It had been little hints, here and there, that set off Aidinza’s paranoia. The empty boldore tunnels widened just enough to be off. The deep peg holes not yet collapsed in on themselves. The unnaturally uniform glowing rocks, and the continued absence of the Galvantula line.
Alone, they seemed inconsequential, but together they painted a stark picture:
Someone had torn through Chargestone cave with a single minded rapacity, and did not care about the Pokémon they displaced doing so.
Did the league know about this? Surely not. To let a population as dangerous as Galvantula ferment in agitation, in a path open to the public? One connecting the thrones of two of their honoured leaders?
That would be dangerously negligent.
It was fortunate for Aidinza that the Mistralton city gym was both his next stop, and the easiest way to get to the bottom of things.
The young nomad’s paused on a grassy knoll overlooking the city, though city might be a stronger word than warranted. Unlike Nimbasa there were no steel behemoths that jut into the sky at seemingly random locations, and unlike Driftveil there was no sprawl of houses dressed in a dizzying array of opulent bronze. No, the buildings of Mistralton were strangely uniform. Single storied and wood walled, their red tiled roofs all had a single break in their slant for an attic window.
Aidinza had been shown how to use the copy-paste function on the Pokécentre’s computers by the kind Nurse Joy of Nimbasa, and there was a part of him that wondered briefly how someone managed to replicate it in real life.
There were only two true breaks in the identical features of the city. The first was a tall tower of carved stone brick and what his reading about Driftveil told him was ‘oxidised’ bronze. Though, Aidinza thought green bronze would be a simpler name.
The second was a wide field of concrete that stretched along the entirety of the city’s width, marked with uniform white markings, lined with tall metal buildings, and dominated by a strange metal thing. The metal thing had two long metal blades jutting out of its sides, and a tail almost shaped like a vertical Vibrava tail, that was crawling along the concrete, slowly turning to face the far side of the field.
Aidinza stared as the machine finished its circle, lined up in the centre of the white markings. The last time he had seen such a large metal thing moving, it had been Driftveil’s massive drawbridge, and that had been an awe inspiring sight.
“First time in Mistralton?” A voice startles Aidinza out of his examination, and he snaps around to the source. It was a young woman standing at the base of the hill, a woman not much older than Aidinza, with long dark red-hair pulled into a bun on top of her head, held together by an accessory that looked like four blue-petals. She giggled at the sight of his face, bulky blue gloves coming to cover her mouth, as her sky blue eyes twinkled, and she walked up to stand at the top of the hill with Aidinza. “Sorry, it's just you have the look of someone seeing a plane for the first time.”
“Cool sands and wet winds, stranger. ‘Plane’ is what the machine is called?” He asks, gesturing towards the metal machine as it sat in the centre of the concrete field.
“Ya-huh. Archeops C-Seventeen Sky Trotter to be exact. The C stands for Cargo-plane by the way.” The woman’s clear enthusiasm for the ‘plane’ was infectious, and Aidinza found himself eyeing the Sky Trotter with a keen eye. “Usually I’d be in the control tower just behind it, but LZ-Twelve got a bee in his bonnet and just absolutely demanded to stretch his… wings in the forest.” She jerks her head towards the forest just past the odd glass houses that bookended the concrete field. “Plus I’ve got gym battles after lunch anyway.”
“Lunch?” Aidinza’s eyes flick up to the well past noon sun, then back down to the woman as his brow furrows slightly. “Gym battles?”
“Ya-huh, Gym Leader Skyla, the heaven's surprising girl don’tcha know?” She beams at the young nomad, as she raises her right hand to her head, and pulls it away in a strangely sharp gesture.
“T-the sun sings for your health Honoured Leader!” Aidinza straightens up as best he could, turning to fully face Skyla. “If I could just ask for a mom-.” Aidinza flinches as a thunderously loud noise interrupts him.
“Ooh this is gonna blow your mind if you’ve never seen a plane before.” Blue gloved hands pushed Aidinza’s head around to look at where the plane was beginning to move, but unlike before where it was doing so silently, now it was screaming like an enraged hydreigon.
And was starting to move very quickly.
The Ya’an-ah boy stared, transfixed as the plane charged down the concrete field, faster than anything that size had any right to move, so fast that in a mere thirty seconds it had crossed half the length of the field that was nearly the size of Driftveil Drawbridge.
