voice wavers slightly. "Our challenge today has been changed by Gym Leader Moore. Challenger Lee Henson will face Gym Leader Moore three-on-three, with no substitutions for either party. The match will begin shortly." The referee sends a severe look to one of the aides to his left.

The nervous Gym Aide scarcely notices, as he pulls a pokeball from his belt and pops it open releasing a young Kadabra, who first looks at Grovyle with a raised brow, then to Rapidash—leaving the psychic type to stare with open, wide-eyed alarm. The Kadabra raises his hand, and around the arena, two barriers with several inches of air insulation between them flare to life. The pink walls fade into invisibility, but their low, ongoing hum tells everyone the barriers are still up.

'No subs? Damn.' Lee frowns. 'That might complicate things. Give it your all, Grovyle,' he silently wishes, staring into the pokemon's back.

The ref looks between Lee and Moore. "Are both sides ready?"

"Ready…" Lee reluctantly mutters.

"Ready!" Moore's grins, wide and almost maniacal. "Ready!"

The referee raises his hand and chops it down. "Begin!"

"Flame Wheel!" Moore's command is near-instant.

Rapidash rears up on his hind legs as his flaming mane and tail surge into a single mantle of bright flame, then he falls forward and rolls into a giant wheel of fire that races across the large arena. The horse pokemon crosses half the space between himself and Grovyle in a flash, leaving a trail of blackened, burnt dirt in his wake.

"Quick Attack, stay at range, and use Seed Sniper!" Lee barks. 'We can't really get close to Rapidash while he's covered in fire. We need to stall for right now.'

Grovyle's eyes narrow, and the subtle glow of Quick Attack covers his body. Then in a flash of green, he zips away off to the right side of the arena and far out of danger. He lands without so much of a skid on the ground and opens his mouth. In his throat, the bright, green-yellow light of Seed Sniper begins to build.

Rapidash rolls out of Flame Wheel, still flying at full speed towards the invisible wall of the barrier. Then in a move that would break all the limbs of a normal equine, Rapidash flips and twists around, landing hooves-first against the barrier. The stallion's legs bend to absorb the impact, then he springs off of the wall and rolls back into another Flame Wheel.

BANG-NG-NG!

The supersonic crack of Seed Sniper shakes the walls and, like a laser, the seed hurtles toward Rapidash in a streak of yellow. The intense flames of Flame Wheel set the seed alight, but before it can turn to ash, the botanical bullet clearly hits flesh with a wet 'thwack!'

"Move!" Lee calls again, looking towards the other side of the arena.

Grovyle follows Lee's eyes, and with another flare of Quick Attack, the gecko pokemon is gone, missing what would have been an incapacitating blow by half a thought.

Rapidash unrolls once more, his cloak of fire fading with an irritated snort on his part. He digs his hooves into the dirt and slows to a stop, focusing an ugly eye on Grovyle. On the Fire-type's left shoulder is a round bullet wound. Heat-dried blood stains it while fresh blood slowly dribbles down Rapidash's leg.

"Well done! First blood goes to you and Grovyle, Lee!" Moore praises, his grin not faltering at all. "We cannot let your game of keep away continue though. Rapidash! Flame Terrain!"

'Shit!' Lee's eyes bug out. "Grovyle! Make a safe spot with Rock Tomb!" He orders, not waiting to see what Flame Terrain actually does. 'If it does what it says on the tin…'

Rapidash rears up on his hind legs again, kicking out his front legs with a whinny. His hooves light up with a blinding white heat, and then he drives them into the ground like superheated hammers.

At the same time, Grovyle leaps into the air and draws back one of his two-fingered hands. Before the hand, a rock manifests from little whirls of sand, growing to Grovyle's size with the rumbling groan of stressed stone. He tosses the boulder to the ground with a crash and lands on it in a crouch. He digs his hind claws into the stone, ready to move at a moment's notice.

It quickly becomes apparent why Moore named Rapidash's attack Flame Terrain.

From around Rapidash's hooves, the ground cracks and begins to glow red-hot. The cracks, spewing out sooty embers, spread like glass spider-webbing in slow motion. The ground between the rends in the dirt steams and hisses, drying to ashen clods.

Grovyle cringes, though Lee can't feel any of the doubtlessly oppressive heat.

'The whole field is going to be a no-go zone for Grovyle if he can't touch the ground!' Lee grits his teeth as he watches Flame Terrain consume the arena floor. "Don't let him finish, Grovyle! Rock Tomb!"

Grovyle draws his hands back with a hiss rolling from his lips, as a pair of craggy boulders manifest before him. Grunting, he pushes one then the other at Rapidash.

The stones gracelessly fly through the air with a dull whoosh, one aimed at Rapidash's legs, and the other at his head.

"Defend! Flamethrower!" Moore calls with a pointed finger.

Rapidash raises his head and opens his mouth. From inside of his throat and without a single moment to charge comes a tight beam of spiraling fire, barely as big around as a bottle cap. The beam splashes across the first Rock Tomb and deflects off the rock faces, sending gouts of fire large enough to engulf a man in every direction.

The stone superheats to red-hot in less than a second, then explodes as if filled with gunpowder, throwing splatters of molten rock everywhere.

Rapidash, still powering Flame Terrain, throws his head, sweeping the impossibly concentrated Flamethrower into the second boulder still flying at him. Following in the footsteps of its short-lived brother, it explodes into red hot chunks scattering around the arena.

Grovyle weaves to and fro on his boulder, avoiding the molten bits of rock with a frown. He glances back at Lee as more and more of the ground is turned into a hellscape.

Rapidash snorts and swings his head around again, drawing his Flamethrower and sweeping the blistering beam towards Grovyle.

The gecko pokemon returns his eyes to his opponent and leaps over the Flamethrower.

Rapidash's eyes follow Grovyle, and he sweeps the attack up to follow, maintaining the slow creep of Flame Terrain the entire time. By now half of the field up to the barrier is hissing and sputtering, just short of being fully molten.

"Detect!" Lee clenches his fist as his mind frantically tries to come up with a plan to deal with this nightmare scenario.

Grovyle's eyes glow with supernatural clarity. Contorting his body to the side and charging Quick Attack, he turns and spins away in a mid-air dodge that draws gasps from the crowd.

Moore's Rapidash simply keeps his Flamethrower going and chases Grovyle through the air as if trying to swat a fly with a laser beam.

Hissing in exertion, Grovyle flares his Quick Attack and darts in another direction after another near miss from Flamethrower. He and Rapidash keep the dance going, and with each gravity-defying dodge, Grovyle is forced further and further away from Moore's side of the field.

Lee takes his eyes off the fight for a moment to look at the crowd.

Steven watches the going-ons with a pokeball held idly in his hands. His steel-blue eyes remain locked on Grovyle without a single waver, and he-

'Dolittle, use that brain and remember mine and Brendan's lessons! Focus on the battle, not the people!' A tiny voice similar to Zinnia's scolds in the back of his mind. With renewed focus, Lee pretends all the eyes on the pokemon and himself are gone.

'Grovyle can't remain in the air indefinitely with Quick Attack, and using Rock Tomb to make platforms isn't going to cut it…' Lee eyes the boulder Grovyle used as a sanctuary with a wince.

The air inside the field is growing so hot that it's beginning to shimmer. Flame Terrain has already reached Grovyle's perch and its base is melting into liquid slag. 'I can only imagine the hellish temperature Grovyle is dealing with in there.'

Grovyle dodges the latest pass of Flamethrower, this time with only an inch to spare above his back, and Lee has to stifle a wince and a curse when he sees Grovyle clench his jaw in agony.

Even with a total miss, a thick line of scales on Grovyle's back is burned nearly black from sheer radiant heat. The flesh underneath the burn is dry and cracked, and Grovyle's twisting through the air splatters the ground and barrier with droplets of blood.

'Lee, whatever you do, don't let Moore drag the fight out,' Ninetales urges from within her ball. Lee can feel her peering through his eyes and watching the fight as well. 'If you let him decide the pace, Grovyle is sure to be beaten.'

"Damn it all…" Lee mutters, wondering just how to get out of this as Ninetales' words bound around in his head. Trying to limit Grovyle's mobility is a smart play on Moore's part. 'We're getting risky then. I wanted to practice this maneuver more, but live fire it is,' Lee sighs. "Grovyle! Quick Attack directly at Rapidash, and charge Rock Tomb as you go!"

"Oh?" Moore's eyebrow rises. "Intercept, Rapidash!"

Grovyle crosses his arms in front of him as he falls, stones beginning to form before his claws. Then with a deep breath, Grovyle flies down at Rapidash in a burst of white aura.

The Flamethrower Rapidash is somehow still maintaining is swept into Grovyle's path long before he reaches his foe. With less than a foot between himself and the fire, Grovyle thrusts his hands forward and uses the rapidly coalescing Rock Tomb as a shield.

Flamethrower bites into the rock, superheating it and carving a melted trench. The second before the rock goes critical and explodes, Grovyle's aura of Quick Attack shines white, and he flips over his stone shield to rush Rapidash as a zig-zagging blur of green.

The horse's eyes narrow, and like a hose nozzle being adjusted, the Flamethrower's tight beam flares out into a wide spray of fire.

Lee's jaw drops at how such a simple maneuver turns his entire plan inside out. 'Lee, you idiot! Of course, Rapidash can control Flamethrower's spread! Any good Fire-type can! Why did I order Grovyle to rush in without expecting that?!' In the back of his mind, Lee can feel Ninetales trying to shush the self-aimed scolding.

Grovyle is consumed by the fire with barely any time to cry out. In the blaze, his silhouette writhes and loses its momentum, beginning to drop from the sky.

"Grovyle! Listen to me! Power through it! You have to go through to make it stop!" Lee's heart begins to sink.

The silhouette stiffens, then rockets forward again, curving and landing squarely on a surprised Rapidash's back.

Lee winces for what feels like the tenth time in the match.

Grovyle is panting and covered in burns. Patches of his scales, particularly on his arms, are blackened and cracked. A few smaller patches are even more macabre, with scales burned away entirely, exposing cooked red flesh beneath. His head leaf is burnt to half its usual length, and the leaves on his left arm are gone. His Miracle Seed is unharmed, but the neckerchief it's affixed to is done for, barely hanging on by an ashen thread.

Grovyle shakes constantly and looks to be barely holding on to consciousness. The flames of Rapidash's mane only make Grovyle's exhaustion more apparent, as the usually unflappable lizard shies away from the fire. Its a display of weakness he would never consider doing in his right mind.

'Don't dally, Lee!' Ninetales urges.

"Rock Tomb!" Lee orders, hoping beyond hope Grovyle isn't too exhausted.

"Pull free and buck him off!" Moore's order is just as fast, and in his helmet, Lee can see the elderly man's eyes narrow.

With a gasp, Rapidash finally lets his Flamethrower sputter to a stop and goes to pull his hooves free of the ground. With visible effort, the stallion pulls one free with a burst of ash and molten dirt… But the other remains stuck in the ground. With a snort, he tugs again, and slowly his hoof rises out of its molten bath. He shakes his body to try and dislodge Grovyle as best he can without breaking a leg, but Grovyle reflexively digs his hind claws into the equine pokemon's back, drawing bloody furrows.

Grovyle's eyes snap into clarity at the sound of Lee's voice, and with a vindictive hiss, he draws an arm back as a rock the size of a bowling ball quickly grows in his burnt and cracked claws. What's left of the leaves clinging to his head and wrist glow bright green as Grovyle's ability, Overgrow, activates in his peril.

With all the finesse of a rampaging Ursaring, Grovyle drives the Rock Tomb right into the back of Rapidash's head with every bit of force he can muster.

The rock shatters across Rapidash's skull, and blood wells up from the wound as Rapidash falters in his efforts to free himself. His eyes roll in their sockets from the stunning blow.

"Flare your mane! Get him off!" Moore's voice commands.

"Get out of there and…" An idea strikes Lee. One that some people might see as cruel, but… 'We can't stand up to Moore's pokemon in sheer power, so we will have to get technical in how we deal with his team. With Overgrow and the Seed active, Grovyle should have enough firepower to overcome a Fire-type's Grass resistance, so…' Mind made up, Lee finishes his order. "Get out of there and use Leaf Blade on Rapidash's free front leg!"

Moore's eyes shoot open. "Belay last command! Retaliate with Stomp!"

Grovyle moves first, jumping off of Rapidash and landing heavily on the cooling ground, a brilliant green blade growing from his right wrist. He draws his arm back and hacks at the bulging tendons in the back of Rapidash's free leg.

The Leaf Blade cuts deep and draws blood just as the dazed Rapidash raises his hoof to stomp on the gecko pokemon. He brings his leg back down like a hammer blow that Grovyle only barely stumbles out of the way from, cratering the ground and rumbling the whole building. As soon as the hoof punches through the dirt, though, Lee can hear the partially cut tendons snap. It's a sound that makes his stomach roll.

With a cry of pain, Rapidash's free leg gives out and refuses to support any weight, causing the equine to stumble and fall to his side with his other front leg still trapped. The sound of Rapidash's trapped fetlock breaking is as loud as thunder in Lee's ears.

Rapidash flails in both pain and anger if the hateful, wild-eyed glare that he levels towards the burnt and exhausted Grass-type before him is any proper indicator. Gritting his teeth, Rapidash slowly, painfully pulls his trapped leg free and tries to rise, but neither of his crippled front legs can support any kind of weight. He breathes raging tongues of flame impudently as he stumbles back to the ground.

Grovyle leaps to one of the corners where the horse pokemon can't angle his neck, watching and waiting as Rapidash struggles to move.

Behind Rapidash, Moore watches his pokemon struggle with a deep, melancholic frown that forces guilt to settle in Lee's gut.

After ten seconds of fruitless efforts on Rapidash's part, the stunned referee steps closer to the invisible barrier around the arena and raises his microphone to his mouth, seemingly unsure what to say. "It… It appears that Gym Leader Moore's Rapidash is unable to battle. Round one goes to Grovyle!"

Grovyle, burned and in pain, takes a deep breath, steadies himself, and crosses his arms as if he didn't just defeat a pokemon decades his senior with a type disadvantage.

Rapidash lays his head down, eyes wide and mouth open as he's declared the loser. It's as if the thought is utterly inconceivable to him.

A hole opens up on Moore's Side of the barrier, and with a reluctant sigh, Moore recalls his pokemon into the worn pokeball in his hand. "I see…" Moore begins, placing Rapidash's ball back into the woven straw holster resting against his side. "I know not if I have allowed my team to fall so far, or if the talents of the new generation outstrip me to a degree even I didn't realize. Even ten years ago, the thought of any of my team falling in combat to a Grass-type, let alone a mid-stage Grass-type, would be laughable. Now, look at where we are…" Moore isn't wearing a microphone, not that he needs one, as the Gym is stunned silent following Grovyle's win.

Lee licks his lips, feeling as if he should say something.

'Perhaps assuage his feelings,' Ninetales suggests. 'All I have on the matter is your mostly forgotten history lessons, but typically noble types will remember if you help them save face.'

'Right. This whole mess is political as well. It has to be, somehow…' Lee withholds a grimace and directs himself to the Gym Leader. "Gym Leader Moore, even if Rapidash takes the loss harshly, I didn't put Grovyle forward to be insulting, I let him lead as I have faith in his abilities as a fighter. You and Rapidash battled in a way that pushed both of us to our limits. As evidenced by Rock Tomb, I've been specifically training him to counter his weaknesses, yet Rapidash trivialized much of what I've taught. Speaking of limits…" Lee looks towards the referee. "Ref? I'm retiring Grovyle from the match. He's gone above and beyond after facing down such a powerful pokemon."

Grovyle turns to Lee, offering him the faintest of nods.

The referee accepts the concession with a nod of his own, raising his microphone once more. "Challenger Lee is retiring Grovyle from the match following his win. Grovyle may not be used for the remaining duration of the challenge. Both Gym Leader Moore and Challenger Lee have two pokemon remaining!"

'That Rapidash was a fucking monster and we won that by the skin of our teeth.' Lee gulps. 'He landed only one direct hit and it nearly took Grovyle down. Meanwhile, he kept two attacks going for minutes on end, got shot in the shoulder, took a super-effective rock to the back of the head, got hamstrung, busted an ankle, and still wasn't knocked out. We had to hit him with a TKO for a win.' Lee breathes out a sigh and raises Grovyle's pokeball in his hand. 'To think Rapidash was even better in his prime. What the hell would two elite-level pokemon clashing look like? Or even two champion pokemon?'

'Messy, I would presume,' Ninetales telepaths dryly, though she can't hide the apprehension in her voice at the thought.

'Regardless, Grovyle's ability to maneuver mid-air is the only reason we won that. If he lacked the ability to tell gravity to get bent, then we would have been sunk.' In a flash of red, Grovyle's burned and battered form is returned to his pokeball. Raising the ball to his mouth and covering his lapel mic with one hand, Lee smiles and whispers; "Damn fine job out there, Grovyle. I can't even put into words how proud I am of you. I mean it when I say you went above and beyond today."

The ball in Lee's hand shakes once, then goes still.

Putting Grovyle's ball on his belt, Lee takes Octillery's ball and raises it to his mouth. "Ready?" He murmurs.

The octopus' ball rattles eagerly.

On the other side of the field, Moore smiles thinly as he takes another pokeball from his holster. "Ready?"

Lee nods, raising Octillery's ball.

Once more, both trainers throw their pokeballs at once.

This time, Moore's throw is a hair faster, and his pokeball pops open first, dropping a simply enormous mass of light onto the scorched floor.

Octillery's ball snaps open a moment later, and due to being smaller, the octopus materializes more quickly. Already alert, Octillery doesn't even need to blink any stars from his eyes. He stands ready with a narrow-eyed glare and all of his tentacles raised, ready to strike.

The mass on Moore's side finally finishes coalescing into a pokemon, and Lee covers his mic before cursing under his breath.

Standing at least seven feet tall and utterly rippling with muscle, Moore's second pokemon is revealed to be an Arcanine, the 'cousin' of Ninetales. The humongous canine is covered in rusty orange fur crisscrossed with thick black stripes. His chest and head are covered with a thick, cream-colored mane bleached nearly white with age, and the back of each of his legs sport a tuft of the same color fur. Behind him, a dense tail sporting the same cream coloration lays limp and unamused. Like Rapidash, Arcanine's fur is marred by thin, hairless patches of scars. The pokemon cuts a majestic, regal figure, as if his very presence compels admiration and deference.

While Growlithe, Arcanine's prior form, is much more common than Vulpix, Arcanine is a different story. The books call the canine pokemon 'legendary' for a reason, and it's because Arcanine is nearly as rare as Ninetales. Though, it's less because of how uncontrollable Arcanine is, and more due to practicality. Few people have the resources needed to feed and care for a powerful, fire-breathing dog that weighs several hundred pounds and lives a hundred years on average. Factor in the cost of the Firestone needed to evolve a Growlithe, and one is looking at seven figures of investment at minimum to raise an Arcanine over the pokemon's entire life. Owning an Arcanine is a loud and proud symbol of prestige.

It doesn't hurt that they're mighty pokemon renowned for their superb speed, stamina, and physical strength. Kanto and Johto's old noble families keep Arcanine to this day for many reasons beyond saying "look at how wealthy I am."

Arcanine's hard eyes take in Octillery. He then pulls his lips back into a snarl, revealing teeth as long as a human finger that gleam a brilliant, healthy white. The canine tooth in the lower right of his jaw is missing, replaced with a titanium implant.

The holes in the barriers close up with haste as Octillery and Arcanine size each other up.

"Round two, A-Arcanine versus Octillery!" The referee stumbles over Arcanine's name as if he didn't expect the pokemon to make an appearance. "Begin!"

"Rock Blast into Octazooka!" Lee calls.

Strangely, or perhaps worryingly, Moore doesn't call an attack. He simply stands with his arms crossed.

Octillery draws back and spits a barrage of small stones from his mouth. Around each stone is an aura of red, and after several feet of flight, the aura flickers out. As soon as the red is gone, the stones expand to be the size of cannonballs as if by magic. The rocks keep all their speed despite the physics-defying trick and scream towards Arcanine's flanks, but the 'mon still hasn't moved. A second later, Octillery gurgles and swells, then with a supersonic crack, fires a bolt of ink in the middle of the rock barrage.

With grace unbefitting of a beast of his size, Arcanine swerves around the Octazooka, which outraces Rock Blast, then weaves and ducks around the stones flying at him as if he's entirely weightless on his paws. The entire time, his eyes never leave Octillery. The sound of the stones impacting the barrier behind him and shattering into thousands of pieces doesn't rattle him either.

Moore finally calls an attack, and it's the last one Lee wants to hear. "Extremespeed! Then Thunderfang!"

'Shit!'

"Wall yourself off!" Lee tries to counter.

Arcanine tenses, and before Octillery can spin around and make a wall of ice with Ice Beam just as they practiced, the Fire-type moves. There is no flicker, no flash of color, no shadow, nothing. For an instant too short for Lee to appreciate, Arcanine is standing on the other side of the field, then the dirt implodes under his dinner plate-sized paws… But Arcanine doesn't move? The great canine simply looks hazy now.

Lee blinks when he hears a squeal of pain, and as he blinks, Arcanine disappears from his sight. No, wait, what happened?!

Arcanine is already upon Octillery, mauling the octopus and shaking him around like a ragdoll. Octillery twitches and writhes under the crackling, electrified fangs digging into his flesh.

'What the fuck?! I could've sworn I saw him standing still a moment ago!' Lee's mind whirls. Arcanine didn't leave behind some kind of illusion, did he? No? 'Lord above, he moved so fast that he actually tricked my eyes. I just saw a real after image.' Lee doesn't dwell upon the revelation for long and returns his head to the fight. "Octillery! Fight it! Use Wrap around his neck and squeeze as hard as you can!"

Octillery struggles past the electrical surges running up and down his body just enough to wrap two tentacles around Arcanine's neck. Before the octopus can get a proper grip, Arcanine throws his head and releases his jaws, sending Octillery rolling across the dirt. The Water-type lets out a short squeal each time his savage, electrical burn-covered bite wound is dragged across the ground.

Moore doesn't leave his pokemon without an order for long. "Circle around and Thunder Fang again!"

Arcanine moves in a flash of rusty orange and gleaming teeth, his paws digging furrows into the dirt from the force of his legs alone.

'Fuck me! First, he tries to keep Grovyle at a distance, then he knows to stay on top of Octillery! Has Moore fought pokemon like them before, or is he reading them somehow?' Lee growls under his breath "Octillery! Use Gunk… Shot!"

'Just like we planned, Octillery. Hold steady…' Lee thinks even if only Ninetales can hear him.

Octillery rolls to a stop, his eyes taking on a knowing gleam after hearing the pause in the command.

…But Moore notices too. His eyes harden. "Arcanine, be wary!"

Arcanine bears down on Octillery twice as fast, sparking fangs poised to shred the smaller pokemon.

Octillery gurgles and sucks in a breath, making an obvious show of charging an attack and pointing his mouth directly at Arcanine.

The huge canine jukes to the side at such speed it's as if he teleports, dodging a projectile… that Octillery hasn't fired.

'And fire!'

During the split second that Arcanine's brow furrows in confusion, Octillery corrects his aim and spits a glob of viscous, fuming purple… Right into Arcanine's mouth.

The poisonous gunk splashes across Arcanine's lightning-infused fangs, his gums, his tongue, and the force of the shot sends some right down his throat. Some splatters across his nose, with a bit making its way into his nostrils.

If training with Octillery has taught Lee anything, it's just how nasty Poison is as a type. It's as if someone took a timid child's understanding of what poison is and distilled that fearful nightmare substance into something even worse. Poison TE is both caustic and toxic, existing as a general anathema to anything alive. Octillery isn't even Poison-type, yet his Gunk Shot shatters rock, eats through the shards left behind, then kills plants around the impact.

And Arcanine just took a direct hit to several mucus membranes.

Arcanine leaps back and snorts, sending purple muck and mucus to the ground. He snorts again, and this time the mucus is flecked with blood.

Then the pain sets in.

Arcanine shakes, then howls and hacks in torment, whipping his head side to side and showering the ground in bloody saliva. He stops for a moment to retch, spilling blood from his bleeding gums and nose, then he vomits a torrent of steaming fluid with a worrying red and purple tint. He coughs once more, throwing up another mouthful of red and stumbling.

"Arcanine, fight it, boy!" Moore urges. Lee can just barely make out the sight of sweat on the old man's helmet-covered brow. "Raise your temperature and burn the toxins out! Do it now!"

The Fire-type coughs, giving Octillery a woozy glare filled with seething anger. He takes a deep breath in, then out, flames exiting his mouth with the exhale.

'Of course, he has a counter for poison,' Lee clicks his tongue, feeling foolish for pausing. "Octazooka!"

Octillery sucks in a breath of his own, then blasts a tank shell's worth of ink at Arcanine.

The orange and black canine aborts the purge of poison from his body and leaps to the side, dodging the ink that hits the ground behind him and kicks up a cloud of dust.

"Again! Don't let him rest!" The zoologist orders. 'Poison… What a distasteful way to win, but I don't know what else we can do…' Lee takes the short lull to inspect his pokemon. What he finds makes him wince.

Octillery's right side is one giant, ghastly bite wound surrounded by spider-webbing electrical burns. One of Octillery's tentacles looks as if a fang went completely through it, as the limb is limp and unresponsive. Two more tentacles are being used as makeshift sutures, holding much of the bite wound closed and stemming Octillery's bleeding as much as possible. Despite the efforts, blood is still soaking the dirt next to the octopus. If not for the impromptu field treatment, he likely would have fainted from blood loss already.

The red cephalopod continuously blasts his signature attack at Arcanine, who dodges each supersonic bolt. Even if Octillery tries to fake him out or herd him into another shot, Arcanine still remains untouched even if his grace is waning with each passing second.

'Down three tentacles, tender on his entire right side, and slowly bleeding out. Even if Gunk Shot really messed up Arcanine, Octillery still got the worst of the exchange…' Lee frowns and mentally scrolls through all the maneuvers he and Octillery worked on.

"Enough of this!" Moore roars, his anger carrying throughout the entire building. "Have I allowed my team to fall so far? I cannot bear the shame! Arcanine! We're done playing Meowth and Rattata! Use Facade!"

It takes Lee a moment longer than he cares to admit to remember what Facade does. 'A Normal move that doubles in power if the user is burned, poisoned, or paralyzed. Fuck me, really?'

Arcanine dodges one final Octozooka, then sets his muzzle in grim determination. Drawing back his lips for a bloody snarl, an aura of white wisps around his body as small billows of steam escape from between his teeth. He lowers himself, then blasts forward trailing white like a missile.

Neither Lee nor Octillery can do anything as Arcanine drives his skull into Octillery like a supersonic wrecking ball. Lee is treated to the disheartening sight of his newest pokemon's entire body rippling like a water balloon ready to burst, then flying off of his tentacles and smashing into the arena barrier with a bone-rattling THUD!

Arcanine coughs once more, splattering the ground with red droplets.

Octillery falls to the ground, unmoving and barely even breathing. His whole body goes limp like a deflated ball.

Lee's shoulders slump. "Damn…"

"Octillery is unable to battle!" The referee calls the match as a hole opens up on Lee's side of the barrier. "Arcanine is the winner of round two!"

Applause and a handful of cheers come down from the crowd as Lee raises Octillery's ball and recalls the unconscious Water-type. Like with Grovyle, he raises the ball to his lips and whispers. "You did incredible out there, Octillery. We've only been working together for a week and already you're irreplaceable. Thank you," he murmurs quietly before clipping the pokeball back to his belt.

"Challenger Lee! Please select your final pokemon!" The referee calls.

The applause goes quiet at the announcement as nervous anticipation seems to fill the entire arena. All eyes are on Lee. Everyone knows who his selection is going to be.

On the other side of the room, Moore's grin finally returns.

Lee takes Ninetales' ball and enlarges it. With a deep breath, he steadies himself and readily accepts the mental embrace Ninetales pulls him into. 'Ready?'

'Always, Beloved,' she says, her voice filling him with blessed confidence.

They pull one another close, close enough that words become useless.

Lee draws his arm back and throws the ball into the arena.

The ball splits open, and out comes Ninetales.

The great fox lands in a crouch, then slowly stands, unfurling each one of her tails as she does so.

The sunlight streaming in through the window suddenly re-doubles its intensity, casting harsh rays that quickly begin to heat the room. The aging air conditioning system of the gym kicks on, but even then the large room begins to grow warm. The only one who doesn't feel the additional warmth is Lee.

Once Ninetales is at her full height, she snaps her red eyes open and stares down Arcanine with open, burning hostility.

Despite being twice Ninetales' size, the other Fire-type wheezes through his burned trachea and retreats half a step.

"Round three, Arcanine versus Ninetales, begin!" The ref chops his hand down as the Barrier in front of Lee closes again.

Before Moore's mouth can even move, a command flows from Lee to Ninetales. In the time it would have taken for a regular person to say a single word, Ninetales and Lee could have an entire discussion with how closely intertwined their minds are.

Hold. Lee's brain fills in the silent instruction with a word, just for himself.

Ninetales' eyes glow, and Arcanine is seized in a purple telekinetic aura, forcing him to stiffen against his will.

"Crunch! Break the hold and use Facade!" Moore's voice booms as his eyes take on an intense focus.

He noticed fast. Hex.

Before Arcanine can power up Crunch, wispy orbs of ghostly violet swirl into being around the immobilized Arcanine, then they all converge and sink into his skin. A half second later, Arcanine shrilly yowls as arcs of charged Ghost TE rip across his body, cruelly attacking the organs most ravaged by Octillery's poison.

"Arcanine! Focus! Break the hold!" Moore demands.

Extrasensory.

Extrasensory is an extraordinarily brutal, borderline sadistic move to Lee. Ninetales learned it upon her evolution, and when they tested it on a boulder a few days ago, they were left with a pile of gravel. Some way, somehow, the psychic field creates zones of overlapping spatial fluctuations, or at least that's what it looks like to caught inside is ripped apart. 'Nature was on its A-game when it decided only twenty or so pokemon can learn it,' Lee muses to himself.

Ninetales' eyes glow brighter, and all around Arcanine, fields of overlapping Psychic bubbles form out of thin air. The bubbles all quiver as one, then each one expands and contracts rapidly, pulling at the canine's body with rippling gravitational distortions.

Arcanine howls as his entire body bruises, with several splits opening in his skin. Blood quickly begins to soak his fur, and when Ninetales releases him from her crushing telekinetic grip, the monstrous dog pokemon sways on his paws.

With a snarl, Arcanine raises his head and reflexively fires a gout of white flame towards Ninetales.

The vixen's control of all things Fire leaps out, sinking invisible tendrils into Arcanine's nameless attack and wresting control away from him without a struggle. Just as the fire reaches Ninetales, it parts around her as if splashing against an invisible, spherical shield, missing entirely.

"Arcanine! Listen!" Moore is actually beginning to look unsure. "The poison has progressed too far! Use Facade or you'll be defeated!

Arcanine snarls, lowering himself as the same white, steamy wisps defuse from his fur and begin to surround him.

Double Team. Feint Attack. Confuse Ray. Hex. Be ready to move. Use only non-Fire attacks to remain optimal.

Ninetales narrows her eyes. Unnoticed by anyone other than Lee, a single Double Team illusion covers her form just as the cloak of Feint Attack renders her invisible. Slowly, she steps off to the side while her doppelganger remains standing in her place, powering up her Confuse Ray as she does so.

In the backseat of Ninetales' mind, Lee focuses on animating the single Double Team illusion, keeping its tails swaying and its chest rising and falling so his partner can keep concentrating on remaining unseen. He pulls the clone's muzzle back into an infuriating smirk, hoping to remain a juicy target.

Still cloaked, Ninetales lets her Confuse Ray fly.

Arcanine rushes forward, Facade turning him into a missile once more, only for him to stumble halfway through and stop as he runs face-first into an unseen Confuse Ray. With a growl, he shakes his head and clears the mental fog within only a few seconds, but a few seconds is all it takes for Hex to crackle to life again and tear into his body. Once more, he howls and seizes on his feet.

Finally, finally, Arcanine sways on his paws once more, then falls to his side with a thud, wheezing and too weak to rise. Twice he tries to get back on his paws, and twice he just falls. On his third failure, he lays down and stares at the Ninetales illusion with defeat in his eyes.

Just like in the last matches, after ten seconds the referee steps up to the side of the arena and speaks into his microphone. "Arcanine is no longer able to battle! The winner of round three is Ninetales!"

Abandoning Zinnia's advice for a moment, Lee looks into the crowd.

Behind the polite applause, a number of people seem startled by the match. In a way, Lee can understand it. To them, it must look like Ninetales won without moving a muscle. 'Something tells me it would be a different story if Arcanine was at full health.'

Steven still watches carefully with a pokeball in his hand, looking between the downed Arcanine and Ninetales' illusion… Then his eyes shift and look right at the real Ninetales, who is still invisible. 'Well, that's not creepy or concerning at all… Is Metagross telling him where Ninetales is? I guess I shouldn't be too surprised.'

Up in the stands, Brendan stands and applauds louder than anyone else, his face locked into a grin so wide it must hurt. Beside him, Zinnia is standing too, clapping her hands with a grin that rivals Brendan's. Next to her, Courtney's applause is much more reserved, though her small smile at least makes it seem genuine.

A hole opens in Moore's side of the barrier, and raising Arcanine's ball, the Gym Leader sighs and recalls his ill pokemon in a flash of light. He raises the ball and touches it to the forehead of his helmet, muttering something too quiet for Lee or Ninetales to hear. Replacing Arcanine's ball in its holster, Moore sags. "Goodness me, goodness me…" He raises a hand and clenches it over his chest. "We're in quite the mess with this one."

Once more, Lee can't help but feel compelled to say something in response. Mentally, he untangles himself from Ninetales enough that their words won't get jumbled. "Gym Leader Moore…" Lee pauses and crosses his arms, not really sure how to phrase himself. "Maybe this battle isn't the glorious thing you were hoping for, but it's certainly told me something; that your pokemon and tactics are just too much for us to handle without tricks like targeting weak points or using poison. I don't think your pokemon are weak at all, and perhaps you're being too harsh on yourself by saying they've fallen. Your pokemon have clearly been raised with love and dedication, and it's plain to see. Even a rookie trainer like myself sees it."

Moore chuckles, then it deepens into a full belly laugh. "No no, my boy! You give me too much credit and yourself not enough, and this certainly isn't a criticism of our battle here today! It would be foolish of me to expect anything but a battle of wits as well as might. No, in that regard you and your pokemon have more than lived up to my expectations! This is the most difficult battle we have faced in years!" His smile lessens. "My era was one before the information age, so I cannot show you just how mighty we stood in those days long past, but as we are today… Well, my pokemon and I are merely pale imitations. Juxtaposed against yourself, it's all the more obvious." Moore reaches into his straw holster and withdraws an old pokeball, one with nearly all of the red paint on the cap worn away. Moore rubs a thumb across the capsule lovingly. "Rapidash is far past his prime, and Arcanine's age is beginning to show. My first partner, Ty, is nearing the end of his days as a battler. Today… might even be his last battle before he's just too battered to continue. I know where we stand, Lee. Today was never truly about winning."

Moore throws the worn pokeball into the arena.

"Today!" Moore's roar echoes through his helmet as his eyes blaze. "Today is about that glorious final burn!"

The weathered pokeball snaps open and deposits a pokemon in the field. As the light of the pokeball fades, Lee feels his heart leap into his throat.

In the pokemon anime Ty, Moore's Typhlosion, is depicted as an average member of his species. No outstanding traits, no real battles shown, just a normal pokemon.

The pokemon before Lee and Ninetales is not normal.

Ty stands tall, at least six and a half feet, and like his teammates, his physique is positively olympian even with his graying coat showing off his advanced age. That's not what draws the eyes, though.

The scars do.

Ty's entire chest, his stomach, his arms, his legs, parts of his neck, parts of his face, they're all covered in overlapping scars and burns. Even the tip of his right ear is missing, and on the left side of his chest is a spiraled scar like he was shot with an artillery cannon. His entire front is a veritable tapestry of suffering, each square inch of ghastly flesh telling a story not fit for any with a weak constitution. The pokemon stands all the taller and more unbreakable for each healed wound, like a war monument brought to life.

Lee reaches up and touches the three lines burned into his face. They… feel almost like nothing in comparison.

Ty turns slowly to regard Moore, showing Lee and Ninetales his back in open dismissal.

The only scar on Ty's back is a spiraling exit wound, a mirror to the one on his chest.

Ninetales' hackles rise, and she struggles to remain invisible.

"Old friend…" Moore's visage is soft despite Ty's eyes boring into him. "Can I count on you here?"

Ty says nothing. Slowly, he turns around, facing the Ninetales illusion and lowering himself into an animalistic ready stance, one fore paw braced on the ground with the other held claws out. On his back, the iconic mantle of jet-like flames Typhlosion is known for bursts to life, burning not orange, but a pearl-white with a ghostly blue center.

"Final round…" The referee looks between the Ninetales illusion and Ty, not hiding his nervousness at all. "Begin!"

No one moves right away.

Ty stares down the illusion with smoldering eyes, silently daring Ninetales to make the first move.

After a full, nerve-racking minute passes, Lee breaks first.

Baby-Doll Eyes, Confuse Ray.

Under her cloak, Ninetales stares hard at Ty, the glow in her eyes going unseen.

The instant Baby-Doll Eyes is cast, the veteran pokemon takes off across the ground with devilish speed on all fours, moving and zig-zagging like he didn't even notice the enfeebling effect of the Fairy ray. He's on top of the illusion in an instant, his clenched fist trailing white as he swipes it through the false Ninetales' head in a brutal, unnamed attack.

The Double Team dissipates, leaving Ty alone.

"I knew there was something fishy!" Moore exclaims, eyes scanning the arena. "Ty! Burning Ash!"

Ty draws in a breath just as Ninetales' Confuse Ray strikes, but like with Baby-Doll Eyes, Ty is seemingly unaffected. He slows for perhaps half a second, then he spews a thick cloud of ember-laden ash at the ground, making a cloud that quickly scatters in every direction.

The hot ash doesn't harm Ninetales... But it does stick to her, making her outline obvious through Feint Attack's cloak.

Ty moves like lightning, zooming toward the revealed fox with his mouth open and teeth aimed squarely at Ninetales' neck.

Hold him!

A purple haze, the same color as the glow that overtakes Ninetales' eyes as Feint Attack drops, covers Ty from head to toe and stops him cold.

The Typhlosion growls, and without needing any instruction, he flexes his body against the blanket of telekinesis around him. His muscles stand up in sharp relief against his scarred skin, and to Lee's horror, Ty shatters the telekinesis around him with sheer physical strength alone. The sound of the telekinesis failing is sharp and hard on the ears, like a burst of radio static played at maximum volume.

Ninetales recoils from the backlash of having her focus broken so utterly. A headache quickly begins to bloom in her head, and Lee does his best to draw the pain off of her and into himself.

Ty lowers himself again and runs at Ninetales, his teeth seemingly gravitating towards her neck.

Quick Attack! Double Team!

Ninetales jumps to the side out of the cloud of ash and out of Ty's way, illusions trailing her and scattering as she does so. She lands on her paws some distance away with a frown.

"Combustion!" Moore is just as fast to respond to the clones as they appear.

'Combustion?' Lee wonders. 'I've never heard of that move.'

Unperturbed by the missed attack, Ty stands on his hind legs and crosses his forepaws, which take on a bright orange glow. With a growl, he thrusts his arms out, the fur of his arms rubbing together and sparking with snaps and pops.

Then a gargantuan fiery explosion, with Ty as the epicenter, rocks the entire building. Smoke fills the psychically shielded battleground, chips of rock bouncing off the transparent wall and clattering to the ground.

Any personal woes or memories of fire are skipped by Lee as Ninetales' pain tears through his body. With a gasp, Lee's legs shake as he almost falls to his knees. Already, he can tell how bad the damage is.

His ribs are on fire and the taste of blood coats his tongue, so Ninetales must have shattered a few ribs and might be bleeding internally.

His left ear is ringing, so Ninetales is probably deaf on that side until seen at a Pokemon Center.

A phantom limb he doesn't own is filled with sharp, keen pain, meaning one of her tails is broken.

The rest of his body just aches in general.

Through Ninetales' bleary eyes, Lee watches her get to her paws shakily.

Gritting his teeth, Lee urges her to rise!

Ninetales gets to her paws, ignoring the stabbing of her abused ribs. With a growl, she reaches out to Lee and pulls his mind a little closer, and to his surprise, time seems to slow as they think together.

'I don't know what happened, but I'm certain Moore has more hidden moves than he originally let on,' the vixen mentally snarls. 'Rotten bastard. I don't care how powerful Typhlosion is, we're tearing him to pieces!'

The complaint comes off as a bit hypocritical to Lee, but he doesn't voice it for now. It won't do to rile his fox up in such a critical match. 'Easy, Love…' Lee watches as a stone launched by Ty's explosion falls as if dropped into molasses. His desire to study this strange time perception alteration is pushed aside for now. It takes immense effort just to move his eyes to follow the stone, and he can feel Ninetales totally ignoring her body to communicate with him. Sadly, it looks like re-creating a 'Bullet Time' effect is off the table. 'I kind of expected that Moore was hiding something. Everyone seems to keep the best methods and discoveries to themselves to keep their competitive edge.' His neutral face falls into a frown with painstaking slowness. 'That explosion is bad news. If Ty can attack in every direction at once, that negates much of what we can do. I can feel he's already injured you.'

'...' Ninetales says nothing, still not acknowledging that she's been wounded.

'The orange glow, though… Fire TE?'

'It must have been,' Ninetales agrees. 'I felt more than a bit of heat.'

Lee would smile if he could. 'Do you think you can pull control away from him?'

Ninetales' mental smirk is almost evil.

Mentally, the man and fox pull away from each other, and sensation returns to their bodies. Time resumes its normal speed.

Double Team. Payback.

Doppelgangers once more flash into existence around Ninetales, Each one bounding away to surround Ty, who looks unimpressed with the stunt.

As one, each fox snarls as bubbling Dark seeps out of her wounds, coating her in a cloak of Dark that fills her body with spite-powered strength.

"Combustion!" Moore orders once more, his eyes narrowing in confusion as he looks at Lee.

Lee smiles back.

Ninetales and her clones rush Ty, each one opening their slender muzzles to bear sharp teeth.

With a scoff, Ty crosses his arms and thrusts them out again, sparks flying from his fur.

Now!

Before the old Typhlosion can set off another explosion, Ninetales' influence snakes its way into Combustion's orange glow, seizing the reaction before it can complete. All that comes from Ty's arms is a puff of smoke.

Ty's eyes narrow as Moore's jaw drops. "What in the blazes…?"

The half-second of surprise is just enough for Ninetales to leap up, dig her claws into Ty's chest, and snap her jaws around Ty's throat like a steel vice.

With a roar of fury more than pain, Ty drives a glowing fist right into Ninetales head, making stars explode into Lee and Ninetales' vision. The bloody split in her temple empowers Payback enough that Ninetales can bite down hard enough to cut off the veteran's windpipe, choking him with a gasp.

"Pull her off without hurting her, Ty! You'll make Payback worse!" Moore's orders quickly stop his Typhlosion from sabotaging himself.

Ty takes Ninetales' jaws in his hand-like paws, trying to pry the superpowered fox off.

The golden fox growls and whips her head side to side before her burst of physical might fades, wrenching Ty's neck and throwing his balance off, but the titan of a Fire-type simply refuses to stumble.

Finally, just as Payback begins to wane, Ty overbalances and topples over, and Ninetales refuses to let the opportunity go to waste. Snarling once more and rebuffing the pain in her ribs, she twists her whole body and throws Ty into the ground head-first.

The packed dirt of the arena caves in as Ty strikes it, making a crater several inches deep and drawing a wounded cry from the Typhlosion, the first one in the entire match.

Back away!

Ty returns to his feet with a livid roar, not letting the cut in his skull or the blood dripping into his eye stop him. He takes a wild swing at Ninetales, who ducks the blow and leaps backward.

Hold him! Extrasensory!

Ninetales' eyes glow violet, and Ty freezes in place. The head wound must be slowing him down, because the elder Fire-type doesn't escape immediately, giving Ninetales enough time to encase him in a psychic bubble.

Ty roars again as psychic power pulls at every fiber of his body, opening up rends in his skin, making ugly bruises blossom across his body, and likely hemorrhaging something inside of him. His struggles redouble, and rather than let him overpower her again, Ninetales drops him and leaps to his left, directly out of the way of Ty's retaliatory wild charge and the glowing fist that effortlessly punches nearly a foot into the ground.

'What a tough old bastard…' Lee sweats. 'Gets hit by Baby-Doll Eyes and still has enough strength to shatter Nine's telekinesis, shrugs off a Confuse Ray that sends other pokemon right into a seizure, took a Payback bite to the throat, made Payback worse and barely choked, gets choke slammed into the ground hard enough to leave a crater, eats a full-power Extrasensory, and he still fights like he's more pissed than hurt. How strong was he back in the day?'

"Heh… Hahahaha!" Moore suddenly laughs. "I haven't seen Ty this fired up in years! Hell, I haven't seen him bleed in years! This is wonderful! Extraordinary! C'mon, Ty!" He urges his pokemon. "Don't hand the youngsters a win! Show them what you can really do! Quick Attack!"

Quick Attack! Stay a step ahead!

Both Ninetales and Ty transform into blurs of gold and gray-blue respectively, crashing into each other and disengaging a moment later all across the battlefield. The only way Lee can tell what's happening is by watching through Ninetales' eyes.

One clash and Ty leaves with a new bite wound.

Another, and Ninetales has claw marks carved into her chest.

The pair stop for a second, Ty dodging around a tongue of flame that leaps from Ninetales' throat, one that chases him like a snake. Finally, he bats the fire away with a paw and launches back into Quick Attack with Ninetales following.

For all her skill and physical strength, Ninetales begins losing more and more exchanges. Ten, twenty, over thirty pass in the span of just a few seconds broken up by short furious trades of projectiles. Ninetales' injuries begin to pile up. For each new one, Lee has to bite his tongue and forcefully keep his face straight as every sensation Ninetales feels echoes through her into him. At the one-minute mark, Lee can barely stand and groans under his breath.

Disengage! Ready Payback!

Ninetales reappears on Lee's side of the field, panting and with an uncomfortable amount of her golden coat stained red. Her limbs shake, and her left hind leg struggles to hold any weight. Through her, Lee feels her determination to win is fueling her far more than anything else.

Ty, however, apparently has no plans to let her go and comes down at Ninetales like a roaring, furious comet.

With a growl, Ninetales spools up Payback and lets Dark-TE practically explode from her numerous wounds, covering her in a sinister mantle of black.

"Abort!" Moore calls, drawing a silent curse from Lee.

Ty flares his Quick Attack, halting midair and leaping back to Moore's side of the battleground with a single deft flip.

While Ty won much more of the High-speed fight than his foe, he didn't escape unscathed. A deep bite wound across his left wrist slowly drips blood on the ground, Three thin slashes run across his inner left thigh, and his right eye is bruised and blackened. Ty breathes slowly and deeply, with a nearly inaudible wheeze.

"This is almost more than I could have hoped for…" Moore smiles. "Hehe! Hahahaha!" The joy in each laugh can't be understated. "To push Ty to such lengths, I'm astounded! Lee, Madam Ninetales, this is everything I ever wanted!"

'Push him to such lengths?' Lee almost shakes his head. 'Hardly. Typhlosion looks like he can go another ten rounds!'

'Perhaps on the surface…' Ninetales pants, not taking her eyes off of Ty. 'Age… Age hasn't been kind to him, Lee. I can feel the Fire inside of him giving out.'

Lee closes his eyes and allows Ninetales to gently guide him through her extra senses. Then, he 'sees' it in a way no other person likely ever has.

If Ninetales is a deep core of paradoxically solid fire, one producing warmth without end, then Ty is a candle without any wax left. On the end of a wick long since turned to fragile ash burns a single, stubborn flame. Blinking away the imagery, Lee looks at Ty once more, noticing the mantle of jet-like flames around his neck is slowly, reluctantly changing from white to orange.

'Fighting at his maximum, even for less than fifteen minutes as we have, has pushed him beyond the brink,' Ninetales blinks, the vengeful irritation she's been nursing for Ty and Moore begins to drain, replaced with something more melancholic. 'Ty can't maintain this pace for long, not with the injuries I've inflicted upon him.'

"Which is why it's time to bring this match to an end," Moore continues, drawing Lee and Ninetales in with the ominous line. "I know Combustion failing was no fluke, and instinct tells me that trying Overheat will get us nowhere. Nevertheless, we have a second option that's just as good." The Gym Leader's grin lights up the darkness of his helmet. "Ty, it's time to finish this. Either we fall here in an exit for the ages, or we send a pair of whelps packing!"

Moore points a damning finger forward. "Ty! Hyper Beam! Give it everything you have!"

Lee's eyes bug out and Ninetales' stomach drops.

Typhlosion turns his eyes to Ninetales, his red irises softening in a split second of respect, then he raises his head, mouth open wide. Above his mouth, a globe of boiling golden energy begins to grow, going from the size of a fist, to the size of a beach ball, to the size of a man in the span of only four seconds. Then the ball begins to contract, shrinking down on itself until it's a tiny marble glowing such a bright white that no one can look at it directly.

Ty lowers his head, aiming his attack right for Ninetales, and Lee sees the sweat beginning to soak the elderly pokemon's fur.

Panicked and bereft of any plans for beating such a monster pokemon, Lee makes the fastest call he can. "Flamethrower! Match him!"

Ninetales opens her jaws wide, a light deep in her throat flickering white as she prepares to spew fire to meet the Hyper Beam head-on. Her remaining energy screams within her body and beelines towards her mouth, making the white glow utterly blinding.

In the stands, Lee sees Steven suddenly stand from the corner of his eye and throw the pokeball in his hands. "Metagross!" Steven barks. "Reinforce the shield around the arena now!"

Lee doesn't actually get to see Metagross be released, as the entire room lights up a horrific, calamitous white.

Ninetales would never hurt you.

Nausea smashes into the zoologist like a freight train, but he swallows the bile in his throat, takes a deep breath of cool air, and peers from around his arm into the arena.

Inside, Ninetales and Ty are locked in a final battle that can only be described as cataclysmic. From Ninetales comes her strongest Flamethrower, the same white-hot pillar of flames she demonstrated a few short days ago, the one with enough power to ruin entire landscapes. Ninetales stands with her legs spread and braced in the blackened, burned dirt and her tails all splayed out, the broken one included. Her head is thrust forward, her maw open and blasting fire with every ounce of power she can muster.

In the middle of the arena, her Flamethrower meets Ty's Hyper Beam in a dead-even struggle. Her fire pushes against the practically solid battering ram of energy shooting from the old Typhlosion's jaws, with smaller beams bending around the fire to smash into the cracked barrier. Ty himself is down on all fours, gripping the ground with his claws and roaring with such terrifying volume that he can actually be heard over the shrill scream of his and Ninetales' attacks meeting. Flamethrower and Hyper Beam smash into each other like opposing rivers.

Slowly, Ty's beam begins to flag, and Ninetales pushes even harder, the diameter of her Flamethrower growing and pushing Hyper Beam back.

Ty snarls, eyes wild, and with jaw-dropping effort, he somehow pushes even more strength into his beam, matching Ninetales and meeting her in a stalemate once more. Both Flamethrower and Hyper Beam glance off of each other for no longer than a second, but the errant attacks strike the shield around the battlefield.

The first barrier shatters, and the young Kadabra off the side of the arena lets out a cry lost to the din of the clash before him.

A horrid heat pours into the room, raising the temperature several degrees instantly and quickly rising. The few spectators scream until another barrier, one formed from nearly transparent, interlocking hexagons forms in place of the first one.

Lee hazards a look over to Steven's Metagross, who watches Ninetales and Ty with a shine to his red eyes.

Flamethrower and Hyper Beam both begin to sputter as both pokemon start to lose control. From Ninetales, Lee can feel her stamina being sucked down at a rate he previously thought impossible. 'Ninetales! Keep in control! You can do this!' Lee sockets himself into her attack, letting her consume his stamina. He can only let the fox drain him for a handful of seconds before his head becomes light and she forcefully disconnects him, but anything he can spare to keep her in the fight is worth it.

A second before it happens, Ninetales squeezes her side of their bond down to almost nothing, freeing Lee from her aches and pains.

Flamethrower and Hyper Beam both destabilize, detonating in an explosion that covers the entirety of the boxy shield around the pair of pokemon. Even with the explosion contained, the tremors that run through the entire building knock ceiling tiles loose, shatter windows, and burst a fire sprinkler pipe overhead, sending water raining down.

"Ninetales!" Lee cries, his stomach tying itself into a knot.

Moore remains quiet.

The fifteen seconds it takes for the smoke to clear is the longest of Lee's life, but when the dust settles, he can hardly believe his eyes.

The battleground is entirely ruined, as most of the dirt is now ash, and in the ashy field, both Ninetales and Ty are still standing.

Lee forces his telepathic connection to his pokemon open, ignoring the wracking, bone-deep weariness and the phantom pain of being more living injury than unmarred flesh. 'Ninetales?'

The fox doesn't respond. It's all she can do to stand on her shaking legs and not fall into a dead faint. Blood is pooling under her, and swaths of her fur are burned away despite how her pelt should be fire retardant. Even now, Lee can see the darkness beginning to creep in the edge of her vision, which is focused firmly on the ground.

'C'mon, Love. I'm so sorry to do this to you, but hang in there for a bit longer!' Lee opens up his stamina to her again, diverting a bit of his own essence to slow the unconsciousness creeping up on the vixen.

Even half dead and unresponsive, she weakly snorts and finds just enough willpower to feed her trainer a morsel of telepathic love.

Lee looks up at Ty.

The Typhlosion is dyed red with blood, and he stands openly panting with his head bowed. Slowly, he raises his head and aims unfocused eyes at Ninetales.

Ty takes a single, shaking step forward, dragging a lame leg behind him.

'There is no way…' Awe and a touch of fear strike somewhere deep within Lee as Ty shuffles closer, step-by-step, foot by foot. 'There is no way he's still moving after that! That explosion had to be enough to bring a skyscraper down, and he's still able to fight?!'

Moore's first pokemon makes it to the halfway point in the charred battlefield, then with a hiss, he crumples to the ground. If not for his gasping breaths, Lee would swear that the pokemon fell and died.

Silence reigns in the Gym.

Lee licks his dry lips, looking between the still-standing Ninetales and the fallen Typhlosion. 'Did… Did we win?'

Moore raises his fist to his mouth. "Norbert, the call?"

At the side of the arena, the stunned referee raises his microphone. "T-Ty is…" He stops short, blinking his eyes as if he were dreaming. "Ty is unable to battle… The winner of the final round and today's Gym match is Ninetales and her trainer, Challenger Lee Henson!"

Ninetales perks an ear, and with the very last of her strength, she rears her head back and lets out a victorious howl. Immediately after, her legs finally give out and she falls to the ground, her mind going blank with a lingering note of pride that's plain to Lee.

The barriers around the arena fall for the last time, and both Lee and Moore recall their fallen pokemon to their pokeballs. The lack of applause or really any reaction from the onlookers places an awkward feeling upon Lee's shoulders, but nonetheless, he walks out to meet Moore in the middle of the ruined field.

'Thank you, Love. You were spectacular,' Lee smiles and returns the ball to his belt.

In the center of the field, Moore removes his helmet, showing everyone his sweaty, exhausted face that nonetheless wears a small, content smile. He offers a hand for Lee to shake. "Lee," he begins. "I have nothing more to say that you and your pokemon's astonishing performance here today hasn't already said. First Roxanne, then Brawly, Liza and Tate, my dear Flannery, and now you and all of the other young men and women challenging the League this year. The future is bright, and my team and I can retire knowing the world is in good hands." He releases Lee's hand, and from a pocket in his breastplate, the Gym Leader produces a shining badge in the shape of a plume of flame.

With a wide smile, Lee reaches for the badge, but stops when Moore pulls his hand away.

"Before I give you your rightfully earned Heat Badge…" Moore smiles mischievously. "Can you make a promise for an old man?"

"That promise being?" Lee raises an eyebrow.

Moore laughs once. "Why, return to the Lavaridge Gym in a year or two! I know a battle between you and Flannery will upstage our match today countless times over!"

'Ah, so that's the political angle to this whole stunt…' Lee returns Moore's smile. "I can do that."

The badge is dropped into Lee's hand, and the silent spectators burst into deafening applause when it's raised high in triumph.


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Act 2: Interlude 2
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The elevator door shuts behind Steven with a near-silent click as he steps into his floor-spanning office in Ever Grande City. With his mind abuzz, he barely notices sitting down behind his desk. The Champion is only pulled from his musings when something icy and alien touches his brain.

'Your thoughts are in disarray, Steven. Are you well?'

Steven blinks and sits up straight. Inside his jacket, where a number of magnetic pokeball clamps are sewn, Metagross' ball begins to grow warm, like a machine humming into high gear. 'I'm fine, Meta. Just thinking is all. How are you feeling?'

The instant the thought hits Metagross, Steven feels the lightning-fast reply come.

'Teleportation from Lavaridge to Ever Grande utilized six-point-four-five percent of my total stamina reserves,' Metagross rattles off mechanically. 'Supplementation of the Lavaridge arena barrier utilized eight-point-seven-one percent of my total stamina reserves. At this time my reserves have recovered to ninety four-point-eight-two percent and rising. I am able and ready.'

Steven can't help but smile to himself. 'No need to be so clinical. You could say 'I'm fine.'

''I'm fine' relays nothing of substantial value,' Metagross sends back.

The Champion and Devon heir doesn't argue, knowing it's a lost cause with his stubborn ace. Instead, he logs into his computer and clicks his tongue at the number of emails in his inbox. 'How was that eight percent divided between Ninetales and Ty?'

Metagross takes only a second to answer, but Steven is well aware that a second to Metagross is an eternity to anyone else. Just one idle thought from the Steel-type would burn out a modern computer from the sheer processing power needed. 'Between combatants Ninetales and Typhlosion, my barrier absorbed a comparable amount of force between their attacks. Of the eight-point-seven-one percent stamina utilized, Combatant Ninetales's Flamethrower required four-point-six percent of the aforementioned total.'

Steven lets out a breath. 'Not a bad figure… Not a bad figure at all.'

With a drag of his cursor and the typing of a long, nonsensical password, Steven opens up a hidden network path on his computer, one home to a number of off-record servers under the Hoenn Pokémon League HQ.

Once inside, he opens up a folder labeled Archive19xx0101_JohtoKanto. Inside are a number of subfolders, and any history buff would pale upon seeing the names of each folder.

Each folder is named for a battle fought in the Kanto-Johto skirmishes.

Pokemon battling is the world's most profitable sport, the go-to method for dispute resolution, and is a general way of life for many; at the dawn of the information age, every regional Pokemon League had very quickly agreed on one thing:

War footage should not be spread for fun.

Any unapproved graphic media that could damage the delicate relationship between pokemon, pokemon trainers, and the common person had been deemed unacceptable, and to this day, a small army of technicians and a legion of Porygon work to scrub the internet of any content the League deems uncivilized. The resilience and stubbornness of the internet cannot be understated, but the underbelly of the web, away from normal people and the scrutiny of the League, is the only place where such footage of death and carnage can survive.

Some people cry foul at the censorship, and in a way, Steven understands, but at the same time…

Steven's cursor hovers over a folder, one labeled 19xx1023MtSilverRout_WildfireIncident.

He dares not open it a second time.

…There's a unique horror to seeing a pokemon, then the trainer behind him fall, both never to rise again. It's vile; wrong.

Moore and Ty's might were a pillar for Johto those twenty-odd years ago, legends who stood side by side with trainers from Clan Blackthorn, Clan Hayato, and Johto Gym Leader Pryce—who is still regarded as one of the best Ice-type trainers to have ever lived.

Moore and his Typhlosion were past their prime even then, but they commanded a terrible presence on the battlefield. Where they went, Kanto's forces burned. Kanto's civil army, staffed by regular people wielding small arms, refused to march anywhere that Moore and Ty might be.

Ty was finally disabled and retired from the conflict after being impaled through the chest by the Horn Drill of a Rhydon belonging to one Giovanni of Kanto. Pryce would be forced into open retreat by Kanto's Samuel Oak a week later. When the Blackthorn Clan Head fell in an ambush, the clan of dragon tamers was left leaderless. As tragedy and misfortune piled up and their allies proved reluctant to assist, Johto's morale collapsed. The war came to a close with Johto's surrender only weeks later.