So fast that Aidinza’s eyes could not help but snap to the chain-linked boundary that marked the edges of the field, and the strange glass buildings beyond that. If it kept going like that, at that speed. Well, the brutal conclusion was obvious, and Aidinza’s heart began to race in his chest. What sort of insane show was happening here?
But then something genuinely, truly fantastical happened.
Rather than slowing down, or crashing through the obstacles in front of it. Instead the plane began to rise. The back of the long steel blades that jut out of its sides snapped downwards, and the piercing scream reached a fever pitch, and in a moment that slowed to an eternity, the nose began to list up, the front wheels pulling off the field first agonisingly slowly. Then all too quickly the back wheels were off the ground, and this steel behemoth was in the air, rising steadily.
Flying.
Aidinza goes slackjaw, as he stares at something insane. The plane itself did not dawdle for a moment, continuing to speed up as it left Mistralton behind in moments, and rose high enough to split the clouds.
“Pretty amazing isn’t it?” It took a long moment for Aidinza to even register that the voice next to him, the voice of an honoured leader, might be addressing him, and he looks back at her witlessly.
“Uh.” Was all he managed, sending her into another set of giggles, before she skipped a few steps away from Aidinza.
“You know it’s pretty incredible from down here, but when you’re up there with it.” She shakes her head, twin strands of dark-red hair framing her face jumping around with the energetic gesture, one ending up caught on her mouth. She spits it out. “It’s a hundred thousand times better.”
But Aidinza did not really process any of that, the moment the words up there with it had left her mouth, he was lost in his own thoughts. Though, those thoughts were just an endless cycle of trying to comprehend what being inside a plane while it was flying would be like.
“Uh-oh I mental boomed him.” A gloved hand jabs Aidinza in the nose, snapping him out of his daze. “Hey you’re a trainer right?”
Distantly Aidinza nods, before shaking his head and focusing.
“Well I’m a Gym Leader, and there’s only really one natural thing to do now hey? Come on, we’ll head back to my gym.” Skyla’s hand snatches Aidinza’s wrist, and in moments he is being dragged down the hill, and into the city proper. Caught up in the whirlwind of the gym leader's energy, and the lingering mind bending of the plane’s fantastical feat, it takes him several streets to even properly register that he was being taken anywhere.
Though, that did not mean he pulled away from Skyla, she was an honoured leader, if she wanted him to go somewhere, then it was his duty to be there.
Besides, he came here for a gym battle right? Getting there with the gym leader in tow was hardly an issue.
-
There was somewhat a line in the gym when the two of them arrived, full of irritated trainers who all looked like they had been at this training business for years.
Skyla, dragging a slightly out of breath Aidinza behind her, did not give any of them a moment of attention as she entered the gym proper.
“Got a Gym Battle Jazzy!” She calls over her shoulder at a rather elderly lady, who just smiled and waved at the Gym Leader. “So usually you’d sign in and whatever, but we’re takeoff buddies so you get to skip the line. How many badges do you have?”
“Er, two badges Honoured Leader.” Skyla hummed, as the two of them came to a section of floor replaced by a massive fan behind a heavy metal grate.
“And you’ve got three Pokemon! Easy as pie. Now watch this.” Skylar fiddles with a switch on the wall above the massive fan, and in moments the things begin to spin at an insane speed. “Now watch this!”
They also became extremely noisy.
“WHAT?” Aidinza shouted, unable to hear Skyla over the noise. But Skyla in turn could not hear him, or did not care to clear up any confusion, as she jumped - backwards for some reason - into the fan’s air stream.
And did not hit the ground.
The complete opposite in fact, she shot up through an opening above the fan disappearing in moments.
Aidinza was not sure how he should feel about that. If he was to be honest, he was fast approaching his limit for today.
A few moments later he dimly heard Skyla’s voice again, and when he glanced up, he could see her leaning over a railing high above him, gesturing towards the fan, and shouting something.
She wanted him to walk onto the fan.
Aidinza was raised in a culture where you obey your superiors. In most tribes that meant the honoured leaders, and the elders. The first for the weight they have taken upon themselves for the tribe, and the Ya’an-ah in totality. The second for the wisdom they had learned underneath the harsh eye of the Mother Desert. The closest Aidinza had ever been to breaking that guiding ideal was questioning Honoured Leader Clay.
Right now, there was nothing Aidinza wanted to do less than obey an Honoured Leader. Over the intense noise of the sound, he managed to catch Skyla shouting that it was safe, she promised.
Considering that Aidinza could see that Skyla was almost bouncing over the railing that was keeping her plummeting down several stories, that did not reassure him as much as she might have hoped.