Moore returned to Hoenn bitter and defeated. Only his decades of service and the potential for public backlash had kept the League from expelling him for abandoning his post as an Elite Four member to fight in the most unpopular war in history; the black mark that branded his file still stands to this day.

Nearly forty thousand souls went to meet Arceus in those five months, marking it as one of the most deadly conflicts in modern history, and the then-primitive internet gave everyone a front-row seat to the devastation.

Steven logs out of the server and steeples his fingers on his desk.

Even with age and old wounds slowing him down, Ty was still a monster of a pokemon who went undefeated for years—until today. It seems almost surreal that he was bested.

'As I stated previously,' Metagross begins, interrupting Steven's thoughts. 'Due to advances in medical and communication technology, along with greater availability of education for trainers, it is a near certainty that subsequent generations will surpass their forebears.' The supercomputer of a pokemon doesn't seem impressed with either Ty or Ninetales, or at least that's how Steven sees it. Metagross' more esoteric emotions are still a mystery to the Champion even after nearly two decades together. 'Your first meeting today is scheduled to begin in two minutes, fifteen seconds.'

'Ah, right. Thank you, friend.' Steven clicks his tongue and opens his calendar, seeing the two meetings he has set for today. One is the usual, however-often meeting the Gym Leaders and Elite Four attend whenever everyone manages to find a free hour, and the one before that is one Steven scheduled on his phone before leaving Lavaridge.

Emergency Disciplinary Hearing - 3:45 P.M.

Turning on his camera and his microphone, Steven enters the meeting and schools his face into well-practiced diplomatic neutrality. Less than two minutes later, his computer beeps and Mura Moore's face appears on the screen. The old man looks entirely too content for being called into a meeting such as this. Behind the elderly Gym Leader is a darkened meeting room with no one else present.

"Mura…" Steven begins. Even after being on the throne of Hoenn's champion for several years, it still feels a little odd to the Devon heir that he ranks above decorated veterans such as the man before him. "Do you know why I scheduled this meeting?"

"Because you wanted to escape the curious mob that was dying to know what you and Lee talked about in that private sitting room?" Moore jokes with a hearty laugh. "Goodness me, your fans are going to have a heyday with that one. What do the girls call it? Yeow-y? I admit I'm rather curious myself. What was so important that that Lee boy had to talk to you in person?"

Steven doesn't humor the joke. "Don't worry about that discussion. I called you here to discuss the dangerous stunt at the end of your match with Lee Henson," the champion's eyes narrow. "Moore, as Gym Leader, it's your duty to ensure the health and safety of everyone who steps foot into your Gym. You know the strength of your own pokemon better than anyone, and you knew that the average league-trained Psychic-type would not be enough to contain the after-effects of a Hyper Beam. If the second barrier had failed, we could've had dozens of injuries and possibly even deaths on our hands. What do you have to say in your defense?"

Moore's expression doesn't shift. "I recognize that maybe I went a little overkill at the end there, but I don't think you understand, Steven; I needed to let Ty have one last clash! One more moment to relive the good old days before Dialga's wake forced him to fade into the twilight! Maybe you didn't see it, but I did! When Ty was staring down Ninetales, I saw decades lift off of his shoulders! I saw the Ty from before I let him stagnate!" Moore's voice rises until the Gym Leader stands up in an emotional crescendo. All at once, the energy seems to drain out of the Fire-type master, forcing him to sit back down heavily.

"I betrayed him, Steven…" Moore whispers, head bowed. "I let him sit and languish, afraid of the pokemon I raised from boyhood. I went to defend my ancestral home, and what did I get in return? Years of scorn for participating and the phantom sense of blood on my fingers. Ty created so many widows, widowers, and orphans all those years ago, all of them at my order. I let him get old and fall from the Elite because I feared him, my first pokemon! I needed to give him this, Steven, I needed to show him I learned to trust him again before he dies…" Moore removes his glasses and pinches the bridge of his nose with a deep, shuddering sigh. "Not once did he protest. Weeks, months, years at a time spent idle, growing older and weaker. Not once did my partner question me, so absolute was his trust."

Taking a deep breath and holding it, Steven counts to ten and exhales slowly, hating how he always feels like the bad guy in exchanges like this. "I understand there was an emotional stake in this particular match, Mura," he begins calmly. "Due diligence… still wasn't performed, though, and that is my primary concern here. If Metagross hadn't stepped in, there was a very real chance of the second barrier failing. I think you already know the implications of such an event upon yourself, but Flannery would have been caught up in the scandal as well."

Moore says nothing, but from how his shoulders slump further, the point obviously gets across. "She had no part in this. Taking over the match was entirely my decision."

"That may be, but the Lavaridge Gym is the oldest and arguably the most respected Gym in Hoenn. Flannery would have inherited a Gym with a tarnished reputation if the worst had come to pass. People don't forget things like that nowadays." Steven leans back in his chair, remaining stern. "It's still conduct not befitting of a Gym Leader either way."

Moore says nothing in his defense.

"Since no harm was done and you're already planning to retire, I won't be filing an official reprimand, and if the chairman or the board of directors asks, I will say the matter is already resolved." Steven's conscience finally forces him to relent. "...How are your pokemon doing?"

Moore raises his head and replaces his glasses, doing so with an exhausted sigh. "Rapidash has a broken fetlock on his right foreleg and severed tendons on his left. He'll be down for a week or so with another week of limping after that, but he's expected to make a full recovery. Arcanine will be back home in a few days, though he won't be smelling or tasting much for a few weeks. Ty…" Moore smiles, both content and melancholic. "The Pokemon Center gave me an official notice that his days as a battler are over."

Steven struggles not to shift in his seat. "Will he…?"

"Ty will live, of course," Moore finally laughs once more, his spirit returning. "That fight forced him to use everything he had and aggravated a lot of his old wounds. That's not to say Ty can't roughhouse with his kids or send a whelp packing, but his retirement is official now. The average Typhlosion only lives to be sixty-some, and Ty is already pushing seventy. We're a regular pair of old coots now!"

Steven finally allows himself to smile. "I'm glad to hear everything will work out."

Moore laughs once more. "You're a good kid, Steven. I can't think of anyone better to be champ!" The Fire Master composes himself and clears his throat, bumping his table with his elbow and shaking the camera a bit. "Now, onto the big meeting, right? I'll see you there." With that, Moore drops out of the call.

With a tired groan, the Champion leans further back into his comfortable leather chair, grumbling to himself. After spending a minute mustering the willpower to compose himself, he sits back up and clicks 'join' on the next meeting link after turning off his camera.

Ding!

After buffering for a moment, the computer screen fills up with the names of all of the Gym Leaders and the Elite Four.

"Well well, the champ himself is late," Sidney's icon lights up, and Steven can already imagine the man's sneer. "What took ya?"

Glancing at the corner of his screen, Steven rolls his eyes when he sees he's only a single minute late. "Sorry, Sidney. I was organizing some news that I'll be sharing." Steven's retort is as diplomatic as he can make it. "Does anyone have any important news they'd like to share before we move on to the state of the league this year?"

There are murmurs, and after a moment, Roxanne takes the lead like she usually does. "Devon Corp suffered a break-in here in Rustboro several weeks ago, as I'm sure you've all heard," The academic woman's frown can almost be heard in her voice. "I worked with the local police and Devon to try and determine who the thief was and what the possible motive might have been. A Devon representative revealed to me that the thief was after a gene sequencer intended to clone pokemon from fossils."

"Clone pokemon from fossils?" Wattson asks with an amazed whistle. "Didn't that lab in Kanto land in hot water over the ethical ramifications of cloning some years back?"

"The Cinnabar Island Laboratory in Kanto pioneered the technology and faced rather severe backlash for it, yes," Roxanne confirms. "But Devon has begun prototyping their own gene sequencer. As per the representative who shared the details with me, I must request that this information does not leave this circle."

"If this tech is so new, it must have been top-secret…" Phoebe, the Elite Four's Ghost-type Master hums. "How did the thief know?"

Roxanne pauses, likely to collect her thoughts. "After setting up a sting operation with the Rustboro Police Department, we captured another thief and interrogated him. He refused to reveal much, how he acquired the information on the gene sequencer included. After several fruitless days, all we ascertained is that he is loyal to the eco-activist group called Aqua."

"Those bozos again?" Wattson grunts. "I heard they've been sniffing around the Slateport sub docks, too, and someone busted them before they broke into a dock holding some state-of-the-art submarine."

"Their thugs have been seen around Lilycove as well, according to my darling niece," Wallace chimes in. The Water Gym Leader might sound as he usually does to everyone else, but years of being best friends have keyed Steven into the dangerous lilt in Wallace's tone. "How curious…"

"The thief refused to cooperate for a lighter sentence and was jailed with a heavy bail amount. The bail was paid… then the thief never showed up to his court date. He's assumed to remain at large," Roxanne clicks her tongue.

Steven takes that time to unmute himself. "Thank you for the update, Roxanne," he says kindly. "That actually ties into my news as well. Does anyone mind if I take the floor for a moment?" After a round of negatives, Steven clears his throat. "A source I've deemed to be reliable has tipped me off that the eco-activist groups Aqua and Magma might be a greater danger than suspected, suggesting that their current street-gang level crimes and environmental activism are fronts for something much more sinister. The source suggests that both gangs have deep pockets, friends in high places, a slew of Elite trainers and pokemon to call upon, and goals that might result in the loss of lives or even the destabilization of Hoenn." The Champion hardens his voice. "This is an unofficial notice for all Gym Leaders and Elite Four: confirmed members of Magma and Aqua are now considered persons of interest to the Hoenn region. Suspected members are to be tracked and may be detained for questioning with probable cause. An official notice in writing will be sent to you after the Hoenn League Department of Justice finishes its final drafts. I am warning you in advance as I believe that this is a matter that shouldn't wait. Depending on the results of further investigations, Magma and Aqua may be elevated in status from simple eco-activists to domestic terrorists."

Stunned silence is the answer to Steven's announcement. Really, he can't blame them. If he didn't get the news right from the Ponyta's mouth, he wouldn't really believe it either.


"That's quite a warning…" Steven murmurs, resting his chin in his steepled fingers. 'Metagross?'

From within his ball, Metagross is silent for almost five full seconds, long enough for a living supercomputer like himself to simulate a rocket launch, one so detailed it would go all the way down to the specks of dirt displaced by the engines. '...After a thorough analysis of Henson's brain waves during questioning, including a recursive analysis of the results, I have found no evidence of falsehood or deception. He believes what he is saying.'

Steven raises his eyes back to Lee Henson's face.

Blue, impassive eyes, one framed by ghastly burns, stare back. "I'm aware it might be… hard to swallow," Lee says with a nod. "And I'm sorry that I cannot reveal the source of my information for safety reasons, but I hope Metagross' verification of my word is enough."

Steven isn't really sure where to begin with this. Plans to awaken ancient pokemon? Moving landmasses and oceans? Schemes upon schemes upon schemes? It almost seems like something out of a fantasy novel. Henson seemingly couldn't stress how dangerous both groups were enough, going as far as to give detailed accounts of key members—one of which he and his dragon tamer friend are traveling with to pump for info—and their capabilities. To make things worse, Henson declined to cite where exactly he got all of this information, saying that revealing his source would put him in danger.

When Henson said that leaders of both organizations are capable of Mega Evolution, Steven felt his brain short-circuit for a moment. Absolutely no one outside of the highest tiers of upper echelon trainers and classified circles in academia should even know what Mega Evolution is. And yet, Henson looked right at the keystone pinned to Steven's breast pocket when he said it. The conclusion was inescapable:

He knows.

Did his Draconid friend tell him? No, never. The Draconids are as stubborn as the Dragons they stand beside. Not a single one would dare breathe a word of their sacred technique to an outsider. During Steven's visits to Meteor Falls in the far north of Hoenn, not one Draconid has ever agreed to part with any information related to Mega Evolution, no matter the reward offered, and so the phenomena still remains mostly a mystery.

Were Henson anyone else, Steven might have invoked his powers as Champion and declared this whole fiasco to be a national concern, letting Metagross mentally probe the other trainer without fear of legal repercussion. He had stopped himself short, though. The possibility of Henson realizing something is amiss mid-probe is just too high. Alienating the Hoenn Regional Laboratory, the Birch family, a Draconid, and angering a Ninetales on top of a cadre of other powerful pokemon is courting disaster, even for a regional champion.

So here he is, in the awkward situation of being told about national threats not from an official source, but from a trainer vetted only by Metagross…

"It's obvious that you're very well-informed, Lee…" Steven lets the statement hang, hoping Lee will provide more info of his own accord. When Steven gets no such thing, he continues. "However, my ability to act is limited by your refusal to disclose exactly where you're getting your information. If someone is threatening you to keep quiet, I would be happy to provide official League protection from any persecution or retaliation."

The unmarred side of the other trainer's face frowns. "Thank you for the consideration, but I'm afraid I still have to decline." Henson seems to consider something as he taps a finger on the meeting room table. "Champion Stone, have you ever heard of Ash Ketchum?"

"I've heard his name pop up here and there, yes. He's competing in the Ever Grande Conference this year, I believe," Steven raises an eyebrow. "Why ask?"

"Have you been following his…" Lee pauses, rolling a raised hand as he searches for a word. "More 'extravagant' adventures?"

Extravagant? "I don't know what you mean?"

Lee hums, staring hard at the champion. "That confirms a few things for me. I know the various Leagues keep files on different trainers, so look up Ash Ketchum when you get a chance. I think my warnings about Groudon and Kyogre will make more sense after that. Legendary pokemon, as in Legendary with a capital L, are more real than you think. Worse is that Magma and Aqua know that, too." Lee smiles, and it's a grim thing that forces a frown onto Steven's face. "After all, is there anything more tempting to a psycho with men and money to spare than Godly power?"


What Steven found in Ash Ketchum's files, or rather what he didn't find, spoke volumes. Even with his credentials as a Champion, the logs regarding the Kanto-born trainer were filled with black ink. A lot of black ink. Even the dates were redacted. It took a brainstorming session with Metagross doing the heavy lifting to build a rough timeline of all of the censored files, and each one lines up with strange happenings and legendary pokemon hearsay in Kanto and Johto. He sent an inquiry to Kanto's chairman for more information, and his email bounced back.

Someone is going to a lot of trouble to ensure Ash Ketchum and his friends remain unmolested in their travels, but it highlights Lee's warnings clearly.

Legendary pokemon, as in Legendary with a capital L, are more real than you think.

Is there anything more tempting to a psycho with men and money to spare than Godly power?

With little else to do and honestly feeling a bit out of his depth, the Devon heir decided to trust in the warnings as they were presented to him… and to begin his own investigation into the mystery that is Lee Henson.

"Well…" Norman Maple of Petalburg begins unsurely, drawing the Champion's focus back to the present. "Sure thing, Steven. We'll keep an eye out."

"Steven, dear," Glacia of the Elite Four begins to object, "How was this source verified?"

"By Metagross." With that, any other protests wither on the vine. Steven clears his throat. "I apologize if I unintentionally made the atmosphere awkward. Is there anything else, before we move on to lighter topics?"

After a round of negative murmurs, the Champion leads the group into the next topic. "Has anyone had any interesting challengers? We've had a record number of registrations for the Ever Grande Conference this year, so I imagine everyone's schedule is packed."

"Several," Roxanne begins, her cool voice restoring an air of normality to the meeting. "One Gavin Freed, a Fighting-type specialist, visited me. Due to the threat he presented, I met him with my personal Graveler and Nosepass. He did well, securing a sure, if narrow win, despite Nosepass paralyzing his Machoke early in the bout. My other opponent was a rather sour boy, maybe seventeen years of age, named Andre." Roxanne huffs. "I underestimated him at first, which proved to be a mistake as his Mightyena's Ice Fang incapacitated my loaner Geodude in one strike. Nosepass fared better, defeating Mightyena, but lost against his Absol. That Absol was quite adept at avoiding harm." The Rustboro Gym Leader sighs. "His pokemon were powerful and his tactics without needless fluff, but the boy could do with an attitude adjustment. The gloating before and after the battle was entirely unseemly."

Brawly groans. "That kid… Don't worry too much about Andre, Rox," Brawly says. "He was my last real challenger, too. The kid is a Dark-type specialist and has been throwing himself against me for years, finally winning narrowly a month ago. He's got a case of asshole-syndrome and some sort of victim complex that I'm hoping calms down now that he's left Dewford," the surfer grumbles. "In other news, I battled this kid, Ash. I beat him the first time, but he had his Nuzleaf pull a pretty clever trick in the rematch by attacking Hariyama's legs. With Hari slowed down, Nuzleaf took the win." He chuckles. "I'm going to battle the Gavin guy you mentioned tomorrow, but I haven't really faced anyone else of note."

"My turn then?" Wattson goes next. "I've got four this time around. Brendan Birch, Lee Henson, Tyson Rhyn, and Ash Ketchum. Hoho, Brendan really is his father's son!" The old Electric-type specialist laughs. "Baited me good! His Breloom smacked one of my poor Magneton silly with Counter, and his Marshtomp went toe-to-toe with Manectric for a fantastic finish! He was really cooking my brain there with his moves all planned out and such!" Wattson's chuckles ease. "Lee Henson… Hrm, I hope I didn't make a bad impression on him. He came into the match distracted and was right peeved when I had to pull out the old Agility-to-Baton Pass to save Jolteon and knock out his Grovyle. All the speed in the world couldn't save us from his Vulpix, though." The sound of Wattson scratching his beard can be heard through the microphone. "Sure as the sun rises, she went on the attack and everything she threw out curved and swerved like an angry Beedrill with barely any warning. Magneton and Joltie both went down, and that was that. Tyson and Ash…" Wattson hesitates. "I'm not sure what happened in those matches. Tyson was a terror and a half. I remember sending him packing three or so years ago, and by golly, he and all of his pokemon must've had their noses to the grindstone the entire time because his Donphan tore through my Jolteon and Electabuzz. We could barely do anything. It was the same story with the Ketchum boy and his Pikachu, only worse. With one attack for each, Pikachu downed both Manectric and Magneton."

A ripple of murmurs flows through the assembled Elites and Gym Leaders, and after a second, a sigh comes from Sidney. "Someone want to put it on screen sometime today, maybe?"

Reluctant keystrokes can be heard through Wattson's mic, then the videos of each fight begin to play.

Ash's battle is just as Wattson said: the boy's Pikachu throws utterly enormous thunderbolts at Wattson's pokemon, so bright they almost overwhelm the cameras. With just two attacks that rattle the windows, the battle is over, leaving a shocked silence behind.

"Arceus above…" Winona mutters.

Tyson's is almost worse. The Donphan the young man used is brutal. The instant Jolteon makes the mistake of coming too close, Donphan seizes her hind leg in his trunk with devilish speed before he breaks the limb like a dry twig. Before Jolteon can cry out, she's raised high, slammed upon the ground, and then crushed beneath Donphan's foot as Tyson calls for an Earthquake that shakes the entire building. Electabuzz is dealt with in a similar, nauseating manner.

"I battled Tyson two days ago…" Norman breaks the usual order to chime in grimly. "I used Spinda against his Hariyama and paid for it. Spinda went down in a single blow. Slaking managed a win against Hariyama after sustaining a few injuries, but…" A sound similar to grinding teeth can be heard for a moment over Norman's mic. "Slaking was treated like a toy by Tyson's Metagross."

There are several sharp inhalations when they hear another of the near-legendary Metagross is in the hands of a trainer other than the Champion, and it takes Steven a moment to realize one of them came from himself.

"We lost, and last I heard, he was headed to Rustboro and then Dewford," Norman finishes, clearly warning Roxanne and Brawly. "Other than that, I defeated a talented Grass trainer named Valorie who is set for a rematch in about a week. I'm not sure I can win a second time."

"It seems like Miss Forrest is moving quickly…" Winona says quietly. "To my shame, I underestimated Valorie Forrest and suffered a loss at her hands. Her Venusaur is quite a powerful pokemon with an impressively diverse array of techniques."

"No one too strong has crossed our paths yet…" Liza of Mossdeep speaks for herself and her twin brother, Tate.

Wallace hums under his breath. "Mister Clark White and I clashed a few weeks ago. He has quite a polished nonverbal style to conduct his pokemon with, quite literally I might add! I've never seen someone use an orchestra conductor's baton to direct pokemon as he does, and it was a delightful showing. Alas, the power of his pokemon left something to be desired, as he struggled greatly for his win against my weaker pokemon even when he left me guessing as to what he would do next." After a moment, Wallace speaks again. "Mura, you've been silent so far. Have any interesting trainers crossed swords with you recently?"

'Oh Wallace, you don't know the half of it.' Steven thinks to himself.

Moore chuckles. It's a quiet, worrying sound, and it tells Steven that the Johto noble theatrics are going to come out. "Indeed. Today, I battled Lee Henson in a three-on-three match. It was quite something."

Drake, the strongest of the elite four, finally speaks. "You mean your granddaughter battled Henson."

"No no, I know what I said," Moore's tone is all smiles. "Today, I pitted my Rapidash, Arcanine, and Ty against Lee's Grovyle, Octillery, and Ninetales. We lost."

Even with the meeting relegated to audio-only and despite it being no surprise to himself, Steven can still feel the tension ratchet up. First the revelation that a Metagross is in the hands of a challenger, and now a Ninetales?

Without needing someone to complain, Moore taps a few keys on his end. "C'mon… I know Flannery put the video somewhere… Aha!"

Moore starts the recording of the fight for everyone to watch.

The first is Lee's Grovyle against Rapidash, and already Steven can tell everyone's eyes are glued to the screen. Reviewing the match from this new perspective, Steven watches as the Grass-type dips and dives with impressive midair control, avoiding what should have been nigh undodgeable attacks. Then, when Rapidash suddenly changes the spray of his Flamethrower and sears large, ugly patches of skin right off of Grovyle, there is a gasp here and there. The brutally pragmatic disabling of Rapidash draws hisses from more than one person.

Octillery versus Arcanine is less thrilling, but no less wince-inducing. Octillery's resolve to keep battling with his entire side torn open is admirable, but the Gunk Shot directly into Arcanine's mouth and its horrifying effects flip any positive sentiment right around. After Arcanine's unexpected Facade finishes off Octillery, Arcanine is left a panting, wheezing mess, with red still weeping from his gums.

Finally, Ninetales makes her appearance.

"Challenger Lee! Please select your final pokemon!" The referee calls.

The applause goes quiet at the announcement as nervous anticipation seems to fill the entire arena. All eyes are on Lee - everyone knows who his selection is going to be.

Lee takes Ninetales' ball and enlarges it. With a deep breath, he steadies himself, draws his arm back, and throws the ball into the arena.

The ball splits open, and out comes Ninetales.

The great fox lands in a crouch, then slowly stands, unfurling each one of her tails as she does so. Once at her full height, she snaps her red eyes open and imperiously stares down Arcanine with open, burning hostility.

The fox cuts a hauntingly beautiful figure, one that glows radiant gold in the intense sunshine streaming through the windows. Even through a computer screen, the weight of her presence is undiminished.

Ninetales' eyes glow, and everyone is treated to a front-row seat as Moore's Arcanine is dismantled without being touched.

When Ty, in all of his scarred glory, is finally called upon, no one makes a sound as the pair of Fire pokemon clash, ending with a Flamethrower versus Hyper Beam struggle. The resulting explosion is one that rocks the Gym so violently that the cameraman tumbles to the ground, ending the video with a loud crack and an 'OFFLINE' error message.

"Madam Ninetales was the final send-off Ty needed…" Moore sighs contentedly. "I feel the storm brewing over Hoenn. This year's crop of trainers…" Moore laughs, loud and clear, "will be unforgettable!"

Silence consumes the meeting for the next minute as mute testament to the calculation being undertaken by every other participant.


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Topic: Official Lee Henson Megathread
Threadmark #1: Lee wins 4th badge at Lavaridge
In: Boards ► Hoenn ► Indiv Trainers ► Lee Henson

DannyDarko
Posted On July 20th 20XX:

Well I almost died but I'm pretty happy about it ngl. I nabbed a ticket to see Lee's battle live at Lavaridge and flew in on my pal Fearow to see if he lives up to the hype. I definitely got my money's worth. I got most of the battle on my phone and I'll post that alongside the rip of the TV broadcast. Summary for anyone who cant watch rn below:

So this was supposed to be Flannery vs Lee because she's been fielding all the battles in Lavaridge for like the last month and some change and filtering the casuals pretty well, but Mura Moore walks in at the last minute and yoinks the match away from his granddaughter. I asked the guy next to me what was going on and he kind of shrugged.

They start the match and Mura sends out his personal Rapidash. Like a Rapidash to fight Lee's Grovyle. I'm sitting there like "Wtf how is this fair." Then Grovyle pulled out some insane 3D moves, shot Rapidash in the shoulder with a move I've never heard of and got first blood, then somehow tanks a Flamethrower to hamstring Rapidash and win the fight. (Look I know I'm bad at describing fights just watch the videos. Grovyle's fight was good.)

Grovyle gets retired, and Octillery comes out next to fight Mura's Arcanine (This fuckin guy sent out an Arcanine in a gym match). Octillery gets blitzed by Arcanine and loses, but not before he does Arcanine dirty and hits him in the mouth with Gunk Shot. Arcanine is choking, bleeding, and throwing up, and finally things even up when Lee sends out Ninetales.

Arcanine stood no chance and gets folded like wet cardboard without being touched. L.

I can't even put the Ninetales v Typhlosion fight into words cuz running out of post space and I can't do it justice anyway. Just watch. Mura keeps going on and on about how his pokemon aren't elite-tier anymore and it shows but fuck me they ain't slouches either man cool it

Edit: Thanks for threadmark mods

#TVRip Lavaridge gym Lee Henson versus Mura Moore (Link)
#LHvMM (Link)


(Showing page 91 of 124)

KazuoKandy
Replied On July 20th 20XX:
This thread is clearing 150 pages by tomorrow. Screenshot this post.

LowKeyBadAtBattling
Replied On July 20th 20XX:
Type specialists on suicide watch. Variety team wins again. Go look at the stats and seethe at how the top 1% of trainers almost all use variety teams.

J_Augger (Verified Trainer)
Replied On July 20th 20XX:
DannyDarko The fuck you mean you almost died you're skipping over an important part.

OakNuggins (Banned)
Replied On July 20th 20XX:
[Deleted]

RunThatBack (Mod)
Replied On July 20th 20XX:
OakNuggins
3rd strike for advertising in viral threads. You're gone.

K_Markus (PKMN Ranger)
Replied On July 20th 20XX:
…Was Steven Stone in the crowd? I swear I saw Steven Stone.

#1solrock
Replied On July 20th 20XX:
Ok. I know everyone is absolutely freaking out about Ninetales, but I'd like to talk about grovyle for a moment. Go back and watch (Timecode here) where Rapidash is using flamethrower and grovyle flickers around it in midair! That's crazy! How fast is that pokemon? Can he fly?

CarbinkBoi
Replied On July 20th 20XX:77
Ok, what the hell is he feeding his pokemon, and where can I get some?

Aegi_ (Verified Trainer)
Replied On July 20th 20XX:
Maybe I should start betting on these matches? Henson for the title vibes anyone? Hoenn's heating up this conference!

WirelessGrasp (Psychic Type Specialist)
Replied On July 20th 20XX:
Where did that second shield come from? The gym Kadabra's shield broke on that last attack, and there was a little bit of a shout at the end…did someone say Metagross?!

(Showing page 92 of 127)

FeFiFoFum
Replied On July 20th 20XX:
Anyone else take a look at the crowd in the video? I thought I saw Steven Stone of all people there. Can someone who was actually there confirm that?
EDIT: WirelessGrasp if the Champion was there, then that must have been his

GreenPhoenix (Verified Trainer)
Replied On July 20th 20XX:
Why is no one talking about how Ninetales countered HYPER BEAM with flamethrower? HYPER BEAM! Sure she took some damage, but so did Ty! She is going to be a monster by time she reaches the Ever Grande tournament!
Edit: Spelling. I make that mistake every time.

F_Aulmais
Replied On July 20th 20XX:
Told y'all Henson would be giving Ketchum a run for his money. This shit is wild. Next thing you know he'll be going head-to-head with a goddamn Moltres or something.

FlamingTress (Verified Trainer)
Replied On July 20th 20XX:
WTF is the madlad doing to those pokemon?! Flamethrower matching a HYPERBEAM!?
What the hell is next?! Hyperbeams that track their targets? Baby Shinx using Hydro Pump? Grass that cuts through boulders?

TipsNTypes
Replied On July 20th 20XX:
You all are sleeping on Octillery. This must be Henson's new acquisition to his battle team. They couldn't have been together for more than a week right? And he held his own on Moore's Personal Arcanine? Octillery has massive type spread in their movesets. Can you imagine what Henson can do with a couple months of training with him? We've already seen some custom moves come out from the rest of his team. The move variety could be endless!

TipsNTypes
Replied On July 20th 20XX:
Octillery got mentioned in the last thread update, hadn't been seen before Lee passed through the Valley of Steel. I don't know of any major bodies of water there though, and Lavaridge is about as far inland as you can get in Hoenn? Maybe Lee got him at the beach and has just been keeping him in his back pocket or something.

Regardless, Octillery did surprisingly well, and displayed a breadth of move types.

TwoPlusTwoIsFish
Replied On July 20th 20XX:
J_AuggerDuring Ty and Ninetales final clash, you can see the barriers fall before being reinforced, if they did actually fall I definitely would have died as well seeing as I had a front row view. Completely worth it though. Anyway, is anyone able to get some rough stats for the energy output in that clash? I want to know how close I came to being annihilated.

Edit: the firebeam(that move has no right being called flamethrower) seems quite similar to the pillar of fire that was seen in a wild-fire clearing near Lavaridge a few days ago. Maybe they are the same? If so could that help in getting some numbers to this insanity?

PoisonedFaith (Poison Type Specialist)
Replied On July 20th 20XX:
FlamingTress Grass and leaves slicing through boulders is fairly standard for grass-types. There is a reason why Grass usually trumps Rock.
Back on topic, thank Arceus I am not competing on the Hoenn Circuit this season. Tentacruel, Weezing, Cradily and either of my three Muk (Especially Crag) are my go-tos for dealing with fire types, but that much fire would boil them alive!

Spece-Time (Pokemon Researcher)
Replied On July 20th 20XX:
ARCEUS FUCKING DAMN! Just how much energy was being output by that final Hyperbeam vs Flamethrower!? Hell, how could flamethrower somehow match it? Wait, going to use a napkin for this real quick. Anyone here study Pokemon Moves?

FlamingTress (Verified Trainer)
Replied On July 20th 20XX:
PoisonedFaith Fair enough. Maybe grass cutting boulders was me taking leave of my senses and forgetting. But seriously though, the way things are going, that lizard will probably use Surf, and whatever move that vulpix used in Dewford, all in the same match.

Whatever pokemon he captures next will never know what hit it.

(Showing page 93 of 131)

platinumGuy009
Replied On July 20th 20XX:
Not sure if anyone else has pointed this out, but, Henson's Ninetales was already setting records as a Vulpix, I wonder how she stands in comparison to other records of freshly evolved Ninetales now? We might just have a new record for their entire species on our hands.

Add on the fact that Henson seems to create radical new moves every few weeks, especially for his Ninetales, and you get a trainer whose record is starting to border on the fantastical. Furthermore, he's traveling with Birch's son and an unknown Dragon Tamer who is not challenging gyms with them, which compounds on that fantastical factor. I'm very curious about the strength of a Dragon Tamer who travels with those prodigies.

Leafeon_L0ver
Replied On July 20th 20XX:
Jeez, sending a Grovyle out against a Rapidash is one helluva move. Impressive that he was able to win despite the type disadvantage and Rapidash being so stronk. Hope he's doing ok! Plus 9T at the end? Wow, I'm partial to my grass fox, but that firefluff is DANGEROUS!

Licorice&Litleo
Replied On July 20th 20XX:
Does nobody else find it a bit sus that Henson is ON CAMERA at Moore's Gym when he gives vulpix her fire stone? Moore's even in that vid?! I'm not saying it's all fake but come on, the man must have given Henson the stone in the first place and then muscles Flannery out of her match to use his old as dirt team. He probably just told them to make it flashy to hype him up.

GyaradosUsedSplash (Water Type Specialist)
Replied On July 20th 20XX:
licorice&litleo do u have eyes? i was in the stadium and i felt the heat from that beam struggle from the back row. no way that shits fake, im betting henson all the way to the conference

JustAnotherInternetStranger
Replied On July 20th 20XX:
Yo! That battle was insane and it was only his 4th badge!? What's his 8th badge battle going to be like?

FlamingTress (Verified Trainer)
Replied On July 20th 20XX:
JustAnotherInternetStranger The gym will probably explode. In style. Wallace will be ecstatic.
Speaking of style, I wonder what that battle crow of his is up to. Anyone got an update on that?

Leafeon_L0ver
Replied On July 20th 20XX:
Licorice&Litleo No way, That team is dangerous as hell. I've heard stories from family friends who took part in the fighting back then. It wasn't pretty.… I think I remember hearing a rumour about a glass field after a battle that took place. Nothing left to even see of the enemy.

Licorice&Litleo
Replied On July 20th 20XX:
Leafeon_L0ver I'm not saying Moore wasn't a monster back in his day… but his day was a long time ago, his typhlosion is what, pushing 65 at least? I just can't help but wonder how a grovyle (not even sceptile) can take out a formerly elite rapidash without some foul play, but an octillery (the only member we don't even have stats on yet) gets one lucky shot before being downed. Arcanine didn't even try to fight back once ninetales came out.

But the real smoking gun is in that final showdown, after that firestorm typhlosion makes it tries something else and the move fizzled, smoke and sparks like some sort of skit. And then it doesn't pull out any more fire attacks for the match? Like at all? Has anyone ever seen an elite's attack just go limp like that for no reason? Smoke and mirrors, has to be.

Leafeon_L0ver
Replied On July 20th 20XX:
Licorice&LitleoI don't think thats the case at all. There is a REASON his team is in the elite tier, even as they have gotten older. I'll admit that the combustion Typhlosion tried to make was kinda sus, but I don't think that was on Typhlosion's part. He did seem super surprised when it didn't work. Plus he still had the energy for that hyperbeam at the end! (I am questioning why he went for hyberbeam rather than overheat, but that just may be a personal choice from Moore) Something was off about that battle, but I don't think it was fixed. Both were giving it their all at the end.

CrystalShowers (Scientist)
Replied On July 20th 20XX:
Did anyone else notice that only Grovyle had a held item? Ninetales did all that without a type booster!? That's insane! I'd love to examine the battle data and performance stats with and without an item of that majestic beautiful floofy fox.

(Showing page 94 of 134)

Green0Photon
Replied On July 20th 20XX:
I wish I went out to watch matches more often. That video was sick! It must have been amazing being there in person!
Then again, that final barrier shaking attack was pretty scary…

j4x3r (Ace Trainer)
Replied On July 20th 20XX:
Kids these days sure grow fast, my first circuit wasn't as intense as this one and if I tried what Henson did, my pignite (at the time) would be toasted. Keep it up! Will be waiting on the big leagues!

Glasses_Man
Replied On July 20th 20XX:
Well, I might not have confirmation for talking, but Ninetales sure delivered hard on psychic abilities. I'm honestly shocked.

WitchHatStrat
Replied On July 20th 20XX:
Glasses_Man I had to rewatch from the fan cam and the official gym video a few times to realize. Did anyone else notice that Mr. Henson spoke a total of FOUR words that entire fight!? Count em FOUR and they were "Ninetales match him" and "Ninetales". I want that! The Pokemon just needs to be able to learn psychic stuff right? How do I learn to do that with my Braixen?!

Glasses_Man
Replied On July 20th 20XX:
WitchHatStrat Yeah, they are obviously communicating: I was specifically wondering about whether they could TALK. With words. I know some people who have described it as vague ideas back and forth, and I think some people have said they could talk but it hasn't been proven: This Ninetales is probably a contender for saying if it's possible at all.

Betterwhenwetter (Water Type Specialist)
Replied On July 20th 20XX:
Holy shit, that Ninetales looks AMAZING! She and Henson are so totally in sync with each other it's just mind boggling. Makes me wonder if there's something going on behind the scenes in their relationship. Almost makes me regret becoming a water type specialist.

LoPwny99 (Verified Trainer)
Replied On July 20th 20XX:
See?! I told you all he was drugging that Grovyle! How else would a stage two grass type battle an elite level fire type for longer than 20 seconds, nevermind beat it! The fact that the League hasn't liberated the poor thing from Lee speaks volumes of the incompetence of the League. Poor lizard is drugged out of his mind. Someone save these pokemon, before someone gets hurt!

FlamingTress (Verified Trainer)
Replied On July 20th 20XX:
LoPwny99 Bruh, I sure would love to have some of whatever shit it is you're smoking. Do you think none of the pokemon centers he visited would have known if he'd been drugging up his 'mon? Birch would probably have fired his ass (or worse) if there was even an inkling of something shady going on with the guy his son is traveling with, not to mention one of the Nurses Joy would've come down on him like the wrath of Arceus.

Dude's supposed to be a researcher, researching pokemon nutrition, care and movesets. That would explain much of the bullshit he seems to be pulling outta his ass on a weekly basis. Seems to me like he's putting his money where his mouth is.


A sudden tug at the back of his mind draws Lee from scrolling through his phone. He jolts up so suddenly his head hits the wall behind him, drawing both Brendan and Zinnia out of the conversation Lee had since tuned out.

"Something wrong, Dolittle?" Zinnia asks, eyebrow raised. She leans back on Brendan's bed, folding her arms behind her head. "You look like you saw a ghost."

"I just felt Ninetales wake up is all," Lee answers, letting the relief ease the tension in his shoulders. The fox is still largely incoherent, and telepathically peering through her bleary eyes, Lee sees her glaring at the itchy cast on her fractured hind leg. A wordless complaint about the too-tight oxygen mask around her muzzle zips from her brain to Lee's. He soothes her with a silent assurance that it's for the best. "I don't think she's happy to be in the ICU."

Brendan snorts. "She's got Typhlosion right there with her, so it's not like she's going to be lonely," the boy jokes.

"Hmm…" Lee, nearly as tired as Ninetales after the match, doesn't put much effort into replying. He frowns though when he notices someone missing. "Where did Courtney go?"

"Errands," Zinnia's reply is curt, telling him that she's suspicious as well.

"Maybe someone should go give her a hand next time…" Lee grunts. "You guys don't have to stay here with me if you don't want to. I'm tuckered out, and all I have to do tonight is feed Shinx before bed."

Brendan frowns. "Maybe… but you don't have any battle-ready pokemon right now. It wouldn't feel right to just leave you here."

At Lee's raised brow, Zinnia rolls her eyes and explains. "It's a… What's the phrase? Sort of a social faux pas to disable all of a trainer's fighting pokemon. Once the nerds online figure out that Greenbean, Calamari, and Miss Fox were all your fighters, Moore might catch some heat for it. It's why you never see anything more than a four-vs-four unless it's a huge tournament with a lot of security hanging around. Kinda your fault, too, for not objecting to a three-on-three, but Moore was expected to know."

'Interesting cultural bit I didn't know about…'

"Besides, all of us being here gives me the opportunity to ask something," Zinnia continues. Sitting back up, her smile is traded for something a bit more serious. "Lee, Brendan, if it's cool with you guys, I'd like to head north to Meteor Falls and visit my tribe." Dare Lee call the way Zinnia is holding herself nervous? "I've some business to attend to, and people to talk to. You know how it is, right?"

"Why not give them a call?" Brendan tilts his head. He yelps when Zinnia reaches out and flicks his forehead.

"You think my tribe out in the sticks has a phone?" She snorts before sobering. "I know it's out of the way and all, and if it's too long, I can split off and meet you guys somewhere afterward?"

Brendan's face brightens into a grin. "Lee, aren't we way ahead of schedule?"

"We're only three months into the league year and already we're at the halfway point," Lee idly muses, wondering what Zinnia needs to do. "I don't see why not. We'll have to run it by Courtney, though."

Zinnia's smile is rather pretty when it fully reaches her eyes, Lee thinks to himself.


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Act 2: Lee's Logs 1
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"That should be everything, Professor," the smartly-dressed intern standing before Nigel Birch's desk closes his binder. "We've moved Miss Jenning's Trumbeak to aviary section five, which is the least populated. Since then, Mister Mudahar's Staraptor and his clique have calmed down."

Seated behind his desk, Professor Birch sighs. "That bird…" He mumbles, thinking of the aforementioned Staraptor and his foul attitude. "I'll have Medicham, Flygon, or someone else straighten him out. Matt," He addresses the intern before him. "Make a note on Mister Mudahar's profile. If his pokemon can't behave, then he's going to forfeit his place at our ranch and be forced to purchase private boarding. This is the second time one of his pokemon has acted out."

The young intern nods rapidly. "Yes sir," he says, then his brows furrow. "Professor? Can't you ask Lab Trainer Birch's or Lab Trainer Henson's pokemon to keep an eye on things? It seems like your pokemon are forced to play peacekeeper rather often…"

Professor Birch has to suppress a grimace at Matt's question. "I would, but Brendan and Lee are very picky with their pokemon. Neither of them has more than six yet," Nigel scratches his short beard and sighs. Oh, if only… Nigel finally got clearance from the ever-so-finicky Pokemon Rangers to camp out and observe a natural Sitrus grove near Verdanturf, and all this nonsense is cutting into his prep time! A pokemon trained by either Lee or Brendan would quickly rise to the spot of ranch Alpha and keep the peace. He can already imagine a Swampert's bellow and a ground-shaking thud putting an end to any drama.

While Nigel thought of the Mudfish Pokemon, given that most of the lab is in a tizzy over the battle that aired in Lavaridge today, he knows Matt's thoughts are probably focused on a certain golden fox.

'For a man scared to death of drama, you sure find yourself mixed up in it a lot, Lee.'

As if cued in by his thoughts, Nigel's computer bings, and glancing up at it, he sees a new Logs Update email from Lee with a number of attachments to it. .

"Anyway, thank you for sorting everything out Matt," Nigel smiles. "Please close the door behind you."

Smiling widely back, the aide bows out and shuts the office door as he goes.

After waiting for a moment, Nigel opens the email — which is devoid of any text as usual —, then clicks the first attachment and leans back. 'I'm glad my predecessor had the office soundproofed, Nigel thinks to himself. 'Lee's been throwing a lot of curveballs lately.'

"Log twenty, day ninety-three." Lee's voice begins from the first recording. In the background is the sound of distant conversation, and Lee's voice reverberates as if he's standing in a cave.

"I realize these logs are probably going to arrive a bit later than usual considering that we're currently traversing the Valley of Steel. At first, the four of us considered using the desert which would have been about two-and-a-half weeks to Lavaridge assuming no complications, but when we came to the crossroads between the desert and the valley, we decided the valley was the better option for a few reasons. One, Zinnia knows how to get through the valley in a little over a week, and two, Brendan and I want to hunt for new pokemon."

"Brendan is doing fine considering that he has three active battlers on his team, but Vulpix and Grovyle are having to do all of the heavy lifting due to Corvi's absence. I… still haven't officially released him. I want to give him more time. He's too complex a pokemon to just leave for no reason, and I get the feeling deep down that I'll see him again one day so that I can ask why."

"Anyway, onto what I was originally talking about. The Valley of Steel is home to a number of powerful pokemon, many of whom would make excellent team members based on Type and what role they would fill in the team. I'm still lacking a bulky fighter, and I hope that a trip through the valley will fix that. I've updated my 'wanted list' as well and I'll attach it to the email I send with this recording."

"During our time here, I've gone out and approached a number of wild pokemon while trying to be obvious with my intent to expand my roster. I made sure to keep a respectful distance away with either Vulpix or Grovyle at my side, along with an empty pokeball in my hand. So far, though… There've been no takers. I did briefly consider trying to capture a monstrous Magnezone that attempted to attack us, but thought better of it after the injuries he inflicted on Brendan."

Nigel sharply inhales and pauses the recording. "What?" He hisses to himself. The date on the recording is weeks ago, and he was never informed of this? Neither Lee nor Brendan ever said anything about being injured! Taking a deep breath and keeping his suddenly short temper in check, Nigel resumes the voice recording and crosses his arms.

"Brendan is fine, thankfully. He pulled quite a few muscles in his legs and back lifting himself out of Magnezone's Gravity attack to pull Zinnia to safety, and he'll be spending the remainder of the trip being carried on poke-back. From what I can tell, he'll make a full recovery. He said he'll be giving you a call about the mess once we're in Lavaridge."

The Professor exhales slowly, letting his temper ease. Brendan did indeed call home as he usually does once or twice a week to recount their adventures, but evidently, his son left out some very critical details. "What am I going to do with that boy…"

"During the whole fiasco, we did run into a familiar face. Do you recall the huge Manectric in my earlier logs? Her egg hatched, and apparently, she felt it prudent to track us down all the way in the valley to give her son to me." There's a short pause in the recording. "I'm certain Brendan will give you a call about this, so I won't bore you with details. Like his mama, Electrike is quite large, and while I would love to raise him... I've already got Shinx to care for. Taking care of two cubs, raising a battling team, traveling, and performing independent research all at once is quite a lot of work, so I've taken the liberty of giving Electrike to Brendan. I think it'll be a good test for him, as I've recently begun teaching Brendan the finer points of zoology, nutrition, and... I guess not animal psychology, but non-human psychology to aid in raising his pokemon. Naturally, he's taken to it like a Goldeen to water, and a hardy baby to raise will be the perfect opportunity to apply what he's learning in a practical way. Of course, I'll be on standby in case anything happens, but I doubt that Brendan will need anything more than a finger pointed in the right direction every now and then."

"As for my team, things are progressing as normal. Due to the volatility of the valley's pokemon, we haven't been able to get much more than basic training in, as anything more than mild noise and lights irritates the locals. I have to say, the Valley of Steel is an exceptionally hostile place, both in terrain and wildlife. Never before have I seen pokemon so aggressive and raring to battle. More than once while out hunting for a prospective new team member, we've had to bow out and cut our losses when a pokemon clearly too powerful for any of us stepped forward, spoiling for a fight."

There's another short pause in the audio. "During these nights where there is little going on, most of our time has been spent meditating on where we want our future training to take us and how to best get there. Grovyle already has a superb mastery of Leaf Blade and X-Scissor, and both moves utilize the leaves situated on his wrists. He can also channel both moves into the claws on his hands if needed, but it's not terribly practical unless his leaves have been sheared or burnt off mid-battle. He's most familiar molding Grass TE, and with a bit of creative application, can even alter the size and shape of his wrist-blades. He can't do this with X-Scissor quite yet, but he's getting there. I considered having him attempt to channel his attacks through the long leaf on his head, but discarded the idea later as Sceptile lacks that leaf, and Grovyle is so heavily reliant on kinesthetic learning that he quickly builds habits and muscle memory. I don't want him to get into the habit of using a feature of his body that he won't always have. With that in mind, our focus going forward will probably be on expanding his available repertoire with new slicing attacks like Night Slash."

"Considering the Lavaridge gym uses Fire pokemon, I'm also thinking about using a TM to round out Grovyle's arsenal. We still haven't used the Rock Tomb, Bulk Up, or Shockwave TMs given to us from our gym battles, and Grovyle would benefit greatly from a projectile like Rock Tomb to shut down Ice, Flying, and Fire Types. It'd also introduce him to Rock TE, opening further doors down the line."

"Shinx is still growing like a weed, as I've said in past updates. Not much has changed with her. In the next few weeks, I'll be weaning her off of her bottle and introducing her to solid food. Her introductory training is moving along with minimal hiccups, though we haven't been able to do much with her here in the Valley due to how sensitive the local Magnemite are to atmospheric electric charge. She is getting squirmy and frustrated with being stifled, but she's kept her acting out and mischief to a minimum."

"Vulpix's abilities are definitely beginning to plateau on the physical side. I don't know where she stands in comparison to other examples of her species, but she's been able to reliably fight middle and occasionally final evolutions looking for trouble out here. Granted, she's fighting most of these battles with a type advantage, considering many of the wild pokemon around here are Steel-type, but I've watched her stumble pokemon that must weigh a ton at minimum with her Quick Attack."

"On the non-physical side, we're beginning to hit roadblocks there as well. Vulpix' pyrokinetic abilities continue to improve at a steady rate, and although her firepower is superb, we're running into issues with her focus and stamina. These two critical factors are being outpaced by her power, and although I can help out on both fronts via telepathy, the amount of stamina and mental computing power that a human can contribute to a superpowered fox is a drop in the bucket. In our efforts to mitigate the focus issue, we've been trying to deconstruct moves that contain inbuilt 'programming.' As things stand, Vulpix must manually direct every part of an attack that is functioning outside of the normal parameters of an established move. Redirecting Embers doesn't take much, but redirecting Embers and having them chase two different targets requires a noticeable increase in focus. We've kept this to ourselves thus far, but something as intensive as charging Convergence leaves Vulpix practically paralyzed. The more complex the move becomes, the more mental resources it takes to ensure it actually fires off without a hitch. We need to figure out what's missing from these custom techniques, and how to integrate that innate programming that other moves seem to have. Or maybe we're overthinking it? Is it just repetition until it becomes muscle memory? This is what we'll be focusing on for a while."

"Also... regarding the study you mentioned? The one regarding the telepathy between Vulpix and I? Once our group gets to a good resting point in our journey, which I imagine will be after this gym, I'll be reaching out to you regarding your trusted contact. Over the last few weeks, I've been digging deep into the extant theories about telepathy and the various nuances in how a relationship develops between individuals who frequently utilize telepathy. I can't say that my search has been particularly fruitful, as telepathy is an absolutely indispensable tool in pokemon battles for the ones capable of using it, and I suspect that much of the information that exists is not being shared in order to keep a tactical advantage over other trainers. Part of me understands it, and the other is frustrated that important studies like this are being kept private. Vulpix and I have been collectively mulling over our dynamic, particularly in regards to the advice that Zinnia gave me in Slateport."

"According to Zinnia's words, both the ones she said aloud and the ones she didn't, the trainer should be the undisputed leader in the relationship between humans and pokemon. Now, I think this is colored a bit by her specialty in Dragons, as I've noticed that her team has a very definite pecking order to it, but part of me wonders how valid that is when it comes to the dynamic shared by myself and Vulpix. Vulpix herself is insistent that Zinnia doesn't know what she's talking about, and makes some valid points, though I'm worried bias might be influencing her opinions. Despite that, Vulpix has certainly stepped back and held my hand less when making critical decisions. If your contact can offer any insight, then we'll be glad to participate in this study."

"That's all for this one. Lee, out."

Nigel rubs his chin as he digests the man's words. "Huh. Guess we're moving that study back up…" He hesitates. "I don't think I've ever really considered that telepathy would be more than speaking brain-to-brain..."

He starts the next recording.

"Log twenty-one, day one-hundred-one…" Lee's voice comes through with a troubled sigh. "Please excuse any brevity, Nigel. I've got a lot on my mind."

"We arrived in the town of Lavaridge yesterday after an all-night march. The day before that, we happened across an Octillery in a watering hole that I suspected was contaminated. Octillery was displaying a number of symptoms consistent with heavy metal poisoning, and after wearing him down, I captured him and everyone agreed to shorten our remaining two day trip to Lavaridge with a hellish pace so Octillery could receive proper treatment. I'm happy to report that Octillery is in the care of the Pokemon Center and is expected to make a full recovery. Once he's lucid, I'll be extending an offer for him to join my team. Octillery isn't a pokemon on my wanted list, but I very much would like a Fire type counter on hand that isn't Vulpix."

Lee sighs once more, and in the background of the recording is the faint sound of furry paws sliding over denim.

"All day today, and I suspect for probably a while longer, my studies have taken a detour into the psychology behind evolution anxiety and research into Ninetales." Lee hesitates again. "Yesterday, I had an impromptu meeting with Mura Moore, the Gym Leader here in Lavaridge. To make a long story short, he wants a custom Fire technique for his granddaughter's pokemon in return for a grade one, purity one Fire Stone."

"I never even considered the possibility of Vulpix evolving this early, let alone with the best stone possible. I've only done some basic searching to get an idea on evolution stones, their prices, and how much the quality actually affects the resulting pokemon. Fire stones are some of the most expensive stones due to the danger associated with their mining and how they're in huge demand for Growlithe owners. A gee-one, pee-one demands... Hundreds of thousands of credits at a minimum. In fact, I think the only stones more expensive are Dawn Stones, which only form naturally during the nightless summers of the north pole, and only on the very tops of specific mountains at that."

"The benefits would obviously be undeniable as Vulpix is beginning to hit limitations that we've been struggling to overcome, but at the same time, she's anxious about the idea. She... doesn't want to outlive me. Much of what I found in my initial research about Ninetales is mostly mythological lore, as the sheer rarity of Ninetales, combined with a seemingly species-wide introversion, makes getting concrete facts a nightmare. The only common report is that the average Ninetales lives for several centuries. I don't know if the thousand-year lifespan is real or not, but I wouldn't be surprised if it is. It's not only me that Vulpix has to worry about outliving, either; she's worried about everyone else as well. I know for a fact that Vulpix has become a fixture in my life, and losing her would be like losing... everything all over again. I suspect… that might go both ways. In an effort to help her make the most informed decision possible, I'm diverting as much of my free time as I can to researching the Vulpix and Ninetales species."

"Between that, we'll be keeping to routine training and visiting Octillery as he recovers. I have no updates or breakthroughs to inform you of on that front currently."

"That's all for this one. Lee, out."

'An interesting look back into Vulpix, even if that was more Lee venting than anything.' Considering he already knows the choice Vulpix makes, Nigel continues on and clicks on the next recording before leaning back into his chair.

"Log twenty-two, day one-hundred-nine." This time, Lee sounds much more relaxed.

"Two days ago, after much debate, soul-searching, and days upon days of research, Vulpix decided to make the leap and evolve," Lee laughs quietly. "It's... it's been something. I'm not even sure where to begin. I suppose first, there's the excitement of having a pokemon evolve. I was beyond thrilled, and so proud of Grovyle when he evolved, but this feels different. I suppose that Vul- Ninetales reaching her final, mature stage has an assuring permanence to it. Of course, I took the liberty of giving her a very thorough physical and documented all of my observations. I'll include some scans of my notebook along with this recording. Who knows, maybe the stiffs at the Hoenn Academic Board will up the lab's funding in return for my findings?"

Nigel grins to himself. He can't help it. Something about his usually serious and pessimistic Lab Trainer speaking with such an upbeat tone just makes the professor want to smile. "Wishful thinking about the board, Lee..."

"Besides that, there are also the mental changes Ninetales has undergone…" Nigel hears the ruffle of shuffling paper in the recording. "Some of what was shared between myself and Ninetales is rather personal, especially her reason for evolving, so I won't be going into that in the recording here. The first and most profound change within her is the new crystal clarity in her telepathy. I think I described it before? If not, then telepathy with Vulpix always involved a level of guesswork, as sometimes the words she was trying to convey would get garbled or skewed with her non-human comprehension of certain concepts. Now I can hear her word for word! It's incredible! Her telepathic power, precision, and range have increased to such a degree that she can reportedly pick out Brendan or Zinnia from across the entire town. It's… astounding, simply astounding."

Nigel can almost hear the smile on Lee's face. "Heh. We have some work to do on the physical side of her psychic abilities. We began working on refining her other telekinetic abilities back in Slateport. Since neither Vulpix or Ninetales are true Psychic-Types, it took a bit of time to get that off the ground and it's been slow going ever since. Before her evolution, Ninetales could reliably lift about twenty pounds with telekinesis and manipulate her load with a degree of clumsy dexterity. Now? Ninetales... I don't even know just how strong her telekinesis is, but clearly we have quite a bit of work to do with regards to control, as she accidentally ripped a door right out of its frame."

A growl comes from somewhere nearby in the recording.

"Love, there's no shame in needing improvement! Knowing you, you'll get it in no time."

The growl tapers off into a huff.

"Where was I? Ah... Her physical and pyrokinetic abilities have also taken a significant jump, so significant that I hesitate to put a number to the amount. As a Vulpix, I estimated she could drag around a half-ton worth of deadweight if her paws could get enough traction, and as a Ninetales that strength has probably doubled. I'll be taking up an offer from the Lavaridge Gym to use their equipment to get exact numbers, but I'm spitballing a solid two-times increase since I can sit on her back and she barely even notices my weight. Doing so isn't very comfortable, mind you. Muscles like steel make for a rough bareback ride."

Again, there is a huff, but this one sounds much more amused.

"...Love, a phrase like that can only be misconstrued if you're looking for things to misconstrue," Lee clears his throat, sounding embarrassed. "Anyway... I don't have a number to put to the pyrokinetic side of things, so we'll be testing that later. Also, Nigel? That psychic expert you mentioned? After both Brendan and I secure gym badge number four, I'll be reaching out to you for that study on telepathy. With the new clarity between Ninetales and myself, there have been a lot of personal revelations that… are difficult to put into words. If you didn't ask me to be perfectly candid in my audio logs, I likely would have excluded this part."

"Ninetales and I had a heart-to-heart talk shortly after her evolution. Telepathy… at least our telepathy, goes much deeper than just words, images, and emotions. I say this with the utmost seriousness."

"I know Ninetales better than I know myself. Much better than I know myself. It is no exaggeration to say that I know everything there is to know about her. I know for a fact that she knows me better than she knows herself in turn."

Nigel's spine tingles.

"Yesterday we had a short conversation regarding our relationship and the dynamics therein, as her evolution, the circumstances behind her choice, and the newfound ease of communication caused a shift between us. It's difficult to explain, but something fundamentally changed. Telepathy between her and I has always been... intimate, but the bond that exists following her evolution is magnitudes deeper."

Lee is silent for a handful of seconds.

"I'm... aware that relationships like the one you're likely thinking of right now exist in a... legal gray area that the Pokemon League tactfully refuses to touch or draw attention to. Our relationship is not heading in that direction and likely never will, despite what her joke a minute ago might make you think. We both agree that there would be little to gain and potentially much to lose in doing so, but then, neither is the relationship that we share completely... Well, platonic? It is platonic, but at the same time, it's not? I don't know how to describe what we even have." There's a frustrated sigh. "It's certainly not romantic. Being keyed into each other's thoughts, emotions, and often physical sensations, is much less romantic than some trashy books might make it seem. The stories always seem to gloss over things like intrusive thoughts, involuntary reactions, and the annoying poke to the brain that occasionally wakes you up when your partner gets up in the middle of the night to use the bathroom."

"This isn't a round peg, square hole situation either. Hell, this is like replacing the peg with a tesseract in the peg and hole metaphor. There isn't a word for what we have due to how complex all the factors are, and as such all we can really do is wing it, and promise to be understanding if someone missteps." Lee once more pauses, leaving several seconds of silence in the recording. "Ninetales isn't overly concerned about this, but we discovered that we can't disconnect anymore."

"What?" Nigel's brows raise in surprise before furrowing in renewed focus.

"The telepathic connection between myself and Ninetales has been actively sustained for... geez, months now. I don't have any kind of psychic talent, so this is just me describing it as best I can. See, before her evolution, Ninetales and I kept the telepathic connection going constantly and while doing so, there was a distinct termination point between myself and her. As time went on... that termination point became blurrier and blurrier. At the time of this recording, the termination point is completely gone. Somewhere in the 'middle' is an indistinct gradient where there is no telling which side belongs to who. Now, don't misunderstand this as some kind of problem! I certainly don't want the connection to be broken, but I want to understand it and what it means for myself and Ninetales. It's for that reason that I would like to move the priority of that telepathy study up."

Nigel barely has the presence of mind to pause the recording before he slumps back in his chair. With a sigh, the professor opens up his drawer, taking out a bottle of aspirin while eyeballing the half-full glass of water on the corner of his desk. "Arceus dammit, Lee," he curses, dropping his face into his hand. "You're going to make the lab so much money at the cost of my sanity…" He raises his head again and stares at his desk phone. "I'm going to need a better psychic specialist. And someone who knows how to manage relationships like this." Ruminating for a moment longer, he presses play once more.

"I had more to say, but my train of thought is still a little fuzzy even two days after Nine's evolution. Octillery is slated to get out of the Center in the coming days, then I'll begin training with him in earnest in preparation for our Gym challenge. While Flannery isn't an insurmountable opponent, I think it would pay to properly respect her and her pokemon's capabilities."