Carefully he pushed his hand into the air stream, his arm shooting up, and then out of the flow in an unsettlingly violent manner.
Another shout from Skyla lost to the sound of this terrifying contraption touched the edge of Aidinza’s hearing, and the young nomad was pretty sure that if he looked up at the gym leader, she would be doing something else insane that would gut his slowly building nerve.
“Send my bones home to the mother desert.” He mutters to himself, before squeezing his eyes closed, and throwing himself forward into the airstream.
Aidinza had never felt heavier than in that moment of weightlessness. Never felt the relentless pull of gravity on his limb harder than when he was being bodily raised in defiance of it. The fact that the opening led immediately into a tight, dark metal tube that felt like it was pressing down on him did nothing to help the strange sensation of heaviness.
The young desert nomad had never felt more relief in his life, than when he was spat out the top of the tube, landing heavily on his front, importantly on solid ground.
“Took you a hot minute there didn’t it?” Aidinza groans, and rolls over onto his back, taking in the gym arena for the first time. It was very similar to Clay’s field, the battle ground made of earth, and marked out clearly with sharp white lines. The difference was in the air, all around the field were hoops strung up on floating balloons, and beyond that there was no roof, leading into the clear, open sky.
“That was…” Aidinza took in an unsteady breath as he pushed himself to his feet. “Something.”
“You should come around when I finish convincing the league to let me put in cannons!” Aidinza knew that he was… less than familiar with a great deal of things outside of his mother desert. But he was pretty sure that a cannon was a large barrel that shot things at great velocity, not something that any human would ever want to be shot from.
“C-cannon?” Aidinza had never been terrified by anything more than the way that Skyla’s smile widened into a beam, and she nodded eagerly.
“Ya-huh. The league keeps saying it's too dangerous, but human cannonballs do it all the time, and could you think of how cool it would be?” Aidinza needed to get out of this town before Skyla gave him a heart attack, or attempted to use him as a demonstration to the league of how safe being shot from a cannon was.
His hand fell to the pokéballs at his side, and without a word to acknowledge what she just said, he walked to take his position on the battlefield.
As he turns to face Skyla, he catches her covering her mouth, before she pulls a pokéball from her belt, and gets more serious.
“This will be a Two on Two battle! I will choose first!” There was a whirring noise off to the side, so similar to the fan down below that Aidinza actually flinched, but it was just the wall pulling back to reveal a large screen, that briefly flashed up with Skyla’s face and name, before a not found error popped up. “Hawker Hurricane, come fly with me!” A flash of red fills the clearing, and with a coo the familiar sight of a tranquill materialises in the air.
But this tranquill was different from the wild pokémon Astazhei had bullied along route six. Its grey feathered chest was well-groomed and slick, rather than rough and matted. Its sharply slanted yellow eyes were intent and focused, rather than absent-mindedly ditzy. Most of all, it was larger than any tranquill that Aidinza had seen before, maybe even larger than some of the smaller unfezants that he had fought before, with long grey and black wings stretching at least a metre.
Not that it changed the pokémon Aidinza planned to send. A tranquill was a tranquill was a tranquill, no matter how big and well groomed it was.
And Astazhei ripped tranquill out of the sky for breakfast, lunch, and dinner.
With a flash of red, and a domineering cry, Astazhei appeared in the air, powerful wings beating a gust over the field with a single flap.
“Now isn’t that a handsome lad! You’ve been holding out on me!” Skyla took a moment to admire the Eaglet, as he landed on one of the hoops strung up over the arena, powerful talons digging tightly into them, as his head tilted at his opponent. “Ooh he’s such a confident boy! Those raptor eyes could spot an Ice-type in the snow at six kilometres couldn’t they?”
Now Astazhei was not a vain bird, he enjoyed fighting in the muck and mud far too much to properly care about his appearance, beyond the grooming that Aidinza gave to him every night. But he was a prideful bird, and it came as no surprise that the moment the compliments from Skyla registered with him, that the Eaglet immediately began ignoring tranquill calmly riding the thermals around the arena, to preen himself at Skyla.
Something told Aidinza that that was going to come back to bite him in some way.
Stolen novel; please report.
“Now on three okay?” The screen flickered with an error again, before it went white, and a large, blocky number three appeared.
“Three!” A robotic voice boomed across the arena, and Astazhei stopped his preening to sharply eye his foe once more.