"That's all for this one. Lee, out."

Nigel sighs, finally uncapping the little bottle of aspirin before tossing two capsules in his mouth and grabbing the glass of water on his desk to wash them down. The water is unpleasantly warm. Once both pills have hit bottom, the professor clicks on the final recording of the email.

"Log twenty-three, day one-hundred-nineteen."

"Our gym battle will be bright and early tomorrow, so today we're taking it nice and easy today so that we're rested up. With Octillery's release from the Pokemon Center, the wake of Ninetales' evolution, and Grovyle mastering a new move, I've actually got a fair bit to report in this log. I apologize if the last one was just a long string of rambling about Ninetales."

"Anyway, I know I said Octillery wasn't on my shortlist and wasn't my preferred Water-type, but he's thoroughly changed my mind. Part of me still wants a Vaporeon, but I won't be terribly upset if that doesn't happen this League year. After making a thorough recovery, Octillery has proven himself to be a very competent pokemon, if one I'm still trying to figure out how to best sync with."

"First off, I didn't realize just how wide a variety of techniques are available to Octillery as a species. At the time of this recording, Octillery knows Wrap, Headbutt, Water Gun, Octazooka, Psybeam, Gunk Shot, Rock Blast, Charge Beam, Aurora Beam, Signal Beam, Ice Beam, Bullet Seed, Focus Energy, and Lock-On. Good Lord above it seems like he has a move for every situation. Naturally, we tested all of them, and I was surprised by a lot of the findings. Due to some preconceived notions, I expected Lock-On to work much like slapping a magic lightning rod on the enemy so that attacks would home in on them. Lock-On working like a reversed Detect is not what I expected, but I can understand it. Octillery is already an adept shot so Lock-On is unfortunately less useful than I expected. Sitting still and focusing all of your brainpower on a ballistic calculation is definitely a devastating advantage when it comes to long-range combat, especially when trying to hit an evasive or flying target, but in the range of typical pokemon battles, Lock-On is unfortunately just too situational. Ice Beam, Gunk Shot, and Octazooka open the door to some real shenanigans, and to maximize the tactical applications of Octillery's techniques, I've been working with him to hammer out some subtle cues on how to apply each move. It's... amateur stuff that won't work on a more experienced opponent after the first time honestly, but voice inflection and delays between words combined with Octillery's sheer variety should hopefully win the day in most cases."

"While he is not lacking in the power department at all, Octillery's mobility leaves something to be desired. Maybe this is just a weakness on my part, as I freely admit that I'm used to having the fastest pokemon on the field. Either way, some of the maneuvers that we have been working on are defensive in nature, like using Ice Beam to erect obstacles and walls, or using a low-power, quickly cast Signal Beam to blind the other pokemon long enough for us to make a play. I'll still be exploring mobility options for Octillery, but in the meantime, we will make do with what we have."

"Personality-wise, Octillery is quite the intellectual. The first day we went out to train, he astounded me by drawing a pictogram to detail part of his internal anatomy, as I was wondering why his species were considered to have "rock-hard" heads. Using that pictogram, he made it clear that he has a pressurized subdermal sack that he fills with water so that he can use his own head as a bludgeon. The intelligence neatly explains why he was so miserable in the Pokemon Center; he was sitting there bored to tears as they weren't mentally stimulating him. I went out and got him a number of puzzles and brainteasers for him to play with in his downtime. Though... he seemed a bit indignant when I told him I didn't get the most difficult ones. Regardless, he's happy if he's got something constructive to do. He's integrated quite well with the team and enjoys the company of both Grovyle and Ninetales. Understandably, he's a little standoffish with Shinx, what with being a Water-type and all, but he's yet to be outright rude. Due to his innate intelligence, I was a little startled to realize that he can't read. I guess it makes sense now that I really think about it. Ninetales can read because I can, and she knows what I know. Corvi could read... which further confirms my theory that he had a prior trainer. I never realized that Grovyle always required Ninetales to read for him if I wasn't around, and I feel like a bit of a jackass for it. Either way, I'm rectifying that mistake by offering both Grovyle and Octillery lessons. Grovyle was... less interested than I expected, but Octillery jumped at the chance. After a few nights of tutoring, Octillery is already beginning to pick up on things."

"Ninetales... Where do I even begin here? It's clear to me that to actually get hard numbers on her current capabilities, I'm going to need to consult some League specialists with especially heavy-duty equipment. That's a can of worms that we'll open when we get there. I'd say more, but I'm afraid even naming a Fire attack around here will bring that lady ranger and her Togekiss running. It's still too early in her evolution to know if my baselines are accurate, or if any observed growth is just residual, but I'll be keeping an eye on everything anyway."

"Grovyle has been spending the last week or so perfecting Rock Tomb and Night Slash. Since Rock Tomb was learned via TM, he started off at a passable level, but 'passable' isn't good enough for Grovyle, and he's back to the grind. For all his grace and finesse, he can certainly hurl a boulder with the best of the brutes. We've also been experimenting with using Rock Tomb to alter the terrain around us into something more favorable. Since Grovyle can speed along and change direction on a dime, additional obstacles aren't really a concern for him. Another interesting application we've tried testing is using the stones generated by Rock Tomb as shields of sorts. Due to his unfamiliarity with Rock TE, the stones aren't exactly the most sturdy, so that one's on the back burner for now, but it's always a possibility for the future."

"In regards to all of his other abilities, Grovyle continues to excel and push himself to newer and greater heights... I really hope I'm not making a mistake by deciding to let him participate in the upcoming Gym match, but Grovyle needs a win he can be proud of. He's continuing to grow in response to near-daily training and his tailored diet. I believe the typical example of his species is roughly three feet tall, with Grovyle now approaching approximately three-foot-four. His muscle development continues to remain nice and even."

"In other news, I've been modifying the diets and general workout routines of my team. Ninetales' evolution and the potency increase of her psychic abilities have necessitated a drastic increase in her caloric intake. Before her evolution, Ninetales was already eating twenty-two-hundred calories in a standard day, with twenty-six to twenty-seven-hundred on days when we have intense training. Her dietary mixture has changed only a little, though going forward I'm sparing no expense in picking the best ingredients. Her brain is the focal point of her Psychic TE, and I'm taking steps to limit any sort of strain caused by her newfound abilities. Specifically, I want to be sure that Ninetales is getting enough omega-3s, magnesium, calcium, vitamins B1, B9, B12, D, E, and various neural amino acids to promote cognitive health. If Ninetales has a blood-brain barrier similar to other, more common pokemon who utilize psychic powers, then the quality, abundance, and balance of these compounds in her food are paramount... I realize that might be some biology jargon, so let me explain a little."

"Around the brain of most creatures, there is a layer of protective, semipermeable cells that separate the brain from general blood circulation. This is called the blood-brain barrier. These cells are selective in what gets to be transported into the brain, and how much of what gets to go in at once. This is to protect the brain from pathogens and toxins in the blood. I'm simplifying things a lot, otherwise, we'd be here all day. Due to the nature of these cells and the limited amount of compounds they allow to pass at a time, the quality and balance of what is actually going into the brain can make all the difference in the world. If Ninetales wants to hang with the best psychics, then she needs a proper balance of the good stuff. With that in mind, Ninetales had been upped to thirty-three hundred calories on a standard day, and I'm not discounting the possibility of her requiring four thousand or more on an especially intensive day."

"Grovyle's menu has remained largely the same with a few variations for taste. Like Ninetales, his caloric intake is increasing, but it's a slow uptick."

"Octillery needed an especially careful amount of thought put into his diet. As I said before, mammals are where I'm most comfortable, and devising a menu for a cephalopod took some thinking. A standard dish for Octillery is looking to be roughly twenty-eight hundred calories daily spread across two meals. I've selected an array of fatty fish, clams, enriched seaweed, caviar, and crustacean meat served raw with added supplements, Sitrus slivers, and seasoning to taste. This was all selected to try and emulate what his species would eat in the wild, and I think I did a fairly decent job considering he digs into his food with gusto."

"Having to make such a large amount of food each day is becoming laborious, but it's something I do happily. On that note, though, this is going to become a problem with the addition of more team members, especially team members who might be human-sized or larger. I've been looking into the possibility of getting a portable pokeblock maker to produce high-density food... but the ones I actually want, the ones that use Silph space-bending tech to cook and condense high volumes of ingredients all in one go, are so damn expensive... If the check I get from Silph for our TMs bounces, Aarons is a dead man."

"Shinx is pawing at my leg and starting to use her claws, so I better cut this short. My baby here is definitely starting to grow out of her infant phase, as I noticed that she's been more and more interested in the food the rest of the team is eating as time goes on. Her grasp on human speech is getting better and better by the day, and to my chagrin, her emergent personality is… Ugh. She's turning into a troublemaker with her best pals Electrike and Goomy. Oh, baby girl… Stay a cute kitten for a while longer, please?"

"Merow?"

"Ah...That's all for this one. Lee, out."

With the last recording over and his aspirin finally kicking in, Nigel grumbles and opens the first document on the email: Lee's notes on Ninetales.

After a brief moment to load, the professor is shown seven scanned pages filled to the brim with notes and anatomical sketches. Ninetales' weight, height, the measurements of all her limbs—tails included—and countless other details are written in small, excited lettering. Lee must have burned through half a pen of ink in his haste to put every single thought in his head on these pages. He even went as far as to sketch the fox's rough skeletal structure, noting that everything was done by hand and shouldn't be considered accurate... then he wrote down that each of Ninetales' tails has exactly sixty vertebrae and that he counted the bones in each tail by touch alone.

There is practically no one else on the face of the earth that could get away with touching every single one of a Ninetales' tails and live. The Academic Board is going to have an absolute heyday with this.

Moving on down, Nigel opens up the updated 'wanted list'.

No particular order. Wanted for battle/research/both

Vaporeon
Eevee
Sylveon?
Flygon
Audino/Chansey/Blissey
Persian
Kecleon
Kangaskhan
Ursaring
Mienshao
Latias/Latios - Wishful thinking
Ditto?
Hippowdon (Maybe)
Alolan Vulpix/Ninetales (Clear with Ninetales first)
Zorua/Zoroark
Miltank?
Chatot
Purrloin/Liepard
Braviary
Galvantula/Ariados


Some were removed, some added, which was all pretty well in line with what Nigel was expecting. But at the same time… "Really shooting for the stars there, Lee," Nigel clicks his tongue, focusing on the name 'Zoroark'. "I don't think a wild Zoroark has been publicly seen in decades. Finding a Latios would be easier."

Nigel glances over at his desk phone with a grimace. Reluctantly, he reaches over, picks up the receiver, and slowly dials a number he knows by heart, but sorely wishes he didn't. Holding the phone up to his ear, it rings once, twice then—

"Yo! If it isn't Nigel boy himself!" A chipper voice, one forced to speak loudly through the din of what is obviously a party in the background, addresses him by name. "You never call! What's the occasion? I'm here at the LaGoodra, a little place I had built just a stone's throw away from the Battle Tower! Do you want in? I can arrange for an air taxi to be in Littleroot in twenty minutes! Best Salamence-sized hangover of your life!"

"Scott, can you cut the crap for five minutes?" The professor grumbles. "I've got a study I should be preparing for, I can't goof off to hang out at a sports bar you built on a whim."

"The LaGoodra is a sophisticated establishment that happens to serve a good drink to enthusiastic clientele. It's not a sports bar," Scott scoffs.

'Right. Sure…'

"Anyway, what can I do for the esteemed Regional Pokemon Professor?" Scott asks. "You never call me for anything fun," he whines, "so what could it be?"

Nigel grunts. "You recall that study on telepathy that I was talking about a few weeks back? The one involving Lee Henson?"

"Sure do!" Nigel can definitely hear Scott's grin. "What a battle he had today, eh? We played it on the big screen in here, and I bet you could hear the cheers from the other side of the Battle Frontier!"

Ignoring Scott's attempt to strike up a longer conversation, Nigel soldiers on. "In light of some new info I've been provided, I don't think the specialists you wanted to loan me will be good enough anymore. Can I borrow Anabel?"


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Act 2: Chapter 10
Want to support me? See Fuggmann is creating Transformative fiction and other things | Patreon on the place of patrons. I do have goals on there that will hopefully allow me to cut back on work in favor of more writing. As thanks for donating, patrons get to see updates a few days early and suggest edits to the final draft before it goes live.

Big thanks to Bobbles for helping smooth this chapter out with his several editing passes.


It's frustrating sometimes, Brendan thinks to himself, the amount of politicking in the world of organized pokemon sports. Oh, he understands why, as pokemon are everything. Power, prestige, wealth? These things are ripe for the taking for any pokemon trainer willing to make pokemon training their life: their truest passion in all of Arceus' green earth. The rest of the world follows suit, as trainers simply exist above other people in society, and it's most evident with how much money and effort goes into catering to the needs of pokemon and the humans who raise them.

Shops with equipment designed for pokemon? Even in the smallest towns, they can be found on every street.

Fundraisers to sponsor trainers from less fortunate families? They almost always meet their goal.

The latest technological advancement everyone is chatting about? The first question everyone has is how can trainers use it?

The number of news outlets with a dedicated section on pokemon training? All of them.

People love strength, and to be a pokemon trainer is an open declaration that you're cultivating the greatest sort of power, one of friendship and destruction alike… But where there is power, there is politics. In the wake of Lee's match versus Mura Moore, Brendan's match against Flannery has been… well…

'I don't have anything nice to say, so I'll say nothing,' the boy thinks to himself.

Politics are afoot here too, for the only spectators of his match are Courtney, Zinnia, Lee, Moore, and a few of Moore's staff. Officially, the gym is closed for repairs. But Brendan knows the real reason why his fight with Flannery isn't being shown off.

'I'm too high-profile an opponent for Flannery.'

Brendan shakes his thoughts away and returns to the Gym match afoot. "Marshtomp, Mud Bomb! Slow, douse!"

"T-Torkoal! Deflect with Rapid Spin!" Flannery quickly counters.

Marshtomp is so much faster than Torkoal that it's almost unfair. Brendan's starter repositions just as they had planned before the fight began, leaping to the left and circling to Torkoal's flank. The Mud Fish Pokemon's mouth opens, thick, dark mud pooling inside.

Torkoal tenses his legs to spin in place, but before he can, Marshtomp's Mud Bomb screams through the air and slams into his legs, tripping the tortoise pokemon and knocking his legs out from under him. Torkoal's blazing body heat cooks the mud into a brittle ceramic in hardly a second, forcing Torkoal to waste precious moments shaking his legs free of the sharp shards of hardened earth.

A second Mud Bomb flies right into one of the holes in Torkoal's shell, hitting the coal base in his back with a hiss and the crackle of baking mud. Torkoal throws his head back with a distressed groan and shakes in pain, falling to his knees again.

Flannery's look of desperation makes Brendan's stomach twist, but he ignores it for now; he can apologize after the badge is in his hand.

Earlier in the match, Breloom secured a win against Magcargo with Brendan's preferred style of high-speed hit-n-run. Stun Spore into Mach Punch is an effective, if simple, combo. Magcargo and Flannery attempted to counter with Flame Terrain, but after watching Lee struggle against the move yesterday, Brendan brainstormed a counter.

Breloom dealt with Flame Terrain by using an unspoken Growth with a focus on the soles of his feet. Normally, Growth works by forcing the user's body to produce a bunch of fresh, healthy cells all over the body packed with TE to boost the power of energy attacks, but with a last-minute modification, Breloom could turn the soles of his feet into thick calluses, giving the Grass-type a few moments of immunity to the burning ground.

Magcargo fell after only landing a glancing Flamethrower on Breloom, and Brendan used his one substitution in the match to allow Breloom to rest, letting Marshtomp take the stage.

They played it safe for the first minute, feeling Torkoal out with a few cautious attacks while dodging the retaliation. Flannery's pokemon are powerful and have several tricks to boast; the burns littering Marshtomp are proof enough of that. Much like the elder Moore's pokemon, though, they're entirely too straightforward, with stratagems more suited to tackling multiple weaker foes than a strong opponent in single combat. A quirk of learning under a war vet, maybe?

Brendan catches Marshtomp's eyes for a split second, and the trainer sharply nods his head to the left. With a savage grin splitting his face, Marshtomp shines a bright white, then explodes towards Torkoal with a wordless Take Down.

Neither Flannery nor Torkoal react fast enough, letting Marshtomp drive his shoulder into the side of Torkoal's head with a brutal thwack!

Torkoal's head whiplashes to the side, the tortoise pokemon stumbling from the blow, one that would have thrown a car right off its tires. Bleeding profusely from the split in his skull, Torkoal shudders and lets his legs give out, falling to the ground in a heap.

"Torkoal, c'mon baby! You can do it!" Flannery calls into the arena, her hands cupped around her mouth. "Don't give up!"

Groaning, Torkoal slowly, painfully forces himself back to his feet. A second later, his head wound forces him to falter and slip, falling back down.

Flannery sighs and slumps her shoulders, signaling the referee off to the side of the arena to call the match.

The ref, a younger man in the traditional robes Moore insists on, clears his throat. "Torkoal is unable to battle! The winners of this match and the Gym Challenge are Marshtomp and Brendan Birch!"

The barriers around the arena fall as the few spectators rise to their feet and politely applaud. Despite how few people there are, Zinnia's grin, Lee's half-smile, and Courtney's tiny smile all feel wonderful to Brendan. He catches Courtney's pretty magenta eyes, and her smile deepens, making the boy's stomach grow warm and wiggle. Despite trying to play off the win coolly, he grins back and feels his face become hot.

Courtney is forgotten for a second as Marshtomp, yelling in excitement, rushes Brendan with his arms wide open. The air is driven from Brendan's lungs with an "Oof" as he gets a back-popping hug from his starter. Man oh man, Marshtomp's excitement is infectious! Brendan's grin returns as he hugs the mud-fish back. "Way to go, bud! You did amazing out there!"

Marshtomp sets Brendan down and bumps a slightly charred fist against his own chest, gurgling confidently. "Of course I did," Marshtomp practically says.

Across the field, Flannery recalls her unconscious Torkoal, sucking the pokemon back into his ball in a flash of light. She murmurs something too quiet to hear to the pokeball, then clips it to her belt where two other pokeballs hang.

Schooling his face into a polite smile, Brendan walks out to the middle of the battlefield, which still bears the marks of Ninetales' and Ty's cataclysmic duel. There, he and Marshtomp meet Flannery in the middle.

"You really are the real deal, huh?" Flannery begins, hooking her thumbs into her belt loops. She blows out an exasperated breath that makes her hanging red bangs flutter. "Gramps wasn't joking when he said the Birch family pumps out good trainers. I guess I've got a ways to go with this whole Gym Leader thing…" She sighs, but perks up and offers Brendan a closed hand with a smile. "Despite the loss, that was a fun battle! Illuminating, too. I think I now know better what I need to work on going forward."

Flannery's hand opens, and in her palm is a shiny Heat Badge.

"For your victory, I award you this Heat Badge!" Flannery smiles and offers it to Brendan, who takes the badge with a small, awed smile on his face.

Getting a new badge always feels amazing.

"Heh…" Flannery combs her fingers through her ponytatail sheepishly. "We, uh, need Ty to rest up and make us another copy of Overheat, so it might be a few days before you can get your prize TM. We'll have your prize money transferred over before long, though!"

"It's no prob." Brendan waves Flannery off and deposits his new badge in his pocket to be later added to his badge case. He grins up at the heir of the Lavaridge Gym. "We were looking to take a vacation here in Lavaridge anyway. Just gimme a ring and I'll swing by!"

Flannery smiles back. "Will do. If you're looking to vacation a bit, try out the Quilavaridge Onsen on the north end of town. They've got some of the best natural hot springs around. Book the 'special' and tell them I sent you. They cater to trainers and pokemon, so take everyone along," she says.

Brendan grins. "Will do!"

After a good-natured handshake with Flannery, the victorious trainer turns and heads back to the front of the Gym through the arena doors with Marshtomp in tow, finding that Lee, Zinnia, and Courtney are already in the lobby waiting for him.

"Not a bad match at all, kiddo." Zinnia grins and pulls Brendan into a rough, one-armed hug that feels more like a headlock. Before Brendan can complain, Zinnia releases him and plants her hands on her hips. "You guys killed it out there."

"Indeed you did," Lee agrees with Zinnia. "You aced both rounds. Well done. You'll have to tell me how Breloom got around Flame Terrain, though. I didn't see what you did."

"Growth, just localized around Breloom's feet," Brendan reveals. "Not how it was intended to be used, but after some last-minute tweaking, we managed to get a padding of dead skin he didn't have to worry about burning."

Lee blinks. "That's smart."

Brendan glances over to Marshtomp, who looks back knowingly. "I would have liked to have a showdown more like yours, though."

Lee's smile grows brittle. "You say that, but Moore is not a pushover—"

'That's exactly why I would have liked to battle him.'

"—and all of my pokemon sans Shinx are still laid up in the Pokemon Center with some of the worst injuries they've sustained yet." Lee sighs and crosses his arms. "Ninetales was not a happy camper after finding out she's going to be in the Center for another few days, and on light duty for a few more afterward."

Idly, Brendan wonders if Lee and Ninetales are talking to each other right now with telepathy. Ninetales was pretty opinionated and finicky as a Vulpix, and evolving only made her more so. Does she complain to Lee nonstop? If so, then Brendan's friend-slash-mentor is even more patient than he thought.

It does seem strange to see Lee without Ninetales, though…

As a Vulpix, she would always ride on his right shoulder, and as a Ninetales, she always walks on his right when she can. Lee, as absentminded as he is sometimes, might not have noticed, but the symbolism is not lost on Brendan.

Coming back to the present, Brendan crosses his own arms. "I think we could have managed against Mister Moore."

"I dunno, kiddo. That heroic confidence will take you far, but Mura Moore and his pokemon are a whole other gaggle of beasts." Zinnia's doubt stings. The dragon tamer looks through the still-open arena doors at the pock-marked arena inside. "You'd outbrain him maybe, but sometimes raw guff wins the day."

Courtney, surprisingly, speaks up. "I think you'd win, Brendan," she says quietly, drawing all eyes to her. If the attention spooks her, she hides it perfectly. "Gym Leader Moore… is a product of his time. He wins with power, you win with skill. Skill, when properly leveraged… wins nearly every time." She smiles, and despite how small a quirk of the lips it is, it's fantastically pretty.

Brendan can't help but turn pink under the unexpected vote of confidence. "T-Thank you, Courtney," he says with a shy smile.

Lee and Zinnia share a short, severe look that seems to convey a whole conversation. It's so brief that Brendan almost misses it.

Brendan takes a moment to clear his throat. "Since we're going to be here for a few more days—" He pauses to cross his arms behind his head and stretch, feeling his tense body loosen now that the adrenaline of a good battle has passed. "Why don't we take a real break before we hit the road? Fallarbor is easily two weeks away or more, and Flannery told me about this place called Quilavaridge on the north side of town."

"I was looking at that same place the other day," Zinnia chimes in with a smile and a nod. "A restaurant, onsen, and spa all in one." Her smile becomes sly, and she bumps shoulders with Courtney. "I bet they can be convinced to let our pair of celebs and their pretty friends in for cheap, don't you think?"

Courtney shakes her head, making her hair bounce under her hood. "That seems shameless…"

"Thrifty, you mean," Zinnia counters. She turns to Lee and clasps her hands together. "Dolittle, you won't leave your best gal pal hanging, will you?" she asks with a cringe-inducing simper and big, Rockruff eyes.

Lee smirks. "Never, but I think Ninetales will get the guest of honor treatment just for showing up."

Zinnia's expression twists like an arrow just struck her in the heart. A tanned hand flies over her chest and dramatically claws at the fabric of her shirt. "I see how it is…" she grumbles, but her lips twitch in a barely suppressed laugh. "Well, let's make tracks, people. We've got a booking to make and Brendan's pokemon are due for a Center visit." Zinnia turns and strides toward the doors.

Lee and Courtney turn to follow, leaving Brendan and Marshtomp to bring up the rear.

As they walk, Brendan locks his gaze onto Lee's back.

Pokemon training is a game of power and politics, and that realization hit Brendan at an early age. Growing up, people never talked about his father's discoveries as a professor and academic. No, for years they only ever wanted to gripe about how he could have been Champion, or how he could have been a part of the Battle Frontier, and how much of a disappointment he was when he declined both titles. Some regions might treat the title of Regional Professor differently, but in Hoenn? It's a place for figureheads.

Nigel Birch, a figurehead.

The old newspapers in the Littleroot library had told a younger Brendan everything he needed to know about how the world reacted to his father taking the regional circuit by storm, only to quit and vanish to be with his wife and newborn son. Even now, the Pokemon League barely gives his father the time of day for the 'betrayal,' and only now, years later, is his reputation recovering.

As if watching history repeat itself, Brendan can see the same thing happening to Lee.

Lee's been kind to Brendan, even during the times he's treated more like a child than a peer. There's no maliciousness, just genuine concern. Lee even gives away his methodology and secrets behind his raising of pokemon, taking the time to answer every question and teach Brendan anything he asks for, even at his own expense.

Lee… He's too gentle, too kind to want the office of Champion. Brendan knows the only reason the man is even tackling the gym circuit is because he's too polite, too… meek to protest being railroaded into it. Brendan can't help but wonder to himself if Lee's unwillingness to protest has to do with his past—the one Brendan knows so little about.

Regardless, the man lives and breathes everything pokemon, never pausing or resting in his pursuit to know and understand. If he's not giving a physical examination, measuring every facet of his pokemon, counting calories, providing physical therapy for injuries, or something else a casual or even intermediate trainer wouldn't think to do, he has his nose in a book researching something or other. Lee Henson barely has a life outside of pokemon. With his tireless methods, his pokemon are growing into monsters that will draw the eye of every dedicated battler around.

Heck, that's already happening. People online are going nuts over Lee and his pokemon, and the initial ripples are going to double back in waves soon. Were he a bit younger, Brendan might have felt upset or even jealous about playing second fiddle to his friend. Instead, he finds himself fine with it, considering his goals now.

When they first set out from Littleroot all those months ago, Brendan wasn't really sure what he wanted out of his journey. Dad said not to worry and just have fun, as a goal would come to him eventually. Traveling Hoenn, seeing new and wonderful things, meeting strange people and stranger pokemon, all of it is an inspiration of the finest sort…

…but here on the battlefield, where his adrenaline rushes and his heart thunders in his ears, here in the ring of honor where mind, body, and bonds are truly tested. This is the place Brendan found his own dream.

He will win the Ever Grande Conference, topple the Elite Four, and dethrone Steven Stone, declaring to the world that he is his father's son, here to finish what was started twelve years ago.

That's not all, though. His mission is twofold.

Before Brendan can be the Champion, he has to defeat Lee and his pokemon at the summit of the Ever Grande Conference, freeing them from the expectations of the masses. If Lee is defeated at his best, then the shackles of promises unspoken can't close around his wrists.

Brendan's eyes travel over to Zinnia. He's suddenly stricken by how little he knows of her as well. He knows Zinnia likes Dragons, is from a reclusive tribe up north, is an old movie buff, and many other surface-level things… But who is Zinnia Draconid, really? Who is the woman who broods and rolls an empty pokeball in her hand when she thinks no one is looking?

Well, maybe it doesn't matter. Like Lee, she's Brendan's friend, and he'll make sure he and his pokemon are strong enough for her, too.

Brendan looks over to Marshtomp, his best friend and partner in this journey across Hoenn. Like the brother he never had, Marshtomp is simply so in-tune with Brendan that, when they lock eyes, the boy knows they're thinking the same thing.

Dad never said it aloud, but his actions after abandoning the Ever Grande Conference are clear as day:

Friends and family are everything.

The young Birch's gaze once more finds its way to Lee.

And because of that, I will defeat you.


"Alright baby girl, hit it!"

Shinx puffs her cheeks out in concentration, her fur sparking yellow, especially around the multimeter probes touching her ears. Lee glances down at the multimeter sitting in his lap as the meter's insulated probes quickly grow warm in his hands. "Goodness. Forty thousand volts at fifteen milliamps…" He whistles. "Okay, Shinx. That's enough."

Shinx cuts off her electrical current as Lee takes the probes away, setting them down next to him in the grass before taking a moment to wipe the sweat off his brow.

"Merow?" The kitten looks up at Lee with big, sparkling eyes.

"Wonderful work, baby girl," Lee smiles and reaches a hand out, rubbing her under the chin and earning him a heart-warming purr. "You're getting so strong all of a sudden. I don't know why Brendan and Zinnia are worried about me when I have you around."

Shinx beams under the praise. Quite literally, in fact. Her luminescent yellow eyes shine with a captivating gold light that's visible even in the bright sunlight. She presses her head into Lee's hand, purring all the while.

'Forty thousand volts at fifteen milliamps. That's enough to put a burly man on his ass, or even kill someone with a weak heart.' Lee breathes out an amazed sigh. 'In just a few weeks, her electrical powers have gone from unpleasant static zap to totally incapacitating… for a human, at least.'

A week after Brendan's gym battle finds Lee and company in one of Lavaridge's parks. Other people are out and about, with kids and pokemon playing in the field while parents chatter by the picnic tables off to the side. A few other trainers are going about some light training of their own, and thankfully no one wants to bug him or Shinx.

Brendan and Marshtomp are out near the center of the field, quickly endearing themselves to the local children with Marshtomp's Water Gun playing the role of a sprinkler on this hot day. Breloom is using the distraction to leisurely dig through Brendan's bag, munching on anything that looks edible. Electrike, meanwhile, is off to the side playing with a few other younger pokemon under Mawile's watchful eye. The younger pokemon are simply awed by how large the electric pup is.

Courtney is further away, engaged in a battle with a teenage trainer. It's clear Courtney's foe didn't expect the reclusive-looking woman to be a challenge, but the young trainer's Croagunk is sweating and barely keeping out of the way of Courtney's Mightyena. Even if Courtney is being mercifully lenient, the match's outcome is already a foregone conclusion.

Zinnia is absent, waiting impatiently at the Pokemon Center for her Tyrunt, which is due to be delivered today. Upon acquiring Tyrunt, Zinnia will take the "rarest pokemon in the group" title from Lee and Ninetales.

Grovyle and Octillery were released into Lee's care just two days ago, both with light-duty advisories. Grovyle, ever dutiful, decided to rest in his ball, staying on standby with Lee when not otherwise needed. He's recovering quickly, though his appearance remains rather lop-sided with his burned wrist-leaves still regrowing.

Lee had once more offered to teach the gecko how to read alongside Octillery, but he hesitated, and then declined, much to Lee's befuddlement.

Octillery, who is driven up the wall when sitting idle, was left back at the hotel. Having tired of doing all his research and projects on his phone, Lee had splurged a little and bought a laptop for himself, which was left with Octillery today. In mere days, the octopus had grasped the basics of reading and writing enough that he began to crave something more stimulating. After a night of learning the basics of using a computer and memorizing Lee's credentials for the Rustboro Trainer School's online learning website, Octillery could safely be left to his own devices.

Poor Ninetales is set to be released today, then left on light duty for an entire week, much to her chagrin. Even if they're never truly apart, Lee had stopped in to visit her every single day. In the back of his mind, Lee can feel the great fox lightly dozing on her hospital bed.

That has left Shinx receiving nearly all of Lee's attention for a solid week, and seeing as he had nothing else to do and he couldn't put off Shinx growing up forever, they finally began some light training for the little Electric-type. To Lee's silent lamentations, her training has confirmed his worst fears.

In just a month and a half, she's left the clumsy kitten stage and is taking her first steps into the overly-curious juvenile stage. It's a part of a feline's life that Aasir back at the zoo made damn sure Lee was familiar with.

Looking down at Shinx, Lee lets his hand wander from her chin up to her cheek and short muzzle. With his thumb, he strokes one of the tufts of fur on the side of her face.

She'll be the third cub he's raised by hand.

Something in Lee's chest clenches painfully. They're gone. They're gone and they're not coming back.

"M-Merow?"

Lee sucks in a sharp breath and blinks, wondering when he spaced out. Looking back down, he sees Shinx looking back up at him with worry in her big, gold eyes. With an inward sigh, Lee goes to curse at himself only to stop himself short. 'Remember what Mable said. Don't put yourself down over things you can't control, and talk with someone if you need to…' Lee composes himself and smiles back down at Shinx. "Ah, I forgot how in-tune with emotions young pokemon are. Don't mind me, Shinx. I was just thinking about some things, is all."

Shinx says nothing in reply, but she does crawl into Lee's lap and looks up at him, blinking once.

Lee snorts ruefully. "Don't worry yourself over it, baby girl. I won't mope around you anymore."

The kitten flicks her tail once, still staring up at him as if waiting for him to explain.

'Ah, to hell with it. You'll feel better by saying something, and Shinx is so young she won't remember this.'

"...You weren't my first baby, you know?" Lee strokes Shinx across her back with two fingers, talking more at her than to her. "You're the third. You would have been the fourth if… things had worked out for the best." The zoologist takes a deep breath in and out. "Zefu and Suburi were like you, these little cubs I helped raise. I loved them like nothing else, but they aren't… around anymore, making you my last."

Lee looks down at Shinx again, who is still staring at him with her wide, innocent eyes. "You look just like them, and for a while, I wondered if I made the right choice by taking you, baby girl. Was I trying to fill the hole they left behind? I don't know, but I do know I was worrying myself sick wondering if I would do a good job raising you, wondering if you'd get big and strong." Lee smiles and scratches Shinx near the base of her tail, making her arch her back and shut her eyes with a contented purr. "Well, here you are, doing fine. That's probably more you than me, but I'm thankful regardless." He scratches a little harder. "I love you, baby girl."

Shinx's purr grows, and she nuzzles her head into Lee's stomach.

'You should give yourself more credit, Beloved,' Ninetales' groggy 'voice' echoes through his head. 'Shinx went from a premature waif fated to be as fragile as spun glass to just a few pounds underweight in the span of fifty days. In another fifty, no one will be able to tell she's ever been anything but a model of picture-perfect health.'

'Perhaps, but I credit her for tolerating all my meddling and therapy,' Lee sends back. 'I'm sorry if I woke you up.'

'If you want to apologize for doing so, you can come and check me out of the Pokemon Center,' Ninetales says dryly. 'I've been ready to leave since day one.'

Lee closes his eyes and taps a little deeper into Ninetales, gauging how she's feeling.

Her broken hindleg is free of its cast. Her ribs, although tender, don't hurt. Her blown-out eardrum is as good as new, and her hearing on both sides is back to 100%. Her burns are healed, though her regrowing fur is thin in some places. Most importantly, the bone-deep weariness is gone, replaced with a pent-up energy yearning to be free of the Pokemon Center.

'We're on our way.' Lee nods and looks down at Shinx. "C'mon, girl. Let's go pick up Ninetales."

Shinx's eyes light up at Ninetales' name, and with a little wiggle, she hops up and drapes herself across Lee's shoulders like she'd seen Vulpix do a thousand times.

After packing up the multimeter, his new and marginally filled notebook, and a charred, cut-up poke-doll that Shinx was honing her Thundershock and Scratch attacks on, Lee shoulders his bag and stands. Rather than yell over the dull roar of the park, Lee quickly sends Brendan and Courtney a text message each saying he's heading to the Center and starts off.

During the walk to the Center, Lee hesitantly unlocks his phone and opens his emails.

24 New Emails.

Lee clicks his tongue. Weeks after Ninetales' evolution and eight days after their dramatic win at the Gym, Lee is still getting barraged by emails. Some are obvious spam, some seem like real offers for various sponsorships that become one-sided when scrutinized, and some are just nonsense. Easily 90% of what he was sent was either ignored or politely declined, with a decent chunk of that remaining 10% being sent off to Monty for a better response than Lee could come up with.

Monty, the Hoenn Pokemon Lab's PR manager, is an older gentleman that Nigel has been friends with for years. He was a nice enough guy during the call that the professor had arranged so they could meet each other, and has so far proven himself to be exceptionally competent at turning away pointed questions.

Lee had forwarded the man an email from a gossip rag that wanted to interview him, one heavily implying Lee was using stimulants of dubious legality on his pokemon. Monty shut down the entire conversation in a heartbeat, giving them a sterile, diplomatic denial with no room for misinterpretation. He ended with the implication that the League itself might be displeased with the accusation leveled at Lee.

No article was ever published by the newsgroup.

In light of some of the other emails he's getting, ones with business offers, Lee bit the bullet several days back and contacted a Rustboro-based lawyer to keep on retainer. Finding a lawyer had been a surprising pain, as many declined without even speaking to him. It took a while before he realized why.

To a lawyer, a client with a vengeful, mind-reading pokemon is a nightmare come to life.

Amanda Keller, a young woman only a year older than Lee, finally took up the job for a modest (or at least modest for a lawyer) monthly retainer. The law firm she works for in Rustboro has a good reputation, and although Amanda herself has only been on the job for a year and some change, she's won nearly all of her legal battles and was willing to take on a high-risk client like Lee. Keeping her on retainer is risky with his sometimes unstable income, Lee thinks, but not having a lawyer on speed dial doesn't seem like an option anymore.

'Being a trainer is expensive….'

Lee opens his emails and begins scrolling. 'Let's sort them now and be done with it for today.'

Spam, spam, invite to a spammy-looking BattleNet group that he declines, a new post in Fox Friday, spam, new posts in his BattleNet mega-thread… Really just a whole lot of nothing.

There are a few that seem interesting. One is from a company called Junesoft Entertainment, which wants to license his and his pokemon's names and images for what looks like a mobile gacha game in return for a decent monthly sum. Another from a company called HoD Group is asking for more or less the same thing, just for their brand of trading cards and figurines. More money can never hurt, so Lee forwards both to his lawyer to scan for any red flags.

'Gah. Six months ago, my biggest concern was what I was having for dinner. Now it's navigating business deals and keeping an eye out for eco-terrorists.' Lee grunts. 'When did life get so complicated?'

'Such is the burden of the extraordinary,' Ninetales chimes in, a mental giggle punctuating her words. 'If they make video game characters of us, insist on you and I being the highest rarity there is. I won't settle for less.' After a moment, Ninetales continues. 'Lee, Magma may be making a move soon. We'll be investigating Mount Chimney in accordance with 'canon', correct?'

Lee hesitates, turning his body so a Rhydon carrying a child on his shoulders can slip by on the sidewalk. 'We can look. If we don't find anything, then Ash and his friends probably will when they stop by Lavaridge, and it'll be taken care of then.'

Ninetales' reply is the curious sensation of a telepathic nod.

With the Pokemon Center in sight, Lee dismisses the rest of his junk mail and glances at BattleNet, finding little of importance. Fox Friday is once more hosting a little event, asking posters to share a little-known fox fact. 'This probably isn't well known.'

Today at 12:50 PM
L_Henson: Ninetales (Sample size of 1. Counted by touch. Unknown margin of error) have sixty (60) vertebrae per tail, checked and double-checked, for a total of five hundred and forty (540) when all the tails are added up.


Multiple people are typing…

Lee locks his phone and slips it into his pocket as he steps inside the Pokemon Center. With no line at the front desk, he's free to walk up to Nurse Joy—who is busy typing away at her computer from her place seated behind the desk. "Good afternoon, Nurse Joy. I'm here to check a patient out."

The nurse looks up, a smile on her face. "Good afternoon, Mister Henson. I'll have someone bring Miss Ninetales out. In the meantime…" She hits a button on her keyboard, and the printer under her desk spits out several forms. Taking the forms, a pen from an assortment within a mug on her desk, and a little bacon-looking treat from a jar by the mug, Joy hands the papers and pen to Lee. "Here is Miss Ninetales' release forms and her continued recovery plan," she says, offering the treat to a delighted Shinx, who gobbles it up and leaves crumbs on Lee's sleeve.

By the time Lee has signed everything and handed the papers back to Joy, a young nurse in scrubs has emerged from the doors leading deeper into the Center with a pokeball in her hands. Walking up to Lee, she presents the ball with a smile.

"Thank you." Lee smiles and takes the proffered ball.

"Take care, Mister Henson!" Nurse Joy says goodbye with a wave.

Looking around the Pokemon Center, Lee quickly finds Zinnia sitting on a couch in the corner impatiently bouncing one of her legs. The Dragon Tamer glances at the clock on the wall and sighs.

Upon making his way over, Lee sits down next to Zinnia, surprising her into looking at him. "No Tyrunt?" he asks.

"Not yet," Zinnia scowls. "I was told 'noon', and guess what happened?" she asks snarkily, pointing at the clock. "Still nothing."

Lee looks up at the clock as well. The hands tell him it's just now one o'clock in the afternoon. "Hmm. What region is your contact in?"

"Orre…"

"Orre's timezone is three hours behind Hoenn."

Zinnia groans. "Cool…" She crosses her arms and grumbles. "So I'm here way early…" She reins in her annoyance and looks at the pokeball in Lee's hand. "How is Miss Fox?"

In response, Lee just hits the button of Ninetales' ball.

With a flash of light, Ninetales materializes, sitting regally with her tails fanned out behind her before Lee, Shinx, and Zinnia… though the effect is ruined by the places where her burned-away fur is thin and in the process of regrowing.

Ninetales looks down at the spots where Lee's eyes linger, a frown on her muzzle.

'I'll trim your coat a bit soon, Love. It'll cover the worst of it,' he silently promises. 'You're still the most beautiful pokemon around regardless.'

Ninetales' frown eases. It vanishes when Shinx leaps down from Lee's shoulders to rub herself against Ninetales' front legs lovingly.

Zinnia nods slowly, looking up and down Ninetales' form. "Well, it could've been worse. Do you think you've recovered enough to put a Dragon throwing a tantrum in his place?"

The golden fox raises an eyebrow, and Lee turns to Zinnia asking Ninetales' unspoken question. "Can we get some elaboration on that?"

"I'll be all too happy to fix your ignorance on the topic," Zinnia jabs with a smirk. "Do you know how dragons, capital 'D' Dragons, run their relationships?"

"I… can't say I do," Lee admits with a blink.

Dragons, like Fairies, aren't very well-documented. Dragon Tamers keep their secrets close to their chests to make their powerful pokemon that much harder to counter. There is more myth than fact out there.

"Dragons crave social structure, and that structure is based on a strength-driven hierarchy," Zinnia begins, tapping Shelgon's ball. "They want a pack, sometimes called a Flight — or a Thunder depending on who you ask — and a role in that Flight. Naturally, the alpha spot is the one they all want since it comes with prestige and guaranteed mating rights. A Dragon coming into a new Flight must challenge the strongest pokemon for their spot. Normally, a Dragon will fall in line after taking a harsh enough loss, but a sore loser might just try to assume control of a neighboring group as a vassal of sorts, so… Jeez, Dolittle…" Zinnia snorts and tries to hide a smirk as she peers down at Lee's hands. "You're such a nerd."

"Hmm?" Lee looks down at his notebook, unsure when he pulled it out, but Zinnia's explanation is already written word for word there. He crosses out the unconsciously written 'Jeez, Dolittle, you're such a nerd'. "Well, I'm not going to apologize. This is fascinating stuff! Please, keep going."

"Right, right." Zinnia composes herself. "Anyway, vassal groups. A sore loser Dragon who can't secure the alpha or beta spots in a Flight might take over a weaker Flight and use them as a vassal to their main Flight. A greedy alpha might even send Dragons under them to go do this on purpose. Some Dragons have made some impressive kingdoms in the past, spanning dozens of Flights and hundreds of individuals beholden to a central Emperor Flight in a big social web."

'Wouldn't that kingdom inevitably fall due to infighting?' Ninetales asks skeptically. She flicks her heart-marked ear. 'If the primary way to move up socially is with violence, it just incentivizes the hidden consolidation of personal power and a culture of backstabbing.'

When Lee repeats Ninetales' question, Zinnia shakes her head. "Not really. Most Dragons are just born with a concept of honor, understanding that before any other emotion, so they don't do backstabbing. A challenge from a Dragon is unmistakable. Besides, Dragons grow fastest when put under pressure, and the pressure of keeping your underlings in line and your crown safe is immense."

'That paints a frightful picture…' Lee can already imagine how Dragon-types have snowballed their way into being considered the most powerful type. If the strongest Dragons get stronger just by being strong, and they're almost certain to find a mate, it turns into an infinite feedback loop.

"The reason why I ask is because Tyrunts are fighty little things," Zinnia continues. "When Shelgon puts my little dino in his place, he's not going to take that sitting down and is going to pester Ninetales and Marshtomp. When he does, make it clear he's not going to get a foothold, okay?"

"We can do that," Lee agrees, closing his notebook. "That's some really interesting stuff, Zinnia. I'd like to hear more if you get time."

Zinnia raises an eyebrow. "Huh. I thought a mammal-focused trainer like you wouldn't be… Ah, what am I saying, of course you'd find Dragons cool." She shakes her head with a small smile.

"You call me a nerd and then think I wouldn't be interested in pokemon social structures?" Lee scoffs. "That'd be like a Dragon tamer not being interested in raising an ancient reptile back from the dead."

"Okay, okay, get off my back," Zinnia grumbles. Her red eyes scan around, then she levels Lee with a serious look. "Lee, I was tipped off that Magma might be operating in the area," she says, her voice quiet. "I…I'm not going to ask that you look with me, but I wanted to inform you that I'll be scouting Lavaridge and Mount Chimney for them. I have no idea why they're here, but…"

Lee and Ninetales share a look, time seemingly slowing as they converse. 'What I want to know-' begins Ninetales, '-is why Zinnia is so interested in Magma. She's never stated a reason. She's apparently been using clandestine, perhaps even illegal, sources for information and supplies. I don't see how it could be related to her stated goal of being the Draconid Lorekeeper.' Ninetales' suspicion is as plain as it is distrusting.

'Neither do I,' Lee agrees. 'There must be some reason, though. Zinnia is a hothead, but when she sits and thinks things through, she can be surprisingly shrewd. I doubt this obsession with Magma is something baseless. I mean, we know for a fact they're trying to unbalance the entire world! I think that counts towards the goal of keeping her tribe safe.'

'Yes, we know what Magma's aims are because of meta-knowledge. Zinnia already implied that she knows what they're up to, but if she knows, why wage a single-woman crusade when she has a tribe of Dragon Tamers as backup? Why not tip off League officials as you did? Something isn't adding up,' Ninetales insists. When Lee has no answer, Ninetales relents ever so slightly. 'Before we commit to anything, I have to insist we ask why she's pursuing them so dogmatically.'

The conversation passes in a tenth of a second, and Lee returns his attention to the woman next to him. "Zinnia… What's with this thing you have for Magma and Aqua? I get that they're eco-terrorists and up to no good, but why are you so personally invested in this?" Lee crosses his arms. "I appreciate the warning, and I'm not going to let you wander into danger alone, but I'd like to know why you're doing this."

Zinnia hesitates, looking away and biting her lip. "Lee… it's complicated. I don't want to say, because I don't want you to get caught up in this."

"It's a little late for that now," Lee shoots back. "We're already going to sniff around for Magma and we've got one of their admins under surveillance."

"Caught up in the deeper parts, I mean," Zinnia snaps back. She takes a deep breath and calms herself, looking around to make sure no one is looking their way. "There is a lot at play beyond Magma and Aqua. I really do not want to explain, because if I do, I know you'll get tangled up in this mess even worse, and…" She gives Lee a tired look. "I don't want to push more onto your plate, Lee. You've got your own things to worry about, and I've got mine, okay? Some things are better left unsaid."

"Deeper parts, deeper than what crackpot eco-terrorists are up to, hmm?" Lee frowns. "You're not doing anything to alleviate my concern, here."

Zinnia leans back into the couch, her face falling into something… lost? Afraid? She takes a pokeball from her belt and rolls it in her fingers. After a minute of silence, she speaks up, quiet and unsure. "You and Brendan are the first friends I've had outside of my pokemon since Aster died…" Zinnia says, voice little higher than a whisper. "I don't like keeping you in the dark, but I have to for your own good. I know your type, Lee. If I explain, you'll invite yourself along even if you don't want to. Even if you know it could kill you."

Lee's skin breaks out into goosebumps as Ninetales' hackles rise. At Ninetales' feet, Shinx stares up at Zinnia.

Zinnia stares down at the pokeball in her hand and presses the button. The ball pops open, and no pokemon comes out. She closes it again with a sigh. "If you really want to know…" Zinnia's eyes lock Lee in place. "…then think about it until we get to the Draconid stronghold outside of Fallarbor, okay?" She puts the empty ball away. "I need to work up the nerve to talk, and you need the time to consider it. If you still want to know…" Zinnia clenches her fists on her knees. "Then I'll tell you. I promise."

Silently, Lee nods. "My answer won't change, but take however much time you need."

Zinnia gives him a tired smile, then rises from her seat with a dramatic flourish of her cloak. She stretches her arms over her head. "Alrighty! Enough doom and gloom! I saw a Johto sashimi place down the road, and if my pokemon isn't going to be here for another two hours, then lunch is in order!" She grins. "For upsetting your best gal pal, you can pay for her lunch!"

"But Ninetales isn't upset."

Lee earns a slug to the arm for the comment. Apparently, Zinnia doesn't care for being hit with the same joke twice in a week.


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Act 2: Chapter 11
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It's a rare sort of day today, two days after Ninetales' release from the Pokemon Center. For the first time in several weeks, Lee and Ninetales have been left to their own devices.

Brendan asked to borrow Grovyle and Octillery for a training exercise out near the base of Mount Chimney, and both pokemon agreed. After making some plans, promising to return before dark, and double promising not to work Grovyle and Octillery too hard since both are still on light duty, Brendan took his temporarily expanded team and set out.

Shinx, who is thankfully not fussing too much during the process of being weaned off of her bottle, is off in a deep slumber. She ate a little too much for lunch and quickly fell asleep to digest her meal. Lee returned her to her ball and placed the capsule in a pocket of his backpack, letting Shinx sleep somewhere dark, cozy, and quiet. She'll be out for a few hours, at least.

Zinnia and Courtney are out together for some 'girl time'. Lee is 99% sure the outing is Zinnia trying to get the Magma admin to slip up and talk about something she shouldn't, and maybe 1% trying to get free drinks at a bar somewhere. The Dragon Tamer apparently has plans to begin their investigation into Magma's recent activity tonight. She's going to go out and eavesdrop in the usual dives that gangsters frequent, while Lee… is going to study up on how far his powers as an auxiliary peace officer go. First, finding out if he can request warrants, just in case Zinnia gets stonewalled on a lead.

None too thrilling, all things considered.

Since today is their weekly rest day in the cycle Lee has formulated for his pokemon, Lee and Ninetales have been left with some time to relax together, as their only obligation today is to meet with Moore at the Gym and allow the still unnamed move for Flannery to be copied. That in mind, Lee and Ninetales decided to go out and enjoy themselves for a bit.

Out on the streets of Lavaridge, man and fox cut through the crowds on the street with ease, as most part around them with excited whispers and awed smiles. Ninetales was the subject of stares before, but she's a veritable celebrity now after defeating Ty.

The great vixen keeps her head held high and her prowling gait regal, but she can't quite hide the smile that pulls at the edges of her lips. Her steps are still a bit ginger and if one looks hard enough, they can see where her coat is a little thinner in places, but the fading aftermath of her bout with Ty does nothing to diminish Ninetales' mood.

Lee smiles. 'Enjoying yourself?'

'Perhaps a little,' she admits with a sniff. 'It was somewhat unwelcome before our match with Leader Moore, but now the attention feels appropriate.'

'Lavaridge has a lot of immigrants from Kanto and Johto, and both regions have a long history with the Vulpix line. It makes sense that people would stare.' Lee eyeballs a few shops as they walk, his eyes lingering on a tobacco shop advertising everything from traditionally Asian-looking pipes to fine cigars.

Ninetales follows his eyes and draws her lips back into a thin line. 'No.'

A frown finds its way to Lee's face. 'I wasn't going to get anything bad. Just a box or two of cigars for special occasions.'

'Lee, my Beloved,' she begins, eyeing him with a pained look, 'you only have so long on this earth, and I want to savor every moment of it. I don't want you to ruin your health, and I don't think my heart could bear it if you perished before your time.' Ninetales narrows her eyes, staring up at him seriously. 'You already quit smoking months ago, so why go back?'

Quitting had been more involuntary than anything, considering how hectic the first few weeks of trainer life had been, but guilt still pokes a hole in his heart and Lee falters. 'Ah… I forgot about that part… My bad, Love.'

The conversation falls into a lull and, although she tries to hide it, Lee can feel Ninetales' own guilt gnawing at her. 'You may have one box of your choice,' she begins, her tone leaving no room for argument. 'They're to be saved only for special occasions like you said, understood?'

'Nine, if it upsets you so much, then I'm fine doing without.' Lee reaches a hand out and strokes her behind her heart-marked ear as they walk. 'No skin off my nose.'

Ninetales leans into the touch with a content sigh. 'Perhaps, but I shouldn't have manipulated you like that. I knew what I said would make you feel guilty.'

Mulling over her words, Lee takes a moment to reply. 'Maybe you did, but that doesn't make your point or good intentions less valid.'

The fox huffs. 'You're infuriatingly kind sometimes.'

'If I can't have pity parties, then you can't either.' Lee meets her eyes with a smile as they walk past the tobacco shop. 'I'll pass this time. Maybe another time.'

Ninetales leans into Lee's side, her warmth seeping into him just as much as her telepathic adoration does.

The pair separate and continue forward, pulled along by whims more than anything else. They browse the various merchants as they go, such as a flower shop teeming with Cutiefly, all busy pollinating the flowers within. The shop's largest display is a colorful array of bamboo, grown by crossbreeding the plants with Berry trees. A liquor store they stop by proudly presents its locally made sake, a traditional form of rice wine. Ninetales is considerably more okay with alcohol over tobacco, so Lee buys himself some "Burning Spirit Sake," the bottle of which features Ty the Typhlosion's scowling, stylized face on the label. The third shop is what really captures Lee's attention, though.

"Look at that…" Lee breathes as he and Ninetales step in through the propped-open door of Parlor Kaede.

All around them are racks of clothes and garments. Some are obviously common wholesale fare, but quite a bit looks to be handmade, especially since the bulk of the inventory is traditional wear like robes, kimonos, haoris, and other things Lee can't rightly name. They're artistic and eye-catching, but that's not what has Lee's attention. No, what draws his eyes is deeper inside.

Near the back of the store and behind the employee counter are a hard-working group of Spinarak, diligently overseen by an Ariados.

The Spinarak are spider pokemon sporting a size fit to send an arachnophobe into conniptions. The spiders are green with yellow legs that easily span a foot, and both the body and legs are banded with blue-black stripes. On the spider's head are two large eyes, a pearly white horn, and fangs colored a threatening red. Despite being commonly called spiders, the pokemon only have six legs.

The rear wall of the shop is covered in a silken spiderweb of mammoth proportions. From the wall protrude a number of shelves off to the side, also covered in web. If a Spinarak isn't hanging on the back wall, then they're on the shelves, or sometimes under the shelves, parallel to the ground.

Some of the spiders are busy working the spinnerets on their abdomens, producing a steady stream of silk that they twist and roll up into wooden spools held in their rearmost legs.

Others are transporting full spools of pure white silk over to one of the shelves in the corner of the wall. They set the spools on upward-facing pegs before pulling the threads through a low-set bowl on the bottom of their workstation. With slow, careful tugs, they drag the white threads through the bowl, and the silk, now a brilliant color, is wound around another waiting spool.

'They must have little pools of dye up there,' Lee thinks to himself.

On an unused portion of the employee counter, a team of Spinarak are using their fangs like sewing needles, weaving spools of colored silk together to form a thick bolt of fabric. They're even weaving a pattern into it! The current bolt they're working on is a rich sky blue with purple flower petals.

In the middle of all the commotion sits the Ariados, one that must eat well with its three-and-a-half-foot leg span. Like the Spinarak, it is a spider of terror-inducing proportions. Its body is red striped with black, with yellow legs striped violet, and the same violet coloring its two eyes. On its forehead is a white horn, and its similarly pale fangs are easily as long as a man's fingers.

The Ariados keeps a watchful eye over the efforts around it, shifting its attention around rapidly. Its legs pluck at the web every now and then, and with each pluck, some of the Spinarak heed unspoken orders and move to new phases in their work. The spiders all work together like a well-oiled machine, and Lee can't help but stare despite the unease he feels from Ninetales.

"Quite something, hmm?"

Lee jumps and barely suppresses a curse when an unexpected voice speaks up next to him. He turns his head, taking in the owner of the voice.

Next to Lee, a short, elderly woman watches the spider pokemon work with a small smile on her face. Her visage is like that of an old crone, one so on-the-nose Lee has to wonder if that was her intent. With gray hair pulled back into a high bun, a drooping, hooked nose, half-lidded eyes paired with a self-satisfied smirk, and a lit cigarette in a long, stem-like holder in her hand, she must be aiming for the appearance.

The old woman turns her smirk up to Lee. "Captivated by my darlings, are you?" she asks, a pronounced accent most evident in how she says "dahlings". "I don't blame you. They're masterful in their art, so much so that I've little left to teach them." She chuckles and lifts her cigarette holder up, taking a long drag. Exhaling the smoke, she continues, "Ninth generation in a growing dynasty of silk-weavers, they are — and sweethearts to boot. They barely let their old master work anymore. It makes me feel useless."

The Ariados on the wall seems to take offense at the statement, lifting its head and clicking its fangs in obvious agitation. It stares at the old woman with a hard, challenging gaze.

The elderly woman meets the stare with a raised brow. After just a few seconds, the Ariados concedes and looks away.

"Hmph!" The old woman nods, then returns her eyes to Lee. "Well then, boy. Don't be rude. Introduce yourself and your companion to me if you're going to be in my shop taking up space."

Ninetales gives the old shopkeep a glowing red glare for the brusque tone, but it goes unnoticed.

Caught flat-footed, Lee blinks. "Lee Henson, ma'am. With me is Ninetales, my first pokemon and best friend."

"Hmm…" The crone of a woman regards Lee for a moment, then Ninetales, deep in thought. Then her eyes widen just a bit, and she cackles a hair-raising cackle. "Ah! You're the ones who toppled Mura! I remember." She calms herself. "I am Madam Kaede, and you will refer to me as such in this store, understood?" Without waiting for a reply, Kaede sends a look of disgust at Lee… or rather, at his jacket. "What brings you into my store? Obviously not your sense of taste…" She reaches a gnarled hand out and pinches the worn elbow of Lee's jacket. "Hoenn Civil Army camouflage? What are you hiding from? If I were in such an ugly, ineffective pattern, I'd be hiding from the mirror!"

Lee drops a hand onto Ninetales' head and gently pets her, silently coaxing the narrow-eyed vixen to keep a grip on her thinning patience. "We were just browsing around Lavaridge, Madam Kaede," Lee begins diplomatically. "I saw your pokemon at work through the window and my feet led me in. They really are quite a marvel."

Kaede sniffs imperiously. "Indeed, indeed," she agrees, looking the trainer up and down. Her disdainful face remains, but at the very least, the elder sounds less hostile. "I can tell that my shop has nothing for you."

"You might be right…" Lee glances at the different racks of clothes on display, noting a number of garments clearly intended for non-human body plans. "Ninetales and I have been thinking about entering a pokemon contest just to see how we like it, and my first thought on that was to go for a more traditional look for the performance…" Lee turns to Ninetales, who blinks her red eyes at him. "Would you like a kimono, or maybe something else, Nine?"

'I was under the impression that the trainer is the one that needs to dress up in a pokemon contest, not the pokemon.' Ninetales punctuates the telepathy with a rolling growl in her throat and a snort, mostly so Lee doesn't look insane getting answers from a mute fox.

"Yes, but the point is to show off the pokemon, not the trainer." Lee crosses his arms. "Plenty of coordinators use accessories for their pokemon."

Ninetales scans the racks of clothing, her mind slowly working. As she thinks, Lee can practically see what's going through her head.

One part of the fox is skeptical. Her natural beauty is enough, she thinks. Besides, clothes are for humans, not pokemon. She'd only wear an outfit once in a blue moon anyway, and they would take up space the rest of the time.

Another part, one close to where their minds join, looks at the assorted robes and dresses with a measure of appreciation, imagining some of them wrapped around her. She's also pleased by the idea of receiving a gift from Lee. The two sides clash in indecision briefly, then a winner is decided.

'...I suppose one won't hurt,' Ninetales says with a nod of her head.

Lee smiles in reply. "I guess we'll have a look around, then," he says, looking back down at Kaede.

"Look around?" The elderly woman scoffs and tilts her head, peering at Lee like someone might a Slowpoke. She waves a hand around the store, occasionally stopping to point at the racks. "At this?" She shakes her head with an aggravated sigh and pinches her cigarette out between two fingers. "Darling, these are rags for tourists, barely even fit to be used as bibs for children."

Lee raises an eyebrow and looks at the different clothes. They look great to him, with some of the more opulent robes boasting price tags of thousands of credits a pop. "Could have fooled me."

Kaede hands her cigarette holder and the snubbed cigarette to a Spinarak who descends from the ceiling. The spider takes the wooden holder in his front legs and rises back into the rafters, vanishing from sight. "No," Kaede declares. "I will not be besmirched by letting a Ninetales wear anything but true Madam Kaede. Come! Come!" she urges, stepping around Lee and walking towards a closed door in the rear of the shop.

Lee and Ninetales share a look, then follow.

Kaede leads them to the door, a sliding one made of wood, and throws it open. "Lloyd!"

Inside the room, a teenage boy with a Joltik on his shoulder jumps and nearly drops the bolt of fabric he's carrying. "Y-Yes, Madam?" He turns, regarding the old shopkeeper nervously. The boy is young, bright-eyed, and looks like he wishes he was anywhere else but here.

"Make yourself useful and man the front. I have a client to see to." Kaede waves the boy off.

"Yes, Madam!" Lloyd gulps and hastily jogs to the corner of the room, placing the bolt in his arms down next to several others, then slips by Lee and Ninetales in a hurry. As he goes, the Joltik on his shoulder blinks its four shiny, curiously intelligent eyes at them, as the teen slides the door closed behind him.

"Hmpf. Stupid boy," Kaede mutters to herself. "He'll be in debt forever at this rate…"

'Quite a pleasant person, isn't she?' Ninetales' words are like a concentrated stream of sarcasm right into Lee's brain, thick and gel-like. 'How a merchant can keep operating with such an attitude is beyond me.'

'Perhaps her work is just that good?' Lee spitballs. 'In my experience, good artists are either humble as can be or so far up their own ass that they look like a human donut.'

The vixen smirks at the imagery.

"Now, where to begin…" Kaede mutters to herself, peering around the room.

The back room of Parlor Kaede is a tailor's dream, with high shelves fitted with cubbies, all of which sport great rolls of fabric. One wall is dominated entirely by a pegboard filled with spools of silk arranged by color, and the opposite wall is stacked high with wooden boxes, each color-coded with a small sticker. What the colors mean is anyone's guess. By an ancient-looking iron sewing machine are a number of mannequins, each made for a different body type. Several quadrupeds, a few human-sized ones, and even a more esoteric one that looks like it can have extra limbs slotted into its torso.

Looking up, Lee is only amazed further.

In the rafters are several more Spinarak, and with them are even more shelves of fabric and equipment. Seeing what the spiders are standing vigil around in the gloom of the unlit ceiling is a challenge, but the stark white web at the very top of the ceiling is plain to see.

"Hmm…" Kaede looks up as well and snaps her fingers. "A blank 15QM4M6 if you would, my darlings."

A Spinarak from the rafters skitters to someplace out of view, then returns and descends on a thread of spider silk. A plain white robe, a white sash, a filled pin-cushion, and a rolled-up tape measure are all held in his legs.

"Thank you, darling." Kaede smiles and takes the garments, tape, measure, and pincushion from the spider, who chitters and rises back into the ceiling. Then she turns her attention to Ninetales. "Come here, darling. Let's begin."

'I'm beginning to rethink my choice…' Ninetales grumbles, but she does as the old woman asks and steps into the middle of the room.

Kaede drapes the blank kimono over Ninetales' back, holding the sleeves up so Ninetales can easily step into them. Then, reaching under the fox, Kaede pulls the kimono closed, wraps the sash around Ninetales' middle, and tightens it in seemingly one movement. The whole dress seems to have been made from the ground up with a quadruped in mind.

"Yes, 15QM4M6 should be about right…" the old seamstress murmurs, securing her pin cushion onto her wrist with a strap. Moving like lightning, she takes various measurements across Ninetales' body, sometimes marking the blank kimono with pins.

Lee leans back against the wall, content to watch.

Kaede moves with a deftness unfit for a woman her age, quickly marking the blank kimono and adjusting it, sometimes stepping away and asking Ninetales to turn. The blank kimono is then removed and placed on the quadrupedal mannequin before the seamstress requests another from her Spinarak, this time a '14QM4M7'. The process repeats itself several times. Throughout his waiting, Lee notices that, for all her surly confidence, Kaede avoids so much as brushing one of Nine's namesake tails.

With three blank kimonos marked, a Spinarak descends, providing Kaede with a color chart, one of different colored silks stretched over a wooden backing. The chart in hand, the elderly woman holds it to Ninetales' fur coat. "Something warm and simple…" she mutters. "Yes, a red base will do…"

"We don't get to pick the color or anything?" Lee asks, eyebrow raised.

Kaede openly cackles a mocking note.

After much debate with herself, Kaede nods and smiles. "Ah, this will be a good one indeed," she says, undoing the sash around Ninetales' middle and helping the fox step out of the latest white kimono.

"You're certainly thorough, Madam," Lee comments, stepping off of the wall and stretching. He pulls his phone from his pocket and checks the time. 'Geez. Half an hour flew by in a flash.'

Kaede ignores him, instead shuffling over to the well-aged sewing machine, where an old notepad lies. Producing a pen from her pocket, she begins writing down numbers: a long, almost nonsensical string of them, and none of them seem to correspond with the measurements she's just taken. After half the page is filled, she rips the page free, steps over to the wall, and knocks upon it sharply.

"I don't mean to be a bother," Lee begins, keeping his annoyance at being ignored in check. "But can we have an ETA for when the kimono will be ready? And possibly a quote before we actually commit?"

"Hush, boy." Kaede clicks her tongue. "Your Ninetales will have her finery today. Don't worry about money, either. I won't gouge you like some might."

The door to the tailoring room opens, and in walks the Ariados from earlier, scuttling up the wall and into the rafters, but not before he takes the paper in Kaede's outstretched hand.

"Now…" Kaede's eyes sparkle. "Stand back and behold!"

Ninetales retakes her place at Lee's side, joining him in watching.

Ariados stands upside down above them in the middle of the web. He sticks the paper in his little pedipalps to the web and, not taking his eyes off of it, begins to pluck at the web strands with his legs.

All around the rafters, the Spinaraks suddenly move as one, skittering past one another in a frantic race to grab supplies.

Some rappel down to take bolts of fabric in two-spider teams.

Others take spools of individual thread.

Another team drags one of the quadruped mannequins to the center of the room, with one spider remaining behind under the mannequin. Reaching into the dummy's belly, the spider twists some kind of mechanism that has escaped Lee's notice, and sections of the mannequin resize themselves with the clicks of a ratchet.

The spiders all halt as Ariados stops plucking at the web. Then, like a conductor moving to the next movement in a symphony, the great red spider above begins his furious coordination anew. The whole time, Lee looks for the threads he knows must be connected from the web above to the working spiders, but they must be so thin that they escape the human eye.

As the team of Spinarak descends on the mannequin, Lee can't help but let his jaw drop.

Fangs slice cloth like scissors and stitch like needles as a new kimono materializes from raw fabric and thread under the writhing mass of spiders. The Spinaraks seem totally erratic from the outside, but under them, a garment quickly begins to take shape on the mannequin, arrayed in reds, oranges, and white.

The well-organized discord of yellow legs and red fangs dominates the room for a solid fifteen minutes, and the entire time, Lee is transfixed at the scene before him. Even after months in this world, he's still stumbling upon new surprises. 'And I doubt it'll be the last,' he ruminates.

Beside him, Ninetales' spider-induced disgust is stamped down and used as a stepping-stool for her own amazement, her mouth formed into a little 'o' at the end of her muzzle.

Kaede just glows with pride as her pokemon work.

Finally, the Ariados' frantic footwork abates, and the Spinaraks all skitter away, leaving the product of all their hard work behind.

Before Lee can really get a good look, Kaede sweeps forward and urges Ninetales along with her. "Come, Darling! Come try it on!"

Despite her misgivings over Kaede's attitude, Ninetales pads along behind the old woman readily. Trailing the fox, Lee can see her tails flick to and fro with excitement.

The elderly shopkeeper stands in Lee's way of seeing Ninetales as she helps the pokemon into the freshly made garment. As she does so, more Spinaraks descend from the ceiling, crawling over to one of the cluttered corners and dragging a sectioned, rattan divider with them. The spiders pull the divider open behind Ninetales, showing off the sunset and blooming plains painted into it.

Another spider slowly drops from the ceiling, dropping a parcel of waxed paper into Kaede's waiting hand. The parcel is swiftly opened, and although Lee doesn't see what's in it, he does hear the chime of a small bell.

Kaede murmurs to herself as she places something around Ninetales' neck, then something else behind her ears. "There, perfect," Kaede smiles and steps away.

Lee can't help the awed smile that slowly grows on his face.

Ninetales as a species were obviously inspired by the kitsune of Japanese legend, and Ninetales' new attire drives the point home perfectly.

Wrapped around her is a rich, red kimono the same shade as her eyes, edged in white. The rear is slitted in the back, allowing her tails freedom to fan out behind her, and on the lower section of the kimono are broad fall leaves, all expertly woven into the bold red with more subdued shades of orange and yellow. It's all held closed with a sash of red, also edged in white, tied into a ribbon upon her back.

The front of the kimono is open to such a degree that it would be scandalous on a woman, but here it allows Ninetales' voluminous tuft of breast fur to be presented, where it hangs a little over the edge of the neckline. On that tuft and around her neck is a necklace of thick red cord, and dangling from the necklace is an ornate, somewhat shield-shaped charm inscribed with kanji Lee can't hope to translate. The charm is flanked by a pair of small, round bells, and hanging from the bottom of the charm itself is a pair of tassels, one white and the other red.

Finally, in the tuft of fur trailing down Ninetales' head, a pair of hair sticks tipped with red gems are crossed inside. Bridged between them is a golden, fan-like ornament.

'...Well?' Ninetales asks. After a moment of slightly embarrassed indecision, she sits, fluffs her tails up into a neat fan, and turns her head in a pose. 'How do I look?'

"Holy hell…" Lee breathes. "Okay, now we have to try a contest. You'll knock the judges dead just walking onto the stage."

Silently, Lee offers his vision to Ninetales, who reaches across the short telepathic band to see for herself.

The vixen smiles brightly, enjoying her new look much more than she expected, and positively loving how much Lee admires her. Her happiness only makes Lee's own smile wider.

Before that smile fades or Ninetales gets a chance to protest, Lee quickly withdraws his phone and snaps a picture of the scene. 'Wait 'till the nutcases on Fox Friday see this one,' he sends to her, taking another vertical photo and setting it as his background.

Ninetales' ears burn red at the thought of someone other than Lee seeing her like this. 'Must you?'

The longer he looks at the beautiful fox, the more Lee really appreciates just how much his life is looking up… then his smile dies a horrible death when another thought hits him. 'Oh shit. How much is this going to cost?'

Lee turns to Kaede, gulping. "So, uh, Madam Kaede? About the cost here…"

The old woman smirks. "For a specialty such as this? I don't even listen unless a client has a deposit of ten-thousand ready."

Lee feels his soul leave his body. Through Ninetales' eyes, he watches his own face go white as a sheet.

"But…" Kaede continues, eyeballing the now-furious Ninetales. "Stop with the scowl, darling. Let an old woman have some fun," she huffs. "I will only charge you for the materials today. It's not every day I can design for a client who actually wears my work well, and unlike some others, I will tell you to your face that this is a marketing ploy. Tell others you were here, and I will consider the time repaid."

A sigh of relief blows past Lee's lips. Reaching up, he rubs his forehead. "Okay, so how much?"

"Three thousand credits." Kaede looks like she's barely keeping herself from cackling.

Suppressing the urge to hiss at the still steep price, Lee just nods. "I can do that," he mutters, turning back to the door leading to the front of the store.

"Where are you going?" Kaede demands, a scowl taking over her wrinkled face. "Come here, boy! Before you go, you're learning how to take the ensemble off of your pokemon, how to put it on, how to fold it, and how to keep it clean. If it does get dirty…" Her face grows stormy. "Dry! Clean! Only!"


Under Kaede's watchful eye, Lee, who is kneeling at Ninetales' side, begins removing the kimono from her for what feels like the tenth time.

'We should probably head to the Gym once done here.' Lee idly thinks, undoing the knot in Ninetales' sash and folding it up. 'Once the move is in Flannery's hands, our obligations will be done there.'

'We should.' Ninetales agrees. 'I'm sorry that this ended up being so expensive,' she then apologizes, remorse soaked into each word.

'It's for you, so it's worth it.' Lee sends back without a moment's delay.

Ninetales turns her neck and licks her trainer across his scarred cheek.


'I swear this is taking much longer than before,' Ninetales complains, crossing her red eyes to glare at an errant wire hanging in front of her nose.

In the sitting room of the Lavaridge Gym and once more in the company of Mura Moore and Flannery, Lee and Ninetales wait as the old, briefcase-bound TM copier belonging to the Moores copies Flannery's custom fire move from Ninetales. Just like before, the old headband fitted with pitted electrodes and disintegrating wires is just barely hanging onto Ninetales' head, and she's none too pleased with how it's mussing up her head tuft.

She was much happier outside showing off the unnamed Fire move to a starstruck Flannery.

'It's copying a more complex move, Love, and this thing looks like it's on its last legs…' Lee eyeballs the TM copier, swearing to himself he sees thin wisps of blue smoke rising from it. From the sitting room table, Lee raises the teacup Moore poured for him as everyone was seated. Taking a sip more out of politeness than enjoyment, he sets it back down. 'I'll fix up your fur afterward.'

Ninetales just silently fumes in response. The new, three-thousand-credit outfit neatly folded in Lee's backpack keeps her mood from getting too foul, however.

'I'll need to get something for Grovyle and Octillery. I'd get something for Shinx, but I don't think she's at the age to appreciate much beyond toys and attention,' Lee thinks. 'I love you, Ninetales, but it's not super fair to them if I give you an expensive present and don't give them the option too.'

'Well, I'm not about to be jealous,' she scoffs. Even while focusing on the unnamed Fire move, Ninetales' telepathy is smooth enough for her to hold a seamless conversation. 'Grovyle would want something practical, like a TM or a new host for his Miracle Seed, since his neckerchief was burned to a crisp. Octillery…' Ninetales stops. 'Well, I can't rightly say. I don't know him well enough yet.'

"-Damndest thing, don't you agree?" Moore finishes with a rueful shake of his head.

Lee nods along, hiding how he spaced out mid-conversation with the older trainer. "Certainly…" he agrees. "Ah, I never asked. How is Ty doing, Leader Moore?"

Moore smiles. "He's been recovering well. It's taking him some time, considering his age, but he came home early this morning and is plenty happy. I did get an official advisory from the Pokemon Center that Ty should be retired from battle, lest he suffers an injury that he cannot heal from," Moore sighs, content, while Lee has to hold back a grimace. "In return for his send-off, I feel as if I owe you a tip for your next Gym. You said you intend to challenge Norman next?"

Lee nods. "Yes. We're taking a detour up north, then circling around to Mount Chimney's western flank, so it likely won't be for… two or more months, I think."

Moore hums and strokes his chin with a forefinger and thumb. "Hmm. That time to prepare is a double-edged sword, you know. Norman is regarded as one of the best, most balanced trainers in all of Hoenn, and youngsters always complain that he's their biggest roadblock. Norman suffered a particularly humiliating defeat at the hands of a young trainer named Tyson recently, and that embarrassment will only compel him to prepare even more for you and young Brendan."

'Tyson? The same one we battled in Mauville?' Lee wonders to himself. A thrill of apprehension runs down Lee's spine. "Really? Surely it couldn't have been that bad?"

"This Tyson guy beat Norman's Slaking with a Metagross…" Flannery answers in her grandfather's stead.

Ninetales raises her head sharply, and another shiver, one much colder, runs down Lee's spine. "A Metagross?" Lee asks weakly.

Flannery shifts uncomfortably on her cushion, perhaps thinking of facing off with Tyson herself. "And it wasn't an even fight, either…"

"Even Steven was surprised to hear this young Tyson fellow has a Metagross," Moore clicks his tongue. "Nasty things, Metagross. To earn the loyalty of one is an ordeal in of itself, for to a Metagross, all but the brightest humans are retarded children-"

"Grandpa…"

"-Slow children, I mean," Moore clears his throat. "No pokemon such as that would willingly partner itself to anyone but a trainer with true talent. The only other Metagross trainers I can think of are Steven and that girl who runs the Battle Tower, Anabel." The old Gym Leader raises his cup of tea for a sip. "Be wary, boyo. The Conference this year is going to have stiff competition."

Lee sighs. "Wonderful…"

Metagross is right up there with Ninetales on the "rare and dangerous" pokemon chart, as Lee discovered during his research frenzy prior to Ninetales' evolution. Being both physical and psychic powerhouses with an IQ that can't be accurately measured with human methods, they're nightmarish pokemon fit only for extraordinary trainers. Their gestalt physiology only makes it worse, as Metagross are born from the union of four individual Beldum or two Metang. The fusion of different minds makes predicting the gestalt thoughts of a Metagross nigh-impossible. Not many people can cope with the weight and mind games of a pokemon who is for sure more intelligent than they are.

"Anyway," Moore sets his teacup down with a clack. "Be ready for Norman, my boy. Family life might have slowed his growth, but it's done nothing to weaken his pokemon. Norman and his team at their fullest will be your first real taste of an Elite. There is no surefire counter for him, and he'll be getting his team ready for you. If he can rouse Slaking for your battle…" Moore slips his glasses off and cleans the lenses against his shirt. "Well, it'll be a fight for the books."

With a tired hum and the whine of an old electrical capacitor, the TM printer finally slows to a stop and spits out a TM disk from its side port. Once the printer chugs to a stop, Ninetales wastes no time shaking her head and dislodging the wired headband, which gracelessly falls to the floor.

"Ah!" Moore smiles and takes the disk, placing his glasses back on as he does so. Turning to his now-grinning granddaughter, he hands the disk to her. "There you are, my dear. One custom pokemon technique." Moore turns back to Lee and Ninetales, bowing his head. "Lee, Madam Ninetales, I believe that concludes our deal. Thank you for taking the time to develop this technique and provide my oldest partner some closure on his career when I so rudely forced it upon you."

Pushing thoughts of Gym battles and year's-end tournaments away, Lee smiles back and inclines his own head. "No no, thank you, Leader Moore, for the once-in-a-lifetime opportunity with your Fire Stone. I'm aware of the danger associated with mining such a pure stone out of Mount Chimney, so Ninetales and I will remember this."

Moore waves them off. "It's no issue, my boy."

Flannery bows her head as well after she tears her eyes away from the disk in her hands. "T-Thank you, Lee."

"Not a problem at all," Lee returns. "Ah, a quirk of that move to be aware of; don't modulate the power too much. It's made very deliberately, and overloading just causes a backfire."

"Of course, will do!" Flannery nods her head rapidly. She's bouncing in her seat like a little girl, clearly eager to use the TM she's holding like a treasure on one of her pokemon.

With one final incline of his head, Lee rises with Ninetales following along. "Thanks again, and we'll be sure to visit next time we're in Lavaridge."

Moore guffaws. "Glad to hear it, my boy! Glad to hear it! You're a friend of clan Moore, so stop by any time!"

After a final farewell, Moore and Flannery walk Lee and Ninetales to the front of the gym, leading them past the repair crews doing final checks on the building following the damage caused by Ninetales and Ty. Once outside, Lee and Ninetales start back towards the town proper.

'So a Metagross, huh?' Lee frowns and kicks a rock on the dirt road as they walk. 'You know, I only just realized I haven't really done any research on anyone in the circuit. Not even the Gym leaders.' Now that he realizes it, it seems like a really foolish mistake. Andre nearly had them, Tyson and his Donphan didn't even break a sweat against Grovyle, and the win against Wattson's unexpected combo in Mauville was narrow. 'Fuck me, I feel stupid. Brendan does it all the time and I barely even pay it any mind. Does he think I'm some kind of arrogant ass for walking into battles unprepared?'

'Don't put yourself down over it, Beloved,' Ninetales says sharply. She stares up at him with hard, ruby eyes. 'This is a failure upon me as well. I should have thought of trying to predict our foes beforehand, too.'

'Love, I'm the trainer, and you're pokemon; it's not on you at all.'

'A typical pokemon-trainer relationship does not apply between you and I, remember?' The kitsune raises an eyebrow. 'As a pokemon who practically lives within the mind of a human, as your partner, it's my duty to do all I can for you. I've been just as foolish here to overlook such a simple thing as well. Besides, you have your own interests and studies to pursue, so I refuse to fault you. I know Grovyle doesn't either.' She blinks. 'I already feel your argument brewing, so shush.'

'Well…' Lee flounders after being shut down. He eyes a Pachirisu enjoying an Oran in a distant tree. 'Okay, fine. What do we do then?'

'We simply do better. Together.'

Lee runs his hand down the side of Ninetales' neck. As usual, the silky fur soothes his nerves. 'We'll do better from now on. Together.' he agrees.

With Lavaridge proper still being a number of minutes away on foot, Lee withdraws his phone from his pocket, sorts through his emails, then dives into BattleNet. At his side, he can feel Ninetales perk up as she, too, takes in what he reads.

BattleNet is a true behemoth of a website, being a bastardized hybrid of a forum, wiki, chatroom index, and social media site, but even then, Lee only needs to search for his name and scroll to the earliest result to find the "Newcomers to look out for" thread in the Hoenn board. There, he finds Tyson, Andre, himself, Brendan, Ash, and a few names he doesn't recognize. The only profiles he's looked at in depth are his own, Brendan's, and Ash's.

…Or rather, he looked at what little was available on Ash. The young trainer's profile, particularly his activity tracker, is sparse to the point of being useless. A number of his larger, hyped-up moments are captured for all to see, like his performance in Gyms and tournaments, but everything in-between is blank. The fact that the edit history of his profile is dominated solely by site admins is also suspect, enough to trip Lee's finely-tuned 'internet bullshit' detector.

'Considering his Legendary encounters, that's to be expected, is it not?' Ninetales questions despite already knowing the answer.

'Yes, I'm just a little exasperated that shadowy government shenanigans are a thing here, too. I should have guessed, considering the almost feudal-style laws and wobbly power structure between government and trainer.' Rolling his eyes, Lee skims the profiles of the most notable trainers running the Hoenn Gym circuit this year, reminding himself to dive deeper later. 'At least government suits are less inclined to fuck with people this way.'

'With good reason,' Ninetales giggles, blowing a little tongue of flame.

As they pass into Lavaridge, Lee puts his phone away as a pang of hunger gnaws at his… No, wait, that's Ninetales' hunger he's feeling. His own is there, but not quite as intense. 'How about an early dinner?' Lee eyes a few restaurants they pass. 'I saw a traditional-looking asian grill place down the road. Also, are you getting enough to eat in a day, Love? We can up your calorie count if it's too low.'

'I'm fine with my current amount,' Ninetales insists. 'I feel like a Grumpig already with how much you feed me.'

'Yet, you eat it all each time.'

'I'm not going to waste your time and effort by not,' the fox grumbles. 'Being a bit hungry isn't enough to warrant a diet change.'

'Okay, okay,' Lee gives in. 'So, do you want to stop for an early dinner? I think we deserve a treat.'

'My telekinesis still needs work before I can use silverware…' Ninetales' unspoken 'I don't want to look undignified by eating right off the plate' is plain. Just as plain is the slightly bitter frustration at her lack of control.

'Well…' Lee scratches his chin, fingernails rasping against his stubble. He needs to shave tonight. 'I'll feed you, then.'

There is a flash of surprise from the fox, then a smirk crosses her muzzle. 'Beloved, you worry over people getting the wrong idea about us, yet you take me out for a private excursion, buy me expensive clothes, then offer to take me out to dinner, and offer to hand-feed me at that. Why, you treat me better than you have any of your past girlfriends!'

Lee doesn't blush at the tease, merely rolling his eyes. 'Har har. Let's skip that and just get married, then. It already feels like we're there. Hell, I'm already at the stage where I can fall back asleep in hardly a minute when you get up to pee at two in the morning.' He smirks back at her. 'Oh and, Love? You don't need to crawl over me to get out of bed.'

The comment earns him a sharp nip on his pinky finger, along with a telepathic mix of exasperation and fondness. 'Then stop taking the side closer to the bathroom.'

Theatrically waving his 'wounded' hand in faux indignation, Lee chuckles and pulls Ninetales into a one-armed hug. She smiles in turn and nuzzles her head into his stomach.

"Hey, Lee! Is that you?"

With a blink, Lee releases his fox as both turn around, facing the young-sounding voice calling from behind.

There in the street are Ash, Pikachu, May, Max, and Brock, all of whom are smiling at him. Ash, Brock, and Pikachu's smiles are swiftly traded for surprise when they see Ninetales.

'And here I thought today would be peaceful,' Lee silently laughs at himself for ever having a hope like that. Outwardly, he clears his throat and smiles. "Hey, everyone. Long time no see. Did you just blow into town today?"

Ash recovers the fastest, putting a bright grin on his face. "Sure did. We just came in from the Valley of Steel, and boy, what a hassle that was." On his shoulder, Pikachu nods along with Ash's words. Ash turns his attention to Ninetales. "Wow, Vulpix evolved!" he exclaims, eyes wide and cheerful. "When did that happen?"

"Two, almost three weeks ago," Lee says, stroking Ninetales' head with his hand. Looking at Ash's friends, Lee notes Brock's hands on May and Max's shoulders, keeping the sibling pair from getting much closer.

"I've never seen a Ninetales in real life before," May gushes, seemingly not noticing Brock's hand. She pulls out her pokedex and points it at Ninetales, who watches with a quirked brow.

"Ninetales, the Fox Pokemon," begins the droning voice of May's pokedex. "Intelligent and vindictive, these long-lived pokemon never forget a grudge. Legend has it that these pokemon will lay a 1000-year curse on anyone who grabs one of their tails."

May's smile becomes fragile. "Huh. Interesting stuff…" she laughs nervously and puts her pokedex away.

'Whose idea was it to put the stupid little intro on 'dex scans?' Lee shakes his head and continues stroking Ninetales. "Don't let the pokedex blurb scare you too much, there is a lot of misinformation out there on Ninetales as a species."

Ash nods along. "Of course. There's no such thing as a bad pokemon."

'Not the phrase I would have used, but I have to compliment the attitude.' Lee perishes the thought and continues. "I'd say half of what you hear isn't right. Here's an example…" Lee takes the hand that was stroking Ninetales along her head and snatches one of her tails, letting the tip wiggle in faux distress.

Brock inhales sharply, and both May and Max freeze in fright. Ash and Pikachu only seem a bit surprised as their eyes widen in-sync. More than one person on the street stops to watch with bated breath.

After a moment, Lee lets the tail go, and Ninetales returns the errant tail to its fan formation with its sisters. "See?" Lee gestures at himself. "No curse. Just don't repeat the stunt because while the curse isn't real, the teeth and fire very much are."

At that moment, Ninetales' hunger makes itself aware again with a phantom pang, so Lee moves the conversation along. "Ninetales and I were actually about to find a place to eat. If you kids want to join us, you're welcome to come along. My treat."

Lee can already feel Ninetales mentally grumbling; having guests means no more dating jokes.

As with many groups of children, the possibility of danger is forgotten at the mention of free food. As one, all of them perk up.


"I did it…" Kirlia breathes, gasping and panting for air as he looks down at himself. "I did it!"

Corvisquire is treated to the nauseatingly sweet sight of Wally and Ralts - now Kirlia - embracing and spinning in a circle, laughing and practically leaping for joy. In his perch in a tree just above the green-headed brat and the newly evolved Kirlia, Corvisquire sighs to himself and allows the two of them to enjoy themselves for a moment.

For several weeks the pair have been growing like weeds in terms of skill and power. Corvisquire would suffer no weaklings under his wing, and to his grudging approval, Wally and Kirlia learned quickly. Corvisquire would throw problems their way — usually in the form of attacks — they adapt, then rinse and repeat. A brutal, but effective way to train.

The boy proved himself to have something of a brain, studying the art of pokemon training in his spare time. He and Kirlia sync up well with his pokemon's telepathic talent, now to the point that Wally only needs verbal cues for the most complex of instructions.

Kirlia, meanwhile, has been trodding down the route of the patient opportunist. He would duck, dip, dive, block, and sometimes Teleport to keep out of harm's way, then strike when the iron was hot. His attacks, while impressive looking, do little to Corvisquire's steely feathers. Other pokemon are not so fortunate.

In their time training, Corvisquire did set out to possibly find another foe, one mighty enough to trigger his evolution, but alas, no such adversary was found. His evolution is so close, too! That black armor, the sheer strength! It could be his if Verdanturf wasn't filled with such weak pissants!

What's worse is that the Pokemon Rangers are becoming a nuisance. Evading their patrols is pathetically easy, as no League dog has the brains required to match him truly, but their persistence is irritating. He needed only to eavesdrop by an outdoor area of the local ranger office to overhear why they're so doggedly insistent.

A new bulletin went out for him, one stating that he is now a high-priority capture. At first, Corvisquire was confused. He heard the news a full day before his Dawn Stone heist. Then he was furious at the news, at the realization that the scarface's kind facade had finally fallen and that he was pulling rank in the Pokemon League to take Corvisquire back.

Corvisquire was mad that the illusion of choice was just that: an illusion.

He was rancorous for over a day when another thought struck him.

Could it be that he's a high priority for some other reason? Maybe…

Then it hit like a blow to the stomach.

The death of the scarface's whole world. He, Corvisquire, is privy to that poisoned knowledge. He knows it happened, and he knows nuclear energy can somehow be harnessed and turned into bombs. To kill a whole world, one would need to be on equal footing with Arceus.

The illusion of scarface's kindness returned, but another shadow was cast over Corvisquire. If he is captured by the Rangers, he will never see the light of day again, not unless he lets a Psychic root around his brain and erase whatever they please.

The pilfered Dawn Stone hidden in his nest and the fury of the warehouse security seems like the least of his worries now.

The raven pokemon sneered at the memory. The blindspots the warehouse left in their camera array were atrocious, and seriously, wafer locks to keep the precious stone containers secured? He got in and out with no issue and the crudest of tools.

"Mister Corvisquire? Are you okay?"

Corvisquire is pulled from his spiraling mood by Kirlia, who looks up at him with worried eyes.

The little fool's hair is shorter than normal, and his 'skirt' is more like a waistcloth, marking him as a male of his kind, but by Almighty Arceus, the big Rockruff eyes make him an eyesore.

"Worry about yourself," Corvisquire gruffly replies. "Go and rest. Return tomorrow, and we will begin further refinement of your powers. You're still piss-poor at defending from overhead attacks, and that's unacceptable." When the pair don't move, Corvisquire raises an eyebrow. "You've been dismissed, idiots. Go home. That wasn't a suggestion."

The brat and the psychic meet eyes for a moment, then Kirlia gulps and looks back up. "B-But something is bothering you, and we want to help."

An amused snort is Corvisquire's answer. "How cute." He shakes his head. "Begone. You are no use exhausted, and I wish to be alone. I have things of my own to be doing and you're cutting into that time."

Kirlia actually has the audacity to shake his head, wincing as he does so. "No. I can feel it. Something is bothering you."

Corvisquire's amusement drains away in an instant, replaced with a prickling irritation. "You were ordered to leave, fool," Corvisquire clacks his beak. "The hatchling that bites the beak that feeds is a hatchling that will learn a harsh lesson. Remember that." The raven raises his beak and stares down menacingly. "Is that a lesson you're ready for?"

Kirlia shivers on his feet, and Wally begins to look pale, but Kirlia's sad, simpering look seems to redouble itself and he opens his damn mouth again. "Do you miss your trainer? It wasn't your fault. You can't blame yourself for someone else getting sick!" Kirlia slaps his hands over his mouth, aghast at his own words and seemingly surprised that they came out at all.

Corvisquire's mind goes blank. In his ears, he hears a sharp keen, and at the edge of his vision, a red haze begins to form. How does he know? How does he know? How does he know?

"Nothing can be done."

"Nothing can be done."

"Nothing can be done."

"You can't do anything."

"I do not know how you came to find that knowledge," the raven begins, his words halting and so hate-filled that each one quivers. He turns his red eyes down, staring at Wally and Kirlia like Giratina himself. "I do know one thing for certain, however."

Both the child and pokemon openly quake. In their eyes is fear, and Corvisquire drinks it in.

Wally palms the inhaler in his pocket, pulling it free and taking a puff. The action almost snaps the raven out of his murderous haze.

Almost.

"I know that thirty seconds is all I will give you," Corvisquire growls. There is a tiny pop and a flash of pain, and Corvisquire knows he chipped his beak from clenching it so hard. "Thirty seconds to run and meditate on your mistake before I teach you both about the chick who bit the beak that feeds. Go now. Time. Is. Wasting."

Both younglings turn tail and flee through the brush of the clearing, and in his head, Corvisquire begins to count down. Just as he reaches zero, an unexpected voice rings out.

"I don't understand what he saw in you."

Corvisquire gasps and immediately shoots his wings open, taking off in a flash to hover in the air.

There, standing in a casual crouch inches away from where he was perched, is a Medicham.

Corvisquire inspects the interloper up and down, gauging him carefully. The Medicham has certainly seen a fight or two, as his scarred physique tells a story of harsh encounters, but the stranger doesn't trip Corivisquire's well-honed survival instincts. 'An unlucky fool, then.'

The Medicham looks back up at Corvisquire with a bored, bug-eyed gaze, one totally apathetic to the seething fury on Corvisquire's visage. The Fighting-type doesn't even raise an eyebrow at him.

"And just who in the hell are you?" Corvisquire hisses. "You have some ner-" the raven stops himself short when he notices what's in Medicham's hand.

A Dawn Stone.

"You're not as slick as you might think," Medicham hums, slowly standing on the branch and turning the shining stone over in his hand. The drooped, bored eyes never leave Corvisquire's. "He would be held responsible for your theft, you know."

"Wha-" Corvisquire shakes his head, confusion making his boiling fury even worse. "Enough with the pronoun game, moron! Who is he?"

"Lee."

The name makes Corvisquire falter. Why does his private business seem to be public knowledge all of a sudden?!

"I don't understand what he saw in you," Medicham repeats, finally breaking eye contact to look at the stone in his hand. "I've read his reports and listened to his audio logs. He was always fond of you, even if you caused him issues. The hurt in his voice when you abandoned him was real. Now you're out here, menacing children and stealing baubles." Medicham takes a deep breath. "Why run?"

Reports? Audio logs? Just who is this Medicham? Corvisquire defaults back to the one thing that's never failed him.

Anger.

"Listen here, bastard!" Corvisquire shouts, the red haze returning to his vision. "What sort of mind games are you trying to pull? You don-"

Pain explodes in his stomach so fast that he can do nothing. In fact, all Corvisquire can do is gasp as stars dance in his vision. There is a thud, and he realizes he's tumbled out of the air and hit the ground like a falling brick. There, prostrate in the dirt, he wheezes as his brutalized lungs beg for air.

A pair of feet touch down in the grass next to him without a sound.

"That wasn't an appropriate answer to my question." Corvisquire doesn't need to look up to know it's that damned Medicham, as the skinny bastard's voice is still as disinterested as it was before. "Why run?"

The raven hacks and stumbles to his feet. "That's none of your business, nosy shi-"

One second, Medicham is there. The next, he's gone, and Corvisquire shrieks when a knee is driven into his back, sending him back down with a crash that's sure to bruise. The attack is so fast, that even his Extreme Speed accustomed eyes miss any movement.

"Civility will take you far," Medicham murmurs above Corvisquire. Oh, how he's beginning to hate this bastard. "I have given you the courtesy of explaining yourself. Please, use it," Medicham's knee rises, and Corvisquire's pride demands that he rise, too.

Standing up tenderly, Corvisquire takes as deep a breath as he can and levels the thin Fighting-type with a glare. "If it is polite conduct you desire," he hisses, "then so be it. May I have the pleasure of knowing with whom I speak?" He spits the word 'pleasure' like it burns his beak.

Medicham doesn't seem amused. "I am Medicham, Ace of Nigel Birch, the Hoenn Regional Professor and direct superior of Lab Trainer Lee Henson."

Ah. Suddenly things make more sense. Corvisquire huffs. "Very well then, Medicham, Ace of Nigel Birch, the Hoenn Regional Professor and direct superior of Lab Trainer Lee Henson…" He says it all in one breath that reeks of spite. "What, if I may ask, are you doing here?"

"Asking you questions," Medicham answers, voice flat.

Corvisquire waits, and when no further elaboration comes, he scowls.

"Why run?" Medicham repeats, and despite how Corvisquire wishes to look away, he can't seem to escape Medicham's eyes.

Corvisquire doesn't answer, and after a moment, Medicham begins guessing.

"Team dispute? Dissatisfaction with training?" Medicham's blank bug eyes turn toward the path Wally and Kirlia escaped to. "Past hurts?"

Corvisquire bites back a curse.

"Your silence says a lot," Medicham muses aloud.

"Aren't your kind supposed to be a reflective lot that speaks in riddles and preaches zen or something?" Corvisquire growls. "So far, you've been as blunt as a Snorlax's backside."

Medicham shrugs. "There is a time and place for reflection and riddles," he says, freezing Corvisquire in place with his blank stare once more. "Why run?"

Temper and nerves both frayed, Corvisquire raises his voice once more. "Let me answer your question with a question of my own! Tell me, O aloof one! What would you do if your entire world came crashing down!?"

Medicham hums to himself and looks down at the stone in his hand. "I cannot say. I do know what I would not do, though."

"Enlighten me!" the raven snarls, his feathers ruffling. "What sort of sage advice do you have for me? What would you not do?!"

"Run."

The tailwind is taken out from behind Corvisquire's seething anger in an instant.

Medicham ponders the Dawn Stone in his hand for a moment, taking in its gentle glow, then he drops it at Corvisquire's talons. Turning on his heel, the Fighting-type begins walking away.

"Wha… Where are you going!?" Corvisquire caws incredulously, looking between Medicham's back and the stone that Medicham knows is stolen.

Medicham doesn't break his stride or look back. "Back to Nigel."

"After stalking me, attacking me, and interrogating me, a pokemon you know has committed crimes and is a runaway, you're just going to leave?" The raven's head is spinning. From his fall or this maddening pokemon's insanity, he has no idea.

Medicham pauses for a moment but doesn't look back. "I won't take more from you," he says, though a niggling feeling tells Corvisquire that the Ace pokemon isn't talking about the discarded Dawn Stone. "Your trainer is in Lavaridge right now. He will be leaving for Fallarbor town soon. All of your choices impact more than you, far beyond the obvious consequences. Remember that." Medicham continues walking, vanishing in the brush.

As the sun begins its descent into the evening, Corvisquire sits there in the clearing. Confused, frustrated, and with a throbbing pain in his chest that isn't physical, he lifts his head and screams.


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Act 2: Chapter 12
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"In summary, you do have all the powers of a peace officer since Lab Trainers fall under the broad umbrella of 'Pokemon League Field Agent', but Lee, please consult me before you take any liberties with said powers," the voice of Amanda Keller, Lee's recently acquired lawyer, pleads from Lee's cellphone. The little device is on speaker mode for the whole room to hear. "Your conduct is going to be scrutinized heavily by the League Department of Justice if you insist on your investigation, and we must cross every T and dot every I, do you understand?"

"I do..." Lee sighs and rests his chin in his steepled hands. From his place at the hotel room table, he looks at his assembled pokemon.

On the bed is Ninetales, with Shinx snuggled into the vixen's mass of tails. On the surface, Ninetales appears to be busy entertaining the kitten by wiggling a tail tip for a delighted Shinx to bat at with her paws, but Lee knows she's dedicating the conversation to memory. Grovyle sits beside her with his legs crossed, paying rapt attention. His sharp, yellow eyes never leave the cell phone on the table, occasionally shifting his chewing twig in his mouth when deep in thought.

Octillery is splayed out on the other chair opposite of Lee, his tentacles hanging limply. However, his narrowed eyes tell everyone he's dissecting each word Amanda says.

'I couldn't ask for a better team.'

"Honestly, I didn't expect my authority as a Lab Trainer to extend that far," Lee admits to his lawyer. "I'm well aware of the emergency first responder aspect. Professor Birch checked to ensure I knew first aid and had a basic grasp on Hoenn law before we set out, but I had no idea I had full authority to conduct criminal investigations from start to finish. Brendan and I have had run-ins with criminal elements before, and I thought his declaration of arrest was him getting too excited."

'Nigel probably would have better prepared us if I hadn't forgotten to tell him about Magma and Aqua like a dingus.'

"Not at all. Lab Trainers have full authority to lawfully detain criminal suspects, as you now know." The woman on the other end of the phone pauses. "The politics within the League is… tiresome at the best of times. According to my senior associates, much of the Pokemon League leadership, or at least the ones who hold seniority, resent the casualization of pokemon battling in recent years. To combat a shortage of 'strong' officers and field agents in their ranks, the League effectively deputizes trainers holding special trainer classes, such as Lab Trainers, Ace Trainers, Top Coordinators, and so on. In these situations, the trainer in question undergoes a background check and personality exam unless vouched for by a trusted member of the League, then their authority is automatically granted. Due to your affiliation with Professor Birch, you fall into the latter category."

Ninetales frowns. 'We only needed to read the League regulation book, and we weren't even given a test or a timeline to finish it. Isn't the training for a police officer much more stringent?'

When Lee voices Ninetales' questions aloud, Amanda sighs. "The municipal police forces are administered by the civil government. They're separate from League agents, even if both operate under the same laws and charters. The Hoenn League has been criticized for having such lax requirements ripe for nepotism before. When issues do crop up, the League will either rip the extra powers away, or will softball the offender for fear of alienating them. The better the trainer, the lighter the slap on the wrist. Not that it matters much, as bean counters can easily justify a self-training, self-funding, and self-directing peacekeeping force on paper." Amanda has to stop for a moment and take a breath. "The current system only works as well as it does because the deputized trainers are often high-profile individuals beholden to their public image and personal prestige. If not for these factors, things wouldn't work in the slightest.'

"You don't sound like you approve," Lee muses. "Do we need to worry about getting direct orders from the League?"

The lawyer on the other end of the phone hesitates. "Yes… and no. It depends on where you get the orders from. Official writs from the League Department of Justice or Department of Defense can force your hand legally, just as a direct order from the Elite Four or Champion can, but much of the PL leadership is very skittish on the subject of actually trying to order deputized trainers. You can expect more indirect methods from the PL when they need trainers to act, such as emergency bulletins promising a reward for cooperation. Otherwise, they're hoping that deputized trainers take up the mantle of peacekeeper out of a sense of patriotism or goodwill."

'So like that alert we got outside of Mauville from that Pokemon Ranger.'' Lee recalls the incident with the roving Zangoose pack. "I see, and if someone in the League gives us an order without a writ?"

"Legally, it's a strong suggestion, not an order. Be wary of burning bridges, though. For example, if an official in League Accounting and Finance is demanding your assistance for a non-life-threatening matter, you can disregard them. If it's someone within your sphere, say, the League Academic Board, you may want to weigh the pros and cons before making a decision, lest they make your life more difficult. If you ever have doubts, call me right away."

Lee sits and thinks for a moment, eyes jumping to his open laptop and the typed-out notes within. He was in the middle of brainstorming a way to mitigate Grovyle's relative fragility in battle, and finding a way to combine Leaf Blade and Absorb for a 'life-steal' effect seemed like the way to go. Amanda's call interrupted the research.

With a contemplative hum, Lee returns his eyes to his phone. "Seems like an unnecessarily mercenary system if you ask me. Are there many incidents that pop up as a consequence of the current setup?"

"Not too many. Several a year, usually relating to white-collar crime or willful misinterpretation of the law in the line of duty. I'm still dreading the day one of those is dropped on my desk." There is the sound of a pen scratching upon paper over the speaker. "Bills have been introduced to reform the deputization system, but incident statistics, or lack thereof, give opponents of the bills too much weight. A cost-cutting argument falls flat as well, as only trainers providing extra services like Lab Trainers are afforded a paycheck."

The more Lee hears about the inner workings of the Pokemon League, the more it seems like an unknowable, nightmarish behemoth of bureaucracy to him. Departments and officials with poorly defined duties, checks and balances all out of whack, Gym Leaders and Elites reigning like lords, authority being handed out like candy— and that's before factoring in the civil government that handles day-to-day municipal and mundane functions. To further complicate matters, it seems like the Pokemon League and civil government are perpetually at each other's throats all the time.

'Yet, Leader Moore complains about bureaucracy constantly being a thorn in his side?' Ninetales chimes in on his thoughts. 'I recall him stating that even ordering common office supplies through the League wasn't worth the effort.'

'True… but Moore does have a black mark on his record for ditching his post for the war. A single pencil pusher isn't going to mess with a Gym Leader, but…' Lee leaves the telepathic line hanging.

'...With a target on his back, the spineless sort would be willing to gang up on him,' the vixen concludes with a frown and a flick of her ear. 'Attempting the same thing on a Gym Leader in good standing would be career suicide.'

'Petty office politics aside, poverty and crime are at lows that would have been impossible on Earth, so for all the nonsense they get up to, the Pokemon League must be doing something right.'

"Just a few incidents a year, huh?" Lee hums, returning his head to the phone call. In the back of his mind, he idly touches the calm current of emotions running between himself and Ninetales, like dipping a finger in a warm river. The zoologist smiles, a realization baring itself to him. "While I'm not endorsing the system, I'm willing to bet the pokemon themselves also factor into the lack of incidents. I know for a fact none of my pokemon would agree to any immoral shenanigans. The League is working with closely bonded teams, not individuals, and there is a degree of internal moderation within a team like that," Lee says, looking at this pokemon.

Grovyle nods firmly.

Octillery's nod is slower, and a bit more uncaring, but it's still an affirmation.

Shinx ceases cuddling the fox tail in her grasp, staring back at Lee with big, innocent eyes.

Finally, Ninetales raises her nose. 'I don't think you have a treacherous bone in your body, Beloved,' she says. 'If the impossible day comes where you are led astray, I'll happily guide you back.'

Smiling, Lee turns his head back to his phone. "I don't want to disappoint them just as they don't want to disappoint me. Perhaps pokemon are the keystone keeping everything in place?"

"I'm not a pokemon trainer, so maybe that's the answer," Amanda concedes. "It's still a legal nightmare waiting to happen, though."

"I guess so. Anyway…" Lee glances at the clock on the wall. "I know I've kept you for longer than I intended. Sorry about that, Amanda. I'll let you go for now and consult you before I engage the Lavaridge courts."

"It's not a problem, Lee. It's what I'm here for. Have a nice day."

"Same to you."

There is a click from Lee's phone, then the call ends.

Taking the cellphone and slipping it back into his pocket, Lee leans back in his chair with a sigh. "Trainer, nutritionist, amateur electrician, public figure, and now private investigator," he mutters. "I get that trainers need to be flexible, but this towering pillar of hats is getting heavy."

'Don't worry too much. We're here to help each step of the way.' Ninetales vocalizes her telepathic words for Grovyle and Octillery's benefit. 'Right?' she asks with a short yip, one deeper than a mundane fox could make.

Grovyle lets out an affirmative growl deep in his throat, his yellow eyes meeting Lee's.

Octillery just nods once more.

Emerging from her cozy blanket of tails, Shinx makes her support known by leaping from the bed to Lee's lap with a somewhat clumsy bound, one that forces her to dig her claws into Lee's leg a bit to steady herself. The kitten cuddles herself to her trainer's stomach, purring up a storm.

A smile rises to Lee's face.

A sharp knock on the door draws everyone's eyes, and Lee glances at Ninetales.

'It's Zinnia and Shelgon,' the fox provides after reaching her mind out. 'And a pokemon I've not met before. Would you like me to open it?'

'If you could, please.'

Ninetales narrows her eyes, a violet glow to them.

The knob of the hotel room door is enveloped in a corona the same color as Ninetales' eyes. Slowly, hesitantly, the knob twists seemingly of its own accord. The metal groans for a split second when Ninetales twists the knob as far as it can go, but she quickly eases her force off. The door then slowly swings open, letting Zinnia stride in. Following shortly behind her is Shelgon, and behind Shelgon is a pokemon resembling a miniaturized t-rex, standing just short of three feet tall. Its scales are brown and rocky, with orange outcroppings on its head and stubby tail. Its short forearms end in two white claws, its feet ending in three. Around its neck is a crest of white spines, just as white as the large teeth lining its jaws. Its eyes scan the room, taking in everyone and everything with suspicion.

'Ah, looks like Tyrunt finally arrived.'

"Well, it certainly took that lab long enough," Lee says. Every part of him desperately wants to get up close and examine the living fossil that just strolled in, but he restrains himself just as Zinnia instructed a few days prior. "Just today?"

"Just today," Zinnia nods. She sighs in an exasperated manner, but she can't quite hide her excitement. "Tyrunt is a spirited little guy, that's for sure. The lab had some trouble getting him into a ball, so I can't really be upset that they ran behind for a few days. I had to cut today's investigations short to pick him up, but I did get a few interesting leads."

The entire time she's speaking, Tyrunt eyes the various unfamiliar pokemon in the room, all of whom meet his gaze without a flinch. When he finally sees Shinx, a growl rolls out of his throat.

The kitten stiffens in Lee's lap, turning her spooked yellow eyes to Tyrunt.

The dino cracks his jaws open, letting his growl grow louder. In Lee's lap, Shinx's hackles rise and her claws dig into his thigh.

Hissing, Lee reaches his mind across the short, telepathic gulf to Ninetales. 'Ninetales, just as Zinnia said. Let Tyrunt know he can't be a bully.'

Ninetales hops off of Lee's bed in a flurry of gold fur and hellish red eyes, standing directly before Tyrunt. Drawing her lips back and baring her teeth, a snarl fit for a beast twice her size rips through the room. Rolling tongues of flame weave between the foxes' teeth and trail the edges of Ninetales' mouth as she takes a step forward. Behind her, her tails ruffle and shiver like angered snakes.

For a moment, it looks as if Tyrunt might actually rise to the challenge, baring his own teeth and lowering himself to charge.

Sucking in a breath, Lee raises a hand and signals both Grovyle and Octillery, who both tense up. At the same time, he gets ready to jump out of the way if Tyrunt is foolish enough to try his luck.

At the very last second, though, Tyrunt seems to rethink his stance and backs down with a bitter, defiant snap of his jaws. He steps back and glares at Ninetales, defeated but unbowed, letting Ninetales dial back her defensive posture.

It's right then that Shelgon whips his whole body around and smashes Tyrunt right in the nose with his forehead, sending the prehistoric pokemon to the floor with a pained screech.

Zinnia, as casual as can be, steps over to her downed pokemon and stares down at him with disapproval. "Are you done?" She asks, voice flat.

Any sort of protest Tyrunt has dies in his throat when Shelgon takes Zinnia's right side. There's no anger on the shelled dragon's face—just apathy, as if Tyrunt isn't worth the notice.

Lee's body breaks out into goosebumps as he watches. 'It's one thing to hear Zinnia describe how Dragons operate…it's another thing to see it.' He gulps, his stomach rolling a bit. 'I never liked dominance struggles when they pop up in nature, and I think I like them even less here.'

One of Ninetales' tails reaches back, wrapping itself around one of his legs in silent comfort.

Tyrunt rises back to his feet. His head is held low and submissive, but his eyes burn with frustration.

"Next time, don't be afraid to rough him up," Zinnia addresses Ninetales. "Tyrunt needs to learn his boundaries no matter how uncomfortable it makes Dolittle."

Lee schools his face into something more neutral at being called out, while Ninetales nods coolly.

"So, how did your end go?" Zinnia asks while seating herself on the edge of Lee's bed. "I've got a few leads after asking around. It's less than I wanted, but I'm going to count my outing as a success." Beside her, Shelgon lays down on his shell while Tyrunt submissively sits.

Pulling his eyes away from Tyrunt, Lee chews on his lip. "Everything went well, I suppose. Both myself and Brendan have legal weight to swing around. We can acquire warrants, perform lawful arrests, and conduct investigations like any police officer can, which I think is a little fucked." Lee shakes his head and leans back in his chair, stroking Shinx's back with a hand. "My lawyer is not fond of the idea of me being involved with anything, but she didn't drop me as a client, so I consider that a win."

"Ha!" Zinnia laughs. "Seems like everyone is clamoring to be your best friend except for the ones involved in law. There's gotta be some kind of takeaway in that."

"Yeah, that this boneheaded system wouldn't work if the trainers and pokemon didn't self-moderate themselves with mutual expectations of each other's character," Lee grunts. "Supposedly, issues are few and far between. The more I think about it, though, the more I think Amanda was right in her grievances."

Zinnia idly kicks her feet. "Maybe the League knew pokemon would be a good linchpin to ensure good behavior?" she speculates, coming to the same conclusion Lee did. "If it works, then it works."

"I guess," Lee concedes. "What did you learn while you were out?"

"A few things," Zinnia whips her phone out and unlocks it, opening it to a screen of shorthand notes. "Lavaridge is a hotspot for Magma, no pun intended," she grins and winks. "Usually, gangs don't like hanging around towns with Gym Leaders for obvious reasons, but you can find Magma thugs in the usual haunts pretty easily around here. Dive bars, shitty nightclubs, generally any grimy hangout. I barely need to doll myself up and small-time gangsters are lining up to schmooze with me."

Lee can't keep the frown off of his face at the imagery Zinnia's words invoke. "And you've been going to these places alone?"

Zinnia rolls her red eyes. "Save the chivalry for a princess, Dolittle. I keep my pokeballs out on display and that keeps guys from getting handsy." When Lee's dour face persists, she continues; "Lee, I'd bring you along, but I only need a change of clothes and a bit of make-up to be unrecognizable. You're way too high-profile to do anything covert. If I take you with me, you'll scare every Magma grunt into shutting up or just outright leaving any place we go to. Your face is…" she pauses, seemingly searching for a word. "...Distinctive."

Lee opens his mouth to protest, only to realize he doesn't have a good counter-argument. All he can do is rub the scars on his face and curse under his breath. 'Yet again, I'm missing being a nobody.'

"Just leave this part to me." Zinnia's smile is reassuring, at least. "I got some good info last night and a bit today. With any luck, we'll have enough to act on soon."

"...Fine," Lee grumbles, waving for Zinnia to continue. "Please, keep going."

"Gladly!" Zinnia looks at her notes and scrolls the phone screen down with a thumb. "One guy with more ink than brain cells bragged about being a high-level grunt or something. He said he helped a Magma lieutenant move something heavy between warehouses here in Lavaridge a few weeks back, and mentioned the crates came in by ground with a bit of prodding, which narrows the list of answers for another little project of mine."

Lee raises an eyebrow. "Maybe we should finish what we're doing first before starting something else?"

"It ties into everything, promise!" The dragon tamer insists. "Anyway, they're moving things after dark and all that, and a little coincidence pops up when I look around to see if their movements line up with any kind of local events." She shifts her phone over to the browser and goes to the Lavaridge municipal website. From there, she pulls up a calendar built into the site and turns the screen to face Lee. "See anything odd?"

Lee and Shinx both lean in, even if Shinx has no idea what she's looking at. The rest of Lee's team step closer or angle themselves to better see as well.

On the calendar are a few events and notices, innocent things like local holidays and whatnot, but in red lettering are several notices saying: "Lift to Mt Chimney Out of Order." The next morning for each is another notice saying: "Lift to Mt Chimney repaired." There isn't a hard pattern, but the lift seems to go down once every five to ten days.

"The lift seems to be going down a lot," Lee scratches his chin. "Are these dates in-line with Magma's movements?"

Zinnia sighs. "I'm still trying to get exact dates, but one of these days, in particular, stands out." She taps one of the more recent occurrences on the screen with a finger. "That day we let Courtney out of our sight? The lift breaks. My gut is telling me something is off with that."

A frown returns to Lee's lips. Reclining back into a more comfortable position, he meets eyes with each one of his pokemon sans Shinx, who lays quietly in his lap. "That does seem suspect, but for obvious reasons, we can't interrogate her too much on where she was or why it matters."

"We can't squeeze Courtney for info, but we can squeeze everyone else, and that's where you come in, Lee." Zinnia smirks. "The Mount Chimney lift 'breaking' so often opens a window for us, meaning you, to come knocking about concerns of criminal negligence or sabotage. If all of this is connected like I think it is and the lift breaking is a smokescreen to move things to the volcano, then they have to have someone pulling strings to let them move things up there unnoticed."

Lee blows out a breath. "Seems like a bit of a leap to me, if I'm being honest," he says, silently feeling like a scumbag for going along with this song and dance. It would make everyone's lives easier if he could just tell Zinnia that he knows Magma is up to no good up there.

'I need to replay Pokemon Emerald soon, preferably tonight.' A sobering thought strikes Lee. 'If I don't refresh my memory and be ready for what's to come… then telling everyone, or at least Zinnia, what I know might be the best move to make. We can't protect them otherwise.'

Ninetales, who is sitting in on her trainer's thoughts, speaks up. 'Lee, weigh that option carefully,' she says, wrapping a comforting, telepathic tendril of reassurance around his psyche. 'What is the saying? Once that genie is free of the bottle, it does not go back in.'

'I will, Nine. I will.'

The tendril of reassurance unfolds into a thick blanket, covering Lee with a warmth that he can practically feel on his skin. The mental conversation takes a split second, so Lee is able to return his attention outward in time for Zinnia's reply.

"Which is why I'm going to do more sleuthing until more pieces fall into place, then we can bust 'em!" Zinnia's smirk is traded for a full, nasty grin. "I've got a Magma goon a bit higher on the totem pole nice and hooked, and I'm meeting him for drinks tonight. If all goes well, he'll sing like a Swablu, so hang tight and I'll have more to work with tomorrow."

'Zinnia knows how to handle herself, don't worry too much,' Lee thinks to himself. The flash of jealousy from Ninetales is ignored. "Alright, and this other project involving Magma you mentioned?"

"For a while now…" Zinnia crosses her legs. "I've been trying to triangulate the headquarters and ID the leaders of Magma and Aqua. Information from a few contacts and my own wandering has left me with an incomplete heatmap of their activity, and Lavaridge's Magma presence has me thinking that they may be based out of Lavaridge or somewhere in Mount Chimney. Since they're moving supplies by ground here, it would make sense to be in close proximity to the town."

'That's actually a good observation…' Lee blinks. Lavaridge's awkward location in the center of Hoenn's main landmass must mean moving long-distance freight by ground is a chore. "Sharp eye."

"Thank you," Zinnia preens. "Moving on, Aqua has almost zero presence away from coastlines, and I'm fairly sure they're hiding out in either Lilycove City or another coastline city to the east. I still need to confirm that one, though. Aqua has been a pain in the ass to track since they love doing their dirty business out at sea and away from prying eyes."

"Makes sense…" Lee nods. "Sounds like we have a game plan, then. I'll wait to hear back from you about your side. Business as usual until then?"

"Business as usual 'till then." Zinnia smiles, and it's a rare, genuine one that reaches all the way up to her eyes. "Thanks for all of this, Lee. I know we've had our rough patches, but I'm seriously glad we met. You're a damn good friend."

Lee smiles right back. "I could say the same about you."

Rising back to her feet, Zinnia beckons Shelgon and the still-sullen Tyrunt to follow. "I'm gonna go find a private training field to trash with Shelgon and Tyrunt. Wanna come with?"

"I've got a few things to take care of here, so maybe later."

"Suit yourself!" Zinnia waves over her shoulder as she and her pokemon leave.

Once the door closes behind them, Lee can finally stop ignoring the buzz of Ninetales' concentrated jealousy and give the fox a concerned stare. 'Love, what's the matter? Your temper has been way too short here recently.'

Ninetales cools her emotions, though Lee can easily notice how forced it is. 'It's no matter, Beloved.'

'I think it is,' Lee spins his laptop around to face Octillery. The octopus pokemon wastes no time tabbing back over to an online book he was reading before Lee commandeered the device. 'You were about ready to take May's face off when we had dinner with her and her friends, remember?'


After inviting Ash and his friends to join him and Ninetales for dinner, Lee led the newly expanded group to one of the many traditional Asian restaurants lining Lavaridge's streets. After being seated at a low table using cushions as seats and ordering their food, the group settled in for idle chatter as they waited. May, Brock, and Max took one side of the table while Lee, Ninetales, and Ash, who had no qualms about being in close proximity to a 'dangerous' pokemon, took the other. After failing to do so before, Lee decided to start things off by picking Brock's brain, easily sparking a conversation.

"Sodium and other minerals, huh?" Lee asks, looking away from Brock to Ash's smiling Pikachu, who is on his trainer's shoulder. "I think that would neatly explain it. Ketchup does have a fair bit of salt, and although I can't speak to the tastes of rodents, I get the feeling that salt would be the tastiest of them."

Brock nods, a smile on his face. "Mmhmm. I adjusted Pikachu's diet a little with the inclusion of a few mineral supplements, and I think it really helped since he's not swiping ketchup bottles from restaurants anymore."

Both Lee and the teen look over to Pikachu once more… who is eyeballing a half-full bottle of the red condiment on another table.

Ash notices as well and chuckles sheepishly. "Maybe he got a taste for it, though…"

"A little won't hurt, but too much sodium intake might leave Pikachu dehydrated," Lee comments. "The cheap stuff also has a distasteful amount of sugar."

Brock nods right along with the assessment, looking at Ninetales as he does so.

It seems like opening on the subject of pokemon health was the right move, as the tanned teenager is much more at ease now, even if it leaves Ash, May, and Max out of the conversation until the topic changes.

"I gotta say," Brock begins, crossing his arms. "We've encountered a few Ninetales over the years, but I've never been in a position to ask what goes into their care. I fostered a Vulpix for about a year, and she taught me a lot about caring for pokemon. Is there much of a difference upon evolution?"

'Ah, that's right. Brock did have what's-her-name's Vulpix until Johto, didn't he?' Lee thinks, watching Brock intently scan Ninetales through his squinted eyes.

'He cared for her quite well, if your memories of the TV show are any indicator,' Ninetales' telepathic voice rings with approval, and it's clear that Brock is her favorite of Ash's friends by a mile. From her place beside Lee, she regards the Rock-type specialist with an appraising eye, finally taking her displeased gaze off of May.

It seems that the young girl's crush hasn't faded yet, as she can't help but shyly steal glances at Lee when she thinks no one is looking.

'He's an intelligent kid with a bright future for sure.' Lee agrees with Ninetales on Brock. 'Oh, and Nine? No need to stare daggers into May. She's just a little girl with a crush. It'll go away.'

"Well, considering the rarity of her kind and the corresponding scarcity of info, I'm kind of playing things by ear right now," Lee admits, answering Brock's question. "It has required a bit of trial and error, building on her prior routines, and a lot of communication. Honestly, it's a lot to put into words, so if you like…" Lee reaches behind him where his backpack is sitting. Undoing the zipper and fishing his hand inside, he withdraws his first notebook. Already knowing the page by heart, he flips to Ninetales' section and offers it to Brock. "Here are a few notes I took if you'd like to see them. These are a little out of date, but are still good."

The notes aren't anything too revealing: just recipes, nutritional facts on ingredients, calorie counts, a grooming schedule, the results of a few token cognitive and physical tests, anatomical notes, and other idle thoughts on paper.

Brock reaches over the table and gingerly takes the notebook, looking down and scanning the page, his eyebrows rise almost to his hairline. "That's thorough… I don't think there has ever been more information on a Ninetales in one place."

May and Max, who are sitting at Brock's sides, lean over to read the notes as well. Max blinks and adjusts his glasses as he reads, while May just seems lost. Regardless, the young girl levels Lee with a shy smile. "Wow, Lee! You're even smarter than I thought!" After a moment of mustering her nerve, she continues on. "We're going to be in Lavaridge for a while as we wait for Ash's gym match, so is it okay if, maybe…" She twiddles her fingers together and looks at him with large, hopeful eyes. "…We train with you sometime?"

A spike of raw hostility not his own nearly transforms Lee's smile into a snarl, and when he stomps the emotion down, Ninetales twitches.

"T-Thank you, May…" Lee barely keeps his smile in place. "That's very kind of you. I'll have to see what my schedule allows." Inwardly, another conversation furiously takes place.

'Ninetales, what the fuck was that?' Lee demands. 'You were two seconds away from baring your teeth and growling right in the middle of the restaurant. What happened there?'

'...' The vixen looks away, refusing to answer.

'Ninetales…'

After a second, which may as well be a full minute in a telepathic exchange, Ninetales answers. 'I don't know.'

'You don't know?' Lee blinks incredulously. Mentally, he reaches his connection deeper into the fox, trying to divine just what caused Ninetales' anger.

Only for Ninetales to rebuke his probing, telepathic touch, not unlike someone slapping his hand away. The pushback is hard enough to make a headache bloom in his skull instantly. Lee winces not from the pain, but from the realization that he overstepped his bounds. 'Love, I'm sorry about that. That wasn't my intention.'

'Being jealous wasn't my intention, either!' Ninetales scowls and constricts her end of the telepathic channel, ending the conversation.

"Lee? Why is Ninetales suddenly so upset?"

Lee comes back to reality at the question, looking over Max. The young boy studies the glowering fox with a healthy dose of wariness, just as Brock does. May…

May seems to realize that Ninetales doesn't like her and keeps her eyes averted. The poor girl blinks away tears. If the tears are from fright or not, Lee cannot say.

On Ninetales' opposite side, Pikachu stands in Ash's lap, ready to jump into action at a moment's notice. Ash himself frowns but otherwise remains neutral.

Blowing out a weary breath, Lee debates on what to say. "Well, since it's all over BattleNet, I don't see the need to hide it anymore. Ninetales can use telepathy, and we had a bit of a disagreement just now."

"But…" Max hesitates. "Isn't she your first pokemon?"

Ash, surprisingly, cuts in to answer. "Just because a pokemon is your first partner doesn't mean you can't have arguments," he says, self-assured. "Pikachu and I didn't always get along, and we still don't agree on everything."

In Ash's lap, Pikachu nods seriously, only to smile when Ash rubs a hand along his head.

"We're still friends, though, and we work everything out!" The Kanto-born boy smiles, dispelling the uncertain cloud hanging over the table, and doing so seemingly without effort. "Every kind of relationship is a work-in-progress, the one between pokemon and trainer especially."

"Very well put, Ash!" Brock smiles as well.

"A work-in-progress, huh?" Lee murmurs, silently impressed. "That fits."

Ninetales remains steadfastly silent.

Despite Ash's uplifting declaration, dinner is still a quiet and somewhat awkward affair. When the bill is paid and everyone says their goodbyes, Lee and Ninetales return to their hotel, where they don't speak to each other for the rest of the night.


Ninetales cringes at the vivid memory.

'Love, I've been content to wait until you're comfortable talking, but we've pretended nothing is wrong for days now,' Lee rises from his seat, carrying Shinx in his arms. He sits back down on the bed next to Ninetales. 'Please, talk to me.'

Just like the day prior, the fox refuses to reply, instead just looking away and shutting Lee out of her mind.

"Guys?" Lee speaks up, catching both Grovyle and Octillery's attention. "I need a private moment with Ninetales. Do you mind if…" Lee takes three pokeballs from his belt and holds them aloft.

Grovyle barely needs to give it any thought before he nods with an affirmative trill in his throat.

Octillery, on the other hand, lets out a long-suffering sigh and shuts the lid of Lee's laptop, nodding slowly. With that, both he and Grovyle are returned to their balls as flashes of red.

Looking down at his lap, Lee strokes Shinx across her head. "I'll let you out as soon as I can, okay, baby girl?"

The kitten gives Lee large, sad eyes that tug at his heartstrings, but she doesn't fuss when she's zapped by the red beam of her pokeball and returned. Lee then sets the balls on the bed and covers them with a pillow, effectively muting anything the three pokemon can hear.

Not sure where to start, Lee wraps an arm around Ninetales' shoulders. "Nine?"

The fox leans into the hug, but doesn't say anything in response.

"Nine," Lee leans into her in-turn, resting his head on hers. "Take all the time you need, but I think we should talk about our spat. You got so upset out of nowhere that it was honestly frightening. I don't want you to feel like that all the time," he says, gently rubbing her shoulder with his hand.

For several minutes, Ninetales remains mute, instead looking around the room. Finally, she licks her lips and breaks her silence. 'I don't know, and that's the honest truth.' Her tails wrap around Lee, returning his hug like a living, silky cape. 'I simply didn't like the attention May was giving you. I don't have a rational answer,' she admits, frustrated. 'I don't like it when anyone does.'

'When anyone gives me attention?' Lee prods. 'Or just women? Flannery, Zinnia, and now May. You were amused by her crush before. What happened?' He pauses. 'When you agreed that we don't want our relationship to go in that direction, were you just humoring me?'

'No,' Ninetales' answer is quick and woven with reassuring honesty as she slowly reopens her mind to Lee. She peers into his blue eyes with her reds. 'Just as we discussed, I am more than happy with what we have now, and anything more just adds an unneeded layer.' A growl rolls from her throat. 'I don't… I don't know what the issue is!'

'Would you be okay if I tried to find out?' Lee asks after a moment, guilt over his near-intrusion gnawing at him.

'Please, go ahead,' Ninetales draws in a deep breath, pulling her end of the psychic connection wide, essentially baring her soul to him. 'I've nothing to hide from you.'

Before preparing himself to dive into Ninetales' psyche, Lee stops short for a moment. 'I'm sorry for trying to delve deeper than surface thoughts without asking, Nine. That wasn't right of me.'

The golden fox smiles, pulling her head back enough to lick her trainer across the side of his nose. 'That's sweet of you, Lee, but don't invent things to apologize for. I'm the one who should be sorry. We promised no secrets, remember?'

Knowing arguing further is pointless, Lee shuts his eyes and reaches his mind across the short channel to Ninetales.

Even with no talent of his own in telepathy, Ninetales' mind is so familiar, that Lee can navigate his tendril of thought around without any sort of issue. He dives past her stream of conscious thought, down deeper into the confusing crisscross of the subconscious. It's curious, he thinks, that a telepath cannot peer directly into their own subconscious, but that someone else can.

'Or it might be unique to our relationship,' Ninetales silently provides.

Or that.

The phantasmal place below the sea of conscious thought can't really be likened to anything that exists in a 3D space, but nonetheless, Lee's brain fills in the blank with a winding web. In that web, urges and emotions are free to surge back and forth like lightning bolts.

Close to the surface are things he can plainly understand, each one ephemeral, like a pang of hunger and a whimsical desire to satiate said hunger with something meaty and savory. Others repeat themselves over and over, like Ninetales' pleasure at being wrapped in a hug.

Deeper, things become more esoteric and divorced from the waking mind. Much of what goes on here is a chore to comprehend even for Lee. Ninetales, who piggybacks off of his awareness, simply cannot make sense of what goes on here and is stonewalled from diving further. There is a lingering disgust for arachnids and the desire to kill them, fears of formless dangers to come, a selfish want of fame and control, impulses of violence, an unearthly, almost blinding love for Lee, and an ugly, resigned despair of growing old alone. Lee tightens his hug, and the last thought slinks away to hide.

Below that is a level of pitch blackness, where only the most primal of thoughts light the dark with their constant flashes. Any lower, and words will fail to describe what comes after. Here in this animalistic trench, the raw need for food, rest, comfort, sex, fulfillment, and the other driving forces of life resides. The surges of unrefined need are unspeakably ancient, and here without the insulation of the rest of Ninetales' mind, each one twists and yanks at Lee's being. Even so deep here, almost disconnected from his body, he still feels his stomach roll and tingle as uncomfortable emotions rise within him.

Focusing, Lee touches a strand of the web, a vague, muddy picture of himself standing with a woman at the front of his mind. He watches, ready to chase down the spike of jealousy and find what is bothering his partner so.

He doesn't expect Ninetales' entire being to light up with vehement anguish, which is quashed by fury and jealousy a moment later. It's so startling that Lee is forced to withdraw back into his own head. He blinks away the lightheadedness of the sudden evacuation.

'Ninetales, calm down. It was just an image,' Lee hugs Ninetales tightly, stilling the infuriated tremors that run up and down her frame. Slowly, the overwhelming deluge of emotion tapers off, and Ninetales is left hanging her head in Lee's arms.

'I just…' Ninetales growls. 'I don't know! I don't!' Her tails leave their place around Lee and lash against the bed in frustration. With the might in the nine limbs, the bed rumbles against the floor from the blow.

"Shhh, it's alright," Lee holds the shuddering fox close and lowers his voice to a soothing whisper. "Whatever this is, we'll figure it out." He switches back to telepathy. 'I believe you, Nine. I couldn't make heads or tails of where the reaction came from.'

'I thought I had my affairs figured out after evolving,' Ninetales' telepathic voice has a bitter bite to it. 'I don't like feeling this way.'

'We'll figure it out together,' Lee quietly insists. 'Are you afraid of being replaced? You know you're the definition of irreplaceable, right?'

Ninetales snorts and raises her head slightly. 'I don't think it's that. Maybe.'

Lee thinks to himself, but with his head muddled by the brush with Ninetales' inner self, he can't quite come up with any other explanations. 'Well, let me reassure you on this,' Lee leans his head into Ninetales' touching his forehead to hers and staring into her ruby-like eyes. 'There is no one in the world who can take the special place you have, Ninetales. I love you more than anything in the world, and that will never change.'

Ninetales blinks, and Lee's entire body grows warm from the outpouring of love her mind dumps into him.

'We've got people who can help, like Nigel, Mable, Xatu, and that old Pokemon Master, Lokoko,' Lee continues, a smile on his face. 'We'll figure everything out. If you ever get annoyed with someone because you don't like how they're treating me, just smile and remember; I love you.'

The great fox smiles back. It's a small, delicate thing. 'And I, you, Beloved.'

Lee feels her mind reach out and gently grasp his, reeling it in to touch hers tenderly. Just like the last time, the world turns into a haze of bliss as both man and vixen bare themselves to each other, utterly and totally.

The pair don't stay locked in that rolling, fantastic oasis of thought and affection for long. They're together only for a few minutes, but it's more than enough to quell any fears and doubts for now.

Returning to his senses, Lee reluctantly peels himself away from his fox. It takes a second for his entirely-relaxed body to catch up, but he reaches under the pillow of his bed, grabbing the trio of pokeballs beneath. "Alrighty, ladies and gents," he stands and stretches. "Back to work."


The sun is hitting high noon in Verdanturf, and Corvisquire finds that he doesn't care for his heated feathers distracting him from his pondering.

Why run?

Why run?

Why run?

The infuriating Medicham from several nights prior forced this introspection upon him with that stupid, repeated question, and it makes the raven want to pluck his feathers out. He flew to a Sitrus grove to heal his injuries from the one-sided fight, but that lanky bastard was there, and he looked right up at Corvisquire. Reluctantly, the raven retreated, and his slowly mending aches forced him to sit and think with little else to do.

Day in and day out, Corvisquire sat in his favorite tree and meditated, hating each moment.

The brat and the fool haven't returned since that night, and it's beginning to look as if this detour has been all for naught. Trying to manufacture a foe for his evolution has failed.

'Yet another thing you've failed at.'

Corvisquire violently shakes his head once more, shaking the branch beneath him and dislodging the intrusive voice.

Why run?

Because I'm a coward.

There is a rustle in the brush off to the eastern side of the clearing, drawing Corvisquire's eyes instantly. When the intruder steps through, the bird pokemon blinks incredulously.

From the greenery comes Wally and Kirlia. The boy is carrying a wicker basket laden with berries. Considering the berries are all of the sweet variety, the boy might be more observant than Corvisquire thought.

The pair walk up when Corvisquire makes no attempt to chase them away, stopping at the foot of his tree.

"Mister Corvisquire?" Wally begins, nervously kicking a foot along the ground. "We're sorry if what Kirlia said to you hurt your feelings. H-He didn't mean to! He just lost control of his telepathy when he evolved! We practiced really hard before coming back so he wouldn't see any of your memories!"

Any vitriol bubbling upon Corvisquire's tongue fizzles out at the admission. He tries to muster something, but his anger just burns out, leaving him weary. "Tell no one what you saw, and I'll consider the score settled…" He sighs. "Now go away… And do not come back. Take your treats, too. I'm not hungry."

"But Mister Corvisquire…" Kirlia is the one to speak next. Guilt carves hard lines into his youthful face. "We still want to help you…"

Corvisquire sucks in a sharp breath. "If you know what you claim to know, then you're already aware that nothing can be done. Unless you have beseeched Dialga herself to appear and turn back the clock, go away."

Both Wally and Kirlia flinch. "T-That wasn't your fault…" Kirlia forces out.

The cold, nearly dead coal base where Corvisquire's anger rests roars back to life. "Yes it was!" The raven screams back, spreading his wings to balance himself in his sudden rage. "Yes it was!"

"No it wasn't!" Kirlia screams right back, tears pricking his eyes. He clenches his eyes shut. "Stop pretending you're not worth anything!"

Coevisquire explodes.

"What do you know, fool?!" Corvisquire's voice echoes through the trees, and his eyes shine red in his frothing anger. "I was born and bred to be there, to be his First and Most Faithful! I failed! Then I ran away like a coward!" The raven's cries batter the pair as he jumps down from his tree and stands before them, all rancor and ruffled feathers. "What would you do, hmm?! What would you do in my place!? Hmm?! Speak up, lowborn mongrel!"

Wally shivers in fright, only stilling himself when Kirlia steps in front of him.

Corvisquire hacks out a mocking laugh. "How brave. Would you continue being so brave if your trainer was ripped away from you like mine was? No! You would do nothing!"

Why run?

Because I'll fail again.

Kirlia grits his teeth and forces back tears. "Wally?" He asks quietly. "Would you love me even if I failed you? Failed you so bad, that what I failed at can't be fixed?"

"Of course!" Wally's answer is so instant that Corvisquire's laughter is cut short. "Always!"

"If…" Kirlia gulps. "If you d-died, would you be upset if I found another trainer?"

"Never…" The green-haired boy's eyes soften into something tender, something achingly familiar to Corvisquire. "Would you blame yourself and call yourself worthless if something did happen?"

Kirlia is quiet for a moment, as the very thought of Wally expiring seems to root the little psychic in place. "N-No."

"Why?"

"B-Because," Kirlia's red horns quiver and hum, his psychic powers venting the sheer emotion gripping him into the air. "Because I know you would want me to be happy, and I won't ruin your memory by wallowing in despair." He raises his head, staring directly into Corvisquire's eyes with such noble resolve that the raven is frozen on his feet. "Even if I sometimes hurt because someone is gone, I'll never be afraid to reach out again." Each word is like a hammer blow to Corvisquire. "Love is always worth it."

A stabbing pain erupts in Corvisquire's chest. He looks down, expecting a beak, a claw, or a knife coated in blood.

He's unmarred.

Why run?

I don't deserve love.

The world grows blurry.


They were outside a small town on the second week of their journey when the first attack hit. The Young Master couldn't catch his breath after a run alongside Rookidee, eager to be back in civilization. He fell to his rear, gasping along the side of the road.

Rookidee did exactly as he was trained. Deft in both beak and talon, he opened his master's bag, located the inhaler the Lord of the Manor insisted the Young Master carry, and pressed it into the boy's hands.

The Young Master's shaking hands bring the inhaler up, and with an inhaled puff, the peril passes. Breathing a sigh of relief, the Master strokes Rookiedee along his head. "Oh, Rook. You really are the best."

Rookidee doesn't puff up under the praise. He's simply doing as the First and Most Faithful should. Silently, though, he will never tire of his master's love.


The attacks are growing more frequent in the third month of their sojourn. The Young Master led them through winding woods and fantastic new cities, but often he needed to pause to catch his breath and sometimes use his inhaler. When they returned to the civilized world, Rookidee took it upon himself to write reminders to the Young Master to refill his prescription.

A younger, more childish Rookidee bemoaned the lessons in literacy, art, and chivalry he spent with the Young Master, but now the ability to write has never been more valuable.

The inhaler medication is an uncommon one, one not always available in the more humble towns, so Rookidee always ensures there is enough in the Young Master's possession.

Despite his ailment, Young Master is so bright, so happy to be given the freedom to see beautiful Galar, and to share the experience with Rookidee. They didn't challenge the Gyms, or the Contest Halls. No, they were content with the travel, the fun, and the companionship of each other. For a boy of such noble privilege and wealth, the Young Master's ability to find joy in the small things left Rookidee in awe sometimes. He repaid his master's love one day in a battle, showing off Swift, a move he practiced in private as a surprise.

The Young Master's delight filled Rookidee with a wondrous sense of purpose.

With such happiness abound, why does it feel like a cloud hangs overhead?


It was month six.

He collapsed, inhaler falling from limp fingers.

Rookidee didn't panic. He held the inhaler to the Young Master's lips and administered the medicine himself.

It didn't work. They're hours away from the nearest town.

Rookidee tried to carry his Master, gripping the boy's shirt with his talons, but he was too weak to fly with such a load. He cursed himself and his weakness endlessly.

He yanked the SOS cord in the side of the Young Master's wristwatch, and the thing made a terrible wail. The screen flashed, saying help is on the way.

Was it hours or minutes? Hours or minutes, it didn't matter, it all came together into a terrible blur.

A helicopter escorted by a contingent of Corviknight landed nearby.


'Terminal.'

'Cerebral hypoxia.'

'Brain damage.'

'Nothing can be done.'

Words and phrases he's heard for weeks now. In the critical time it took for help to arrive, the Young Master stopped breathing for over five minutes.

Motostoke Children's Hospital scrambled when a young noble boy on a ventilator was rushed into their midst. Some of the brightest minds of Galar resided here, and through them Rookidee's world shattered.

A cancer, one that attacks specific cells in the lungs, was growing beneath the noses of everyone inside the Young Master. His lungs were losing their ability to process oxygen, and had been for years now. His childhood asthma was a gross misdiagnosis.

For all the wonders in the world of medicine, nothing can be done if it's too late.

The Lady of the Manor was inconsolable, and the Lord of the Manor stood with her, hiding his agony behind a wall more stalwart than any castle.

Day in and day out, Rookidee stood at his Master's hospital bed, remaining at his side like the First and Most Faithful should. The Young Master's sleeping face, once full of life, was now pale and gaunt beneath his oxygen mask, ravaged by harsh medicines. The Young Master could wither into an ugly, inert peppercorn, and it wouldn't matter to Rookidee.

He'll be here, at his side.

That is the duty of the First and Most Faithful.


They killed him. They pulled the plug. The instant Rookidee left his side for a day, recalled to the Manor by his Lord, the order was given and the Young Master's life support was cut.

Nothing can be done.

The line plagues him, clawing at his very being like a rabid Zangoose.

Nothing can be done.

They did it on purpose, calling him back. They wanted him away so he couldn't stop them.

Nothing can be done.

On the desk of the Lord of the Manner, Rookidee stands, staring blankly into the polished wood. Everything is numb, and he feels as if he's observing himself from the eyes of another. Stoutland and the Lord are there, and both forgive his abhorrent decorum. "I don't want him to die." The words leave his beak almost automatically. "There must have been something I could have done..."

"Rookidee…" The Lord of the Manor's hand falls upon Rookidee's head. It's heavy and worn, totally unlike the Young Master's hand. "You are hurt, as we all are, but you must understand…" The Lord of the Manor steels himself. "He was never going to wake up, and his illness would have taken him before long. Nothing was working, so do not blame yourself. You can't do anything."

Everything turns into a blur. With the snap of a pokeball's hinge and the shatter of glass, Rookidee flies. Inside him, the love fostered by his Master turns into a Seviper and sinks its toxic red fangs into him.

Nothing can be done.

You can't do anything.

Anywhere, anywhere but here. He flies, heedless of all else but getting away.

Nothing can be done.

You can't do anything.

There is only blue ocean below now.

Nothing can be done.

You can't do anything.

Light envelopes him, and anguish breaks his body, molding it into something new mid-air. From the shell of despair, Corvisquire feels the fires of anger grow within, suffusing his limbs with new and incredible might.

Why couldn't this happen when his Master needed help?! Why evolve now?! Why?!

Nothing can be done.

You can't do anything.

Corvisquire screams. Below, the water passes in a supersonic blur.

He flies, heedless of all else but getting away.

Nothing can be done.

You can't do anything.

He ran away like a coward.

There is green below. His wings can flap no more as the ground rushes up to greet him.

With any luck, he will die on impact.

It's not your fault.

Even if I sometimes hurt because someone is gone, I'll never be afraid to reach out again.

"Mister Corvisquire?"


The world comes back into sharp focus with a gasp. Looking up, Corvisquire takes in Wally and Kirlia without actually seeing them.

Kirlia steps forward, reaching a hesitant hand out. "Mister Corvisquire?"

The confusing whirl of memories and words leaves Corvisquire's head swimming. It takes longer than he cares to admit to steady himself. "What?" he asks, hoarse. There is no surge of rage to return him to lucidity.

"Are…Are you okay?" Wally twiddles his fingers together. "You were screaming."

"Was I?" Corvisquire swallows thickly. "Oh."

Kirlia pulls his hand back, seemingly unsure if he wants to approach. "Are you okay?" He repeats Wally's question.

It's not your fault.

Even if I sometimes hurt because someone is gone, I'll never be afraid to reach out again.

"Do you believe what you said?" Corvisquire asks, looking at the grass.

Both Wally and Kirlia blink.

"Your little speech," Corvisquire cannot even ruffle his feathers. The anger simply won't come to him. "Were you speaking from the heart?"

Kirlia sets his shoulders and nods. "Every single word."

"And do you thi-"

"It's not your fault," Kirlia cuts Corvisquire off. The psychic's face is understanding, and the raven… can't bring himself to hate it.

Mind awhirl, Corvisquire stares at the ground. A thousand thoughts plague him like biting insects, all demanding his attention. Through his mind's eye, things come and go, but a pair of faces stand out.

He sees the Young Master, and the boy's smile is more radiant than the sun. It's free of judgment. In those youthful, trusting eyes is love.

He sees Lee Henson. The scar-laden smile speaks of pain, pain both he and Corvisquire understand. In those weary, haggard eyes is love.

He ran away from both.

Even if I sometimes hurt because someone is gone, I'll never be afraid to reach out again.

Love is always worth it.

'I don't want to run anymore.'

"Listen and listen well," Corvisquire raises his head, leveling Wally and Kirlia with as stern a stare as he can. "In a tree sixty-seven meters south, the one with equal amounts of ivy and moss on its western flank, there is a Dawn Stone hidden in the knothole of the trunk. I stole it for you."

Both Wally and Kirlia gasp, visibly shocked. "Is that the stone Uncle was talking about? The one that the newspaper said went missing?" Wally asks Kirlia, apparently too startled to use telepathy.

"Use it, return it, leave it for someone else, I don't care," Corvisquire sniffs. "Your lessons with me are over. I have an obligation to return to, and I will not hear any stupid begging."

The pair of children get over the admission of theft quickly, and to Corvisquire's surprise, neither argue. "We understand," Kirlia smiles, and damn it, the raven wants to strangle him. "Are you going back to your new trainer?"

Corvisquire snaps his beak. "Yes, are you happy?"

Wally once more produces that heartache-inducing smile. "We are. Oh, Mister Corvisquire?" He calls when Corvisquire spreads his wings. "We'll miss you."

The Flying-type sighs. "For what it's worth… You two weren't totally hopeless."

Their childish faces light up.

Corvisquire doesn't stay around to hear any goodbyes or hear their reply, as he flaps his wings and rockets into the air, his heart thundering in his chest. Yawing to the side, he orients himself north, towards Mount Chimney.

Then he flies. Resolve, and just a little hope, fills each stroke of his wings.


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Act 2: Chapter 13
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"Sorry, sir, I don't even want to give you a quote on this." The apologetic man behind the electronic store counter slides Lee's old, cracked smartphone back to him. "I've never seen the style of port on your device before. Heck, I've never seen this brand in my life! I'm sorry, sir, I don't want to try because my inexperience with your brand means a risk of damage or data loss. If privacy concerns means Porygon can't get at your device and perform a data transfer, then I don't think I can do much. You might be better off consulting a proper electrical engineer for a proper battery swap and charging solution rebuild."

Floating at the counter attendant's side is a pokemon, one that looks like a simplistic, blue-and-pink duck made in a 3D modeling program. The Porygon shakes their head, letting out a series of downtrodden beeps.

A curious pokemon, Porygon. The sapient, hard-light pokemon is one Lee briefly considered acquiring due to their intellect and ability to interface with damn-near any computer. That thought was discarded after hearing about their multi-thousand credit price tag and their tragically short lives unless frequently maintained by their owners. Something about the ever-active and self-editing AI of a Porygon accumulates read-only partitions of junk data, kernel-deep errors, and other issues that turn into a lethal cascade failure if ignored too long. Porygon2 can apparently go much longer without debugging… Which requires the purchase of Porygon's expensive evolution catalyst, the Upgrade. Lee hasn't seen any mention of Porygon Z anywhere.

Lacking the experience needed to debug a pokemon and not wanting to invest the money into keeping a specialized programmer on retainer, Porygon was relegated to the Maybe Someday part of Lee's wanted list.

With a sigh, Lee takes the phone back and slips it into his pocket. "I understand. Thank you for taking the time to look."

"My pleasure!"

A moment later, Lee and Ninetales are outside the shop and in the Lavaridge streets, slowly making their way to the only other electronics repair shop in the city.

After his and Ninetales' heart-to-heart in the hotel room, Lee tended to the rest of his pokemon with a meal, then dug his old phone from his bag, intent on replaying Pokemon Emerald as a memory refresher. If he recalls correctly, he had also installed another emulator, one capable of running newer games. With any luck, a copy of the Pokemon Ruby remake, the one featuring Zinnia as a character, is also there. Being able to play both would be an incredible boon.

Upon pulling the old phone out and turning it on, Lee was met with a '0% charge' message. Not a problem, he thought. I'll just charge it.

Then the rude awakening came.

He doesn't have a charging cable.

Silph Co's omniwire-beta cable that came with Lee's Pokegear branded smartphone doesn't fit his old phone at all, and Lee tumbled into this world with only the things in his pockets.

What a frustrating, vexing, and just plain dumb way to be stopped short. Idly hoping for an equally dumb solution, Lee opened his current phone and looked up 'charging phone with electric pokemon'.

Naturally, what he got was a lot of news articles warning against doing such a thing, saying 'your precious Pikachu's Thundershock will destroy your phone.' The articles all referenced a fake ad campaign run by internet hooligans impersonating Silph Co with the goal of causing mischief.

Least intelligent method eliminated, Lee and his team ventured out into town to tour the various electronics stores. Two of the locations advertised repair services, and with any luck, one of them can pull some sort of miracle and revive the alien device.

Well, one down, one to go.

As they walk, Lee decides to kill two birds with one stone… Two Taillow with one Rock Throw? Eh, that doesn't flow quite as well in his mind. Pulling out his intact pokegear phone, Lee logs into BattleNet and navigates his way around, taking in the recent news on his way to the chat group section, where Lokoko and possible answers to Ninetales' unexpected temper might reside.

'Seems like our novelty is wearing off,' Lee silently comments to Ninetales as he scans their megathread. The number of posts per day has slowed down a fair amount, leaving only a few dedicated weirdos obsessing over Lee and his team. Someone ignited a furious debate with a proposal on Ninetales' 'stats', but that lasted only two days. Curious, Lee zooms in on the little wall of text.

Ninetales
Special Ability: ?
Typical Held Item:
N/A
Known Moves: Confuse Ray, Quick Attack, Payback, Baby-Doll Eyes, Hex, Feint Attack, Extrasensory, Double Team, Bite(?), Flamethrower(?), Ember(?), Fire Spin(?), Will-o-Wisp(?), Unknown Fire Move #1, Unknown Fire Move #2, Unknown Fire Move #3, Others (?)
Notes: Henson's first pokemon(?). Evolved from Vulpix using G1P1 Fire Stone (citation needed). Capabilities are unknown. Observed using undocumented moves as a Vulpix on multiple occasions. Capabilities as a Vulpix noted to be in excess of previously known upper limits of species. Total number of moves is unknown. Type spread of moves is unknown.


At a Glance:
Physical Atk: A+
Ranged Atk: SS+
Status Atk: S+
Phys Resist: A+
Energy Resist: S-
Status Resist: ?
Agility: SS
Reactions: S+
Stamina: S+
Pain Tolerance: S+
Overall Species ranking:
(? Tier) Pokemon cannot be accurately categorized at this time. See legacy feat and performance breakdown here (link)


'Good fucking God. What kind of scaling is this? If you're just now beginning to touch Elite territory, then the 'stats' on a Champion 'mon must look like someone smashed their fist on their keyboard.' Lee shakes his head.

Most people in the thread seem surprised by Nine's ability to take a solid hit and willingness to fight up close and personal, which isn't surprising. From what little battle data is available about the kitsune pokemon, they all seem to be ranged attackers that are practically allergic to melee.

While Lee's megathread is winding down without any major events to spur discussion, Tyson Rhyn's recently made megathread is exploding in activity after his win over Petalburg's Gym Leader, Norman. The revelation that Tyson is the trainer of a Metagross is almost perfectly mirroring the reaction that many had upon Ninetales' victory over Ty. Many posters have flocked to the thread to sing praises about Tyson and his rare, powerful pokemon, while others have barged in to lament about their own shots at Ever Grande becoming harder. A disgruntled few internet raiders have started arguments about how Tyson is needlessly brutal or cheating somehow, with just as many defending keyboard warriors coming to join the verbal melee. A few of them have dragged the names of other popular trainers into the debate, comparing, contrasting, and arguing about who would win in a battle. Lee sees his own name a few times.

Tyson pops in once to thank his supporters amid the mess, then wisely goes quiet.

The rest of the Hoenn section of the forum is much calmer, with news and discussion of much tamer subjects.

Moving on, Lee tabs over to the various chat groups in BattleNet.

Besides 9TT, Fire Masters, and Fox Friday, he has joined a few other ones—mostly to observe silently—but he pays them no mind. The nearly one-hundred pings in Fox Friday are ignored as Lee opens 9TT, then taps his thumb on Lokoko (9TT Administrator) to start a private message chain. In the back of his head, he feels Ninetales watching through his eyes with apprehension.

-Beginning of private message history-

Today at 5:33 PM
L_Henson: Excuse me, Lokoko. Do you have some time? My Ninetales and I have a few questions. I apologize for using DMs, but this matter is potentially sensitive.


The reply doesn't take long. In only a minute, Lokoko sends something back.

Today at 5:34 PM
Lokoko: Of course, Lee. Do not worry about sending me a direct message. I understand the need for discretion. How can I be of assistance?


'Thank goodness,' Lee sighs and begins typing his reply. Looking up, he sees he and Ninetales are only halfway to the next repair shop. Plenty of time for a short conversation, he thinks.

Today at 5:34 PM
L_Henson: Ninetales and I share a rather deep relationship, one aided by telepathy. While we're close, we've agreed that we don't want to go that far, as it adds a level of complication we don't need. Despite that, Ninetales' temper has been… a bit short with other friends, women in particular. Her reactions have been involuntary as far as I can tell, and don't trigger with other members of my pokemon team. We're not sure where to take this and were wanting guidance.


The thin fur of Ninetales' inner ears flush as she follows along with the text conversation. Besides Lee, she growls, only stilling herself when Lee places a gentle hand on her head.

'This is humiliating…' Ninetales laments, focusing her eyes on the ground. Inside of her burns an acrid embarrassment that Lee keenly sympathizes with. 'I feel like an animal, a lesser being for having reactions like this. I should be able to control myself.'

'I thought the same thing when I started seeing Mable, remember?' Lee briefly lowers his phone and rubs a thumb along the white heart on Ninetales' ear. 'You're a brave one for not pushing off outside help as I did.'

Ninetales leans into his touch, but her foul mood doesn't abate.

Raising his phone back up, Lee reads Lokoko's returning message.

Today at 5:35 PM
Lokoko: I see. How old is Ninetales? When did you and Ninetales begin using telepathy? And to what length and level?


An interesting question to lead with. Lee rolls his phone in his hand and takes a moment to think.

Vulpix was a young adult biologically when she evolved, and her kind usually takes around four years to reach full maturity. Mental age is a harder answer, as Lee doesn't want to use human standards for a pokemon. That being said, Vulpix was much more level-headed than most, so…

Today at 5:35 PM
L_Henson: I don't know Ninetales' age for certain, but I am estimating five-to-ten years.Several months back, when she was still a Vulpix,we couldn't communicate much at first, but attained a decent level of verbal and emotional transfer before she evolved by way of constant practice. After evolving, she and I have had perfect clarity. I can understand her one-to-one.


After a moment's hesitation, Lee offers the mysterious Pokemon Master one more snippet. If not for her supposed specialization in Ninetales as a species, Lee doubts he would have told her half of what he already has.

Today at 5:35 PM
L_Henson: We can't seem to disconnect anymore, either. I will be working with Professor Birch and possibly specialists to study that particular phenomenon.


This time, Lokoko takes a full three nerve-wracking minutes to send something back.

Today at 5:38 PM
Lokoko: Interesting. I have both good news and bad news for you. The good? The temper your young Ninetales is expressing is normal. Unlike many other pokemon, where evolution is isolated to physical growth, a Ninetales undergoes a number of mental changes as well. A Ninetales is a creature of robust emotions; they must be, in order to persevere for hundreds of years. At the same time, the attachments one forms will be mighty, and so early in her evolution, a young vixen will need to relearn her control and wrest her conscious mind from the grip of her instincts, which will urge her to be tribalistic and possess her loved ones in every way she can. Both her capacity for love and hate have grown to a level she does not grasp yet. Due to the emotional root of a Ninetales' powers, you can observe this disruption when she performs supernatural feats. Have you observed thusly?


'I'm… having trouble with my telekinesis because of my emotions?' Ninetales herself seems confused, though it's superseded by relief and annoyance that she's having 'growing pains', of all things. 'I don't see how that could be affecting my moves. My Fire is practically a muscle at this point.'

'Let's humor her, Love.' Lee types his response. 'She's got some big names in 9TT, so she has to know something.'

Today at 5:39 PM
L_Henson: I have noticed that her psychic powers are a bit out of whack since her evolution, but I chalked that up to the sudden increase in their potency. Her superb control of her Fire moves hasn't diminished, though.


Today at 5:39 PM
Lokoko: Do you have a phobia of fire, Lee?


The sudden and pointed question makes both Lee and Ninetales stiffen. How does she know that? Lokoko sends another message before Lee can get his bearings.

Today at 5:39 PM
Lokoko: Your young Ninetales indeed has a wonderful grasp on her pyromancy. I observed your past battles on BattleNet and was pleasantly surprised by your Ninetales' skill in molding flame before evolving. Such talent is not commonly seen. In fact, I do not recall a Vulpix in recent history who could perform to such a degree.


Doubts about Lokoko's skills are fleeing both Lee and Ninetales like Zubat might a cave upon nightfall. Man and fox lock spooked eyes.

'Is your pyrokinesis not a unique ability?' Lee sends to his fox. 'That… That never really crossed my mind.'

'Lokoko is heavily implying that it isn't.' Ninetales' telepathy is capped with a twinge of uncertainty. Behind her, her tails frazzle, discontent. 'She clearly called it pyrokinesis… or pyromancy, so…'

'So she's likely a real deal Ninetales expert.' Lee sighs and glances at a weathered, wooden bench that they pass. If they weren't on a timetable for tonight, he would have sat down to better absorb the information being thrown at them. Thinking for a moment, Lee types once more.

Today at 5:40 PM
L_Henson: You're very sharp, Ma'am. What do Ninetales' emotions have to do with her pyrokinesis, psychic powers, and any fears I might have?


Today at 5:41 PM
Lokoko: Spiritual powers, not psychic. Allow me to explain this misconception many hold.


For several minutes Lokoko types, and both Lee and Ninetales slow their walking pace, waiting.

Today at 5:45 PM
Lokoko: In order to explain the relationship between a Ninetales' emotions and powers, one must first understand the inherent differences between the four ethereal pokemon types: Psychic, Ghost, Dark, and Fairy. All other types have elements that totally or partially reside in the physical world. One could make a case for Dragon being a non-material type, but we will not get into that here. As an academic, you are aware of how poorly understood these four types are, yes? So long as they are looked at from a scientific angle, they will continue to elude even the brightest of minds, for they do not work within the bounds of science. These four types exist upon a shifting spectrum with much overlap, and, as such, understanding them is beyond most.


Psychics are the most populous of the four, and thus the type the layman thinks of when they see phenomena that do not obviously belong to another type. Psychics are rooted deeply in using cold logic and intellect to enforce one's will upon the world around them, with almost zero emotional component. Ghost and Dark energy will disrupt Psychics for this reason, as the volatile emotions within these energies are not a quantifiable concept that a Psychic can control or calculate. Many will mistake a Ninetales for a Psychic because of the overlap between Psychics and Ghosts. A Ninetales can wield all four of these energies, yes, but they stand closest to Ghost-type, and this colors their methods of control.

Ghosts are the opposite of Psychics. Strip away the flesh and the mind, and what are you left with? A soul, a being of pure sentiment and passion. Here, understanding becomes hazy for most. Love, hate, joy, sadness, and every emotion save raw apathy has a power that cannot be measured with the eye or instruments. Emotion is what makes a soul, what fuels it, and what drives it forward. I say this with all the certainty in the world. Some might break emotions down to something more cold and clinical, like chemical reactions within the brain. Nay, strong feelings are a power that defies and persists even beyond death, as the name Ghost-type should drive home. Within each Ninetales lies a soul of such force that it practically spills from the body. An immortal existence within a mortal shell.

Lokoko is forced to stop and begin typing again as she hits the character limit for a single post. As Lee and Ninetales digest her words, Moore's words days before Ninetales' evolution ripple through them.

A Vulpix will go from flesh and blood to… something not wholly mortal. Something not easily controlled.

Lee re-reads Lokoko's post with a slowly growing sense of wonder. In all his research, there has been speculation on the nature of pokemon types and TE, but much of it is just that: speculation. Some are more studied than others, but just as Lokoko says, Psychic, Ghost, Dark, and Fairy have resisted modern science's attempts to grasp them beyond the basics. Is it truly because these types have no way to be quantified?

Today at 5:46 PM
Lokoko:
Dark and Fairy exist close to Psychic and Ghost, overlapping but not truly touching. Where Psychic and Ghost are the realms of intellect and emotion respectively, Dark and Fairy occupy an even muddier scale of intent along the axis of Psychic and Ghost, forming a wicked compass.

Dark is the element of animalistic desire and violence. The want to cause harm, the want to control, the want to spread misery. That is not to say all who bear the epithet of Dark-type are monsters, but that the most personable of them are pokemon of admirable self-control. A Dark pokemon may love and hate like any other, but only the intent within will empower Dark energies. Many fail to realize this and nurture a most detestable character in the pursuit of power. The ability to sequester impulses of violence away from the rest of the mind serves to bring the users of Dark to the highest level.

Fairy is a type I hesitate to put into words. Most would think Fairy to be the type of joy and happiness, but that's not quite correct. There is an underlying sinister, distorted nature that I do not truly grasp, one required to bear these powers in battle with the intent to harm. I know precious little about these energies or the minds of those who wield them. The state of mind required to master Fairy-type is alien, and that is all I know for certain. I have doubts that many of the users of Fairies actually understand their pokemon.

A pokemon may call upon these four elements, but their state of mind determines their might. An emotional Psychic is a poor one, as is a stoic Ghost.

As I said, a Ninetales can wield all four of these aspects, but the one they align to most naturally is Ghost, and this will bleed into her other skills. As her mind becomes accustomed to this newfound depth, her temper and control will settle. You require only time.

The Pokemon Master on the other end of the messaging app once more hits the character limit for a single message. As she begins typing again, Lee and Ninetales lock eyes once more.

Ninetales' relief that there isn't something wrong with her spills into Lee, soothing his own nerves some. The vixen takes a deep breath that pushes her chest tuft out, then slowly exhales. 'That answers some questions…' she begins, 'but if this is the 'good' news, then what is the bad news? Much of what she says also seems like nonsense.' Ninetales shakes her head with a huff.

'At first glance, yes, it seems like spiritual mumbo jumbo…' Lee returns his eyes to his phone, waiting with bated breath for the next message. 'At the same time, though, all my academic sources can't seem to pinpoint the cause of a lot of TE phenomena. If what Lokoko says is true, and state of mind can affect TE potency, then that gives us a place to go forward from on that front.'

Psychics aren't nearly as well understood as other types, but there is at least a basis for studying them. Dark is poorly defined at best. Ghost is still mostly speculation and theory, and Fairy is so new that almost no one has even begun delving into it.

Fascinated, Lee resolves to try and pick Lokoko's brain again later, and focuses back on the matter at hand as his phone vibrates.

Today at 5:48 PM
Lokoko: You asked why your young Ninetales' pyromancy is still so refined when her control has otherwise suffered? Look upon yourself to find the answer.


'Look upon myself?' Lee blinks and does so, looking down at his torso and legs, then at his arms. When he sees nothing out of place, he shrugs. 'Any ideas, Love?'

Ninetales thinks to herself for a moment. 'I get the feeling this is intended to be some sort of introspective question, not something literal. Other than that, I have no idea. Clearly, she means you are the reason my Fire is so easy to command, but 'why' is not explained.'

Today at 5:49 PM
L_Henson: I'm sorry ma'am, could you elaborate?


Lokoko's reply is swift, as if she expected to be asked for an explanation.

Today at 5:49 PM
Lokoko: As I said, a Ninetales' powers are bound to her emotions. If you fear fire, Lee, then what would be the most appropriate response from Ninetales?


'To keep it under control…' Ninetales blinks, realization settling over her.

"To keep it under control…" Lee mirrors his fox, the words spilling out of his mouth.

She would never hurt you.

'Is it really as simple as that?' Ninetales wonders with only Lee to hear. She stares at the dirt road as they walk, her thoughts buzzing like Beedrill. From her, Lee can pick out a few fleeting feelings. Part of her is pleased with her own dedication to her trainer, while another is bitter that her talent is all subconscious and not an earned skill of her own. The bitterness of the latter grows stronger as she remembers how heavily Lokoko implied that her pyrokinesis isn't special, either.

Lee shuts down the negative spiral by petting Ninetales behind her ear, his thumb returning to the white heart there. 'Love, you're special to me, and don't you dare imply all those weeks of practice were for nothing. Maybe some hidden factors helped you along, but your hard work is what got you this far.'

Try as she might to remain upset, Ninetales' negativity drains like a basin with the plug pulled. She huffs theatrically and leans into Lee's hand, grumbling to herself.

Today at 5:50 PM
L_Henson: That's certainly in line with your impromptu lesson (thank you for that by the way. I hope we can converse more later on the subject of Types). You mentioned that there was bad news?


Today at 5:51 PM
Lokoko: Indeed. Although your Ninetales needs only time for her control to return, you've inadvertently complicated matters with the use of telepathy. As I said, it's simply the nature of a Ninetales to be possessive, and I fear the narrow boundaries between you two have exacerbated the issue. I am indeed familiar with the unusual relationship that blooms between telepathic partners, and, unfortunately, this unique form of love is of little use as a buffer in this circumstance. Even if no romantic love exists between you and her, and there is no desire on either end to move forward, her instincts will snarl and gnash at the thought that there is a part of you she may not have. There are two possible ways to resolve this:


1. Revisit your relationship with her, and put those instincts to rest by taking that last step.

2. Set more firm boundaries with one another so Ninetales might meditate on what she can and cannot have with all of the people in her life, not just yourself. This should significantly expedite matters. This will mean limiting telepathic contact to the minimum required.

'That's ridiculous!' Ninetales physically snarls, startling a few people on the street before Lee shushes her. 'Why are those extremes the only options? There has to be something else we can do!' She takes another deep breath, calming her boiled-over temper down to a simmer. 'If need be, I'll tighten the leash on my emotions until this all blows over.'

'Easy, Nine…' Lee bites his lip, just as troubled as he pens his response.

Today at 5:51 PM
L_Henson: I understand the reasoning for your solutions, but is there anything else we can do? Neither of us are keen on such drastic measures.


Lokoko's following message is just text, but Lee gets a distinctly exasperated feeling from the words.

Today at 5:51 PM
Lokoko: I had a feeling you would ask. Telepathy also increases the risk of hyper-fixation, an unfortunate condition pokemon like Ninetales can fall prey to. Tell me, outside of time spent with you, what sort of pursuits does Ninetales have?


Lee pauses, his eyes narrowing. After such a fresh mindmeld, Ninetales' memories are almost easier to call upon than his own. Still, he struggles to find an answer to Lokoko's question. 'Love?'

Like Lee, Ninetales can't seem to muster an answer. After a minute to think, she finds something to say. 'I mind Shinx, and I assist you in your research. I also enjoy sitting and watching movies with you when a worthwhile one is on TV.'

'Lokoko was asking about things you do on your own, though.'

Ninetales falls silent.

A tingle runs down Lee's spine. Does Ninetales really have nothing outside of him?

Grovyle meditates and practices what looks like yoga in his spare time. Recently, he's been trying to learn how to use a leaf as a whistle, too. Whether that's for some kind of training or for pleasure, Lee can't say, but the gecko pokemon does it of his own accord.

Octillery is a voracious learning machine. The octopus more or less taught himself how to read after Lee's first lessons, and now he devours any kind of learning media he can wrap his tentacles around. He's also conned Grovyle and Lee into playing strategy games with him more than once, things like chess or shogi, where he usually wins handily.

Shinx's boundless curiosity means she's always getting into things, and when she isn't up to no good, she's playing with Electrike and Goomy, or leading them into no good.

Ninetales… sits and waits for Lee's attention most of the time. The realization that he overlooked something so critical makes Lee's stomach roll.

Looking down at his phone after it buzzes with a new message, Lee reads what he sees.

Today at 5:53 PM
Lokoko: I can guess the answer from the amount of time it's taking you to reply. If you're going to insist on not taking my offered solutions, then you'll be forced to work things out on your own. A good starting point in either direction is pointing Ninetales' passion into a pursuit of her own choosing, one that is not you or her training. That is not to say that you may not join in on whatever this hobby might be, but you cannot be the locus. This will point your relationship in a healthier direction, and assist in smoothing over the harsh spikes in her emotions. Learning that there is more to life than their human is the most important lesson a Ninetales can learn. If you disregard any part of what I have said today, make it not this.


I'm afraid I have other matters to tend to and must cut our time here short. I am no expert on the subject of telepathy, let alone a case like yours, but constant contact without boundaries is something the more learned warn against, lest you venture into the uncharted waters of a gestalt. When you meet your professor-recommended expert for your study, I ask that you keep me in the loop in some capacity. They may offer instructions contrary to mine, and I would like the chance to offer amendments if required.

Today at 5:53 PM
L_Henson: Thank you for your time. I hope we can speak again soon.


Locking his phone and putting it away in his pocket, Lee stares down at the road, troubled. Their walk descends into an uncomfortable silence. A lot of Lokoko's words replay themselves over and over to both of them.

Constant contact without boundaries is something the more learned warn against, lest you venture into the uncharted waters of a gestalt.

Learning that there is more to life than their human is the most important lesson a Ninetales can learn.If you disregard any part of what I have said today, make it not this.

A cold shiver wants to run down Lee's spine as he thinks to himself, but he powers through it, reminding himself to bring the questions now nagging at him up to Nigel's telepathy expert. 'Lokoko was right on the second one, though. I want Nine to know how to be happy after I'm gone.'

'Nine?' Lee musters up his nerve and returns his stream of thought to the telepathic line between himself and Ninetales. 'You've been rather quiet. Are you okay?'

A sigh escapes Ninetales' lips. 'I don't know.'

Lee can feel what her words fail to relay. She doesn't want to follow either of Lokoko's solutions.

'Love, don't be so morose. We'll deal with all of this the same way we always do.' Lee gives his pokemon a gentle smile. 'Together, and one step at a time. We'll consult Mable, Xatu, and Nigel's expert before we start putting anything into practice, okay?'

The fox leans into his side, her frazzled nerves settling. 'I understand, Beloved.' She pulls away and shakes her coat out, starting from her head to her tails. 'I do not like it, but I understand.'

'Together, and one step at a time,' Lee repeats. 'Now, onto less gloomy subjects. What sounds like a fun hobby to you? I think that was a great suggestion.'

Ninetales' mind works, but she can't seem to come up with something. Once or twice, she almost voices something, but she pauses and second-guesses herself.

'Nothing at all?' Lee broaches. 'There is plenty to do here in Lavaridge. We can peruse an art store, or maybe see about something electronic at the repair shop? I know BattleNet and the rest of the internet is a good time sink.'

The golden vixen at Lee's side snorts. 'Perhaps something less brainless.'

'Well…' The zoologist peers at a store that they're passing, then stops with a smile. "Ah," Lee begins aloud. "Maybe here?"

Ninetales looks up as well.

Before the pair stands a small, two-floor shop sandwiched between two other buildings. Hanging upon a pole by the door is a swinging wooden sign saying 'Armand's Fine Texts' in wispy strokes of black ink, as if painted by a calligraphy brush. The building is as plain as they come, and if not for his current musings, Lee might have missed it entirely.

'A bookstore?' Ninetales blinks and tilts her head. 'Beloved, you read enough for the both of us.'

'I read a lot, yes, but it's mostly scientific articles and research documents nowadays,' Lee remarks. 'If you're wanting something stimulating to do, a good book is worth a try, I think.'

Ninetales mulls the idea over, one of her tails escaping their neat fan to flick in thought. 'What time does that repair shop close again?'

'Seven. We've still got an hour.'

With a shrug, Ninetales steps towards the bookstore. 'I suppose it can't hurt.'

Stepping inside, the pair are greeted by modest shelves of books sorted by genre along the walls, and more freestanding shelves arranged in rows along the floor. Near the back of the store is an open staircase, above which hangs a sign that says Employees only. Near the door is a lonely little desk and a cash register, and behind the desk sits a man of middle age, engrossed in an open book. The store is as unassuming on the inside as it is on the outside.

The door shuts behind Lee and Ninetales, ringing a little bell hanging from the doorframe and drawing the attention of the proprietor, who looks up with a smile. "Welcome! Let me know if you need help finding anything!" he says, returning to his own reading shortly afterward.

Slowly meandering around the shop, Lee and Ninetales take in the various titles on display. From fiction with fantastic, colorful covers, to solemn biographies and historical accounts of famous people and pokemon now gone, the little shop seems to have a slice of everything. A small rack of comic books and manga catches Lee's eye.

Front and center is a manga with a cover featuring a sleepy old man in a rustic suit, his glasses drooping along with his eyes. In the elderly man's lap is a cheering little girl in a white sundress, and in her lap is a tiny, alarmed Sunkern. The pair are riding in a lawn chair, flying through the cloud-dotted sky with the aid of a dozen Butterfree, who are tied to the arms of the chair with lengths of string. The whimsical-looking comic is titled "Road to Belfry Zephyr - Vol #8".

Ninetales, meanwhile, scans the bookshelves intently, trying to find something that jumps out at her, though Lee can feel her disinterest second hand. Over in the history section, she stops and takes a closer look at something near the back.

Lee steps away from the comic rack and peers over the fox. "Find something interesting?"

'Perhaps…' She hums in her throat. Her eyes glow violet for a second, then she stops and thinks better of using telekinesis, instead snaking a tail forward. The tail pulls the book free, letting the fox and man read the title on the front.

Johto - Other Eyes

The cover art is sparse, merely a stylized Growlithe staring out from a balcony down into a sunset-lit valley.

Ninetales flips the book around, revealing the summary on the back.

A historically-inspired retelling of the fall of the Johto shogunate, rebuilt from ancient archives, personal journals of the shogun and his retainers, and the testimonies of the pokemon and people descended from the original noble clans. The events of Johto - Other Eyes are told from the perspective of Shiba, sire of the shogunate's finest force of Growlithe, along with a number of other real characters. Within, you will find a world long gone in the era of the feudal lords.

Under the summary is a number of reviews from different sources, and they all have a common theme of praising the book for being both a thrilling read as well as historically accurate. There is even one from Mura Moore.

"(Johto - Other Eyes) is a fantastic retelling of the shogunate's final days, never shying away from the ugly events of the past or besmirching the moments of glory. A must-read for lovers of both history and political intrigue." ~ M. Moore, Hoenn Elite Four.

"Is this one that you want?" Lee asks. "Looks interesting."

Ninetales looks up at him with a smirk. 'Not true. You consider political discourse to be dry, but thank you for being supportive.' She licks her lips. 'I'm willing to give this a try. I don't have a history of my own, so… I'd like to know more about my kind's homeland.' As she speaks, a vague sense of wistfulness fills her words, and Lee can only liken it to misplaced nostalgia. 'Maybe I'll learn something about myself along the way. I know what I want out of life,' her eyes drop to Lee's boots, 'but I realize I know little else.'

Lee's fingers comb through the tuft atop Ninetales' head. 'Once all is said and done here in Hoenn, we'll go on holiday in Johto and Kanto, okay?'

Ninetales smiles and cuddles into Lee's side. The love she exudes washes away the day's doubts, and Lee realizes following Lokoko's instructions beyond this hobby-seeking is going to be difficult.

'That sounds lovely.' Ninetales sighs and separates herself from her trainer. 'Let's keep looking.'

After another twenty minutes, Ninetales picks out three more books, all of which are historical but are of less interest than her first selection. After checking out and returning to the Lavaridge streets, Lee's phone buzzes in his pocket.

"Now what?" he grumbles, pulling out the device and unlocking it. On the screen is a single new message.

Zinnia: I got everything we need.


High upon a telephone pole and vigilantly keeping an eye on her trainer below, Swellow sighs to herself for what feels like the millionth time.

Below, in a nearby field, Courtney smiles as she and the Birch boy sit and converse. The pair sit like young lovers upon a boulder, and at their feet, Swellow's teammate Mightyena and the Birch boy's Marshtomp catch their breath after a spar.

Marshtomp is a cut above the rest for certain, and with the boy's direction, stood up to Mightyena as an equal. Swellow sees why her trainer is so determined to bring the boy into the fold of Magma.

Such is the nature of poisoned minds to poison others.

Hate burns under Swellow's feathers: hate for the man who twisted her trainer so.

Maxie, the pompous, overinflated bastard in charge of the terrorist freakshow known as Magma, poisoned Swellow's trainer. Promises of a new world, promises of glory as a savior, promises of his approval. Bah! Swellow would cut him down if she knew she could get away with it.

Promises upon promises, and Swellow knows in her heart of hearts that each word is false under its sweet coating. Maxie runs his organization of misfits as a cult, and only devotion will see one rise in the ranks. The higher one goes, the more absurd his demands of them become, but the worship within the underlings makes them blind to how they are used. One such demand is the use of crude psychic safeguards, so no one in the upper echelons of Magma may be mentally probed.

Swellow suspects more than just safeguards are put in place.

Does the madman even know what he's doing, Swellow wonders? He dares tamper with things better left alone, in pursuit of what? To create more land with the power of a God, to combat overpopulation? This march of madness is driven by a problem with centuries, maybe millennia of time to answer. No. There are no pure intentions here. Maxie is driven by hubris. In that hubris, he's created monsters of his own design. Every moment, he sweet-talks another.

In another life, Maxie could have been something else. An orator with few rivals, a leader, a pokemon Champion even.

Instead, he seeks ruin for everyone.

At the very least, Maxie is not the criminally insane head of Aqua. Maxie has the discretion to pretend his schemes will save lives.

Archie, leader of Team Aqua, does not hide what the result of his victory would bring.

Swellow's eyes narrow.

Courtney's ace, Camerupt, cannot escape the trappings of his kind. Strong in body and clever in battle, Camerupt is still a dullard. He sees no issue with following these schemes, for he doesn't understand that Courtney's choices aren't her own.

Mightyena is even worse. She sees the events before her clearly, yet she turns her head away and abdicates responsibility, saying Courtney's word is law and claiming it's not her place as a pokemon to protest Courtney's orders. Mightyena knows it's wrong, Swellow can see the conflict in her eyes, but Mightyena takes the easy way out and refuses to stray from her pack instincts.

That leaves Swellow alone to seethe over the injustice. She pushes away the anger, lest it consume her.

Henson and Draconid have hidden their suspicion of Courtney poorly in recent days, and Swellow has tailed them, confirming Courtney's feeling that her cover is blown. It doesn't matter now. Upon the Lavaridge volcano, a device whose function escapes Swellow is nearly complete, and Magma will step toward its next veiled goal soon.

Just as Courtney is stepping toward her next goal below.

Swellow's trainer and the Birch boy are too far away to hear, but Swellow's powerful eyes watch their lips, reading the words that flow out.

"Brendan?" Courtney begins with a despondent sigh. She balls her hands up in her lap. "I… have some things to tell you. About me… and some things Lee and Zinnia… have been keeping from you."

Brendan blinks curiously. "What do you mean?"

Beside Brendan, Marshtomp's eyes narrow, and Swellow feels herself tense, ready to swoop in if needed.

Courtney looks away, conflicted. Swellow can't tell if it's genuine or an act, a distressing thought. "I'm… more than I say I am. I'm on a mission, and… I need your help." She meets Brendan's eyes. "I'm part of Team Magma, and I want to explain some things to you."

Courtney tells him about herself, about Magma's 'mission', about how Henson and Draconid left Brendan in the dark. As she talks, Brendan's eyes grow wider and wider as his jaw hangs lower and lower.

Swellow grits her beak. Upon that pole watching for interlopers, she bides her time, waiting.

She'll break Courtney free of this madness once the opportunity presents itself, once everything is lined up just right. In the meantime…

Swellow can only hope the Birch boy is made of sterner stuff than her Courtney.


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Act 2: Chapter 14
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'You're certain you'll be fine? One-hundred percent?'

Ninetales' worry distracts Lee enough that he nearly trips over a crack in the Lavaridge streets. After his stumble, he smooths his jacket and replies. 'Just fine, Love. Enjoy your day off, okay?'

'You'll call me if you need me, yes?' Ninetales' follow-up is as quick as lightning, and, try as she might, she can't quite hide her discontent. 'Zinnia reported that there are confirmed Magma agents in Lavaridge, and I'm loathe to leave you alone with such dangers about.'

Ninetales' ire compels Lee to glance to his side, where Courtney walks with him, having taken him up on the offer of morning training. He returns his eyes forward before the Magma admin can see him looking.

'I have both Grovyle and Octillery with me,' Lee says soothingly. 'I doubt anything will happen, but if things look dicey, I'll call you straight away, okay?' After a moment, he adds, 'Also, can you keep an eye on Brendan when he wakes up? He was kind of withdrawn last night. He said he was fine, but nothing has kept him upset for this long…'

Although her worry and twinge of irritation at being left behind don't totally abate, Lee can feel Ninetales slowly turn her attention away from him and down to the book before her paws. Through her eyes, he sees that she's lying on his bed, halfway through page one-forty. 'I'll speak with Brendan if something still seems amiss,' Ninetales promises.

'Thank you. I know things have taken a weird turn between us, Nine, but I still love you and always will.'

Even across town, Lee can feel Ninetales' annoyance melt, replaced with a fond mental grumble. 'And I, you, Beloved. Be safe.'

'We will.' Lee lifts his hand and touches his cheek, stilling the ticklish sensation of a phantom fox snout nuzzling him.

After a long minute, Ninetales' focus shifts to the half-read chapter within her book, and Lee gently squeezes the telepathic channel between them mostly closed, slowing the throughput of emotions, shared senses, and idle thoughts.

A shiver runs down Lee's spine at the sudden, primal pang of loneliness, but he sighs and looks to his left.

Grovyle, his escort for today, looks back up at him. In those cool, yellow eyes is a silent, reassuring confidence that dulls Lee's spike of anxiety.

Lee smiles down at the gecko pokemon, who nods back in acknowledgment. Taking a deep breath, Lee's mind turns back to the day prior.

Yesterday was a busy one. Their primary goal of finding someone who could repair Lee's old cellphone, and thus salvage the treasure trove of information from the pokemon games within, failed. The first shop didn't want to risk damaging the unfamiliar device further, and the second was a PokeGear chain store that turned Lee away instantly when they saw the phone wasn't a supported brand of theirs. Disgruntled, Lee debated on trying to work on it himself before stopping.

He has no idea if volts and amps are measured the same on this Earth. With that in mind, he sent an email to Lavaridge Electric, the local power supplier, to see if they have a legitimate electrical engineer who can provide some insight. So far, his email hasn't been answered.

During the trip from the first to the second repair shop, Lee and Ninetales had their disquieting talk with Lokoko, who insisted that Lee and Ninetales need to draw harsher boundaries in their telepathic relations, lest they "venture into the uncharted waters of a gestalt."

Lokoko's other suggestion, one that Ninetales needs interests outside of being Lee's pokemon, was one Lee agreed with wholeheartedly. After a stop at a local bookstore, Ninetales picked out several books to see if reading would be a hobby she would enjoy. So far, the vixen has been engrossed with texts of historical accounts… when she's not brooding over Lokoko's previous warning.

The only other thing of note popped up when everyone was settling in after dinner, and it was a surprising one.

Silph Co finally paid him for Grovyle's TMs. All of Seed Sniper and Seed Blast's pre-orders must have sold out, because in Lee's bank account, a lump of seventy-six thousand credits appeared.

That was only for the first run minus the patenting fee that Silph Co took out. If the second and final run of the TMs sells out, then another eighty-seven thousand might be on the way.

After looking around online, he realized that it wasn't a question of if the TMs would sell out, but when.

A moderately popular BattleNet video uploader, an older, retired trainer named Haul Parrel, who is often praised for being factual and down to earth, pre-ordered a copy of both Seed Sniper and Seed Blast to review at the behest of his fans. It seems as though Silph Co pulled some strings to move preorders for high-profile trainers faster, as Parrel claims he acquired his disks several days before uploading his video. The man's Cacturne demonstrated both moves on a variety of targets to devastating effect, and Parrel himself provided commentary on what he thinks the moves excel at and criticisms on where they could be better. The review signed off with Parrel commenting that the moves are "Steeply priced if bought as a complementary pair, but seem like they would fit well into the arsenal of a career competitor. Are they worth the price? You be the judge."

Following the release of the video, a number of copycats with Grass pokemon are now trying to secure their own copies of the TMs to capitalize on Parrel's wake and grow their own followings.

If that wasn't enough, Gardenia, Gym Leader of Eterna City all the way over in the Sinnoh region, apparently got copies as well. Her famed Roserade, a pokemon as powerful as it is beautiful, used Seed Blast on live television during an exhibition match to decimate a speedy Lycanroc.

Lee had to sit down after that, uncomprehending for a moment. In the next month or two, he will likely be holding onto six figures worth of money. The thought… seems so strange.

It was mostly his pokemon's doing, so the acclaim feels… misplaced. People online have offered praise for the 'talent' of being able to make moves, but none knew that his piggy-backing off of Ninetales' senses offered him a pokemon's perspective on how Type Energy works. Even if Ninetales can't use most forms of TE, the first-hand insight she provides makes unraveling the unfamiliar forms of TE and instructing his pokemon how to mold it so much easier.

Ninetales shushed him, saying there was no reason to feel guilty for capitalizing on a team effort. She did agree with him that the stylized, anime-esque art of himself and Groyvle on the box of the TM was cringe-inducing, though, joking that the eyesore wasn't worth the money.

The TM case accidentally nailed the early 2000s aesthetic of an earth video game case perfectly, featuring a split cut of Grovyle and Lee's scowling faces in the middle. The top held the name of the move in bold, eye-searing font, and the corner had a bombastic "Limited Edition!" sticker. Lee didn't bother looking at the back.

"Gro?"

Lee looks back down to Grovyle, who stares back up at him with a raised eyebrow, and Lee realizes his face twisted itself into a grimace. "Sorry, Grovyle," Lee waves him off. "I was thinking of the box for your TMs again."

The gecko pokemon's muzzle twitches in distaste. He gives Lee a narrow-eyed look and a short hiss, one that clearly says, "What do you mean by my TMs?"

"Our TMs; my bad. I'll take half the blame there." Lee raises his hands, exposing his palms in mock surrender. "I expected Silph to use a photo or something, not a picture that looks like it came from the bowels of BattleNet's fan art section. We'll be more involved in the process next time."

Grovyle twiddles his twig in his mouth, mollified. On Lee's opposite side, Courtney's mouth twitches in amusement.

Together, they venture out to one of the more secluded training grounds on the edge of Lavaridge. Zinnia returned the night prior with damning information on Magma's movements up upon Mt Chimney, and now it's business as usual until the next 'unexpected' lift closure…


It's nearly 11pm, and Lee has changed out of his day clothes for a bare chest and thin shorts in preparation for bed. Anything heavier is just too hot when he and Ninetales share the covers. The overhead lights are already turned off owing to Brendan, who has turned in for the night. Lee pauses in his task of grooming Grovyle and scans the room.

At the foot of Brendan's bed, Electrike and Shinx sleep cuddling together. The (literal) odd bedfellows are equal parts adorable and comical since Electrike is three times the size of Shinx.

Ninetales herself has already wound down, lying across the hotel bed on her belly as she slowly reads through the first of her stack of books. So far, Johto - Other Eyes has been such a captivating read for her that she's said little all night, not even letting the upsetting talk with Lokoko linger in the forefront of her mind. So relaxed is she, that the vixen's hind legs are splayed about behind her, covered by her limp tails.

Octillery has relinquished Lee's laptop for the night. In a rare moment of lethargy, the octopus is sitting on the couch doing nothing. Octillery watches the news on the TV, which has the volume turned down low. The local news channel of Lavaridge has little to report, it seems, as Octillery is dozing off in the glow of the screen.

All of Brendan's pokemon sans young Electrike are sleeping in their balls. The three were… unusually sullen and guilty-looking, retreating into their pokeballs before they could be questioned.

Grovyle is sitting on the bed with Lee, just beside Ninetales. The gecko pokemon doesn't show how bashful he's feeling (though Lee is sure the Grass-type is) as Lee gently rubs a green medicated gel intended for burned and scarred skin across patches of discolored scales. It's the same stuff that Lee uses on his face to keep his own scars pliant.

"Rapidash sure did a number on you, bud…" Lee murmurs, massaging Grovyle's side. He pauses to take the bottle of gel leaning against his crossed leg and squirt a little more in his hands. "Even now, in fighting shape, you've still got scales coming in oriented wrong or missing their chlorophyll…" Lee continues rubbing the gecko's side, working the gel past the scales and into the skin underneath. Idly, he has to admire Grovyle's hard-earned musculature. It doesn't show under his scales, but one could mistake the Grass-type for a Fighting-type if judging solely by hand. "Any stiffness or pain when stretching?"

Grovyle shakes his head in a jerky 'no'.

"That's good." Lee smiles and shuffles to the side of the bed, standing up to put the scar gel back in his backpack. The gel is exchanged for a pack of wipes, which he uses to clean the remaining gel off his hands. "With any luck, the discoloration and uneven scales will fade in the next few weeks. If not, evolving should fix it right up."

Grovyle perks up at the mention of evolution, his embarrassment at being touched forgotten.

As Lee zips his bag back up and sits back down on the bed, his phone buzzes on the nightstand next to Ninetales.

Without looking up from her book, one of Ninetales' tails reaches out, wrapping dexterously around the phone and dropping it into Lee's lap.

"Thank you, Love," Lee says aloud, reaching out to scratch the base of Ninetales' center-most tail.

The fox wiggles at the pleasant, tingly sensation that runs up her spine, turning her head back to offer Lee a wordless smile.

Lee unlocks his phone, an eyebrow rising when he sees another message from Zinnia. Unlike the vague message before, this one is asking him to meet her outside.

"Back in a moment, everyone." Lee stands and throws on an undershirt, stepping around the bed and to the door with his team's eyes on his back.

'Zinnia?' Ninetales questions, quite literally reading his mind. 'Is she finally elaborating on her unhelpful message from earlier?'

'Seems like it. I'll keep you in the loop.'

Gently pulling the hotel room door open as not to disturb Brendan, Lee shivers as the cool night air nips at him. With the summer coming to an end, the nights are slowly getting chilly.

Outside the door, looking down at her phone, Zinnia perks up as Lee shuts the door behind him. "We scored big, Lee!" she whispers excitedly. "I've got confirmation on everything!"

"Really?" Lee crosses his arms as he looks Zinnia up and down. "Do tell."

Zinnia's usual outfit is absent, replaced with a too-small, midriff-exposing shirt and jacket that pushes her bust up, a dangerously short skirt, and high heels. The Dragon Tamer's face is lightly dusted with make-up, and the faint scent of alcohol and smoke hangs around her.

'Arceus, she looks like a groupie.'

Zinnia's face takes on a teasing smirk when she sees Lee's roaming eyes. "Dolittle, check me out later. We've got more important things to talk about."

"Less checking you out, more wondering how you're breathing with a shirt that tight," Lee shoots back, but it doesn't stop the faint prickle of embarrassment. Thankfully, Ninetales is too distracted with her reading to catch the thought.

"Uncomfortably, that's how. Now hush! The faster I give you the low-down, the faster I can get out of this get-up." Zinnia's retort is just as quick as Lee's. Grinning, she reaches into her jacket and withdraws a small, shiny badge, presenting it to Lee.

In Zinnia's hands is a silver coin reminiscent of a gym badge, one emblazoned with Magma's M-shaped logo. Taking the presented coin, Lee flips it over, seeing a faint, square-shaped QR code cut into the metal of the opposite side.

'A signet coin? Seems like an oversight carrying an identifier like this around…' Lee thinks to himself, rubbing his thumb over the code.

"As of tonight, I'm officially a Magma grunt," Zinnia says, pocketing the coin when Lee drops it back into her hand. "Swablu and I trashed some girl trying to muscle in on the knucklehead lieutenant I've been stringing along. I think having girls fight over him stroked his ego just right, because he gave me a sales pitch and asked me to join Magma." Zinnia grins. "He added me to their 'secret' text group, but was smart enough to hide the previous history from me. Not that it matters too much, because if I get pinged for a job on Mt Chimney on the same day the lift next goes out…" Zinnia's grin takes on a malicious air. "Then we know they're up to no good."


The conversation afterward just reaffirmed the plan going forward. If Zinnia is called for a job by her faux boyfriend and the cable cars going up to Mt Chimney happen to go down for "emergency maintenance" at the same time, Lee will approach the lift station and play the role of a concerned League official suspecting negligence. With any luck, they'll be allowed up to the top of the volcano to bust Magma mid-scheme. If not, Lee will have to begin the tedious process of acquiring a warrant to investigate the lift.

Until then, it's business as usual. Zinnia is still sleeping off her late night last night, and Brendan didn't get up at his usual time, so it's just Lee and Courtney for now.

The training ground comes into view, and this early in the morning, the person there is an elderly man on a bench with a Buneary munching on a little pastry seated next to him. The field is a simple, flat plain of green with a children's playground off in a distant corner, out of any crossfire. Some patches of grass in the park are higher than others, the hallmark of damage repaired by a Grass pokemon.

"So what's the plan for today?" Courtney asks, her flat tone giving away no thoughts. Magenta eyes turn their bored, half-lidded gaze to Lee.

"Today?" Lee begins, taking his notebook from a side pocket on his backpack and flipping it open. "I was going to begin work on a new technique for Grovyle, then work on synergy with Octillery and Shinx. Ninetales has been working herself hard lately, so she's just relaxing for now. Afterward, I was hoping you'd be up for a spar?"

Courtney nods, and Lee suppresses a frown at how difficult the woman is to read.

Courtney wanders off to claim her own slice of the park for herself and her pokemon, leaving Lee and Grovyle to their own devices. With a sigh, Lee puts the Magma Admin out of his mind for now and focuses on Grovyle. "Alright, let's get seated and go over everything."

The trainer and pokemon make themselves comfortable under a nearby tree, and Lee lays his notebook in his lap, flipping open to a section dedicated to Grovyle. "Let's see here…" Lee's finger trails down the lines, stopping halfway down. "Right, so in an effort to assist you during prolonged battles, I've been wanting to formulate a move similar to Absorb, but lacking the wind-up time. If my research and observations are correct, then Absorb needs to be cast while still, or the effect is simply diminished too much to be useful. While I'm sure we could puzzle out Synthesis for you, it, like Absorb, is slow. This clashes with your main strengths of speed and maneuverability, so here is what I'm proposing…" Lee draws a quick sketch on the page, one of Grovyle's arms with a Leaf Blade extended. "Other physical life-drain moves like Drain Punch and Horn Leech don't have the stillness requirement of Absorb, so physical contact must bypass that. Using your expertise with Leaf Blade, I think we should hybridize Leaf Blade and Absorb, allowing you to sap foes with every attack. Since both use Grass TE, it should just be a matter of kinesthetic conditioning until you can move the absorption point to your wrist leaves rather than your mouth." Lee looks up from his notebook to Grovyle.

Sitting with his legs crossed and his two-fingered hands in his lap, Grovyle nods coolly, telling Lee that he's following along.

'I haven't worked one-on-one with Grovyle in too long. I'd forgotten how refreshingly sharp and non-combative he is.' Lee smiles and stands. "Okay, let's get to it."


From a dozen feet away, Lee watches Grovyle pull his glowing-green Leaf Blade back out of a log of green, freshly chopped wood. In the face of the log are a number of cuts, and if one were to squint, they might see the cuts appear drier than the surrounding wood.

Taking a deep breath, Grovyle raises his Leaf Blade to his mouth, which takes on a yellow light. From the leafy edge of Grovyle's attack, tiny motes of yellow flow into Grovyle's mouth as the half-hearted Absorb cannibalizes the energy supplying Leaf Blade. Then Grovyle halts Absorb, scrunching his eyes shut as he dedicates the feeling of both Absorb and Leaf Blade to memory. Letting his breath out, he tenses, then lashes out.

Leaf Blade sings through the air, slicing into the wood, and Lee witnesses Grovyle's leaf suck a miniscule amount of moisture and near-unnoticeable dots of yellow energy from the log.

'Incredible…' Lee's pen dances across the nearly-full page of his notebook as he watches Grovyle at work. 'Not an ounce of strain maintaining Leaf Blade while using other attacks, and in just two hours, he's already got a working grasp of…' Lee hesitates to put a name to the prototype attack just yet. Looking down at his notebook, he crosses out the name Lifehunt Scythe. 'I'll come back to that with something more professional later. Anyway, Grovyle's sheer talent is something…'

The first hour was spent with Grovyle using Absorb on a few freshly cut logs to re-familiarize himself with the move. Unlike with a pokemon, Grovyle was able to cast Absorb on the logs instantly, and the pieces of wood were quickly reduced to withered husks, something Lee noted for later. Unfortunately, it seems like Absorb takes more energy to cast than what the logs returned, making emergency refueling from trees a non-option… Or maybe the logs have worthwhile energy, but Absorb doesn't have the conversion efficiency needed to make use of them?

'Considering the extreme desiccation of the wood, Grovyle must be converting the water and nutrients within into something he can use…' Lee mulls the phenomenon over, tapping his bottom lip with his pen. 'Now, can we boost the conversion ratio? Grovyle's prototype attack is getting more effective with repeated use, so there is more to explore on that front. What about wasted energy? The motes generated by Absorb emit light, so we know for certain that much is wasted as radiation, at least.' The zoologist jots down his observations. 'Questions for later.'

During the second hour, Lee instructed Grovyle to practice Absorb while maintaining an unused Leaf Blade so he could get used to the feeling of both moves at once. When it became apparent that holding a Leaf Blade is second nature for Grovyle regardless of the task, they moved on to trying to refocus Absorb's origin point to the edge of Grovyle's blade. So far, having Grovyle cast Absorb on himself seems to be the way to go. Memorizing the feeling of Absorb upon his wrist leaves is definitely aiding in reverse engineering the move.

'It must be a purely mental thing for Absorb to be focused around the mouth. Maybe ingrained in some kind of ancestral memory? Grovyle is showcasing that it is possible to change the absorption origin point, though only time will tell if the energy conversion properties of Absorb will suffer for it.' Lee hums. 'Energy conversion… That might open some exciting doors. Since conservation of energy and mass aren't rules on this Earth…' More ideas are jotted down to be explored later. "Okay, Grovyle! Time for a breather!"

Grovyle's head-leaf twitches, and he powers down his Leaf Blade. He trots over to Lee, following the man back to the tree where they had their briefing.

Sitting down, Lee pulls a pair of water bottles from his bag, along with his berry case. Taking a ripe Oran from the case and one of the bottles, he tosses them to Grovyle, who deftly catches the berry in his mouth and the bottle in his claws.

With a relaxed sigh, Lee opens his bottle and takes a gulp of the cool water, wiping his damp forehead on his sleeve afterward. "Autumn needs to hurry up. Nothing but mild days and cool nights is something I've been missing."

Grovyle snorts past a bite of his Oran. After another slow, methodical bite, he washes the snack down with his water, draining half the bottle in a single go.

"Even after Absorbing all those logs, your thirst and hunger kept building?" Lee asks, flipping open his notebook again.

The gecko pokemon nods, finishing the Oran berry, drinking the last of his water, and licking his lips to make sure he got everything.

"So even with decent mastery, Absorb is consistently a waste unless used on another pokemon. Good to know…" Lee caps his pen and closes the notebook.

Grovyle nods once more, then looks down at his empty water bottle. With a thoughtful growl in his throat, he opens his mouth, and from his glowing gullet comes a handful of brown, thickly-shelled seeds that he spits into the bottle, filling it partway before he caps it. Giving the bottle a shake, he coils his arm back, locks his eyes on a distant trashcan by some children's swings, and throws the plastic bottle. With the heft added by the seeds, the bottle makes it all the way to the waste bin without the wind throwing it off course, and Grovyle sinks the shot without his toss so much as touching the rim.

Lee can't help but grin at the superb display of problem-solving, one even the most intelligent of animals would take ages to figure out. "Nice shot," he compliments, turning his attention away from Grovyle and over to Courtney.

On the other side of the park, Courtney is locked in a battle with another woman with several onlookers scattered around. The old man with the small Buneary is off at the side of the arena, acting as the referee. Courtney's Camerupt is facing down the other woman's Pelipper, a pokemon resembling a white-feathered pelican, if a pelican's head and bill made up the majority of its body.

Pelipper dips and dives, taking care to keep out Camerupt's melee range, all while pelting Camerupt with blasts of water courtesy of his Water Gun attack. Pelipper gurgles, then shoots yet another blast of pressurized water down at Camerupt from his mouth.

Camerupt winces at the bruising strength of the water blast, for Pelipper's attack has enough wallop that Lee can feel the impact rumble the ground just a little. Camerupt's Ground and Fire typing, both being weak to Water, make it all the worse, but the camel pokemon doesn't waver.

Behind Camerupt, Courtney stands, her face impassive. Her eyes remain locked on Pelipper like a bird of prey, just waiting for the perfect moment.

Then Pelipper messes up. The pelican slows down mid-air, relaxing at Camerupt's lack of retaliation, and it's at that moment Courtney finally issues an order.

"Stone Edge." The Magma Admin's voice has zero inflection, as if the battle is a bore.

Camerupt's eyes narrow as razor-sharp stones manifest from rings of bright white light that bloom to life around him. The shards shiver, then scream through the air at Pelipper at near-sonic speeds.

The other woman and Pelipper can only drop their mouths open in surprise at how sudden the attack is, and by the time Pelipper flaps his wings to move out of the way, the first stones are already tearing bloody furrows into him. A second later, Pelipper falls to the grass, bleeding profusely from numerous lacerations. With a croak, the pelican lets his eyes roll back into his head, falling unconscious.

'One super-effective attack and Pelipper was down for the count. Meanwhile, Camerupt was shrugging off Water Gun with barely a grimace…' Lee frowns, watching as the elderly referee calls the match in Courtney's favor. 'That Pelipper didn't seem like a pushover, either.'

Turning his attention to Grovyle, who was also watching the fight, Lee clears his throat. When Grovyle snaps his head around, Lee speaks. "So… Should we confront her? Try to sway her off of Magma's scheme? It's only a matter of time before the events on the volcano kick off. While I'm sure our team, working in tandem with Zinnia and Brendan's, can handle her…" Lee watches as another challenger, this time a confident teen boy, steps up to Courtney. "...I'd much rather not fight at all."

Grovyle crosses his thin arms, rolling his chewing twig between his lips in thought. His intelligent yellow eyes pan back over to Courtney's back. After a moment to think, he shakes his head. He chirps in his throat, ending with a hiss as he looks between the Magma Admin and the people around the park.

Despite not understanding all of Grovyle's speech, Lee nods grimly at what he does understand.

Too much potential for collateral damage.

"You're right, we'll do it later…" Lee scratches the back of his sweaty head. "Okay, let's get…" He trails off, seeing a new set of bodies wandering toward himself and Grovyle.

Entering the park is Ash and his friends. As per usual, it's Ash and his shoulder-mounted Pikachu leading the party with May, Max, and Brock bringing up the rear.

May is quick to spot Lee, and with a smile and pointed finger, makes her friends all aware. The kids smile as one, and begin to make their way over.

"Hiya, Lee!" Ash greets, raising a hand to wave at Lee and Grovyle. "You out here training?"

"That we are." Lee smiles back. Something about Ash makes it hard not to reflect his cheer, even if the kid is a peril magnet. "Come and sit for a spell. I take it you're here for the same reason?"

"Yep!" Ash nods as he and his gang sit down in the shade a few paces away. "My match with Flannery is in just a few days, and my Corphish is my only solid counter, so I've been training my other pokemon up just in case."

"A solid plan." Lee nods. "I faced the same issue with my Octillery. Who is on your current roster, if you don't mind me asking?"

Ash shakes his head. "No worries! I've got Tailow, Corphish, Nuzleaf, and Pikachu here," the boy says, raising his hand to pet Pikachu across his cheek.

Pikachu nuzzles into the gloved hand with a pleased expression.

"If you haven't already taught him one, then Nuzleaf might benefit from a Rock-type move since Rock beats many of Grass's weaknesses, chiefly Fire. Grovyle made use of Rock Tomb in our gym match to great effect." Lee idly fingers the shoulder strap of his backpack as he talks. "Not only are the dense rocks good at breaking bones and pinning limbs, they can also function as cover or obstacles in the field."

"Hey, that's a great idea!" Ash grins and slides his backpack off. Unzipping the bag, he reaches a hand inside and begins digging through the contents. "Nuzleaf knows Rollout which is Rock-type, but ever since he evolved, he's had a lot of trouble using it… Rock Tomb might be the answer we're looking for!"

Beside Ash, Brock thoughtfully rubs his chin with his finger and his thumb. "Rock Tomb is a fairly stamina-intensive attack, though," he says, his experience with Rock-type showing itself. "It takes time to manifest a rock that dense, too. I can't imagine a non-Rock pokemon would be able to use it to make much extra terrain, especially in the heat of battle…"

"Not without some time to master it, at least, which is why I had Grovyle practicing Rock Tomb for nearly a week beforehand. As per usual with him, the dedication showed itself in the gym match." Lee sends a proud smile Grovyle's way, and the gecko looks away with a bashful flick of his chewing twig. "Since Nuzleaf is already familiar with Rock TE, he shouldn't need so much prep, but it never hurts to start early."

Max, who is sitting between May and Brock, finally speaks up. "TE? What do you mean by that?" the young boy asks.

"TE is short for Type Energy, the energy that pokemon use for their moves," Brock supplies before Lee can. "Every Type uses its own special energy that influences how the moves work, and a pokemon's mastery of TE can make their moves stronger or faster. That's some really advanced theory, though." Brock turns his squinted gaze to Lee. "You sound like you've researched the topic, Mister Lee."

'I guess I shouldn't be surprised that Brock knows about TE. He's an aspiring pokemon breeder and a former Gym Leader, so the subject has to have come up during his tenure in the Pewter Gym.' Lee blinks his surprise away. "Erm. That I have." He clears his throat and recovers quickly. "I've been researching and experimenting with Type Energy, and its counterpart, Infinity Energy, as part of a larger project centered around pokemon biology and behavior. I'm hoping by understanding TE and IE, the various mysteries of pokemon biology will begin to make more sense. I'm sure you've seen the inherent differences that exist across the Type boundaries of different moves? You must have some fascinating insights on Rock-type."

"I might." Brock nods, a smile rising to his lips. "Not many people are keen to talk about it, though. When you start getting into energy-to-matter conversion and crystalline assembly versus sedimentary layering, it's blank stares all around."

Lee grins. 'No offense, Ash, but I think Brock is my favorite person in your little gang.' Outwardly, he says, "I know that feeling all too well. The only person I can gab about TE to is Ninetales, and I know she is just pretending to be interested beyond a certain point."

"Um…" May finally speaks up. When Lee turns his attention to her, the young girl flushes pink. "Where is your Ninetales, Mister Lee? I'm not sure what I did to upset her back at that restaurant, but I wanted to apologize to her..."

Lee is taken right back to the embarrassing dinner a few nights prior, where Ninetales nearly snarled right in May's face. Taking a deep breath, Lee gently touches the thin psychic line leading back to Ninetales to check on her. When he gets no reply, he peers in just a bit deeper and finds himself staring at a foreign scene.

"Are you certain, Shiba?" Shiro's words are quiet, gliding into my ears like a Noctowl riding a cold wind. My dearest brother's weak voice is yet another reminder of the withering illness that still ravages his body. "I would join you on the field, even if I am weak. A death in battle, no matter how ignominious, is better than wasting away here." Shiro peers down at his bed of straw. "Hideki's forces camp beyond yonder hill, almost atop us. The Shogun requires bodies to stem the flood." His head lowers. "I wish to be useful, brother. Just once in my life."

Shiro's coat, pale as a horned herald's, hides his frame, which is frail as reeds, just as the hastily moved straw hides the sick that I know he expelled. Shiro, dearest Shiro, in his condition, cannot smell what even a man could. He does not know he cannot hide how dire his health is.

"You ask me to commit a sibling's greatest sin, Shiro…" I lower my voice, so as not to disturb the other Growlithe resting in their own beds. They will need all the rest for the morn to come. "You ask me to let you stray into danger, to let you die. I am Firstborn, and I would see myself fall before you. Why must you force this issue so?"

Shiro's head lowers further, nose brushing the floor. "I'm sorry."

The scene suddenly freezes, growing blurry.

'Lee?' Ninetales takes notice of him. 'Is something the matter?'

'Nothing wrong here, just checking up on you,' Lee thinks back.

A pulse of understanding comes from the vixen. 'I see. Everything is going well, then?'

'Yep,' Lee confirms. 'It looks like you were really into your book, so I'm sorry for interrupting.'

He can almost hear Ninetales scoff. 'You're not interrupting. My legs are getting stiff, so I was due for a break, anyway.'

'You like your books, though?' Lee sends back. 'I know your imagination is vivid, but it was almost like I was there when I peeked into your head.'

Ninetales mulls her answer over. 'Other Eyes seems to have some creative liberty applied here and there, but it is quite an engaging read.' After a moment, she continues. 'Would you be opposed to me seeking out other books? The citations Other Eyes uses are listed in the back, and I would enjoy seeing those texts.'

'Say the word, and our eventual house will have a library just for you.'

Ninetales scoffs, and this time he can hear the sound, though it's through her ears. Despite that, the fox's loving amusement is plain to feel.

'Oh, and before I forget…' Lee frowns. 'May says she apologizes if she offended you.'

The emotions within Ninetales twist themselves into a paradoxical mess, one so warped that Lee can barely decipher what she's feeling. Like a drop of dye creeping through white threads, though, regret bleeds through to the surface. 'Beloved, please tell her the fault lies with me. It was… wrong of me to nearly snap at a child. There is nothing to forgive on her end.'

'I'll let her know, but don't beat yourself up over it.'

Ninetales doesn't reply with words, but a bright pulse of affection that washes Lee's frown away. With that, Ninetales pulls away, reluctantly allowing the connection to narrow once more.

'Good to see that her conscious self can look at what her instincts do with some logic.' Lee returns his attention outward and gives May a smile. "Sorry if I spaced out there. That's nice of you, May, but don't worry about it. Ninetales evolved only recently, and it's made her temper short and somewhat random. I'm helping her get over it, and you're not at fault."

The brunette girl breathes a sigh of relief. "Thank goodness…"

"Aha!" Ash finally pulls his hand out of his backpack, and with it comes a cylindrical case filled with different TMs, and Lee struggles not to boggle at the thing. Ash must be lugging around tens of thousands of credits in TM disks. Popping open the case, Ash sifts through the disks within, humming to himself. On his shoulder, Pikachu finds Rock Tomb before Ash, and reaches his tiny hands in to pull it out. "Pika!" the iconic pokemon exclaims, presenting the TM to Ash.

"Good eye, Pikachu," Ash compliments, taking the disk. He stows the TM case away and stands, his free hand taking a pokeball from his belt. Holding the ball aloft, Ash gives it a grin and rears his arm back. "Go, Nuzleaf!"

The pokeball flies from Ash's hand and snaps open with the typical 'snap-hiss' sound, tossing a mass of light at the ground. When the light fades, a short pokemon is left behind.

Nuzleaf blinks his eyes and stands, showing his three-foot-and-some-change height. The pokemon is obviously a Grass-type, owing to the green leaf growing from his head, and the brown, bark-like skin covering much of his humanoid body. A beige, mask-like pattern covers his eyes and nose, the latter of which is long and ends in a point. Nuzleaf's arms are thin, ending in mitten-like hands, but his legs boast impressive muscle. All in all, the pokemon resembles a buckeye nut that has grown a body.

"Nuzleaf, huh?" Lee comments, looking over the pokemon. "Hmm…" He hums to himself, looking at a little pouch held to Nuzleaf's leg with a strip of leather. 'A held item? I don't remember Ash ever using held items before.'

"Yep!" Ash grins. "At first, I wanted a Treecko, but then I found Seedot protecting his favorite tree from a couple of Nincada bullies lead by a Ninjask, who wanted to drink it dry. We helped fight off the Nincada and Ninjask, and when Seedot went off on his own to find Oran berries to treat Ninjask afterward, I knew he was a good pokemon."

Nuzleaf crosses his arms, nodding rapidly.

'Certainly sounds like an anime episode…' Lee and Grovyle meet eyes for a moment, neither commenting on the distorted timeline.

"So how about it, Nuzleaf?" Ash kneels down and shows the Rock Tomb TM to Nuzleaf. "Want to learn a new move?"

Nuzleaf's hand rises to his chin, where he hems and haws in an exaggerated show, leaning back and forth like he's considering it. Then he smiles and gives Ash a thumbs up, complete with a nasally chuckle.

"Great!" Ash rises back to his feet, then unexpectedly gives Lee and Grovyle an eager look. "Say, Lee? How about a battle afterward so Nuzleaf can test out Rock Tomb?"

'Well, that came out of nowhere…' Lee debates the merits of a battle with the Ash Ketchum, hiding his grimace. 'Not the best idea right now, not with Magma so close to making a move. I need all my fighters in top shape and a bout with Ash will end with injuries.' After another moment of thought, he decides the bare minimum explanation will do.

"I would…" Lee begins carefully, "but all of my fighters are on standby right now for an investigation I'm running on behalf of the League. I can't have them getting torn up right now."

Max adjusts his glasses with a small frown. "What kind of investigation?"

Lee meets Grovyle's eyes once more, and the gecko shrugs. 'Yeah… If I say 'don't worry about it', they'll probably just keep pestering or get into trouble…'

"One regarding the eco-terrorist groups Magma and Aqua," Lee says, unsurprised to see a flash of recognition in the eyes of the children before him. Before he continues, he peers over Brock's shoulder.

Courtney is in the middle of another battle, not paying the group any mind. She's using her Camerupt again, and her Mightyena is standing by, but her Swellow is nowhere to be seen.

"You probably didn't get the memo since you're not Hoenn natives, but members of Magma and Aqua are officially persons-of-interest to the Hoenn League." Lee didn't get that memo either; it was forwarded to him by Nigel this morning, but the kids didn't need to know that. "They're suspected to be involved in more illicit activities and have Elite level trainers in their ranks. Ash and Brock…" Lee levels the boys with a stare that makes both stiffen. "You two are experienced pokemon trainers, more so than I, but for the sake of my own conscience and the sake of your less experienced friends—" He looks to Max and May, who both fidget, "—I have to ask you to be careful if you encounter members of their team. They're dangerous and unpredictable."

"You don't need to tell us…" Ash's smile falls. "We encountered those creeps in Rustboro, Oldale, and Dewford. They seemed like common criminals… until Dewford. We stumbled upon them while exploring some caves on the coast, and they got into a battle so intense that it nearly brought the whole cave system down. We barely avoided being flattened."

'Wasn't Nigel supposed to be with them during that adventure?' Lee clicks his tongue and chalks the inconsistency to another timeline wrinkle. 'Nigel would have said something if he was there, I'm sure.'

"Well, I'm glad you understand how dangerous they are…" Lee mutters before shaking his head. "I'd be glad to battle another time, Ash." When the boy's face falls, Lee adds, "That doesn't mean I can't help with some training, though."


"I never thought of it that way…" Brock rubs his chin as he and Lee watch Shinx sample from a pair of plates on the picnic table they have commandeered.

Before the kitten are two plates of food, one prepared by Brock, and another by Lee. Brock's plate consists of a number of moist, dark brown food pellets, flecked with larger bits of identifiable food matter, like meat, vegetables, and berries that weren't totally emulsified before the mix was balled. Lee's plate looks much more traditional, mainly being rare-cooked red meat sliced thin enough for young fangs to chew, with thin layers of pressed veggies and Sitrus slivers between the layers. The supplements within were rubbed into the meat and masked with a pinch of spice.

"It's a psychology thing, really," Lee begins, gesturing to the plates and Shinx, who is in the middle of tentatively nibbling one of the food pellets. "Pokemon have sharp senses of smell for certain, but sight still plays a role. If it looks like food and smells like food, then it's probably food. Stimulating as many senses as you can helps cubs on the smaller side stay interested in eating until full. For severely premature cases, the act of eating itself might be exhausting enough to tempt them into stopping."

Shinx, after having a nibble of Brock's mix, licks her lips and chomps down on the rest of the pellet, purring. Lee's plate goes ignored for now as Shinx digs into Brock's food.

"Factoring in taste is also very important." Lee raises his fist to his mouth and clears his throat, faintly embarrassed. "Something I'm still learning. Seems like I don't have Shinx's palate down yet."

Brock's maturity shines through, as he doesn't have any funny or smug comments on Shinx's choice. "Learning the tastes of others is a skill of its own. Besides…" He carefully reaches over, minding his hand's proximity to the still-eating Shinx, and takes a strip of the rare beef Lee prepared. The young pokemon breeder pops the strip into his mouth, slowly chewing and swallowing it. After a few seconds of thought, he speaks once more. "There's nothing wrong with what you made. I can taste the supplements a little, and a sensitive palate might disagree with it, but that's all."

"For a pokemon, though, an off taste can break a dish, and I'm weaning Shinx off of her bottle, so…" Lee crosses his arms. "I'd be open to suggestions."

The tan-skinned teen looks back down at Lee's plate. "Instead of trimming the fat down to a target percentage—" He points at the narrow line of fat along the sides of Shinx's meat strips. "—try trimming most of it, cooking it down with a bit of butter, then basting the meat in it. It's a little less precise in the fat-control department, but that'll infuse the meat with flavor and help cover any unpleasant medicines or supplements that happen to be stuffed in there." Brock chuckles. "My sister has a pet Rockruff with the palate of a princess. She wouldn't eat anything if it tasted funny, so giving her medications was a chore, but basted red meat fooled her every time."

"Sure thing…" Lee's notebook finds its way into his hands, and he quickly jots down the tidbit. "Can you tell that I've been a bachelor my entire life?" he jokes.

Brock's shoulders slump dramatically. "You and me both…"

Looking away from the little station that he and Brock set up to talk about all things poke-science, Lee watches as Ash, Nuzleaf, and Grovyle train.

"Once more, with feeling!" Ash orders with a dramatic punch to the air. The twelve-year-old trainer stands by Nuzleaf's side, encouraging the Grass-type as he practices Rock Tomb over and over.

Panting, Nuzleaf draws his arm back, screwing his eyes shut in focus. Just above his palm, sandy sediment swirls in, as if summoned from the aether, before coalescing into a small stone. The sand continues to build upon the stone, growing and growing into a rock roughly the size of Nuzleaf's head. Nuzleaf grits his teeth, then throws the rock forward as hard as he can.

The rock flies in a lazy arc, then smashes into the ground and ruptures like an egg, revealing the insides to be nothing but loose dirt. The bits of rocky shell disintegrate shortly after, turning into dirt as well. Like magic, the pile of sediment slowly grows smaller as the Rock TE decays, leaving flat but unharmed grass behind.

Nuzleaf groans, falling to his rear in a moment of melodrama.

"Don't worry too hard about it, pal!" Ash claps a frustrated-looking Nuzleaf on the shoulder. "It just takes time, is all. You'll get it for sure! Say, Grovyle," Ash looks over to the pokemon that would have been his in another life. "Can we get another example?"

Grovyle nods. He extends his arm, sets his brow, and growls deep in his throat. Unlike with Nuzleaf, when Grovyle's rock begins to manifest, entire pebbles appear and smash into each other as if drawn into a gravity well. Within a handful of seconds, a round boulder several feet across hovers above Grovyle's fingers. Growling again, the gecko pokemon heaves the stone forward, and it lands on the ground with a muted thud. The exterior is cracked, but the stone otherwise remains solid.

Nuzleaf eyes the in-tact rock with a measure of envy.

"Rock TE really needs some 'oomf' when called on!" Lee supplies, drawing Ash and Nuzleaf's attention. "I don't know how much Rollout needed when Nuzleaf was a Seedot, but put more force into it! Act like the Rock TE is an actual rock you're trying to lift!"

Ash grins, determination in his eyes. When Nuzleaf looks away from Lee and back to Ash, that determination bleeds over, and Nuzleaf clenches his fists before standing once more.

Off to the side of Ash, Grovyle, and Nuzleaf, Octillery is splitting his attention between trying to teach Ice Beam to Ash's Corphish and Brock's Mudkip, and Flamethrower to May's Torchic. Pikachu is there as well, not to learn, but to encourage the younger pokemon.

Octillery lets out a gurgling sigh, looking as if he's resisting the urge to strangle Mudkip and Corphish. Once more, he opens his conical mouth, slowly charges an Ice Beam, letting the young pokemon watch the cryo-energy form, then he shoots the ground before him with a weak beam of crackling blue, coating the long-since-ruined patch of grass in frost and lumpy ice.

The octopus then gestures at the ice with a tentacle, telling Corphish and Mudkip to try.

Mudkip's beady eyes are nervous, but he opens his mouth and takes a deep breath as his throat glows an icy blue. Just as the glow begins to build, it sputters out, and Mudkip coughs a handful of snowflakes right into Octillery's face.

Octillery wipes his face off with another sigh, flicking the water and saliva off of his tentacle and into the dirt. He turns his half-lidded and already resigned eyes away from the apologetic Mudkip to Ash's Corphish.

The little lobster pokemon has held a blank look since the start of the lesson, as if he didn't comprehend the words of anyone around him, let alone Octillery's. Nevertheless, he clicks his claws, opens his mouth… and shamelessly fires off the wrong attack, squirting the ground with a Water Gun that throws wet mud directly into Octillery's face.

Mudkip and Torchic cringe.

Pikachu has to cover his mouth with his paws to stifle a laugh.

Corphish pretends to blink cluelessly, but he shakes with barely suppressed laughter, telling everyone that he's playing dumb as a joke.

Lee winces. 'Please don't strangle Corphish and put me on Ash's shit list, Octillery.'

Octillery remains ominously still for a moment, then slowly, he wipes the mud away and stares down at Corphish. With a look far too placid to be anything but full-circle fury, the octopus lays a gentle tentacle across Corphish's back…

…Then throws the lobster with all his might, right up into the sky.

The edges of Corphish's shell whistle as the Water-type flies through the air in an arc, nearly striking a startled Taillow. At the apex of his flight, Corphish blinks and looks down, seemingly realizing he's not on the ground anymore. The crayfish pokemon flails in alarm, coming down on the other side of the park, right into a tiny, murky pond with a splash. The water bubbles, then Corphish breaches the surface, covered head to toe in pond scum. On the lobster's face is the expression of a kicked puppy.

"Never a dull moment with you lot, eh?" Lee comments to no one in particular.

Ash pulls the brim of his cap over his eyes, hiding his embarrassment.


Corvisquire stares down at the hotel room door from the laundromat roof across the street, debating with himself for the thousandth time today, and cursing himself for his cowardice for the thousand and first. Behind him, the sun is beginning to set, reminding him of how long he's been standing here.

The flight to Lavaridge was without issue. He flew, stopped to eat and rest, then flew once more. The wind descending from Mt Chimney made for an annoying headwind, but Corvisquire didn't let that deter him. He would run no more, and wind is the most minor of obstacles. As he flew, part of him wondered what Wally and Kirlia would do with the stone he left behind. They'll likely return it, not because they realize the police would connect a Dawn Stone theft with a Gallade, but because they can't stomach the thought of theft.

Fools.

Corvisquire staked out Lavaridge for the last day, and this morning, on pure chance, he saw Lee leave the hotel he now stares at. Seeing the man's scarred visage, his happy visage, sowed the seeds of doubt within the raven.

Does he have the right to come back? To intrude upon things? What has he missed? What will his estranged team say? Has Lee moved on?

…Should he dig his beak into a wound that might already be healed?

Corvisquire shakes his head, cursing himself again. 'Damnation! Enough sitting here and thinking! Go down there now!'

The raven's body moves of its own accord, his wings spreading as he glides down to the hotel room where Lee and the team are staying. Stepping up to the door, he gives it three solid knocks with the top of his beak and waits. Beyond the door, he hears someone moving.

'...Perhaps I should not have been so hasty. I don't know if Lee has returned yet,' Corvisquire sighs, but remains where he is.

The door latch unlocks, then the door swings open, and Corvisquire's stomach sinks.

In the doorway is no kindly human trainer, but a Ninetales — a Ninetales that he recognizes the eyes of. Those eyes, once a dark brown, now red, widen in surprise.

Then they narrow into hateful slits.

"Ninetales?" A voice from within calls, and Corvisquire matches Brendan's face to the words. "Who's at that door?"

"No one, Brendan…" Ninetales' words are quiet, yet painted with mortal danger, and Corvisquire takes a step back. "No one…"

Ninetales steps outside with Corvisquire, the door slamming shut behind her. Corvisquire can't look to see what shut it, for the hellish red eyes of the fox pin him in place.

"You have a lot of nerve coming here," Ninetales begins coolly, her lack of screaming and raging making things all the worse. "Why? Why come back now?"

Corvisquire takes a deep breath, trying to still his heart after seeing one of his worst fears made manifest. "I see you've evolved. Congratulations."

A flat, unamused stare is Ninetales' answer. "Is now the time for small talk?"

The raven gulps, picking his next words carefully. "I came to make amends."

"Amends?" Ninetales raises a brow daintily, her lips rising in amusement. "You came to make amends… Can you?" The fox asks. Her tails flit to and fro behind her, then like Seviper slithering through the air, begin to close in on him.

"Can I?" Corvisquire parrots, uncomprehending. He tries to watch the tails, but those damnable eyes paralyze him.

"You left." Ninetales lowers her head to whisper in his ear. Her breath is uncomfortably hot. "You left when Lee was most vulnerable, when his healing had just begun." The thin veneer of civility around Ninetales' words begins to unravel, and the fury within bears its fangs. "You left when another loss threatened to shatter him. You know as well as I do, that this team is Lee's family, that you were part of that family." Tails begin to wrap around Corvisquire, around his torso, his legs, his neck, and he sees his life begin to flash before his eyes as his feathers grow unbearably hot.

"I will give you one, and only one chance, Corvisquire…" Ninetales' tone is as frigid as the Crown Tundra, far to the north of noble Galar. The tails around him are feather-light, yet he still feels their weight. From their touch alone, he feels both the world-consuming firestorm within the kitsune, and its desire to swallow him whole. "Fly away and do not come back. Pretend you were never here."

Corvisquire isn't sure if the sudden fire in his chest is foolishness, courage, or just heatstroke from the tails blanketing him, but he speaks once more. "I cannot!" He insists. "I have to make amends!"

"Can you? Can you make amends? For abandoning Lee without so much as an explanation?!" Ninetales snarls, her beautiful face twisting into hideous savagery. "I don't think you can!"

The tails suddenly tighten like coiling snakes, forcing a gasp from the avian's lungs. His bones creak, and his vision begins to flash, but before his breath is robbed of him, Corvisquire blurts: "Lee would let me explain!"

The tails halt, and Ninetales' hate-filled stare tells Corvisquire just how narrowly he's avoided being crushed. "You dare?" She grounds out.

"Am I wrong?" He can't help but snark back.

The tails loosen just enough for the raven to breathe. "Speak," the fox demands. "If I don't like what I hear…" She leaves her threat hanging.

Corvisquire sucks in a breath, blinking the stars from his vision as he wonders where to begin. The explanation is on his tongue, but even with the tails threatening to end his life, the words remain stuck in his throat, as if covered in stinging barbs.

The golden tails wrapped around his body twitch, and Ninetales growls. "I'm waiting, Corvisquire," she spits his name as if it burns her lips. "What do you have to say in your defense? Tell me, so I may finally snap you in half and return to the rest of my day." Once more, the cursed appendages holding him prisoner begin to squeeze and pain lances up his body.

I don't want to run anymore.

"Lee…" Corvisquire hisses past the tail beginning to strangle him. "He was not my first trainer. There was another, a boy, my Young M-Master. I l-loved him. I still love him." The word is like bittersweet poison on his beak, and Corvisquire grimaces, forcing the words to keep flowing so the tail around his neck doesn't cut off his windpipe. "I… was born for him, to be his First and Most Faithful pokemon, just as you were to Lee. My earliest memory is of his hand upon my brow, and the sweet purpose he gave me. I-I…" he raven struggles to keep his composure. "He was sickly, his terminal illness misdiagnosed from an early age. For months we ventured through beautiful Galar, as his medication became less and less effective. One day…"

"Nothing can be done."

"Nothing can be done."

"Nothing can be done."

"He collapsed…" The raven croaks, looking at Ninetales, whose fury-laden visage begins to morph into something he can't place. "I was too weak to carry him, and by the time medical help arrived, he had been brain-dead for several minutes." Ninetales nearly fades from his vision, but the flashback to that hospital room is pushed away. "I watched him wither in the hospital, then they pulled the plug on him, and he…".

He can't say it. Not even with his life on the line.

"You can't do anything."

"Since then…" Corvisquire shudders. "Since then, I haven't allowed myself to become close to a human, or let one touch me. I was… afraid of the cycle starting again, to serve a trainer and have them ripped away. I ran away because I was afraid." The bird gulps. "I was afraid Lee's touch would be like the Young Master's, that it would force me to love again. I was… I still am afraid of loss. Now?" His strength flees him in a wheezing exhale, leaving him slack in Ninetales' grip and staring down at the ground. "I am simply tired. So tired that I can run no further."

For a full minute, nothing is said, and Ninetales' mercy remains unbroken. Then the tails withdraw, leaving Corvisquire ruffled but intact.

Raising his head, Corvisquire takes in the fox who nearly tore him limb-from-limb. The neutral mask upon her face is so terribly forced that a realization hits home. "You know that fear too." He says, not asks. "For your kind, it is not a question of if, but when."

Ninetales' mask cracks, and under it, Corvisquire plays witness to the same ugly, wild-eyed terror he harbors within himself. The terror of being lost, listless, and devoid of reason to live. So often has he seen that same face upon himself, that he's forgotten what his real face looks like.

Never has he been able to relate to another pokemon so well.

"It's almost like looking into a distorted mirror…" Corvisquire murmurs, his thoughts scattered and in disarray.

"I suppose it is…" Ninetales' retort is just as quiet. She takes a deep breath through her nose, seemingly at a loss for words.

For one minute, then two, Corvisquire and Ninetales stand there, unspeaking as everything sinks in.

"When I evolved," the fox begins weakly, "I swore I would endure the pain of parting when the time came, but now?" She pauses, turning her eyes away. "Does it get easier as time goes by?"

"No." Corvisquire's answer is near instant. "You merely forget sometimes."

"Ah…"

Both fall silent once more, and Corvisquire can barely form a coherent thought as he replays the last few minutes in his head, wondering how he'd lived.

The pair of pokemon are pulled from their reverie as footsteps shuffle the gravel of the hotel parking lot. Turning, Corvisquire feels his throat tighten.

There stands Lee, wearing a stunned expression. He blinks, his surprise shifting into a smile that yanks at Corvisquire's heart. "Corvi? Is that you?"

Not trusting his voice, Corvisquire nods, staring up at the man he swore to cease running from.

"I almost can't believe it," Lee breathes, smiling so hard that even the burned side of his face rises. The light of the setting sun frames the scarred man, making it appear as if a halo of orange and gold surrounds his head.

'Is that you, O Arceus, sending a message to me?'

Corvisquire gulps.

"I was beginning to think you were gone for good." Lee's smile lessens and the light behind him seemingly dims. "I don't know what upset you, or if I'm the one who did it, but I'm glad you're back."

I'm glad you're back. Corvisquire nearly falters.

"Did you come to stay?" Lee's eyes and voice are filled to the brim with hope, so much so that the raven hesitates, fearing no reply would be good enough. Instead, Corvisquire watches the cloud behind Lee move, letting the sunlight return and wreathe the man in rays once more.

'How could you want me back? What did I do to deserve this? Are you sure you want me?' None of the questions Corvisquire wants to ask will rise to the surface; he won't let them, lest he get an answer he does not want. All he can do is shudder and nod once more.

Lee's eyes finally travel to Ninetales, and his smile becomes strained. The raven watches a silent conversation that takes only a split second. "I understand that you and Ninetales had a disagreement a minute ago, and that you want to explain why you left?" Despite the strain of his expression, Lee's voice never leaves its pleasant, neutral tone.

From the corner of his eye, Corvisquire watches Ninetales lower her head, shamefaced. Was she ashamed at being caught? Or ashamed of nearly striking him down? Regardless, Corvisquire finds it difficult to lay blame upon her. Better an overzealous First and Most Faithful than a lax one.

"I do…" Corvisquire realizes that he's parched from the heat Ninetales forced upon him, as his voice is little more than a rasp. "Ninetales? I need you to translate, I do not want a single word missed."

The fox's eyes glow. "He is listening."

Before Corvisquire can muster the energy to explain once more, Lee raises a hand, halting any conversation.

"This sounds like it'll be a serious one," Lee's voice is low and soothing, balming the raven's nerves. "You don't need to explain right now. How about you come inside for a meal, and I can listen later, when you're rested up and in a better place, okay?" His haggard smile is so full of understanding that Corvisquire is left in disbelief. "C'mon."

Why run?

Because I'm a coward.

Lee goes to step past Corvisquire and Ninetales, but the raven's beak darts out and bites Lee's sleeve, halting him.

"Hmm?" Lee looks down at Corvisquire, bewildered.

Why run?

Because I'll fail again.

Throwing his fears to the wind, the bird grits his beak and shoves his head into Lee's palm.

Why run?

I don't deserve love.

There is a gasp, then warm, callused fingers close around his head, stroking his scalp tenderly.

Sensations long forgotten surge to life in his chest, like fuel dumped upon a waning fire. The world grows blurry in the raven's eyes, and for the first time in his life, the tears dripping from his beak aren't bitter.

Happiness.

Belonging.

Purpose.

Love.

"Welcome home, Corvi."


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Act 2: Interlude 3
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Barely hiding his boredom, Octillery quashes the urge to twiddle his tentacles and looks at his 'teammates'.

He, Ninetales, Grovyle, and the newcomer, Corvisquire, all stand in a loose circle in the moonlight streaming in from the hotel room window. In the beds just a few yards away, both Lee and Brendan are deep in slumber.

Since Corvisquire has joined the merry band of misfits just a few hours ago, tensions have been high, only just now beginning to loosen after Ninetales quietly called for a meeting. She and Grovyle have brought the raven up to speed on what he's missed since his abandonment weeks ago, while Octillery has been content to stand back and observe.

As interesting an experience as being a 'trained' pokemon is, Octillery's team is proving tiresome, and the returning Corvisquire is no exception. The raven tersely introduced himself to Octillery, then explained the reason for his absence to the team, much to Grovyle and Ninetales' poorly hidden sympathy. Octillery himself doesn't understand the issue. Death happens. Why be so upset over it? Especially when one lacks control of the situation? Octillery wanted to shake his head. Had Corvisquire saved his old trainer, it sounds as if the boy would have been on borrowed time anyway. Better he have died so that time and resources aren't wasted on him. Octillery did not voice his complaint aloud, knowing it would earn him no favor.

His eyes turn to Ninetales and Grovyle, then over to the bed where Lee and Young Shinx lay asleep. The man and cub are utterly dead to the world, convinced of their security.

Grovyle might be his favorite by a wide margin. The Grass-type knows the value of not opening one's mouth when there is nothing of import to say, and when coaxed, is surprisingly shrewd when it comes to games of the mind. Octillery has, dare he say, enjoyed being around this one? Novel, but like all novelties, Octillery expects it to wear off.

Young Shinx, he cannot say, but considering her origins and favored place in the lap of Lee, Octillery expects her to grow into something placid and spoiled. She will persist on her trainer's good graces, regardless of her own ability. How distasteful.

And Ninetales…

Octillery dares not let his eyes linger on the fox, lest he attract one of her seemingly random fits of ire.

Ninetales is dangerous. The unnatural joining of minds has addled her in Octillery's eyes. The brain is but meat between the ears, and meat can suffocate. It can crush. It can die. Meat has limits. To ask a flesh bound pokemon to comprehend the true thoughts of a being as illogical and unsound as a human? That is a task best left unfulfilled, yet Ninetales does so daily and suffers for it.

The fox pokemon is far from the strongest pokemon Octillery has ever seen. She is not even close, as through the years, Octillery has witnessed actual monsters in action, the sort bested only by Legends. The Valley of Steel played home to some such pokemon, ones who could reshape the landscape in their fury. Images flash before his eyes, moments of peril where only his mind and skill carried him to safety. There was no fighting back in those cases, only fleeing and plotting for a better method of engagement.

No, Ninetales is not the strongest, but her unpredictability might make her the most dangerous he's ever met. She is ill, so he will watch her carefully.

His own distaste of them aside, Octillery's teammates present an intriguing puzzle. What, exactly, drives their loyalty to Lee Henson? Octillery knows his own loyalty and theirs are not the same. Lee Henson provides him food, security, and the chance to use his hard-earned skills and honed mind, but at the cost of obeying one less intelligent than he. If not for Lee being a bit sharper than the average human with a few interesting insights, Octillery would have more heavily considered declining the membership extended to him.

Most pokemon—keyword being most—grow their skills and might at an accelerated pace under a human's tutelage. A human provides security and resources to hone one's talents in a comfortable manner, one free of the vicious cycle of the wild. However, the pokemon around Octillery are not most pokemon. Be it chance or a concerted effort from Lee, the octopus pokemon's peers are a cut above the rest.

What defines them? What drives them? Why bend the knee?

Corvisquire carries himself with a horrid savagery held down fast by chains of civility, and it's plain after only a few hours of acquaintance. Under the flowery words and beak raised in superiority is a beast, one that would rend a foe down to the bone simply for the pleasure of bloodshed. A beast of decadence is he, who would slay another solely for entertainment. And yet, he bows his head low to Lee Henson, returning to his bonds freely.

Grovyle is one who would thrive regardless of any circumstances, and one Octillery would be wary of in the wild. His skill is matched only by his drive to rise to new heights, to shed any and all weakness. His prowess is the sort wielded by alphas who sire a dynasty, filled with offspring who spread their own will with the power gifted by their sire. Every cut is clean, every movement is sure, and every iota of his being is dedicated not to himself, but to a human.

Ninetales… Octillery does not even know where to begin with such a wreck of a pokemon. In no world can the mind of a human overwhelm a pokemon, so what Lee has done to have such a dogmatic defender is beyond Octillery. They treat one another in the same manner mammals might their mate in the height of spring, yet they refuse to copulate. It's such a contradictory mess that Octillery can only chalk it up to some form of cognitive damage.

Again, he wonders. What defines them? What drives them? Why bend the knee?

If there are truly defining moments in life, then they must be the moments of peril, Octillery thinks. When one faces their own mortality, their eyes are forced open, be they closed in ignorance or arrogance. He would know, as his earliest memories were of bloodshed. He remembers these moments vividly.

As a common Remoraid years ago, just two weeks hatched, he and his school of fellow fish fled up the mouth of a river from the open ocean, running from a Tentacruel and his cohort of Tentacool. Primal terror compelled them up the waterway and against the current, as many were already lost to the stinging tentacles of their predators. The ones who tried to fight fell the fastest.

This proved to be a blunder. The shallow water forced the Tentacool to abate in their pursuit, but the school swam into the territory of a river Feraligatr and her progeny.

A score of crocodilian pokemon dove into the water at their mother's instruction, surrounding the school. Gnashing jaws nearly claimed Octillery's life there, but in his peril, his mind whirled, his heart hammered, and the drive to survive took hold. The panic and terror, both within himself and reflected in the eyes of the school, laid a numbing cloak over him that would never again rise, and with the numbness came beautiful clarity. At that moment, he recalled how hard he must fight against the force of any water spewed from his maw. A plan neatly clicked into place amid that moment of lucidity.

Swimming to the surface, he aimed downward, and fired off a Water Gun, propelling him out of the churning water and onto land. He landed facing the river, treating him to the sight of the chaos within. His gills burned and stung, but he took another breath and fired Water Gun again. And again. And again. Until he heard no more splashing or snapping jaws.

To this day, he isn't sure how far his flight carried him, but when he flopped back into the river and took in deep breaths of blessedly clear water, he was alone. No other Remoraid had escaped, and a lone Remoraid is little more than a morsel to larger pokemon. The dire situation revealed itself to him in a flash of terrible realization, like a clap of thunder and blinding lightning.

He was weak.

With no fellows to cover him in the veil of the many and utterly lacking as an individual, an ignoble end awaited… He could not outrun or overpower his foes, but the numbness once more soothed him.

His mind had won that day, and he would need it forever more as his path became clear.

So began his life with naught but his own ingenuity to rely upon. He tested himself and the world around him, learning its rules and limits. He observed others, learned from them, then refined their skills to fit his needs. In the early days before his evolution, he learned to speak as others did, saying precisely what potential foes wished to hear so he might pass the few willing to talk unmolested. Acting became second nature in these cases, and the cases shrank in number as he grew. Before long, he wasn't forced to talk much, as speech and violence became tools of equal effectiveness. As time marched on, he began to crave more. More skills, more experiences, more foes, so he might learn from them, then triumph over them in defiance of nature, proving to himself his place in the world. His place as something better.

Looking back upon that fateful day, Octillery cannot lay blame upon the mother Feraligatr, or her hatchlings, or even the Tentacool who drove his school into the river. Nature is as fair an arbiter as they come. The weak die, and the strong consume the weak. It is a cycle that only the extraordinary like himself can escape. That day was the catalyst to making him into who he is today, after all, so how can he look upon it bitterly?

He who learns, survives.

He who plans, prospers.

He who dares, wins.

And Octillery was a winner. At least until migrating into the Valley of Steel via riverway.

The foes within the Valley tested all his skills and guile to the extreme, and Octillery found his wits pushed to their limits. Such power the natives cultivated, that his only option was to engage after lengthy periods spent analyzing weaknesses, often with sleepless nights pondering how he might make use of his repertoire against his prey. Some, he sought out and hunted in week-long engagements, requiring countless hours of planning, observation, and positioning. Others, he trapped or tricked to pass through their territory or lay claim to what they owned. Numerous Aggron, Rhydon, a single Onix, an alpha Skarmory, and even an arrogant Metang were all brought low by Octillery.

Magnezone put an end to that.

The alpha Magnezone of the Valley of Steel was persistent and aggressive beyond measure, chasing Octillery from pond to pond for the mere offense of being spied upon, forcing Octillery to use every trick and tactic he knew to escape harm. Magnezone cast down lightning bolts of such fury that they ionized parts of the ground, and Octillery knew one direct hit would be his end.

Growing weary after hours of unrelenting pursuit under the harsh Hoenn sun, Octillery took shelter in a pool that stung his lungs with the sharp taste of metal. The murky lagoon's dark bottom provided reprieve from Magnezone's bolts. Even with the contaminants aiding the conduction of Magnezone's electricity, the waters were deep enough to avoid anything worse than an unpleasant tingle.

For five days Magnezone remained overhead, waiting without moving an inch. Each day that passed, Octillery remained still in his shelter, even as hunger demanded he move, not at all realizing his thoughts were growing cloudy until it was too late. Then a discharge of lightning drew Magnezone away, but Octillery was too addled by the poison in his blood to realize it immediately. When his sluggish mind finally started turning again, he realized something was amiss, that he had made a mistake.

He should have died there, he realized. If Magnezone hadn't left, he would have perished. A rare spike of anger drove itself into him, that he would die in such a way. In his fury, he attacked anything that dared show its face, his vision growing dark in his mania.

Instead of finding death, he had awoken in a Pokemon Center, a span of days missing from his memory. He was informed that a trainer had rescued him. He wasn't quite sure what to think of that, as he had avoided humans fervently. He could never be better with a human holding him back.

He waited until the humans staffing the hospital deemed him well enough to have visitors, then he met his 'saviors.' Neither seemed like anything special, though he gave Ninetales due wariness. When he questioned Lee, Octillery was assured he was free to leave if he so wished.

Odd. Everything Octillery knew of trainers spoke to the contrary. Once a pokemon is captured, they forfeit their independence as punishment for their weakness.

Then he asked Ninetales her opinion on the trainer before him, not trusting a human on his word as any properly attentive pokemon should.

"Ninetales," he begins, feigning relaxation in the shallow pool the staff of the Pokemon Center provided him. "Why does a pokemon like you follow this one? Just what is this human to you?"

Ninetales smiles, her eyes taking on a warm glow. Merely laying eyes on such an expression stirs discomfort within Octillery; a rare feeling. Then she speaks, and a single word carries so much that he is left reeling.

"Everything."

One word rocked him, and the comforting numbness coating his body wavered. Never before had it done so. Is that thing Ninetales imbued within 'everything' perhaps what compels the fox herself, Grovyle, and Corvisquire so? What is it? How does he learn it so that it might be countered?

Octillery shakes his head, returning to the current conversation as Ninetales' monologue about the last few weeks comes to an end.

As the last words leave Ninetales' mouth, Octillery watches Corvisquire's beak turn downward in a frown. "I've missed much, it seems," the avian comments with a click of his tongue. "At the very least, it seems my timing is fortuitous, as additional talons make shorter work of brigands and criminals. Do we have a timeframe on when the raid will commence?"

"Within several days," Grovyle provides quietly, his arms crossed and the claws on one hand drumming upon the opposite limb. "The volcano lift has gone without a closure for almost a week now and, if the pattern holds, it will be soon."

"My, my… what a situation we've found ourselves in…" Octillery chimes, joining the conversation. His voice and mannerisms are an exemplary act, one of a pokemon who is assured and carefree, with just a touch of concern: precisely what the others might expect. He waves a tentacle. "Has Zinnia provided any intelligence on enemy numbers, teams, or positioning upon the volcano? Or perhaps an ultimate goal? Knowing would make the formulation of a battle plan much easier."

"Unfortunately not…" Ninetales' muzzle is pulled downward into a frown of her own, and behind her, her tail tips all flick in different directions. "We're still waiting on the final details from Zinnia."

Corvisquire scoffs, his feathers ruffling in agitation. "Wonderful…" After a moment of quiet, Corvisquire sighs and looks towards Ninetales and Grovyle. His expression twists, indecision obviously gnawing at him. Finally, he begins to speak, his words quiet and remorseful. "Ninetales, Grovyle?" He lowers his head. "I have yet to do so, so I would… ask for your forgiveness for my absence. It was not my intention to cause harm." His head lowers even further. "It never was."

The gecko and fox share a long look, and Octillery has to wonder if there is telepathy afoot. When they return their attention forward, Grovyle is the first to speak. "You're forgiven, Corvisquire." He flicks his twig between his teeth. "This time, and this time only, however."

Ninetales takes more time to answer. She stares at the floor, her jaw working as if to speak. She licks her lips, then raises her head. "No…" The damning word visibly stuns both Corvisquire and Grovyle. "I will not forgive you for what you did, not now and not ever."

The raven pokemon wilts, his shoulders falling. At the same time, Grovyle gives Ninetales a sidelong look, one of disbelief.

Octillery, thankfully, can simply remain aloof. He hasn't any stake here.

"...But I'm willing to forget, to leave everything in the past where it belongs." Ninetales turns her head away, her ruby eyes closed. "Don't rouse my memory of the subject."

Corvisquire snorts, his surly disposition returning. "Very well then, Queen Furball. Grace me not with the gift of your forgiveness, but the ignominy of your dismissal. This humble servant treasures it either way." He sniffs. "Shall I grovel at thine paws for the privilege of standing before the royal countenance as well? Perhaps pluck mine feathers and weave a decorative train for the graceful dress of tails trailing her Highness?" Regardless of his mocking words and the impudent, sarcastic sway of his head, unmistakable relief almost seeps from between Corvisquire's blue and black feathers.

Ninetales doesn't rise to the taunt, instead continuing on as if she didn't notice. "We four are a team, yet rarely do we come together as one. When time allows, I would like to meet like this more often outside of training and meals." Ninetales scans each of them with a severe eye. "I've been told that I'm… not the most approachable." She falters, her swaying tails halting for a split-second. "I wish to rectify that. As Lee's right hand, I should be watching for the well-being of everyone just as he does, and I would like to assist where I can in that capacity. This will be a learning experience for everyone, so I ask for criticism where applicable," she says, sending a pointed look at Corvisquire.

The raven's red eyes widen, then he sets his face into stern neutrality and nods, no signs of tomfoolery present.

"A sound plan. I'll be happy to do my part." Grovyle nods his head in agreement, a hint of a smile on his face.

All eyes turn to Octillery, and he has to suppress the urge to glare. 'Vexing.'

He does not want more idle talk. That's the last thing he wants. Once more he is tempted to go to his 'trainer' and request freedom, but he crushes the whiny urge. If he leaves now, he'll be abandoning his efforts to find out what that was when Ninetales described Lee back in the Pokemon Center. He wants to know what forced its way past the pleasant numbness, for it's a total unknown to him.

He who learns, survives, after all.

A cheery grin is forced onto Octillery's face, even if that only accounts for an upward crinkle of his eyelids. "Of course! I'd be glad to help," he agrees, not meaning a single word.

The experience here, being a 'trained' pokemon, is not wholly unpleasant, but his loyalty and theirs are not the same, and he wants to know why. He can tolerate more irritations for food, knowledge, and engagement in the meantime.

Ninetales smiles. It's a small thing. "Thank you all. I haven't anything else to say, so-"

The fox is interrupted by Lee's phone buzzing on the nightstand. In the bed just feet away, Lee grumbles and stirs, but doesn't awaken.

Rising to her paws, Ninetales silently steps over to the nightstand, snaking a tail out to lift the phone and peer at the screen. Using her nose, she taps in the unlock code. (1138, Octillery dimly recalls. Lee's thumb idly twitches in such a pattern sometimes.) After using her nose to swipe over to Lee's messages, her eyes widen. "It's from Zinnia," she says, voice hushed. "Magma will be moving in-"


"-two days. The final components are arriving for assembly, and I wish for you to be there with Tabitha to ensure nothing goes awry. Tabitha will be commanding the operation, but he can be… overzealous, and in need of a grounding element like yourself. A local lieutenant has a contingent of fodder ready as labor and foot soldiers as well."

In a secluded Lavaridge park free of any buildings to echo off of, Courtney listens to the words of Magma Leader Maxie over her phone. High above, Swellow flies in lazy circles, her sharp eyes and ears keeping watch for any interloper or eavesdropper.

"Understood, Leader Maxie," Courtney murmurs quietly. "I will be there."

"Good…" Courtney can almost hear Maxie's smile. "You are invaluable Courtney, remember that." Courtney's stomach grows warm at the words. "How goes your pet project?"

"I've made my offer to Brendan Birch," she replies. "I told him just enough to sway him, and to plant doubts about other loyalties. I plan on contacting him once the volcano operation commences, to offer him a chance to see what Magma is truly about," she says, conviction coloring each word, and her brow furrowing. "I know he will make the right choice. He and I are the same."

"They know who I am, Brendan," she lied to him, watching as his eyes grew wider and wider. "They… didn't tell you. I feel as though you should know who I am, and what Magma stands for."

Henson and Draconid haven't found her out yet. Swellow would have warned her if they had—but the lie will drive a wedge in the group. It needs to happen if Brendan is to make the right choice.

Brendan sat there, stunned into silence. Lying to him… felt bad, invoking a painful twisting in her gut, but Courtney hardened her heart. It's all for a good cause. They are alike, she and Brendan, and he'll understand.

"And if he doesn't?" Maxie drawls, freezing Courtney in place and dragging her from her memory. "What will you do?"

"I…" She hesitates. "I don't-"

"What. Will. You. Do?" Maxies interrupts her, and this time each word is laced with a terrible danger that makes spots bloom in the edges of Courtney's vision.

A shiver runs down the woman's spine, and her eyes fall to her shoes. She dares not disobey the unspoken order. "I will do what is necessary… for Magma." She forces the words past her lips.

Maxie is silent for a handful of seconds. Then, "Pi-gamma-delta-delta-alpha."

"Seven, eight, seven, one, four, three, nine, eight, zero, five, one." The answer to the cipher falls from Courtney's lips in perfect order.

"That is all, Courtney." Maxie sighs. "Do not make me regret granting your leave for this project."

The line goes dead, and the phone in Courtney's hand reboots of its own accord. When the phone turns back on, there is no log of the call that took place a moment ago.

Courtney shudders, then looks up at her Swellow.

High above, the bird pokemon stares back down with hard eyes.

Difficult is the path of the righteous, it seems…


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Act 2: Chapter 15
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"Everyone ready?" Lee asks, looking between Brendan, Marshtomp, Zinnia, and Shelgon.

In his and Brendan's hotel room, Lee gathered everyone for the 'lift investigation' about to take place. Just as Zinnia's Magma lieutenant had said two days ago, the cable car leading up to Mt Chimney went out of order today so they could transport cargo up to the volcano in peace, which unfortunately means Lee had to cancel on Mable today. Lee called his lawyer, Amanda, earlier this morning, and the two rehearsed the lines of legalese Lee intends to use if the cable car station tries to stonewall their efforts. Amanda played the role of the most stubborn, law-savvy busybody around, and after an hour of rehearsal, Lee feels that he has an answer to everything short of "Come back with a warrant." As both Lee and Zinnia expected, Courtney is absent and all her belongings in the room she and Zinnia were sharing are gone.

'Barely got a peep out of her in the weeks she's been with us. So much for trying to learn Magma's secrets…' Lee frowns.

On a stranger note, Brendan hasn't asked where the Magma admin is…

A nervous thrill runs down Lee's spine as thoughts of the upcoming conflict buzz within his head. His efforts to repair his old phone and replay the pokemon games contained within for a refresher on the events to come ended up being fruitless, as the electrical engineer he emailed never replied. 'Damn it all. Between all of us, it shouldn't be that big of a problem, but still… Maybe it doesn't matter too much. Canon is already off the rails as it is, so there's no telling what's going to happen. Unless…''

'Shush, Beloved,' Ninetales silently soothes beside him. 'You needn't worry. We can handle this.' Her confidence only eases Lee's nerves somewhat, rather than acting as the reassuring force they usually are.

'I hope you're right…'

"Ready as can be, I guess…" Brendan is the first to reply. The boy tries to meet Lee's eyes, but can't quite do it.

Zinnia is much more confident, a bright grin pulling her lips upward as she answers. "Hell yeah. Let's get going!"

Noting Brendan's unenthusiastic answer for later, Lee turns and slowly leads everyone to the cable car station.

The team makes their way through Lavaridge, parting the usual crowd in the streets with little issue. Several times someone tries to stop them to speak to Lee or Brendan, but each time the person is politely rebuffed, and the walk continues without issue. Once at the cable car station, the 'closed' sign is ignored in favor of Lee knocking on the glass door.

Within the building, a young-ish man with curly hair behind the front counter looks up from his computer and blinks at them. Realization passes the employee's face, and his face pinches as if he bit into a lemon, or perhaps an Aspear berry. Still, he reluctantly rises and walks to the door, pushing it open just enough to talk.

"I'm sorry, sir…" The man behind the glass door murmurs, his eyes shifting around. "I'm afraid the lift is closed today due to unforeseen maintenance needs. Please come back another day."

Before the door can be closed on them, Lee sticks his foot in the door sill, preventing it from closing all the way and rattling the glass when the cable car employee tries to slam it shut.

"That's what we're here about, actually," Lee ignores the smarting of his toes and plasters a polite smile on his face. "I'm Lee Henson, and I'm visiting today as a Pokemon League officer, as I've noticed a pattern of lift closures that have a worrying connotation of negligence, so in the interest of public well-being, I'm here to see what the League can do to help with that. May I come in and talk to you? Are you the manager on duty?"

The man's grimace only deepens. He looks over his own shoulder at the empty lobby behind him, but what he's looking for, Lee can only guess. Returning his attention to Lee, the man then looks down at Ninetales, who stares back impassively. Brendan, Zinnia, Shelgon, and Marshtomp are also afforded looks. "Sure…" The employee begins reluctantly. "Please come in. My manager isn't in, but I can talk for a while."

Holding open the door, the employee lets the group of six inside before he tersely retakes his place behind the front desk. "So uh…" the employee gulps. "What can I help you with?"

"Just some questions for now, and we'll see where it goes from there." Lee clears his throat and focuses on the lines Amanda drilled into him. "Mister Green, is it?" Lee asks, spying the nameplate reading "William Green" on the desk. "I want to let you know that due to the potential public welfare issues the lift's repeated closures represent, my partner Ninetales here will be acting as a psychic lie detector during our conversation today," he says, stroking the fox's neck with a hand.

Green stares at Ninetales, barely able to hide his dread. Beside Lee, Zinnia snorts derisively as she watches.

"Ninetales will not be reading your mind or looking at your memories, she will just be passively scanning any brainwaves you emit. You can decline to answer any question, but cooperation will be appreciated." Lee leaves out how silence for certain questions opens up the muddy waters of 'probable cause'.

'He's already nervous,' Ninetales narrows her eyes and carefully watches Green's twitching face.

'Of course he's nervous. We barged in and said 'hey, we're value-brand cops loaded down with dangerous pokemon and we're going to grill you on the obvious criminal activity here.' That would make anyone jittery.' Lee combs his fingers through the fur on the back of Ninetales' neck. 'I just hope he was bullied into it rather than going along willingly. I'd be glad to argue against any charges dropped on him if that's the case.'

"Do you have any questions before we begin?" Lee smiles at the man running the lift.

Green licks his lips, looking between everyone again. From the corner of his eye, Lee can see Zinnia's knowing, borderline menacing grin, and Brendan's professionally blank face.

"If you get an answer you don't like…" Green begins slowly. "What happens to me?"

"It all depends on the context. I didn't come here looking to arrest anyone, and I would prefer to keep it that way," Lee nods. "Honesty will go a long way. Any other questions?"

Green shakes his head.

"Okay then," Lee smiles once more, doing his best to seem reassuring. He takes his notebook from his bag and flips to a blank page, his pen ready. "Let's get started."

Ninetales' eyes glow red, and Green lets out a sigh, his face going pale.


"...And that's everything I know…" Green looks away, hugging his arms. Shivers run up and down his body, making his curly hair bounce.

Lee looks down to Ninetales, who lets the theatric glow of her eyes fade. 'As far as I am able to tell, he provided no falsehoods,' she says to Lee. 'He genuinely believes his life would be in danger if he and his co-workers did not cooperate with Magma.'

'The manager of the place accepting bribes is probably going to land them all in court, though…' Lee clicks his tongue as he signs his notes. "Thank you, Mister Green. One more question; is the lift actually not working? As in, is it currently unsafe to use?"

The exhausted-looking man before them shakes his head. "No, sir. It's working."

"Can you take us up?" Lee closes his notebook and takes a moment to tuck it away in his backpack. "I'd like to see what exactly is going on."

Wordlessly, Green rises from his chair and walks to the rear of the room, where a large set of doors labeled CABLE CAR ACCESS in capital letters is. Pushing one door open, he beckons Lee, Zinnia, Brendan, and the pokemon along.

"C'mon everyone," Lee looks back to his friends and nods towards the doors.


Leaning against the railing of the cable car platform and watching the next car slowly making its way down Mt. Chimney to pick them up, Brendan crosses his arms and pretends to inspect the scenery. In reality, he's watching Lee and Zinnia from the corner of his eye as his spirit begins to sink.

The older trainers have been standing close to each other the whole time, and Brendan's watchful eye remains locked on Zinnia's face. It takes him only a minute to spy uncomfortable twitches and her expression shifting for no reason. Meanwhile, Lee remains straight-faced. Beside him, Ninetales also remains stoic.

Lee must be using Ninetales' telepathy to talk to Zinnia privately, leaving Brendan in the dark again.

Something in Brendan's chest hurts at the thought. He thought they were all friends…

They knew, Brendan… Courtney's phantom voice tickles his ear. They knew, and they didn't tell you. We don't do such things within Magma, for we all must stand together. Without unity, we are lost.

The pain in his chest stings just a little more.

Part of Brendan chides the rest for being upset. Lee is a worrywart to the bone with firm ideas on what children should and should not do, no matter how much it conflicts with the culture of being a trainer.

Zinnia, on the other hand, is from a reclusive tribe. Being open just isn't in her nature. In the months he's known her, clarity is something she struggles to provide anyone.

Another part of Brendan is still sore and resentful, though. For all his strides forward and proving he can keep pace with them, Lee and Zinnia still treat him like a dumb child, someone who isn't equal to them. Courtney isn't like that. She understands who he is, and the scale of his ambitions.

"We're alike in more ways than one, Brendan," she said as she finished her story, finished coming clean and being honest. Her soft-looking lips twitch, pulling upward into a smile as beautiful as it is small. "In more ways than you know, and that's why I need your help."

Just thinking of the magenta-haired woman and her gentle smile turns Brendan's stomach into warm mush. He gulps and wets his suddenly dry mouth with his tongue, looking away from the scenery and over to Marshtomp.

His blue, amphibious partner stares back with a nervous light in his beady eyes. Twiddling his large fingers, Marshtomp lets out a short, inquiring croak, and Brendan doesn't need to read a single bit of Marshtomp's body language to guess what the pokemon is asking.

"You'll side with me, won't you?" Courtney's phantom voice asks, each word as enticing as a sugary morsel.

"I'm… Still thinking on it, pal…" Brendan's voice is so quiet, he can't even hear his own words. He doesn't want to risk Shelgon, or Arceus forbid, Ninetales hearing him. "No matter what, we'll stay friends, right?"

Marshtomp grimaces, but nods his head without hesitation.

Without warning, there is a poke to the back of Brendan's head, one that isn't physical, and he feels everything in his veins turn to ice. He turns and looks over to the fox pokemon standing by Lee's side, and eyes like blood-coated gems stare back.

Ninetales wants to talk… With telepathy.

Brendan flashes back to just a few days ago, just hours before Lee's Corvisquire unexpectedly returned to the group.


Wakefulness comes to Brendan in just a few breaths, an unpleasant, formless dream of the events to come fading and leaving him disoriented. Sitting up in his bed, Brendan grumbles as he looks at the nightstand clock, which reads just a few minutes before noon. He lays back down, staring at the ceiling as his mind buzzes aimlessly. Courtney, Magma, Lee, Zinnia, The League, his thoughts flit from one thing to another, too restless to stay on a single topic for long. He'd turn and talk about it to whichever of his pokemon was playing night-guard and sleeping in his bed that night… but all of his pokemon are in their balls. They've been avoiding Lee and Zinnia's pokemon ever since he asked them to keep Courtney's secret, and oftentimes the privacy of a pokeball was the only haven away from the rest of the group.

Raising his head again, he takes in the room.

Lee and his bag are gone, and the curtains are pulled shut, likely a favor from Lee. It makes Brendan frown, though. He thought he was hiding his mood better. Apparently not if the older trainer knows Brendan is sleeping in so late. It looks like he's alone in-'

Fwip!

The sound of paper being overturned makes Brendan's eyes shoot over to Lee's bed, and Brendan realizes he's not alone.

On Lee's bed is Ninetales, splaying out in a relaxed pose as she reads a thick book laid out on the covers. She looks up from her reading and levels him with an even look.

"Oh, uh…" Brendan hesitates. "Good morning, Ninetales…"

The Fire-type dips her head in greeting, then returns to her book.

Silence fills the air, and Brendan fidgets before finally throwing the covers off. He hastily steps over to his backpack at the foot of his bed, takes some clothes from his bag, and quickly walks to the bathroom to get cleaned up and change out of his night clothes.

After showering, brushing his teeth, and changing his clothes, Brendan exits the steamy bathroom and sits on the edge of his bed, sighing. He checks his phone, and finds only a text message from Lee saying the man is going out training and that Ninetales is taking a vacation day. There's nothing from Courtney.

For a few more minutes he sits, wondering what he should do today. Just as he begins debating the merits of reaching out to Courtney first, he feels something touch him. It tickles the back of his head, so he pulls his hat up a little and scratches the spot only for the itch to remain.

There is a snort from Lee's bed, so he looks over to see Ninetales with a single eyebrow raised. In the back of his head, Brendan feels the phantom finger poke once, twice, three times. Then again, one, two, and three times. Before the third repetition, everything clicks into place.

Ninetales is reaching out to him with telepathy. What could she have to say? Why reach out to him? Should he let her in? Will she know something is afoot if he declines?

"Uh…" Brendan swallows heavily. "I don't know how to let you in."

Ninetales blinks, and the tickle in the back of Brendan's head is gone like nothing ever happened. For a second, the boy wonders if Ninetales decided against telepathy, then he hears it, and a shiver runs down his spine.

'Are you well, Brendan? You've been sullen for several days.'

Brendan stiffens and shivers. The voice of a woman with an unplaceable accent echoes from everywhere yet nowhere, from the corners of the room and the depths of his skull. The words he understands, but it's as if they lack all inflection, and he cannot hope to assign a meaning beyond literal to each one. In a place Brendan cannot see, there is a great non-human something close to a part of himself that he cannot name, so close that it's borderline perverse, coating him in the sensation of grime despite his having just had a shower. Within him, something primal shivers, wracked by the fear of being devoured by something he can't defend himself against. It takes a moment for his thoughts to clear and realize that the great thing is Ninetales.

Lee lives with this awful feeling every day?

"I'm fine," Brendan congratulates himself for keeping the warble out of his voice. "Nothing wrong, honest."

Ninetales' eyes narrow. 'You're certain? Everyone has noticed you've not been yourself lately, and Lee asked me to check upon you should you still be in the doldrums. If you don't wish to speak to me, then please speak to someone else.'

How much can she see? Can she tell he's not being truthful? "I'm sure I'm fine! I'll let you, or Lee, or Zinnia, or Courtney, or heck, anyone else know." Brendan smiles, but he knows it's going to look off.

Ninetales flicks an ear with a displeased huff. 'Very well, I will not push you. Both Lee and Zinnia have noticed, however. They will eventually want to know.'

Brendan just nods, and the room falls back to silence. For a moment, Brendan debates asking Ninetales what she would do if someone she liked were… on a path in life contrary to hers. Her kind are supposed to be instinctually wise or something, right? Then he stops. Even if he were to get her to swear she wouldn't say a thing, she could just lie to him and tell Lee anyway.

'Oh no,' his eyes widen. 'Can she hear my thoughts right now?' His stomach drops, and he turns to stare at Ninetales once more. "Hey, uh, Ninetales? No dig at your integrity intended or anything, but with telepathy, how much can you see? Or hear?" He asks before his nerves can get the best of him.

If the implication offends her, the fox keeps it off her face and out of her 'voice' like an expert. In fact, her narrowed eyes soften 'I can see nothing you do not wish to show me, Brendan,' She assures him. 'My mind is touching yours only enough for you to hear me. I would never dream of taking anything from you by force.'

'Is that because it would upset Lee, or because of your own morals? I think I know the answer.' Brendan wonders to himself.

The phantom thing that is Ninetales pulls away from his brain quickly, as if recoiling. Brendan goes still for a moment, wondering if Ninetales heard his final, parting thought.


Brendan blinks and returns to the present when he feels another phantasmal poke to the back of his brain. Meeting Ninetales' eyes, he gulps and nods his head.

The pressure is gone, and once more Ninetales' maddening everywhere-at-once voice can be heard. 'Brendan, you're jittering. Is something wrong?'

'I'm fine,' To himself, the young trainer wonders how Ninetales can tell what thoughts are meant for her. Once more, a single exchange leaves him feeling vulnerable in a way he can't put into words, and he hates the feeling. 'Lee suspects this is some kind of criminal negligence case, right? This is why we've stayed for so long in Lavaridge?'

'Indeed.' Ninetales then pauses. 'Brendan, Lee is about to explain in more detail. I wanted to speak with you briefly, just to inform you that what you're going to hear might be shocking. Please understand that Zinnia, and particularly Lee, did not withhold the information from you out of a sense of maliciousness. Lee looks at age before all else in matters where danger might arise.'

'I know he does…' Brendan crosses his arms. 'Maybe he shouldn't, though.'

Ninetales frowns, but withdraws her telepathic tendril, leaving Brendan blessedly alone in his head once more.

As the cable car slows down and turns the bend to the boarding platform, Lee turns and looks his way. The older trainer's face screws itself up into guilt. "Hey, Brendan? There's something myself and Zinnia need to let you in on, something pertaining to this little investigation and… to Courtney, as well."

Beside Lee, Zinnia shifts in obvious discomfort, but is stilled by Shelgon briefly touching his shell to her leg.

'Now they come clean, huh?' Brendan frowns, but banishes his darkening thoughts. "Okay, what's up?"

Zinnia takes the stage from Lee by clearing her throat. "Lemme frame this whole thing real quick. You're probably going to be upset that we've been keeping things from you, and that's fine. You can be pissed, we're expecting it." With a sigh, Zinnia hooks her thumbs in her belt loops. "Brendan, we've been tracking Magma for a while now, and we're heading right into the fire, here. We're expecting to encounter them on the volcano-" she nods her head backwards, towards Mt Chimney "-and Lee wants to give you the chance to back out. One, because of the danger, and two…" The Dragon Tamer sighs and looks around awkwardly. "Two, because Lee and I heavily suspect Courtney is some kind of official within Magma."

"We suspected her from the beginning, which is why we agreed to let her travel with us," Lee continues as Ninetales leans into his side. "I know this might come off as a shock, and we're sorry for not telling you. I know you and Courtney are friends." Lee hides his hands in his jacket pockets, but Brendan can still see him twiddling his fingers nervously. "We still haven't found a motive for her joining, but we figured we'd keep her close anyway in an effort to get her to spill her secrets and to force Magma to operate with one less officer." Lee steps forward and lays a hand on Brendan's shoulder. "Since she vanished this morning, I can only assume she's up there."

'She is,' Brendan's phone contains a single new text message for today, one from Courtney begging him to make the right choice on the volcano. Conflict boils within the boy's gut as the realization that the point of no return is upon him. He looks up at Lee, then to Zinnia.

Two serious faces stare back, faces that want only the best for him. The frustration of being looked at like a child still burns inside of him, though.

Licking his lips, he looks up at the distant, smoky peak of Mt Chimney. Up there, a woman who makes him feel special and wanted awaits. She wishes for him to be by her side as they reshape the entire world.

He can pick only one side. He knows neither Lee and Zinnia nor Courtney will bend to the other.

Taking a deep breath, Brendan gives Lee a hard stare, his brown eyes locking with Lee's blue.

"I want to go along."


The ride up the cable car to the top of the volcano is quiet, with the silence enforced by the building anticipation of the conflict to come. After Zinnia sent Swablu ahead to check for guards at the landing point, the only real noise is the creak of the cable overhead pulling the car along, and the tapping of Brendan's foot.

Tap tap tap!

Everyone's eyes are drawn to the window, where Swablu hovers just outside.

Grinning, Zinnia opens the window just long enough for Swablu to flutter in before rolling it shut again. "Any advance guards?"

Landing on Zinnia's outstretched arm, Swablu shakes her head with a trill.

"Heh," Zinnia raises Swablu's pokeball. "Magma sure is full of themselves not guarding the way in. Thanks, girl. Return!"

Swablu lets out a pleased tweet, then is drawn back into her pokeball for a rest.

As the stopping platform at the very top of the volcano comes into view, Brendan observes his friends once more, because… Because today might be the last time he sees them.

I'm… more than I say I am. I'm on a mission, and… I need your help.

I need your help.

The youngest Birch withholds a shaking sigh and tries to will his heart to be still. He glances over to Marshtomp. "You ready, pal?"

Marshtomp looks down at the steel floor of the car, saying nothing.

"I'm not, either…" Brendan murmurs.

Once the car comes to a stop at the station on the volcano, Lee takes a deep breath and once more takes the lead. "Alright, everyone. Best foot forward, and be ready to fight."

"Be ready? I'm already ready for a scrap, Dolittle." Zinnia smiles and pats Shelgon on his metallic shell. "You aren't?"

"Not really," Lee says, pushing the lift's squeaky door open. "I'd rather be relaxing in my own private lab somewhere."

Lee and Ninetales step out first, followed by Zinnia and Shelgon. Sharing one last troubled look with each other, Brendan and Marshtomp bring up the rear. Immediately, the boy's face wrinkles as his eyes and nose are assaulted by hot air smelling of burning plastic and sulfur.

The 'closed' station atop Mt Chimney is, as far as Brendan can see, abandoned. Off to the side and near the high fence that keeps visitors away from a deadly tumble are a number of wooden crates, some open. There are a few food wrappers on the ground and an overturned trash can by the door leading into the volcano visitor's center, along with a large pavilion where picnic tables sit in the shade.

'The rest of the volcano isn't accessible from here,' Brendan looks at the visitor center to the left. Behind them is the lift, and to the right is a high wall of rock with a painted mural of various fire pokemon upon it. The wall extends into the distance and wraps around to the left, encompassing the pavilion and meeting the visitor center's wall, forming an enclosed square. 'So we've only got one way in, and one way out…' He eyeballs the double glass doors off to the left.

Walking forward as a group, the three trainers and their pokemon approach the visitor's center, stopping when someone pushes the door open.

Stepping out of the building is a man whose face is mostly covered by his red hood. On his red shirt is Team Magma's stylized M logo, and on the belt holding his gray pants up is a single pokeball. At the man's side is a Purrloin, a small, cat-like pokemon covered in creme and purple fur.

"Who the hell is using the lift?" The Magma grunt grumbles. "I thought we go-!" The Magma underling and his Purrloin freeze like a pair of Deerling caught in headlights when they spot Brendan, Lee, Zinnia, and the cadre of pokemon with them. The man's hand shoots to his side, where a radio is strapped. "Purrloin! Fake Out!" He cries, pointing at the group with his free hand.

A command for Marshtomp is on Brendan's lips, but he hesitates even as his partner's eyes bore into him.

"Shelgon, Rollout!" Zinnia counters in his place.

Before the grunt's Purrloin can get into position to attack, Shelgon rolls into a ball and flies across the cement ground like a runaway boulder, kicking up chunks of cement as he goes.

Purrloin can only widen his eyes before Shelgon slams into him with crushing force. There are a few cringe-inducing cracks, and the dull thud of Purrloin's head rebounding off of Shelgon before the poor cat is thrown away like an abused toy. He flies through the air for a long second, then lands on the concrete in a boneless heap, bouncing once. Purrloin coughs through battered lungs and tries to stand, but falls to his stomach and wheezes helplessly as Shelgon unrolls and looms over him.

"Shit shit shit!", the Magma grunt pulls his radio free and goes to raise it to his lips, but before he can depress the transmit button, the radio glows violet, then is ripped from his hand with such force that the man cries out and trips forward.

The radio flies over to hover in front of Ninetales, whose eyes glow the same color as the corona encasing the device. With a growl, she crushes it in her telekinetic grip, throwing sparks and littering the ground with shards of black plastic.

"Please don't resist-" Lee begins as the Magma grunt scrambles back to his feet and tries to run. Tries, being the keyword, because the red-clad man only gets a few steps before Shelgon throws himself into the grunt's path, making the man gasp and fall to his rear. He turns back to stare at the group in undisguised fear.

"Or do resist and make this fun," Zinnia grins a manic grin, one that promises violence. "C'mon, get up and run. Try your luck!" She takes a step forward, her hand grasping a pokeball. "I wanna see how far you'll get!"

The spooked grunt crawls backward, only to run into a glaring Shelgon and flinch.

"Zinnia, please," Lee puts a hand on her shoulder and pulls the tanned woman back. Lee gives the grunt a smile, and after pushing the disgruntled Zinnia back a bit, he steps forward in her place. "Sir, in my capacity as a Hoenn Lab Trainer, you're being placed under arrest at this time for suspicion of involvement with gang activity. Everything you say and do can and will be held against you in a court of law, so you have the right to remain silent if you wish. If you cooperate with us, though, I promise you I'll do everything I can to secure leniency for you." Despite his kind words, Ninetales still adds an air of menace to Lee's words just by standing next to him with her narrow-eyed leer.

Brendan has to wonder if Lee and Zinnia rehearsed this Good Cop, Bad Cop, bit.

The grunt doesn't resist when Lee steps forward and takes his arm, pulling the other man to his feet. Lee produces a pair of zip-cuffs from his pocket and cuffs the grunt's hand behind him, then takes the pokeball from his belt.

"Hey, wait!" The grunt twists in Lee's hold to look at the pokeball the scarred man seized. "What are you going to do to Purrloin? None of this was his fault, he was just following me!"

"I'm going to keep Purrloin with me for now," Lee calmly explains, returning the unconscious cat pokemon to his ball in a flash of red. Once Purrloin is returned, Lee holds down the pokeball's button to lock the ball, then shrinks it and drops it in his pocket. "Once this is all figured out, he'll be returned to you pending your trial and any resulting convictions." Lee's expression twists into distaste. "It's… more likely you'll be reunited faster if you cooperate," he says pointedly.

Brendan can't help but frown himself, looking at Ninetales as he does so. That seems like something she would say, not Lee.

The grunt's face falls, and his shoulders slump. "Okay…" He allows himself to be led over to the side of the building and sat down against some railing. Once sat, his current set of cuffs are cuffed to the railing so he can't escape.

After pulling the grunt's ID from his wallet, jotting a few things down, and asking a few questions, Lee gets to the meat of everything as Brendan and Zinnia stand by.

"Lawrence," Lee addresses the grunt by his name. In Lee's hands are his pen and notebook, the latest page of which is filled with the grunt's info. "You said you were the guard for the visitor center and the lift, right? You don't work in pairs or teams or anything?"

The grunt shakes his head. With his hood down, there is nothing hiding the miserable look on the youngish grunt's face. "No. The Admins want everything set up faster and lowered guards and patrols down to one man to free up workers. I'm covering both the visitor's office and the lift stop."

"What exactly are they working on?" Zinnia asks, leaning over the grunt with her hands on her hips. "With all the bogus closures, you have to have moved a lot of materials up here, right?"

"I don't know what they're working on," Lawrence denies. "I just know it's some big machine that dips down into the lava at the mouth of the volcano. It should be done today after they get the power source."

"Power source?" Brendan finally asks a question. Courtney didn't really fill him in on what was going on up here, only to make the right choice. "What's the power source?"

The grunt shrugs his shoulders as best he can while cuffed and sitting down. "I don't know. Some kind of meteorite filled with pokemon energy, I think? A team had to rough up some doctor named Cozmo to get him to adapt the machine in the volcano to use the meteorite. The Admins couldn't find a better power source, I guess?"

Brendan watches Lee's face when the scarred man's expression becomes forcefully neutral, tipping him off that Lee knows something about what's going on.

"Interesting," Lee murmurs, jotting another note down. "About how many people and pokemon are on this volcano operation?"

Again, the grunt shrugs. "Twenty? Twenty-two with Admins Tabitha and Courtney. Most of the guys only have one or two pokemon."

Zinnia hisses, and Lee gives Brendan a searching look.

Brendan looks away, not wanting to see how Lee and Zinnia regard him with pity. Marshtomp touches his elbow with a webbed hand in a silent show of support.

"Right, thank you…" Lee stands up straight, shoulders his bag, and stows away his notebook. "Stay here, Mister Lawrence. We'll be back."

The grunt is left as Lee takes the group a few paces away and gestures for a huddle.

"We could be looking at twenty to forty pokemon to fight, assuming a max of two per grunt, and that's not counting Courtney or this Tabitha character," Lee begins, giving Brendan and Zinnia hard looks. "Any suggestions on how to go about this?"

"We should have all of our pokemon ready from the get-go." Zinnia clicks her tongue and grabs her other three occupied pokeballs from her belt. "They'll probably try to pair off and hit us one on one, but if they're stupid, they might say to hell with it and try a dogpile. We should be ready for either, even if the latter is unlikely," she says, hitting the buttons on her pokeballs and enlarging them. She tosses the balls up, and all three pop open at the apex of their flight, depositing Swablu, Goomy, and Tyrunt at her feet.

Swablu trills out a neutral note, ready to go. Tyrunt snaps his jaws with a loud pop and hops from foot to foot, eager as can be. Goomy, meanwhile, just shrinks in on himself, quivering.

"Pair off? You really think there's any chance they'll play by any rules and fight one-to-one?" Lee asks, disbelief clear in his voice. He crosses his arms and shakes his head. "There's nothing stopping them."

'Lee always seems to expect the worst…' Brendan rolls his eyes.

Zinnia smirks, and it's a knowing one. "I forget you're still a novice in some things, Dolittle. This isn't a war or anything, so they aren't going to cross any lines that we won't. They know if they take desperate measures, we'll take desperate measures, and they have no way of knowing if our pokemon are more powerful than theirs. It's Pro Crook 101 to play it safe in battles unless you know for a fact they're weaker than you."

Lee hums to himself in thought. "So kind of like one of those hypothetical dilemmas you hear in school eh? Don't press the red button, because that genie won't go back into its bottle." He looks to the horizon with unseeing eyes for an uncomfortably long minute. "Is there any merit to non-lethally disabling the trainers themselves? I think I already know the answer, but…"

"That's the logical end of the desperate measures I was talking about," Zinnia mutters darkly. She looks up at the sky with something Brendan can't quite place in her red eyes. "Hurt the trainer, and what's stopping their enraged pokemon from returning the favor?" She asks.

Lee calmly nods like he expected nothing else. "Okay, let's make some final prep, then hop to it." He takes his pokeballs from his belt and tosses them up. Like Zinnia's, they snap open, and in flashes of light, Grovyle, Octillery, and Corvisquire are in position around him. Catching the falling pokeballs, Lee puts them back on his belt.

Grovyle and Octillery stand ready with little fanfare, looking towards Lee for instruction, while Corvisquire's beak is pulled back into a nasty, eager grin. The raven ruffles his feathers, and it sounds like steel rubbing on steel.

'It's my turn,' Brendan takes Mawile and Breloom's pokeballs in his hands. For a moment, he thinks about also taking Elektrike's, but stops short. 'Naw, he's too young.' He tosses the balls up, and both pop open. In flashes of white, Mawile and Breloom take form on either side of Marshtomp.

Both pokemon look up at him with open worry. Mawile's large, expressive eyes are already prickling with tears, and Breloom's tired face seems even more exhausted than usual.

Mawile steps forward, tenderly taking one of Brendan's hands in her tiny ones. She doesn't need to say a thing. Her disheartened face says more than words could anyway.

I'm… more than I say I am. I'm on a mission, and… I need your help.

I need your help.

Courtney's words echo in his skull again, and Brendan grits his teeth and pulls his hand away from Mawile's to ball it up in frustration.

He knows none of his pokemon agree with him.


"So, we're clear on formations and such?" Lee asks everyone, glancing over his shoulder to the visitor center doors. They need to move, and soon before someone in Magma notices something amiss.

The lift station atop Mt. Chimney is different from the one he remembers in either the games or the anime. In the anime, Lee swears the cable car had an indoor drop-off point, not an outdoor one. The pavilion and the location of the office are throwing him off as well. At least there wasn't a load of goons waiting for them…

The pokemon around the trio of humans give their confirmations to Lee's question with nods, yips, tweets, hisses, croaks, burbles, and other, single-syllable answers.

"Ready!" Zinnia smiles a smile that is perhaps a touch too eager.

Lee looks over to Brendan, who is lost in his thoughts for what seems like the tenth time today. The boy is staring not at him, but past him. "Hey, Brendan? Ready to go?"

Brendan blinks, coming back to reality. "Oh, uh…" He grins sheepishly and adjusts his hat. "Can I get that one more time?"

Lee resists the urge to sigh. Part of him wants to include Brendan, both because of the young Birch's ability as a trainer, and because of the guilt of lying to him, but it's clear the news of Courtney being a Magma member unbalanced him. 'I guess I can't blame him. First crushes are hard to overcome, and this is probably the worst way to do so…'

'He's been distracted all day, remember?' Ninetales says telepathically, replaying her own memory of Brendan's listlessness this morning for Lee. 'Perhaps it wasn't your revelation that is doing this?'

'Then what is doing it?' Lee grumbles then clears his throat. "If they all try to gang up on us, Octillery will hang back and snipe, with Goomy and Mawile as guards. Marshtomp, Shelgon, Tyrunt, and Breloom are going to be our linemen and stay in the front so we can keep the brawl contained on our terms, Corvi and Swablu will deal with fliers and help out below once they've got the sky under control, and Ninetales is going right into the thick of things to keep them disorganized. If Courtney or the other admin get involved, then Ninetales will break away from the main fight to hold them off. Once the grunts are cleaned up, everyone supports her. If things really start to go pear-shaped, Corvi will take off and get back up. Got it?"

At Lee's side, Corvisquire frowns and snaps his beak at his auxiliary role, but his ire dies near-instantly when Lee places a gentle hand on his head.

Brendan nods, but he still seems a little distracted if his wandering eyes are a reliable tell. "Got it."

"Okay…" Lee sighs and turns towards the visitor center, steeling his nerves. "We've gotta move fast, so let's go!" Lee throws the double doors open and heads inside, Ninetales only a single step behind him.

The large group of trainers and pokemon file into the office on Lee and Ninetales' heels (after Goomy hitches a ride on Shelgon's shell). They quickly march through the halls, and Lee silently laments that they aren't here for a day trip, as the exhibits regarding the pokemon of the volcano they pass look so enticing. Resolving to come back one day, Lee glances at a map on the wall they pass and hangs a right, leading everyone to the 'front' foyer of the office. Once the double glass doors leading out to the mouth of the volcano come into view, Lee holds a hand out behind him and stops the group.

Outside is a large, flat swathe of smoothed-over rock, serving as a courtyard of sorts before the building. From the doors, everyone is given a view of several smaller buildings that have also been erected on the mountain, such as a small eatery, another office, a gift shop, and an open shed with several volcanic rock exhibits on display, to name the prominent ones. Along those buildings, a number of Magma members mill about, either moving large crates on dollies, idly playing on their phones or with their pokemon, or in the case of one poor man, getting yelled at by a larger grunt. What the smaller, red-wearing man is getting smoked about is a mystery since the argument is too far away to hear.

'Nine?' Lee barely needs to ask, as he feels Ninetales stretching her mind out already, covering damn near the entire volcano.

'Courtney is out there,' the fox at his side grimly confirms. 'Near the mouth of the volcano, if the unearthly mass of Fire TE I sense is the lava pool. Besides her, there are twenty-three other people and seven loose pokemon.'

Lee takes one deep breath and screws his eyes shut, sending a prayer to God, Jesus, Arceus, Mew, hell, even Giratina is fine. Whoever is listening is good enough.

"C'mon, Dolittle!" Zinnia hisses, drawing Lee's attention to her. At Zinnia's feet, Tyrunt is practically slathering at the mouth for the fight to come, and Zinnia has her foot stomped on one of little dino's own to keep him from lumbering into the fray. "Are we doing this or what?"

With a grunt, Lee looks over his pokemon.

Ninetales smiles reassuringly, and Lee can feel the phantom sensation of hellfire in his chest, which is surely bleeding over from his fox. She gently noses his side. 'Ready when you are.'

Grovyle's leaves are already humming with danger and a glowing, razor edge. The gecko lightly bounces on his feet and gives Lee a simple nod, needing to say nothing else.

Octillery is laser-focused, his eyes locked forward on the nearest Magma goon with deadly-serious intent. Already, Lee can see the octopus thinking ten steps ahead.

Corvisquire's eyes gleam with unfettered violence and the desire to prove himself with it. He looks up at Lee, almost begging for the chance with his gaze alone.

Letting out his bated breath, Lee sets his face into as authoritative a scowl as he can. "Go in fast, demand they surrender, and respond quickly to the ones who don't. If they freak out, take formation and give them hell. Got it?" Without waiting for a reply from his friends, Lee steps forward and throws the doors between them and Team Magma open.


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Omake: Fantastic Pokemon and Where to Find Them | By Fuggmann
A short to get the brain juices moving. Check out https://www.patreon.com/fuggmann on the place of patrons if you want to see other stuff.


"It's rubbish! Utter rubbish! Umbridge isn't going to teach us a thing! I'd put a galleon that we don't cast a spell the whole year!" Ron's voice carries down the entire stone hallway of Hogwarts and draws Hermione from her troubled thoughts. "Even bloody Lockheart was better, and all that ponce wanted to do was strut up and down the classroom and talk about how he 'vanquished' some bloody dog spirit or whatever…"

"Kitsune, Ron," Hermione corrects her red-headed friend without even thinking. "Lockheart said his newest book was about how he banished a kitsune, a fox spirit, that was inhabiting the body of a young woman." Hermione shakes her head a little, feeling silly that she fell for Lockheart's charming hero act. One only needs to read a bit about the Japanese spirits in question to realize something: even if Lockheart was as good as he pretended, going toe-to-toe with a kitsune is a tall order for any wizard. Even the weakest of the fox spirits are rated XXXXX class by the Ministry of Magic.

Ron merely shrugs. "Same difference."

'It's really not,' Hermione frowns.

Between Ron and Hermione, Harry finally speaks. "I'm just hoping this class isn't like DADA…" he grumbles, obviously still upset with the unfair detention he's going to be forced to serve with Umbridge tonight. "Who ever heard of a Care of Magical Creatures class in an actual classroom? They're always outside."

As Ron groans at the realization, Hermione thinks back to the new CoMC professor introduced the night prior.


"Now, we have two changes in staffing this year," Headmaster Dumbledore smiles like a model grandfather behind his podium at the head of the great hall. "As Professor Hagrid is taking a temporary leave of absence, please welcome this year's Care of Magical Creatures professor, Mister Lee Henson!"

Hermione, Ron, and Harry all focus on the man who replaced one of their favorite teachers.

At the staff table, seated between Professor Sprout and Professor McGonagall, Professor Henson stands.

Professor Henson is… Shockingly plain, if the trio of hair-raising, claw-like scars on the left of his face are discounted. The man is tall and lean, with a slight suntan uncommon to the British Isles. Under his black robe are a collared shirt, a tie, and slacks that would draw no eyes in either the wizarding or muggle worlds. The man stands and smiles amid polite applause from the students, waving to everyone for a moment before sitting back down.

Hermione's eyes narrow.

When the professor waved, she spied a number of curious spheres hooked to the right of his belt, each one the size of a golf ball and numbering roughly six. They were nothing like any other wizarding tool she's seen before. When she laid eyes on the first one… the young witch swore she felt eyes peering back at her…


As the trio reach the end of the hallway and push the door to the classroom open, Hermione can't help but flush in embarrassment as many eyes turn to look at them.

They're the last ones to arrive.

"Ah, there you are! You three made it with a minute to spare." At the front of the room, Professor Henson is seated on the front of his desk with a smile on his face, seemingly not upset by the close call. His robe is gone from his person, and his sleeves are rolled back, showing the class a number of scars on his arms, though nowhere near as severe as the ones upon his face. "Go ahead and sit down. Class starts in just a minute," he says, his voice unmistakably American.

As the trio sit down at one of the open, three-person desks, Hermione takes a moment to examine the classroom.

Unlike other classrooms, which are decorated to the tastes and needs of their teacher, the CoMC classroom is rather spartan. There are desks, the Professor's desk, a chalkboard, a few bookshelves against the wall, a curious glass case bearing eight differently shaped pins, and that's it. It's as though the professor brought nothing of his own into the castle.

"Blimey, what's that thing?" Ron suddenly asks under his breath, pointing a subtle finger at the professor.

Following Ron's finger, Hermione… isn't quite sure what she's looking at, and she's not alone if the whispers in the classroom are any indicator.

Stepping out from behind the professor's desk is a gold-furred fox of mammoth proportions. The vulpine must dwarf the average Great Dane and then some, at its large enough to rest its head in the professor's lap even with the professor sitting on his desk. As it walks, its dainty paws are completely silent, and the multiple tails sprouting from its spine all form a majestic fan shape behind it. As the fox sits beside the professor, piercing red eyes that shine like gemstones scan the class.

Hermione shivers as the eyes pass over her, hitting her with the same sensation she felt at the opening feast last night.

"Hey there, love. You finished your nap just in time to help out with class," Professor Henson smiles and strokes the beast behind its ear, and Hermione swears she sees the fox smile a little. The professor then looks up at the clock on the wall and hums to himself. "Okay, top of the hour, so let's get started. We'll begin with roll call, do intros, the syllabus, and whatnot," the professor says, taking a piece of parchment from his desk. Clearing his throat, the professor reads off each name.

As roll call takes place, Hermione can't help but let her eyes be drawn to the fox at the professor's side again. Even without the fox looking at her, the young witch shifts in unease, for something prods her atrophied instincts, demanding she remains alert. She almost forgets to say "Here!" when her name is called.

Once the roll call ends, the professor sets the list of names aside and stands up. "Okay, everyone. It's the first day, so I won't load you down with work. Once we get intros and the syllabus out of the way, we'll use the rest of the period for questions, either about me, the lessons, or whatever you wish."

Both the Gryffindor and Slytherin students give a short cheer upon learning they have a little less homework.

The professor clears his throat, and the sound calms the cheers. "Before we begin, does anyone have any pressing questions that can't wait?"

"Professor," Harry speaks up, and Hermione cringes a little at the unspoken accusation in Harry's voice and narrowed eyes. "Why did you replace Hagrid? And where is Hagrid?"

The golden fox's head snaps up, its red eyes staring hateful holes into Harry.

To his credit, Harry doesn't flinch.

Professor Henson places a gentle hand on his fox's head, and it turns its head away with a growl. "It sounds like you were fond of Professor Hagrid. Mister Potter was it?" The professor shakes his head ruefully. "Well, I didn't want to replace Professor Hagrid. It sounds like he was a beloved fixture in the school. Heck, if we're being honest, I didn't want to be a teacher at all." The man's words cause an outbreak of whispers. "Headmaster Dumbledore… got me out of a spot of legal trouble with the ministry recently. Nothing criminal, just a case of traveling paperwork that wasn't up to snuff. In return, he asked me to teach while Professor Hagrid is away, saying you all would benefit from my insight. As for what Professor Hagrid is doing?" He shrugs. "It's not my business, so I didn't ask."

Harry frowns, obviously unsatisfied, but he doesn't speak out anymore.

Near the back of the room, Hermione can hear Malfoy scoff and mutter something to the Slytherin beside him.

The gold fox's ears perk.

"Mister Malfoy!" The professor speaks up suddenly, causing more than one student to jump. "This 'yank' has ears, but they're not good enough to hear all the way back there. Can you speak up, please?" He asks, leveling the blonde Slytherin with an unamused face.

Flushed red in embarrassment, Malfoy stands up and clears his throat. "I was merely wondering about your qualifications, professor," Malfoy's usual tone is replaced with the faux-politeness he uses for professors other than Snape. "Our last professor had none, so as you can understand, I have concerns."

Hermione has to clamp her hand over Harry's arm to keep her friend from standing up and loudly defending Hagrid.

Professor Henson and his fox meet eyes for a second, then the professor hums in thought again. "Let's turn this into a lesson, then. I do possess a magizoologist certification, and based on my partner here, I'll let you deduce what class of creatures I'm rated to handle. Nine, if you would?"

The fox, apparently named 'Nine', steps forward and stands before the class in a side profile, giving everyone an ample view of her. She lets out a human-like sigh and gives the professor a half-hearted glare.

"Now," Professor Henson claps his hand together once and ignores the red eyes digging into him. "I'm sure everyone can see her rough resemblance to a mundane fox. The first one to deduce her species and ministry classification based on current observations gets twenty-five points for their house. Let's give it…" He glances up at the clock. "Fifteen minutes. If you know the answer, raise your hand. Go!"

Everyone quickly rushes to open their bags and pull out their books, and the class is filled with the sound of turning pages and hushed discussion. Beside Hermione, Harry opens his own book while Ron just drops his head to the desk, already giving up. "Any ideas, Hermione?" Harry asks, looking over his glasses at her.

"A few…" Hermione's eyes comb over the fox, taking in every detail from the gold fur, to the red eyes, to the tufts of fur on her chest and head. Then Hermione moves to the tails. "Hold on…" Her eyes narrow in thought, and she silently counts the number of tails she sees. "...Seven, eight… nine…" The muggleborn witch feels her veins ice over. 'There is no way the professor brought one here. It's impossible to tame one.' She counts the tails again, and once more, there are nine of them.

There are a few groans from the Slytherin students as Hermione's shaking hand rises, but Professor Henson ignores them and points Hermione's way. "Yes, Miss… Granger, right?"

"Y-Yes, professor…" Hermione gulps, acutely aware of the fox staring at her. She dares not meet the spirit's eyes. "Your friend… Is she a nine-tailed kitsune?"

A few whispers break out in response in the classroom.

"Kitsune? What's that?"

"Never seen one before. Foreign, innit?"

"I saw 'em mentioned in some Asian comic book once."

Both the professor and the Nine the kitsune seem surprised. "Well now…" He smiles at the kitsune, who is seemingly sulking as if she lost some unspoken bet. "Considering Nine's kind aren't native to Europe, I didn't expect anyone to get that. Bravo!" The professor lightly applauds. "If you want to elaborate on what a kitsune is for the class, Miss Granger, I could be convinced to part with more points."

Hermione licks her lips and thinks to herself, trying to find an answer that is not only correct, but stresses the unreal danger that everyone is currently in. The last thing they need is someone like Malfoy or his hanger-ons accidentally damning them all for an errant insult.

"The k-kitsune…" Hermione pauses and steadies herself. "The kitsune is a mythical creature from Japanese folklore that is often depicted as a fox with supernatural powers. Kitsune are associated with various attributes, such as wisdom, intelligence, trickery, curses, and various powerful magics."

The mention of curses makes everyone quiet down and pay attention.

Hermione continues, her voice picking up strength. "One of the most famous versions of the kitsune is the Kyuubi no Kitsune or the 'Nine-tailed fox'. In Japanese folklore, the nine-tailed fox is a powerful creature that can live for centuries. It is said that the more tails a kitsune has, the more powerful it is, with each tail representing an accumulated century of power."

The more Hermione goes on, the more the danger sinks in to her classmates. For a moment, Hermione thinks about telling everyone about the legendary kitsune Tamamo-no-mae, a kitsune seen as a monster and unstoppable engine of destruction after slaying thousands of soldiers and wizards in ancient Japan. She holds her tongue at the last second, fearing the fox in the classroom might take the comparison as a slight.

"A nine-tailed kitsune is said to possess intelligence and an understanding of magic superior to that of a human. They are natural shape-shifters, capable of transforming into a human form, other animals, or inanimate objects. They can utilize pyromancy, telekinesis, mind magics, illusions, wards, various dark magics, spiritual magics, space-time magics, unbreakable curses, and many others." Hermione takes a breath. "The oldest and most powerful kitsune are the Tenko, who are nine-tailed kitsune with white or golden fur. It's said these kitsune have divine powers, and they're thusly worshiped…" She hesitates, finally looking at the kitsune in the room, but not at her eyes, "as holy spirits and deities."

The classroom is utterly silent as Hermione takes her seat once more. From the corner of her eyes, she sees Harry look mystified, and Ron deathly pale.

The young witch looks forward again, at the living legend at the front of the room.

The kitsune seems to draw the eyes of everyone in, and Hermione can feel an ethereal weight upon her head and shoulders, pushing her down as if compelling her to bow. As the seconds pass, it grows heavier and heavier.

"Love, stop it! You're making the kids nervous."

The weight vanishes, and more than one student suddenly gasps when it does.

Nine the kitsune turns and stares up at the professor with a sour look on her muzzle.

The professor kneels down to her level and takes Nine's cheeks in his hands, smooshing her face as if she were a lapdog and not a thousand-year-old terror. A growl rolls out of the kitsune's throat, and Hermione mentally prepares herself to see what kind of horror will be inflicted on her teacher.

"So dramatic…" Professor Henson clicks his tongue. "Corvi is enough of a drama queen for all seven of us. You don't need to compete."

Nine's jaws dart out and nip the professor right on the tip of his nose.

"Ow!" He stands and rubs his nose, which is still on his face, miraculously. "Love hurts, it seems."

The kitsune snorts, seating herself and wrapping her tails around her legs. After a moment of fidgeting, she sighs and stands again. The fox rises to her hind legs, braces her forepaws on the professor's shoulders, and gives him a short, affectionate lick on his nose, right over where she bit him.

"The feared Lady Ninetales, kissing boo boos better. What would Battlenet say?" The professor chuckles as Nine sits once more. "Anyway…" Professor Henson rolls his eyes and turns his gaze to Hermione. "To finish up the question, what is Nine's ministry rating, Miss Granger?"

'I don't think I was ready for today…' Hermione sighs, feeling the mental exhaustion of Umbridge's non-class and whatever this is catching up to her. "Class 5, or XXXXX, sir." Then the professor's earlier words return to her and her eyes widen. "Wait, professor, you said earlier that you're certified to handle creatures in the same class as Miss Nine, correct? That would mean-"

The professor smiles and raises a hand, halting her. "Class, allow me to introduce myself properly and put any doubts to rest. My name is Lee Henson, and I'm the first person since Newton Scamander to be certified in the handling and care of Class XXXXX creatures."


Below are the names of some patrons who got to view this short early and felt like signing it. A huge thanks to them and everyone else who supports this story and everything else I write.

puppy0cam (begrudgingly), Kdonmination (less begrudgingly), speedyzman13, DJ Firefox, Ray, Javidom, derpydude9001, ShaRose, Spice_King, TitaniumPhoenix, Grey, Tezral, Emeraldleafeon, Planetace, TheTankiestTrain, Cynicals, Hiniko, Green0Photon, Berusella, Hazel Kings, , Dicloniuslord, ClassicDom, rizen, Murtaugh, JustALurker, Moxie, HT1318, monoman335, demonmonkey89
 
Omake: Borne of Divinity
Amid some rolling blackouts that are making my writing notes intermittently inaccessible, I made this on an old chromebook. Enjoy.

A short Borne of Caution and Okami (2006 Videogame) crossover.


Want to support me? See https://www.patreon.com/fuggmann on the place of patrons. I have goals on there that help my writing along and make it a richer experience for everyone. As thanks for donating, patrons get to see updates a few days early and suggest edits to the final draft before it goes live. If you want to keep up-to-date on releases, use discord code hive-of-degeneracy and opt in to the fic-updates role for a ping.


Amaterasu, Goddess of the Sun and Origin of all that is Good, slows her sprint into a jog. Around her, the blurry, undefined greenery morphs back into trees and bamboo before her eyes.

Bamboo is good. It means they're getting closer to Kusa Village, where the demon Crimson Helm is said to be holed up. As much as she would like to make the rest of the trip before sundown, her mortal body shakes with fatigue. Her jog slows into a calm walk along the beaten dirt road, her aching paws and injured leg thanking her.

Amaterasu huffs to herself, both to catch her breath and out of annoyance. Her favored form, that of a brilliant white wolf, is fleet of foot and mighty as they come, but she knows she should be stronger than this. The terrible fog that has been clouding her memories for the last several weeks fades with an agonizingly slow pace, but she knows that during her last adventure in beautiful Nippon, one that passed over one-hundred years ago, the trappings of mortality never seemed like issues.

Just a few days prior, she felled a pack of imps seeking to ambush a courier along the road. Although she slew the demons without a scratch, one tried to flee by unfurling a body-sized kite and riding the wind.

Amaterasu jumped high, and removed the imp's head from his shoulders before he could run away and cause misfortune elsewhere. When she came back down, it was upon uneven ground. Misjudging her fall, she landed with a painful jolt up one of her hind legs. Her hip and leg have been stiff and sore ever since.

Alas, trying to rid herself of the stiffness was a fruitless effort. Mighty and varied is her Celestial Brush, a divine power that lets her draw her will into creation as if the world was a canvas, and none of her techniques were so useful as Restoration… Which failed magnificently when she tried to heal her leg. The divine power fizzled out to her bewilderment. Then she realized why.

She doesn't know what exactly she is trying to fix. Fixing a broken object like a rotted wooden bridge or a snapped fishing line is one thing, but mending something as complex as a body is another, it seems…

Her stomach growls, and the white wolf growls back.

A flash of green appears in the corner of her eyes, and Amaterasu looks up.

Standing upon her head and between her ears is Issun, her partner in this sojourn to rid Nippon of evil.

The man is tiny, no more than a few centimeters tall, wearing equally tiny robes and a beetle-like hat. Belonging to a race of sprites called poncles, Issun glows with a bright green aura of magic. Despite being a crass womanizer and self-described freeloader, the tiny artist has been her guide, her voice to humans (owing to the poncle talent of animal speak), and most loyal friend since her awakening. For that, Amaterasu feels she cannot thank him enough. She swears she knew a poncle before Issun, but the name just won't come to her past the fog in her brain.

"Jeez, Ammy," the tiny man bounces on her head. "You sound like you could eat a horse. Maybe we should stop for the night and find some dinner."

Her stomach growls once more, so she can't help but nod in agreement.

In the waning sunlight, the wolf and poncle pad along the road. It's not uncommon to find rest stops on well-trod paths, either small inns, teahouses, or unmanned hovels used as a place to sleep, so with any luck, they'll stumble upon one soon.

"At least the demons around here are laying low. We haven't seen one all-day," Issun comments, filling the silence with his pleasant chatter. "No demons, no aggravated leg." After a beat, he asks: "How is your leg doing, furball? Still hurt?"

Amaterasu snuffles and throws her head.

"Running the whole way probably didn't help, ya know," the poncle chides in reply. "I do gotta wonder about the demons, though. Did someone get to them before us? We haven't passed any monks or exorcists on the way, did we?"

The Sun Goddess silently wonders about that herself. Bands of demons roam the land nowadays, making travel perilous for people, but the road from Taka Pass to Kusa Village has been oddly quiet.

They walk for another twenty minutes as Amaterasu's sun dips further and further behind the horizon, bathing the tall stalks of bamboo around them in pink and orange. Finally, they come across a rest stop along the road, one it looks like they'll be sharing with someone else, judging from the gentle light shining out of the windows.

A pleasant, savory smell wafts by her nose from the rest stop, and Amaterasu instinctually takes a deep sniff. Immediately, her tail begins to wag and her stomach grumbles. Hopefully, the temporary companions within are willing to share what they're cooking. The smell is delicious.

Stepping up to the small shack of a building, Amaterasu noses the sliding door open and pokes her head inside. With a blink, she tilts her head at what she sees.

Sitting cross-legged by the hearth and tending to both a boiling pot and a number of meat skewers, a clearly foreign man looks up and meets Amaterasu's surprised eyes with his own. His western features are marred by a ghastly trio of claw-like scars on his face, one nearly claiming his eye, and his hair is a lighter brown than most. Much like his visage, his clothes are foreign, and Amaterasu can't hope to name the articles he wears. Even sitting down, Amaterasu can tell the man must be quite tall.

Beside him sits someone even more surprising. At the man's side is a kitsune, one who regards Amaterasu warily.

The kitsune is roughly Amaterasu's size, and coated in fur that shines and glitters like pure gold. A twitch of her nose tells the Goddess that the kitsune is a female. Ruby-like eyes stare into Amaterasu's own amber orbs, but it's not the fox's eyes that Amaterasu lingers on. No, the wolf swiftly counts the fox's tails, which number nine.

Not just any kitsune, but a kyuubi. Amaterasu can't recall the last time she spoke to one. Lesser kitsune are a rare sight on their own.

…Perhaps this kyuubi is the reason the road to Kusa is free of demons?

"Hey, buddy!" Issun breaks the silence before it can grow awkward, bouncing up and down on Amaterasu's head. "Mind if we join you? We've been running all day and could use a rest."

The western man snaps out of his stupor and smiles politely, unphased at meeting a poncle. The scarred side of his face can't smile as well as the unblemished side does, and Amaterasu finds herself tempted to try her paw at healing the scars with her Brush. "Of course. Please, come in. Some company would be lovely," he says, his accent thick and quite humorous to listen to.

Stepping inside, Amaterasu noses the door shut behind her and seats herself a polite distance away from the man, relaxing her body and sore leg. Although she feels a bit bad for ignoring their new acquaintances, she watches the pot above the fire longingly, her stomach gnawing at itself.

"Hungry?" The man smiles again, pulling a packet of rice paper along with a mortar and pestle from the curious bag behind him. He opens the packet and dumps the contents, a collection of salt and spices, into the mortar to be ground up. "It'll be ready shortly, and we'll be glad to share some."

"That's mighty nice of you, pal!" Issun says. "Normally, I'd make fun of Ammy here for having a bottomless pit for a belly, but we ran all the way here from Taka Pass this morning, so lemme speak for her when I say the generosity will be appreciated."

Amaterasu wags her tail with a short bark of agreement.

"Issun is the name, and this here is Amaterasu!" Issun introduces both of them.

The man and the kitsune meet eyes for a second, a conversation seeming to play out between them in a heartbeat. The scarred westerner then turns back to them. "It's nice to meet you two. My name is Lee Henson… Or I suppose it's family name first here? Henson Lee, then," he says, giving the pot above the fire a stir.

"Ninetales is my name. I am Lee's partner and protector. A pleasure to meet you," The words falling from Ninetales' mouth are no human speech, but Amaterasu understands them regardless, as she's sure Issun does. The kitsune inclines her head and wraps her tails around her legs, seeming content to say nothing else.

Protector? So it was Ninetales who culled the demons on the road. Amaterasu smiles and barks in thanks. Selfish interests or not, the fox has no doubt saved more than one unfortunate traveler some trouble, and the Goddess can appreciate it.

"T'was no issue," Ninetales smiles in reply.

"Oh, tales, I get it!" Issun chuckles to himself, drawing a roll of the eyes from the fox. "How did a westerner and a kitsune meet, if you don't mind me asking?"

"You might say we were made for each other," Ninetales says mysteriously. "It was simply fate that we crossed paths on that sunny day years ago."

"She found me lost and alone in the woods, and decided the dumb man she found needed all the help he could get," Henson cuts in, sending the exasperated fox's mystique crashing to the ground with a smile. "I still need it, so here we are."

Issun's little green aura flares. "Huh. Small world. I did the same thing for Ammy. Poor thing would still be on the other side of Nippon, as helpless as a turtle on a fencepost if not for me."

Annoyed, Amaterasu throws her jaws and catches Issun in her mouth, letting him squirm for a moment. After a few seconds of suffering, she unceremoniously spits him out on the floor with a splat!

"Ick!" Issun gets back to his feet, his aura flaring into a furious red and burning the saliva away. "Again with the wolf slobber! You can't treat a man of my station like that!" He complains.

An elegant, cream-colored tail rises up to the kitsune's face to hide an amused smile before Ninetales sets the conversation back on the rails. "You came all the way from Taka Pass in a day, you said? We've been traveling along this road from the Pass for a few days now. You must have kept quite a pace."

Amaterasu lays down and relaxes, letting Issun speak in her stead. The conversation drifts from topic to topic lazily as the cool of the night sets in. The wolf Goddess listens to Issun boast about his painting skills, to Ninetales' wistful wishing to visit a number of locations in Nippon, but the wolf listens with the most interest to Henson, who speaks of his scholarly pursuits in things like biology, meta-biology, transformative energy theory, and sapient psychology and interrelations among other things that Nippon has no words for. Such dull subjects are boring, but it's hard not to listen when the large man's voice swells with his passion for understanding every facet of life itself. Many of the terms and words fly over her head, but it's clear as day that the man is an expert in his chosen schools.

"We do travel quite far for Lee's studies, sometimes." Ninetales nods along to one of Issun's questions. "Sometimes the locations are less than a day's travel, and other times they're far off the beaten path. Occasionally, they're… farther than we expect." She trails off, looking out the window and to the starry sky outside. "Returning home is often an experience in and of itself."

"We'll get back. We always do," Henson smiles and pulls Ninetales into a one-armed hug. The other arm is busy serving food onto a number of colorful plates made of an odd, flexible material that Henson produces from his bag.

When a plate is passed to her, Amaterasu takes a moment to let Issun gather an armful for himself before leaning down and taking a bite. The meal is simple fare, being rice, grilled eel, and assorted vegetables in a savory sauce with little in the way of presentation, but the taste! The meat is tender and flaky, the rice is soft and has absorbed the flavor of the eel and the sauce, and the vegetables round the flavor and add a pleasing texture to the mix. Eating is a mortal pleasure the Goddess is always glad to indulge in, and this meal is one for the books. As she wolfs down her food, she wonders if one of the esoteric sciences Henson studies somehow involves cooking.

Her plate empty and belly full, Amaterasu stretches out and sighs happily, relishing the simple joy of good food and company.

"Thanks for the food, Henson! It was great!" Issun once more speaks for Amaterasu and himself. "I could eat like that every night!"

"You flatter me, Issun," Henson seems pleased that his dinner went over well with everyone. "Once everyone's food settles, I was hoping to see about Amaterasu's leg."

Amaterasu's head rises off of her paws, taking in Henson with bewilderment.

"Her leg?" Issun parrots.

The westerner nods. "Yes. I noticed she wasn't putting quite as much weight on her right hindleg as the other. May I ask what happened? I'm guessing a bad trip or a long fall?"

"Uh, yeah, actually." Issun seems as surprised as Amaterasu feels. "You seem experienced on the matter."

Henson nods his head toward Ninetales. "I'm just a squishy, regular man, so Nine often has to fight for me if we get into trouble. As a consequence of my fields of study and her being my frontline defender, I've seen about every natural injury a creature in the Canidae family can experience, and a lot of unnatural ones, too. If I can help, then I'd like to."

Issun goes silent. "What do you think, furball?"

Amaterasu thinks to herself.

Henson certainly seems to know his stuff. He spoke earlier of his various sciences and experiences without hesitation or any signs of deceit. When she watches his eyes, though, she feels her own narrow.

Her Godly features are hidden from the eyes of normal humans. To most, she appears as a regular wolf, albeit with a pure white coat. None see the divine red ink in her fur, the swirling tufts on her legs, her ink-dipped tail, or any of her divine weapons, which she keeps in a telekinetic grip behind her when not in use.

Henson is looking directly at the Divine Reflector above her back, a mirror imbued with holy sunfire that has struck down many a demon as a bludgeon. The man isn't quite so regular, now is he?

Yet, that matters not when she looks deeper. The man fidgets under her gaze, but does not shrink away or hide. No, his intention to help simply for the sake of helping is as true as can be. If there is one thing that Amaterasu can trust, it's motives that mirror her own, as arrogant as it may sound.

With a pleased, affirmative bark, the Sun Goddess lets the flames around her divine reflector fizzle out before she sets the weapon gently against the wall. She trots up to Henson, who smiles back.

"Okay!" He begins. "Let's get this show on the road. Can you present your side with the injured leg to me? Issun? Can you sit somewhere else for a bit? I may need Amaterasu to take an unstable position and don't want you getting hurt in the process."

Issun bounces away, over to Ninetales, where he bounds up and perches upon the kitsune's head instead. The fox frowns, visibly displeased, but she doesn't knock the poncle away

"Let's get started," Henson murmurs, taking his hands and feeling up and down Amaterasu's leg.

Henson's experience immediately becomes apparent. The tips of his fingers ghost across her leg with featherlight touches, pausing over areas where the soreness is most prevalent without so much as a twitch from Amaterasu. The hands move up her thigh and to her lower back, where he gently runs a pair of fingers from the top of her pelvis to the base of her tail. If Henson weren't a professional healer and a human to boot, then this feels like it might be too lurid to allow.

"Hey, I can hear your teeth grinding," Amaterasu can hear Issun whisper to Ninetales. "What's got your tails in a bunch?"

"Nothing, bug," the fox hisses, just as quiet.

…Apparently, Ninetales does not appreciate this…

"And this was caused by a bad fall?" Henson questions, his face set into a mask of focus. "Did you land with your body parallel to the ground?"

Amaterasu shakes away the awkwardness with a whine and looks over to Issun.

"Kinda?" The poncle provides from his place atop Ninetales' head. "She was twisted a little bit, and that leg hit the ground before the other."

"Alrighty," Henson mutters. "Amaterasu? Do you have any kind of abilities that would provide passive accelerated recovery from physical injury? Like a healing factor or regeneration?"

The wolf nods. She's always healed quickly. That's why she's been so mystified and frustrated with this persistent ache.

"Okay, Then I have a good idea what's going on." Henson smiles. "I've seen this happen a few times with Ninetales and a few others. It looks like you have a factor fault."

"Factor fault?" Issun crosses his tiny arms. "You've been talking in nothing but jargon all night, Doc. Maybe explain this time?"

"Sorry," Henson blushes, looking away and faintly embarrassed. "A 'factor fault' is medical shorthand back where I'm from used to refer to a category of injuries caused by healing factors incorrectly repairing a prior injury. Things like a bone breaking, then healing back together crooked before it can be properly set, or torn muscles accidentally bunching up and healing together in a big mass."

Amaterasu feels her hackles rise. Ugh! That sounds ghastly! And she has that condition?! She looks over at the man with no small amount of horror, hoping that he's wrong.

"Thankfully, it looks like Amaterasu's case is nothing to be worried about," he smiles. "I didn't feel any misshapen bones or anything of the like, so this is probably just a case of compacted connective tissue in the upper thigh from axial overload." He presses the back of his hand to Amaterasu's thigh once more, before taking her ankle in his other hand and gently lifting her leg a few centimeters. "Her hip wasn't dislocated, but I imagine she probably has some trapped fluid from a bit of transverse overload if she landed at an angle. We can fix both in one go, thankfully."

"Well, what are you waiting for?" Issun bounces impatiently. "Fix her up!"

"Aasir, I thought I would never need to do this one, but you ended up being right again…" Henson mumbles to himself before slapping a pleasant smile back on his face. "Okay, so what I'm going to do is this…"

Henson lifts her hindleg and scooches closer so he can place it over his shoulder, leaving her inner thigh against the back of his shoulder blade. "I'm going to 'hug' the meat of your thigh here, as my hands-" With his arms on either side of her leg, he presses his palms against her lower back, just above the base of her tail, "-push down right there on your hips. Using my body as a leverage point, I can both squeeze and pull your leg, freeing the compacted connective tissue and the fluid in your hip."

…Okay, now this has to look like a compromising position. The wolf does her best to hide how embarrassed she feels. Ignoring the daggers being stared into the back of her head is a bit harder. Harder still is ignoring how uncomfortably hot the room is getting.

"Ready?" Henson asks, looking totally oblivious to the fact that his face is so close to what lies under her tail. "Your leg is going to sting, and your hip is going to feel a pinch. Three, two, one…" He clenches his arms together, pushes down on her hips, and leans his body back. "Just grit your teeth and keep your balance!"

Amaterasu winces, feeling a sharp flare of pain followed by-

PO-PO-POP!

An absolutely heavenly surge of relief.


Amaterasu would look back and ruminate on that night a number of times throughout her and Issun's journey. The noise that came out of her mouth when Healer Henson popped her hip was… embarrassingly indecent. Borderline lewd, even.

That's probably why Ninetales spewed a furious stream of flames from her maw, scorching the ceiling black and scaring the life out of everyone. It was nothing Amaterasu's Celestial Brush couldn't fix, but it was not an occasion any of them would remember as one of their more dignified moments.


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Act 2: Chapter 16
NOTICE: This chapter might rankle a few chains, so the next one is coming soon, probably in just a few days.

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"Hands up! Pokemon League!"

'Is that really the best I could come up with?' Lee grimaces inwardly as he and his pokemon, along with Brendan and Zinnia's teams all pour out into the courtyard of the volcano's visitor center. "Toss away any pokeballs and get on your knees!" he yells at the top of his lungs.

Every Magma grunt's eyes shoot to them, with some being more startled than others. Three of the grunts even cave to the demand, raising their hands and dropping down to their knees with looks of fright painted on their faces. Of the three, two of them can be no older than sixteen.

The others?

One grunt takes a pokeball from his side and throws it at the ground, where it pops open and releases a furious-looking Golbat. "Golbat, get ready!" the henchman orders.

As if hearing the pop of a starting gun at the beginning of a race, the rest of the grunts all shake themselves from their stupor and seize their own pokeballs. Their orders all overlap each other as each one scrambles to ready themselves and their pokemon. In a multitude of flashes, pokemon of all sorts take shape at their trainer's feet. Lee spies several Poochyena, a Zubat, a Numel, a Koffing, a Mankey, and others. Two of the older-looking grunts, who must be lieutenants, have a Machoke and a Lairon.

Ninetales bristles and lowers herself, taking position in front of Lee. On either side of her, a growling Shelgon and manically grinning Marshtomp do the same for Zinnia and Brendan. Lee only spares a second to look behind him, seeing Grovyle, Octillery, and Corvisquire standing ready to jump into the fray.

The grunt with the Lairon blinks and slides forward a bit, his hurt eyes focused on Zinnia. The man is rather unremarkable appearance-wise, sans the cyan hair Lee can see under his hood. "Hey, Zena, babe? What are you doing?!" he demands. "You're one of us! Is this some kinda joke?!"

'Zena? Is this the guy Zinnia was catfishing?' Lee looks between Zinnia and the Magma goon.

Zinnia scoffs at the lieutenant. "You got played, dolt. Try thinking with the head on your shoulders, and maybe you wouldn't have been strung along or found yourself in a gang." She shakes her head. "You and your friends need to give up before you get hurt."

Lee doesn't miss how Brendan flinches at Zinnia's examination.

The grunt retreats back a step, seeming to be genuinely distraught. Beside him, his Lairon's blue eyes narrow, and a growl rattles from his metallic throat. "Well…" The lieutenant blinks his eyes, and his disappointment is replaced with fury. "Fuck you, then! Lairon, get ready! Boys, step up!"

Another grunt steps forward with his spitting-mad Mankey on the lieutenant's left, and on that grunt's left, the grunt with the growling Poochyena takes position. Another steps out of the crowd to join his fellows, a calm Meditite on his heels. The three grunts step forward, with the Mankey poised to take on Ninetales, Poochyena on Shelgon, and Meditite on Marshtomp. The rest all back up a dozen steps with considerable haste, whooping and hollering for their fellow gang members.

"Kick some ass!"

"Make Magma proud!"

"Fuck 'em up!"

'They really do intend to fight us one-to-one…' Lee blinks at how surreal it feels. 'I could have sworn this was going to turn into an uncontrolled brawl.'

Ninetales snarls at the Mankey across from her, who screeches back in blind anger. 'They're afraid of a full-scale conflict, and rightly so,' she says, her thoughts dark as she stares down her foe. 'They have no idea what they're up against.'

The lieutenant off to the side, the one with his tense Machoke, takes a radio from his belt and lifts it to his lips. Amidst all the noise from the Magma members and their pokemon, the lieutenant's message is lost even to Ninetales' sharp ears, but it can't be good.

'He's probably calling Courtney and Tabitha…' Lee grimly realizes. For a second, he's tempted to have Ninetales rip the radio away from the man, but stops himself, fearing that might constitute an attack on the trainer and turn the whole situation into a bloodbath.

Shelgon and Marshtomp take their places on either side of Ninetales. From Shelgon's throat rolls a deep growl that reverberates from within his shell, while Marshtomp wordlessly raises his fists.

The chatter of the grunts and the cries of their pokemon fall quiet. The heated air of the volcano top fills with uneasy tension, one looking for any excuse to explode like a spring wound too tight.

Ninetales' Drought begins to make the sunrays unpleasantly hot, and Lee has to resist the urge to pull on the collar of his shirt. Keeping his head still, Lee turns his eyes to the left.

Zinnia meets his nervous gaze with red eyes practically blazing with resolve. That firm, assured belief that everything will turn out fine takes the edge off his nerves.

To the right…

Brendan refuses to meet Lee's eyes, instead looking away with guilt for some reason. The boy's attitude does nothing to settle the twisting within the older trainer's stomach.

The Mankey across from Ninetales snorts and lowers himself. Behind him, his sweating trainer's lips finally part. "Mankey! Kara-!"

The rest of his words are drowned out as all three battles erupt at once. Shelgon rolls into a ball and charges his foe, while Marshtomp bellows and fires a spear of rushing white water from his mouth. As Ninetales snarls in wordless fury, Lee pulls her mind closer and tries to steady his pounding heart.

Mankey bounds forward at his trainer's command, his hairless fist glowing with enough power to turn a boulder to powder. Jumping high, he screeches and zooms downward with all his body weight behind his attack.

Together, Lee and Ninetales devise a counterplay, exchanging telepathic messages at lightning speed.

The monkey-like Mankey is stopped dead when Ninetales ducks his strike and latches her teeth around one of his ankles, drawing a shrill shriek of pain from him. The fox then throws her neck, releases her jaws, and dashes her smaller foe across the rocky ground like a child trying to destroy glassware. Before the winded Fighting-type can stand up and recover at his trainer's frantic urging, Ninetales leaps to him, stomping a front paw onto his stomach, then hovers her open mouth mere inches away from Mankey's face. The wavering heat mirage pouring from her throat is a dead giveaway of what is about to befall Mankey.

Mankey screeches and drives his fist into Ninetales' lower jaw in a flash, even faster than Ninetales can attack, but the vixen hardly budges from the strike, merely redoubling her hostile glare in reply. No, from the hardly-painful phantom impact on his own chin, Lee can tell the strength difference between the two Pokémon is simply too vast to overcome. Mankey was finished the moment he stepped up.

A split-second later, the Magma grunt's Mankey is bathed in a point-blank Flamethrower. The roar of the fire covers any sort of agonized sound that Mankey is surely making, and despite the monkey pokemon being a true enemy, Lee feels his burn scars tingle in sympathy. The flames are a mercifully cool orange rather than white, but many of the spectating Magma goons still cry out in alarm and shuffle backwards from the heat.

Ninetales cuts off her attack after a mere few seconds, then leaps backward closer to Lee, her stance remaining low and her tails fanned out threateningly.

On the blackened ground, Mankey, covered in blistering red burns and wheezing, doesn't even try to get back to his feet. Behind him, his grunt trainer is staring at Ninetales in open terror, shaking so badly that he can hardly raise his pokeball. "R-Return!" He cries, pointing the pokeball into the cramped fighting area.

In a flash of red, the wounded Mankey is recalled into his pokeball.

Cradling the ball in his hands, the fearful Magma member pushes his way behind his stunned fellows, hiding himself away.

'Well, that didn't make me feel like a bully or anything.' Lee thinks, with Ninetales the only one to hear his sarcasm. He scans the crowd of Magma goons, seeing their smirks and jeers gone, replaced with fearful realization. The only noise that isn't from fighting is Corvisquire's mocking laughter, trumpeting like a grating, rusty horn behind them.

'Is Ninetales that scary?' Once more, Lee wonders if his ideas of normality are skewing.

'They can surrender any time they wish,' Ninetales snorts in reply. 'Until then, they receive no quarter.'

Lee hazards a look over to Zinnia's fight, watching as an unharmed Shelgon bashes his namesake shell into the head of the Poochyena who dared enter the ring with him. Poochyena yelps like a puppy unfairly struck, then stumbles, bleeding profusely from a split in his skull. He stands for only a second more before he collapses, going limp and breathing in gasps. Before the blood pooling around his head can grow to a worrying size, Poochyena is frantically recalled by his trainer, a middle-aged grunt.

Satisfied, Lee glances over at Brendan's skirmish.

Marshtomp plays his fight slow at Brendan's direction, harassing Meditite at range with Water Gun, and parrying physical blows with his large hands when Meditite dares to close the distance. Marshtomp looks as fresh as can be, smirking throughout the battle, while the panicking grunt's Meditite is flagging, becoming sluggish as his stamina wanes.

"Meditite, H-High-Jump Kick!" The Magma member with Meditite can only be sixteen at most, as his voice cracks nervously halfway through the command.

The sweating Meditite leaps high up into the air, his little humanoid body covered in a faint aura of blue. At the apex of his jump, one of his short legs shoots out and he races down at Marshtomp like a javelin.

"Now," Brendan orders with unusual apathy.

As Meditite races down, Marshtomp remains still until the absolute last second, then one of his arms blurs into motion and knocks Meditite's kick wide. Meanwhile, he clenches his hand into a fist glowing with a slight outline of white, then drives it into the still-falling Meditite's solar plexus like a battering ram.

Lee can actually feel the shock wave produced from the brutal blow, which stirs some dust on the ground.

Meditite can do nothing but rasp through his winded lungs, his hands grasping Marshtomp's thick wrist for support as his eyes bug out from the gut punch. When his grip becomes limp, he falls from his place suspended on the mudfish's fist, hitting the ground in a heap.

"Don't just stand there!" The lieutenant with the Machoke yells at his stunned compatriots. "Someone else get in there and start fighting immediately! We have to hold out!"

From the nervous crowd, three more frightened grunts are pushed forward, figuratively thrown to the wolves by the men behind him. With no other choice, the trio shares a look as each one reluctantly takes a ball from their belt.

'Here we go again,' Lee mentally clicks his tongue.

The new trio, this time with a Zubat, a Machop, and a Rockruff, fare no better than their predecessors. Within a handful of moves and barely a few moments, the second round ends just as the first did. The grunts recall their wounded pokemon and push their way through the throng of bodies behind them, seeking refuge behind the other gang members. The third round passes, and then a fourth, each one draining the gangsters ranks more and more. The lieutenant with the increasingly twitchy Machoke beside him quickly grows pale as he realizes his forces are being chewed through.

"C'mon!" Zinnia taunts with an unsettlingly wide grin. "Give up!"

"You don't have to hurt your pokemon like this!" Lee chimes in as well. "You'll get a shorter stint in jail if you cooperate!"

Brendan remains silent.

The morale of red-clad gangsters is in total freefall, as even the lieutenants are looking unsure at this point. It's become evident to them all that winning simply isn't going to happen. Just as the next three reluctant gang members step forward, a loud, angry voice cuts through the silence.

"Why the hell are you all wasting yourselves like this?!"

The crowd of grunts rapidly part, allowing a pair of figures entrance.

On the right is a large, rotund man, both broad and tall, clad in the signature red uniform of Magma. Squinted eyes upon a round face open enough to peer at the gangsters around him with disapproval, which is enough for many of the Magma grunts to bow their heads. On his belt are four pokeballs, one of his large hands hovering above them.

Beside the large man is a much more familiar face.

There, next to the large man, is none other than Courtney. The woman's face wears its usual apathetic expression, which is partially shaded by the red hood pulled over her head. Her hoodie, skirt, and sneakers have been discarded, instead replaced with Magma's distinctive uniform.

"Admin Tabitha! Admin Courtney!" The cyan-haired lieutenant who fell for Zinnia's false affections bows his head, a look of dread upon his face. "We've been trying to stall as best we can, but-"

"You were engaging." Courtney's matter-of-fact voice interrupts the lieutenant, her magenta eyes raking over Zinnia and Shelgon, Lee and Ninetales, and stopping on Brendan and Marshtomp. "Didn't follow training. Fighting when you should be dodging." Courtney shakes her head. "Foolish."

"How many of you are no good to Magma anymore? Twelve? Fifteen?" Tabitha shakes his head with an annoyed sigh, as if having a dozen agents disabled is just an inconvenience. "The rest of you, back off and go guard the TE extractor by the volcano. You're breakwaters, not fighters! Remember that!"

The Magma grunts don't need to be told any more, as all of them quickly break away and retreat to the mouth of the volcano, their footsteps a staccato on the rocky ground. Lee watches their backs for a second, then looks at the large monolith of machinery at the lip of the volcano. 'Did he say 'TE extractor?' On a volcano? I thought that thing was supposed to awaken Groudon?' Lee grimaces, realizing they need to stop this now. "Hold on! What's all this about using TE up here? We're on top of a volcano! If you upset the balance of the Fire TE in the magma, who knows what could happen!? Are you trying to induce an eruption?!"

Zinnia tenses up, while Brendan just remains stony-faced.

Tabitha raises an eyebrow and stares down at Lee, as if he were a child asking an asinine question. He cracks a grin, then throws his head back and laughs. "Ahyahya! An eruption? What do you take us for? Something as crude as inducing a volcano eruption wouldn't require so many men and so much equipment!"

Lee feels his nerves unravel a bit at the awful implications of such a line.

"You're with the Pokemon League, I understand?" Tabitha continues, crossing his arms and staring them down, seemingly unfazed by Ninetales, Shelgon, Marshtomp, and the gaggle of pokemon in the rear. "I've got bigger Qwilfish on their way to be fried, so I don't have time for you. Recall your pokemon, toss their pokeballs down, and surrender. That's the only way I can promise you won't be hurt."

Ninetales bristles, and Lee is forced to take a second to feed her calming, telepathic whispers to keep her temper in check.

"Somehow, I doubt that promise is worth much…" Lee retorts, his glare mirroring Ninetales' to hide his faltering resolve. "Your friends weren't much trouble for us, and even if you're ten times better than they are, this is still a three on two fight. I think you're the one who should be surrendering."

"Three on two?" Courtney's lips quirk in amusement. "No."

"No?" Zinnia's eyes narrow. "Already called for backup, huh? You gang types are all the same."

"No," Courtney shakes her head again, and instead looks to Brendan, her smile growing.

Brendan clenches his fists and grits his teeth. His molars grinding together makes enough noise to draw both Lee and Zinnia's attention. "I…"

"Brendan?" Zinnia blinks. "Kid, what's wrong?"

Brendan stares down at the ground, his eyes shadowed beneath his hat. Behind him, Breloom and Mawile refuse to meet the eyes of anyone. Mawile especially, considering the tears prickling hers. Marshtomp, meanwhile, forces his usually smiling face into an unnatural, almost painful-looking rictus of neutrality.

Brendan then takes a deep breath, one that comes out shakily. "Lee? Zinnia?" He asks, his voice quiet. "Courtney told me what Magma is doing. She told me weeks ago. What they're doing, how they're doing it, and where they want to be when everything is said and done. These guys… Are looking really far ahead, and Courtney needs me to help."

For a moment, Lee listens on, lost, then Brendan's words piece themselves together into a grim picture. Lee feels his jaw drop, and even Ninetales' burning fury abates in her surprise. "Brendan, what are you saying?" Lee shakes his head. "You're not saying what I think you are, are you?"

"Magma is trying to save the world," Brendan continues, his voice gaining strength. "They want to reshape the land, make the world more sustainable for everyone. There are places like Orre that are totally barren, or Ransei, where people and pokemon are always fighting over land and resources. Heck, didn't you say your home was so isolated that it had no pokemon? There are a lot of places that aren't as nice as Hoenn, places that were dealt a bad hand by nature, but that can be fixed!"

Brendan looks up, and Lee does not like the determined glint he sees within those brown eyes.

"Courtney says Magma has the will and the means to fix all of that, to send the world into a golden age." Brendan's eyes narrow. "I… I want to help with that."

'What kind of drivel was Courtney feeding to him?' Ninetales digs her claws into the rocky ground, her frustration bleeding over to Lee. 'Is Brendan so smitten that he's taken leave of his senses?!'

"Brendan, are you listening to yourself!?" Zinnia looks just as shocked as Lee feels. "Magma are terrorists! You can't honestly believe that they're doing this for selfless reasons, are you? They're going to pull the rug out from under you! Whatever the hell you were told, it was all lies! That's all these criminal fucks can do! Lie!"

Brendan's face contorts into a scowl. "Like how you and Lee lied to me?"

"What?" The Dragon Tamer asks, incredulous. "What have we ever lied to you about?"

The boy's entire visage darkens. "You knew who Courtney was for weeks, but never told me a thing! I had to learn about it from her! Not only did she have the nerve to tell me who she was, she told me about Magma's plans!"

Tabitha snickers to himself, staying the hand hovering over his pokeball-laden belt. "Oh, quite the soap opera we've got going on here! Keep going! I want to see how it ends!"

Lee flashes back to that night shortly before Corvisquire's return, when Brendan and his pokemon returned to the hotel sullen and withdrawn. Neither the boy nor his pokemon spoke a single word that night. 'Son of a bitch…'

Zinnia seems equally as shocked, sharing a brief look of alarm with Lee.

"Brendan…" Lee struggles to form words. "We knew from the beginning, yes-"

Courtney's small smile falls, something that Ninetales notes and wordlessly's relays to Lee.

"-but we didn't keep it to ourselves out of a sense of maliciousness or anything," Lee assures as calmly as he can, thinking quickly about how to turn this around. "We wanted to keep our cover and see what Courtney's motive was as we attempted to extract information from her. You-" Lee stops himself short, nearly saying 'You're a kid. You shouldn't be worrying about criminals.' Such a sentiment would surely set Brendan off in this high-tension moment. "It… It wasn't an issue of trust; it's just the more people who know a secret, the harder it is to keep, understand? And… and what about your dream? You want to be the regional champion, right? You can't do that if you're on the League's most-wanted list!"

Brendan scowls and crosses his arms, but the set of his shoulders falls some. "This is bigger than my own dreams…" He mumbles. "I want to do the Birch name proud, and this goes way beyond being a champion."

Lee curses under his breath and tries to think of a different approach. Maybe spin the blame around on Courtney? "Unless my eyes were playing tricks on me…" Lee turns and directs a smoldering glare at Courtney, who twitches, but otherwise remains impassive. "Someone seemed a bit shocked that we came clean. Any reason for that?"

Tabitha quickly steps in when his fellow admin's scheme develops a wrinkle. "Okay, this has stopped being entertaining," the taller of the two admins takes a pokeball from his belt, drawing the eyes of everyone. "If you aren't going to surrender, then we'll have to do this the hard way."

Beside him, Courtney palms a pokeball of her own.

"Brendan…" Zinnia growls, her eyes flashing in warning. "Don't you dare side with a bunch of terrorists."

"You don't have to fight, Brendan… Just stand back." Courtney regards the boy with gentle eyes. "We… Won't make you do it."

Brendan's earlier resolve seems to be faltering, as he looks between Lee and Zinnia, and Courtney. The boy tries to catch the eyes of Marshtomp with his own, but the mudfish Pokémon steadfastly refuses to look away from the ground.

Lee bites his lip, mind racing. Realization strikes him like a blow to the head, and he silently curses himself. Was Courtney playing off of Brendan's infatuation the entire time? Her motive for traveling with them couldn't have been Brendan, could it? The dilemma is shelved, though, in favor of the crisis currently unfolding before him.

Courtney and her team themselves are daunting foes, professional criminals with the skill and the grit to match. They alone would present a serious hurdle. If Tabitha's skill as a trainer and the might of his pokemon match Courtney and her own pokemon, then this was going to get ugly. If Brendan decides to switch sides…then winning might be nigh on impossible.

Even with Ninetales, Shelgon, and everyone in reserve, it's his and Zinnia's eight pokemon versus at least ten of equal standing. A child he may be, but Brendan is a trainer few can stand up to, even this early in his career.

'Beloved, you're shaking,' Ninetales doesn't dare take her eyes off of the Magma admins, but Lee can feel her attention is focused on him. 'You needn't worry. We've come too far to fail.'

'Nine, if there's one thing I know to be absolutely true, it's that failure can strike anytime,' despite his sardonic reply, Ninetales' words steady the zoologist, as does the phantom feeling of a furry muzzle pressed into his neck. He rubs the spot with a clammy hand. '…Do I say it? Tell Brendan about Groudon and what Magma's real endgame is? It might snap him out of it, but it would paint a permanent target on our backs.'

The golden vixen flicks one of her tails. 'I believe the time for being concerned for that has already passed… '

Lee growls and looks at Courtney once more.

She has the gall to smirk at him, and a surge of vindictiveness rises up within Lee.

"Before this fight breaks out, I want to ask something. Brendan?" Lee begins, turning his narrowed eyes to the Birch heir. "Did Courtney explain just how they're going to move all of the land around?"

The young trainer shakes his head in a negative. "She said they have the means, though, and that she would explain when the time came. I trust her!"

Lee winces at the declaration. "Brendan, listen to me. Courtney, and Magma are keeping you in the dark. If you knew what their exact methods were, I don't think you would be so agreeable."

"The drama keeps going. I should adapt this and sell it to a TV station for big bucks," Tabitha laughs once more, his jovial tone utterly infuriating. Rolling his chosen pokeball in his hand, he says: "Go on, scarface. Let's hear your conspiracy theory."

An irritated growl finds its way out of Lee's throat. Taking a second to silently wave goodbye to the prospect of a peaceful life, he continues. "Magma doesn't have any crazy super tech or anything, far from it. You're smart, so think about it for a moment, Brendan. Think about the unearthly amount of power needed to shift continents. Think of all the ecological restructuring and terraforming that would be needed afterward. Think about the massive civil unrest, assuming there isn't outright anarchy. There is no humanly possible way to accomplish all that, let alone maintain order afterward, so Magma isn't using a human way."

Brendan blinks, and Lee can see a bead of sweat trail down his face. In the corner of his eye, he can see Tabitha's smile falling and Courtney's eyebrow rising.

Lee sets his face into a grim scowl. "Magma is up here on this volcano for one purpose: they intend to awaken Groudon and try to leash it like a rabid dog."

Lee was sure he could hear a pin drop on the volcano's summit.

Zinnia stares at him, expression unreadable.

Courtney's eyes widen, wider than any of them have ever seen before.

Brendan looks lost, as if he can't process what he just heard.

Tabitha is no longer smiling. He isn't even looking at Lee any longer. No, instead he's directing a hostile, borderline murderous glare at Courtney, who shrinks away as soon as she notices.

"Do you really think Magma can control a legendary pokemon? A god?" Lee quietly continues, feeling the eyes of his pokemon on his back. "There is some truth in every legend, and the legend of Groudon is as real as the earth we stand on. No one seeking out that much power does so with good intentions, Brendan. Everything you've been told is simply too good to be true."

"This conversation is over!" Tabitha declares, his face set into a severe frown. He draws back his arm, pokeball in hand.

Courtney mirrors him, her brows furrowed and her grip on her pokeball shaking.

Ninetales and Shelgon tense, with Lee and Zinnia following suit. Behind them is a cacophony of hisses, growls, trills, and screeches from the gathered pokemon. Everyone freezes in place, however when a voice calls out from behind them.

"Oh? I hoped to speak a bit longer."

Slowly turning his head behind him, Lee feels his blood run cold.

Hovering above the Mount Chimney visitor center, on a square, translucent pane of purple energy, a man stares down at the gathering below through his thickly-rimmed glasses. At his side, a black, doll-like pokemon hovers midair, unnervingly still.

'A Claydol,' Lee thinks, as he remembers the odd Psychic and Ground type pokemon. Like its name suggests, the pokemon resembles a bulbous doll fashioned from black clay, perhaps a bit over five feet tall. Situated all around its head in a circle, eight unblinking red eyes stare in every direction, making its visage an unpleasant one to behold.

"Leader Maxie…" Courtney breathes reverently, her eyes locked on the new arrival.

"Fuck me…" Lee swears to himself.

The man, Magma Leader Maxie, stands tall and slender. His severe face is pale, angular, and aristocratic, fitting perfectly with the aloof expression on his face. Much like Tabitha and Courtney, Maxie wears the signature red outfit of Team Magma. What rattles Lee the most, however, is the look in the man's eye.

Nearly every foe he and Ninetales have met thus far in their journey gave them their due caution, even if slight or unintentional. Zinnia, Roxanne, Brawly, Tyson, Wattson, Moore, each one of them met the man and fox as equals.

Maxie's eyes stare down at everyone coldly, as if pondering how best to step on an insect.

'Love?' Lee begins. 'Did you hear him approach?'

'… No, no I did not.' Ninetales admits reluctantly. Lee feels her reach her mind out towards Maxie and his pokemon, only to withdraw as if spooked. 'I… I cannot feel his nor his Claydol's mind. It's as if they aren't even there.'

The hairs on the back of Lee's neck stand up.

"Leader Maxie!" Tabitha speaks up. It doesn't take a genius to see that his smile is merely a thin mask, one poorly hiding a deep anxiety. "We were just-"

Maxie holds up a single hand, palm out, and Tabitha's jaw snaps shut. The tall man folds his arms behind his back and takes a step forward, seemingly about to tumble off of his platform, only for another pane of psychic power to appear under his foot without a sound or even a flash. He continues his walk leisurely, descending upon glass-like that appear under his feet. The Claydol at his side - the one presumably creating the stairs - descends with him, remaining deathly still as it does so.

As his feet finally meet the rocky ground, Maxie turns and regards Brendan, ignoring Marshtomp sliding in front of the boy defensively. The barest hint of a smile flits across Maxie's lips. "So, you are the one Courtney sings praises for," he begins, prompting Brendan to blink and absently point to himself. "Yes, my boy. You. The heir to Nigel Birch was sure to be a trainer of great consequence, but you go beyond that. After seeing you and your pokemon in action, I believe I understand it all now. You and Courtney are quite alike, you know. Such steady pragmatism is a quality sorely lacking in today's world." Maxie says, each word smooth, unhurried, and woven with cloying respect. "It would please me to welcome you into the ranks of Magma personally, after all is concluded here."

"Brendan," Zinnia growls, looking between the boy and Maxie in disbelief. "Don't you-!"

She's cut off when Claydol hums threateningly, rattling the ground with a deep, horn-like sound.

"I will be with you in a moment," Maxie gives Zinnia a raised brow and nothing else, returning his attention to Brendan a moment later. "My boy, could I ask a favor of you?"

The young Birch needs a moment to compose himself. "…What sort of favor?"

"May I ask you to defend the extractor with Courtney and Tabitha?" He asks, turning his eyes to the machine in the distance, which is surrounded by a perimeter of lower-ranking Magma thugs and a ring of pokemon. "Aqua is on the way to crash the party as they would say, and your expertise is sorely needed."

"L-Leader Maxie," Tabitha finally finds his voice once more, though he fingers the pokeball in his hand with obvious trepidation. "Are we not enough to keep the volcano secure?"

Maxie smiles once more, but there is no warmth within it. "Resources embedded within Aqua advised that my dullard counterpart Archie may be with the raiding party, hence my arrival."

Courtney's face loses all of its color while Tabitha's transforms into picture-perfect horror. "What?! That madman is coming here?!" Tabitha both looks and sounds as if the incarnation of death itself flashed before his eyes.

'Archie, the leader of Team Aqua?' Lee ponders to himself, watching with a sinking gut. 'Madman? Is he really that frightening?' With a gulp, he mentally reaches out to Ninetales. 'Nine, use telepathy and tell Corvisquire to run for backup. Have him hit the Lavaridge Gym, the Pokemon Ranger station, and the police department. Tell him to use Extremespeed from the get-go so no one has time to react to him leaving. This has officially spiraled out of control.'

'Very well…' Ninetales sighs, and from the corner of his eye, he watches Corvisquire stiffen on his feet. From the gritting of his beak, Lee already knows what the corvid's opinion on such instructions are, but regardless, he shifts his wings and takes a deep breath.

Everyone's heads turn to Lee when Corvisquire vanishes in a sonic crack, becoming a shadowless blur that is gone over the side of the mountain in an instant.

Maxie recovers the fastest, once more seemingly unfazed. "Should we be concerned about that, Mister Henson?"

'Of course he knows my name…' Lee steels his nerves and meets Maxie's apathetic gaze. "He lost his nerve and ran away to hide. He does that sometimes," he lies smoothly.

"Hmm…" Maxie hums, his eyes trailing the path that Corvisquire took through the air. "I see." Rather than comment on it further, he turns and gives Brendan a smile. "As I was saying, my boy, can you please aid Courtney and Tabitha? It will also give me ample time to speak to your friends here."

Brendan hesitates. Like he did a number of times back on the lift, he looks towards his pokemon for answers, only for none of them to be willing to meet his gaze. "Mister Maxie?" He begins slowly and unsurely. "This... Lee and Zinnia are still my friends, so you'll let them go, right?" As he says that, Brendan looks at all of them pleadingly. "I…" He looks to Courtney again and gulps. Watching the normally unflappable boy falter is such a surreal experience. "I didn't want this to turn into such a huge deal, and… and…"

Lee swallows the incredulous words on his tongue, not wanting to set off Maxie's Claydol. Looking at Zinnia, she appears to be just as frustrated. 'What kind of hooks did Courtney set into Brendan to make him do this? Surely he can see this is a mistake!' He telepaths to Ninetales. 'His dream, his friends, his family? Does he know what he's giving up?'

Where Lee expected burning fury in Ninetales aimed squarely at Brendan, her earlier vexation is gone, and in it's place is a storm of conflict, one that grows the longer she thinks of the events playing out before her. The vixen shifts her eyes between the boy and Courtney, her own thoughts in disarray. Finally, she says: 'Emotions and logic often… do not walk hand in hand.'

There is a brief moment, less than a second, where Lee's mind goes to a dark, impulsive place and considers the pros and cons of asking Ninetales to slay Maxie. A mere flex of the vixen's telekinesis, and the man's head would be removed from his shoulders, utterly pulverized. Magma may spiral out of control with no leader, thus halting their insanity in its tracks. As quickly as it came, the plot is discarded with haste borne of self-disgust. If Maxie died, they would be left with his grieving and enraged pokemon to deal with, not to mention the other Magma members. And even if they managed to get away from such a mess, then the law would surely come down on them for circumventing due process.

'Shit…. Not that it would have been that easy anyway.' Lee grimaces and steals a glance at Claydol, who is surely offering Maxie some kind of unseen safeguard.

"There is no need at all for violence," Maxie soothes, cutting Brendan's stammering off. "I will do everything in my power to see them home safely. They need only promise to be fair during our negotiations."

"Negotiations?"

Maxie adjusts his glasses, pushing them up the bridge of his nose as he nods. "Indeed. Magma, as of yet, still requires secrecy. Before your well-informed friends are sent on their way, I wish to see about compensating them for their silence. You understand, don't you?"

"I do…" Brendan murmurs.

"Come with me, Brendan," Courtney smiles and beckons the boy to her side. "You… made the right choice. Magma will take care of you."

A smile tries to rise on Brendan's face for the first time today, but it dies and leaves him only appearing more divided with himself. After a second that seems to stretch on and on, Brendan and his pokemon slowly walk to the Magma Admin's side, falling in step as she and Tabitha turn and begin the walk to the lip of the volcano. Even from such a distance, Lee can see Marshtomp's knuckles turn white as he and the rest of Brendan's pokemon drag their feet.

When Courtney wraps an arm around Brendan's shoulders, Zinnia explodes.

"What kind of fucking superhero bullshit did you feed him?!" The tanned woman screams at Courtney's back, her voice so loud it echoes off of the buildings and the mountains surrounding Mount Chimney. Lee and Ninetales both flinch at the volume. Even Shelgon regards his trainer with surprise.

"Do you feel good, you bitch!? Do you feel good manipulating a kid like that!?" The Dragon tamer continues her tirade. "How many other people who don't know any better have you fucked over?! How many of them were kids?! You fucking freak! You're not going to get away with this! I'm going to break you over my fucking knee, you scrawny, pink-wigged whore! If I find out you did anything worse to him, I'll make you regret ever being born!"

Despite all the curses and threats, Courtney doesn't look back. She doesn't so much as waver in her steps.

Zinnia is forced to take a breath, then she shifts the focus of her frustration. "Brendan!"

Brendan looks back, his eyes wide.

"You had better hope I die on this volcano, because if I get my hands on you after this, then you're going to… going to…" Zinnia loses steam, her shoulders slumping. To Lee's alarm and Ninetales' uncomfortable surprise, the woman's eyes are prickling with tears. "I thought we were friends, you little shit…" She finishes in a weak whisper. She pulls her cloak around herself, seeming to shrink.

Courtney leans her mouth down to Brendan's ear, whispering something that no one else can hear. Slowly, Brendan turned his shaken visage forward, continuing to walk with the pair of Magma admins.

"Feeling better?" Maxie asks dryly, unbothered by the piercing glare Zinnia strikes him with. "As I said, I would speak to you two to see how we can resolve this little wrinkle. I meant what I said earlier, there is no need for us to fight."

Zinnia sneers, once more all piss and vinegar. "Really?"

"Really," Maxie reaches his hand up and rubs his chin, staring at Lee, then Zinnia. "Of course, young Brendan keeps company as excellent as himself. To travel and brave Hoenn as a trio means you all must be quite friendly with each other. Magma always has more room for such individuals, so-"

"Stuff it!" Zinnia snarls like the dragons she trains, both Shelgon and Tyrunt mirroring her. "You already know the answer to that!"

Maxie frowns. Despite being on top of a volcano, the air seems to chill. "Very well… Then we are left with only one option." He glances at his Claydol, who has remained utterly impassive the entire time. "Magma can suffer no leaks, and you, my friends, are indeed the worst sort of leak: powerful, knowledgeable, and connected. If you wish to be let go with no violence, then memories of your time here must be wiped and memories of young Brendan must be altered. Claydol is an expert of such arts-" he waves a hand to his Pokémon "-and I promise you that minus a few hours' time from your perspective, you will leave here unmolested."

Ninetales growls, and Lee feels her wrap her mind around his in a bristling, protective shield. 'Is he actually serious?!' She says to Lee, aghast. 'Absolutely not!'

Lee can't quite hide how disturbed he is by how casually Maxie offers such an invasive and potentially identity-shattering procedure. Once more, he is reminded that psychic pokemon are more than light shows and floating objects. He doesn't need to look at Zinnia to know what her answer is going to be.

"Well?" Maxie asks, raising an eyebrow. "I would prefer an answer sooner rather than later."

'So much for negotiations…' Lee gives the taller man a hard stare. "Maxie… You're under arrest for suspected terrorist activities. Come quietly."

Maxie sighs. "Pity."

In a flash of movement, a pokeball is launched from his hand. The ball snaps open midair, and the air becomes sweltering.


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Act 2: Chapter 17(?)
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Lee gives the taller man a hard stare. "Maxie… You're under arrest for suspected terrorist activities. Come quietly."

Maxie sighs. "Pity."

In a flash of movement, a pokeball is launched from his hand. The ball snaps open midair, and the air becomes sweltering, just like-!


With a gasp, Lee draws in a breath, one filled with searing hot dust. His abused lungs protest, and he coughs. To his alarm, he tastes the metallic tang of blood on his tongue, and something is pushing down on his chest. He blinks his eyes, but stars dance in his vision. His limbs are heavy and clumsy, and he finds that he cannot find purchase on the ground to stand

Confused, he tries to recall what the fuck just happened, but the memory won't surface. 'Ninetales, are you o-!'

Ninetales isn't there.

That special place within his mind, where his first pokemon made her claim over part of him, is gone. Not empty, but completely gone, as if there was never anything there.

The pain in his chest, throat, and eyes is completely forgotten, sidelined in favor of something infinitely more crushing.

Loneliness.

'W-Where is she?' The loneliness nearly transforms into panic, and the zoologist is forced to bite his own lip harshly to bring him back to somewhere lucid. Again and again, he gropes for that telepathic anchor leading him to his fox, but there is simply nothing there. 'Ninetales?'

"N-Ninetales?" He blindly calls between ragged breaths. "Nine? Love? I-I." He spits a globule of blood and saliva trying to slink down his throat. "I need your help, Nine…"

There is no reply.

The terrible feeling of being alone strikes him like a hammer blow. What happened to her? Where is she? Is she okay? Against his will, Lee begins to shake. He blinks the stars away from his eyes and tries frantically to rise, pushing the weight off of his chest. As his vision clears, he unsteadily stands and looks at what he just pushed off of himself. On the floor are wires, ductwork, and a broken drop ceiling tile.

"W-Wha?" Lee swallows the bile that rises in his throat, and once again instinctually reaches out for Ninetales, only to feel nothing once more. His whole body aches and his scars tingle. Idly raising a hand to his face, Lee recoils and bites back a scream.

His scars hurt! It's as if they are fresh burns once more! What the hell is going on?!

Lee allows his eyes to trail away from the bits of twisted metal he pushed off of himself. Slowly, he takes in his surroundings and the pit in his stomach only drops further, for he recognizes where he is.

The breakroom within his zoo.

The ceiling is partially collapsed, many of the tables and chairs are overturned, and the floor is littered with glass, blood, and bodies. Broken, burned, and mutilated bodies he can put names to.

The bile in Lee's gullet rises again, and this time he can't stop himself from bending over and being sick, making a mess on the floor. The vomit only irritates the burns he feels in his throat, which makes his hacking and coughing all the worse.

I've lost it. This is my brain flooding with hormones for a nice vision before I'm burned to ash. There is no other explanation.

The words he thought to himself on his first day in Hoenn rush back to him, and his stomach turns once more. 'No… No!' His hands rise to his head, his clawed fingers grasping his hair and threatening to pull it out. 'It was real! All of it was real! I was there for months! I became a trainer and everything! I even…!

Faces flash before Lee's eyes no matter how hard he squeezes them shut.

Nigel.

Brendan.

Zinnia.

Grovyle.

Corvisquire.

Shinx.

Octillery.

And…!

The serene, smiling face of a golden fox consumes him. Again, his mind reaches out for hers, desperate for reassurance, or anything at all.

Nothing responds.

Lee slowly raises his head, and turns his gaze to the broken window.

High above the landscape, a mushroom cloud framed with a fell, orange light slowly dissipates into the atmosphere. Lee realizes the ringing in his ears is beginning to subside, and he can hear aftershocks still rumbling the earth.

Uncaring of his own sick or the glass or the blood on the ground, Lee falls to his knees. "No…" He whispers, feeling his heart stop within his chest.

I've lost it. This is my brain flooding with hormones for a nice vision before I'm burned to ash. There is no other explanation.

None of them were ever real.

Ninetales was never real.

Listlessly, his hand slowly dips into his pocket, his fingers closing around his cell phone. Pulling the device out, it miraculously still powers on, though the screen is cracked. With thumb movements so practiced that they've become muscle memory, he opens his games and navigates to Pokemon Emerald.

There, in spot number one of his team, is a humble Vulpix, marked with a heart.

Something… just gives out. Whether it's his body or his spirit, Lee does not know, and does not care. He falls backwards to his back, uncaring of the glass and debris digging into him. Be it from a broken heart, radiation sickness, or something else, his limbs begin to grow cold, and his heart begins to slow.

As his vision begins to grow white, he swears he can see Ninetales staring down at him, concern on her face. 'Beloved?' She asks, and Lee swears he hears her voice.

His chilled lips curl into a smile. 'Nine, even if you weren't real, I still love you.'

Before his vision is overtaken, the phantasmal Ninetales leans down…

…And bites him right on the nose.

"Ow! Fuck!" Lee shoots up, rubbing his smarting nose. "What was that for?!" He blinks, suddenly realizing that he's somewhere else.

Gone is the broken, ruined zoo and all of the horror within. He's in a cozy, darkened bedroom, under snug covers and on a plush bed. Right next to him and sharing the covers, Ninetales stares at him with open concern, concern that he can feel through his soul-deep bond with her.

He's not alone…

Lee blinks, touching his face and his body, only to find nothing out of place. He falls back onto his sweat-soaked pillow and sighs in relief.

'Are you okay, Lee?' Ninetales asks, shuffling a little closer and gently touching her nose to his cheek. 'You were fidgeting and mumbling in your sleep. I'm sorry for the bite, but I couldn't wake you.'

'Just fine, Love,' Lee rises up on his elbows and smiles before pulling a surprised Ninetales into a one-armed hug. 'Hell, better than fine since I've got you here.'

The vixen smiles gently and nuzzles him in return before pulling away. 'If you had an unpleasant dream, I would be happy to—'She pauses when something shuffles in the covers between them. 'Good grief…' Ninetales sighs. 'She had just gotten to sleep, too.'

'She?' Lee wonders, lost. 'Who is—'

The head of a small, cranky-looking Vulpix pokes out from under the blankets. The little fox whines and looks between them.

'Return to slumber, O daughter,' Ninetales soothes the little kit, speaking both through her mouth and her mind. Ninetales leans down, nuzzling the kit tenderly and quieting her whines. 'Your father did not mean to wake you.'

'…Father?' Lee blinks and looks down at the Vulpix kit.

The little orange kit stares back up at him, heedless of Ninetales trying to coax her back into a sleeping position. It's just then that Lee realizes that his and the kit's eyes share the exact same shade of blue.

Lee's shoulders slump. "Okay, now this went too far in the other direction."

The Vulpix kit smiles at him, opens her muzzle, and says: "April Fools! Remember to update the thread mark so this isn't listed as a chapter tomorrow!"


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