“Two!” Aidinza studies his own opponent for a moment, her bubbly grin doing nothing to hide the sharp eye that studied Astazhei.
“One!” Astazhei exploded into the air, his tranquil opponent dove through the thermal it had been lazily circling, and two shouted orders mingled in the air.
“Gust!”/”Air Cutter!” Astazhei’s powerful wings beat twice, tearing the air in front of him into a crashing wake that ripped towards the Tranquill. It was Astazhei’s favourite way to start a fight with another flying type, and it had taken Aidinza a long while to figure out why, especially since more often than not the gust would miss.
The answer was both simple and complex. As much as a hammer as Astazhei was, he was not stupid. He knew he was not as fast as other birds, knew they were more agile, knew that if it came to a chase he had no hope. But what he did have was the unrelenting power to dictate the shape of the battlefield, and while the gust might miss, what it did to the thermals and airflow of the airspace dragged both flying types to an even keel. Because while other birds might ride the winds better than him, might be more agile, Aidinza had yet to see a bird tear through turbulent air better than Astazhei.
Unfortunately for that plan, Skyla and her tranquil was not willing to let Astazhei dictate the battle that easily. The tranquill’s wings crack through the air with an incredible speed, blasting forward two streams of tightly controlled wind that slammed into the mighty - unfocused - gust that Astazhei had whipped up. It was a battle of dexterity versus sheer force, a clash between a spear and a sledgehammer.
A clash with only a pyrrhic victor, as Astazhei’s Gust pushed through the Air Cutter by mere inches before petering out. Not that Aidinza had a moment to spare to count those inches, as the tranquill raced forward into the wake of the clash.
“Swift! Then pull around!” Came Skyla’s order, as the tranquill closed in on Astazhei, its beak parting and dozens of brightly glowing gold stars shot towards Astazhei before one of its wings snapped downwards, throwing the tranquill into a sharp right bank, and leaving Astazhei to fruitlessly chase its tail feathers.
It was attempting to keep its distance from Astazhei, while still getting close enough to inflict meaningful damage. Smart, considering what Astazhei did to most pokémon that got close enough to him.
“Gust, into Wing Attack!” Unfortunately for the tranquill Astazhei did not need to catch it. Once again Astazhei’s powerful wings struck out against the air, but this time it was not a probing attempt to wreak havoc on the airspace, but to slam the tranquill out of its sharp turn.
And this time, Astazhei did not stay still after his attack, diving forward much like the tranquill dove after its own attack, his wing gleaming with a white light, as the gust crashed into the tranquill, the turbulent wind throwing it into a spin.
But that only ignited Aidinza’s paranoia. Skyla and tranquill had proved from the very first move that they understood Astazhei’s game plan, and it was very obvious that Skyla specialised in flying-types. She and tranquill should know that this is exactly what Aidinza and Astazh-
His eyes catch a flicker of shaped air, hidden previously in tranquill’s wake, set on a collision course with Astazhei moments before he would smash into his vulnerable opponent.
“DIVE!” Astazhei’s wings snapped to his sides, and not a moment too late, as the shaped air missed him by mere centimetres’ ruffling his feathers with the proximity.
And leaving both him and his tranquill foe in a strange limbo. Tranquill was bare metres away from Astazhei, and had yet to recover from the previous gust. An unenviable position for any bird. But by the same vein Astazhei was now below Skyla’s bird, and far too close to build up the momentum to overcome that while ensuring that Wing Attack landed cleanly.
But pokémon battles were not dictated by just moves. “Tear it out of the sky!” Astazhei screeched, and with one powerful beat of his wings he tore himself out of his dive and threw himself at tranquill.
“Feather Dance!” Aidinza heard Skyla call, but the mass of feathers that burst into the air between Astazhei and his opponent did nothing to stop the rufflet from slamming into the wild pigeon pokemon, his heavy black tipped talons digging into its wings and trapping it in close quarters with Astazhei.
Leaving it at the mercy of the far physically stronger bird.
It was not a move, at least not that Aidinza could tell. There was no invocation of the energy that saw Astazhei’s wings glow when he used Wing Attack, no strength beyond their size like tackle. Just the raw force of Astazhei’s muscles used to wrestle his opponent into submission.
Astazhei threw himself into another dive, taking his unwilling passenger hurtling towards the ground, and as he reached full tilt, so close to the ground that the tranquill had no hope of recovering, he let the tranquill go.
Straight into the red beam of a pokéball.
“Hawker Hurricane forfeits!” Skyla calls across the field, hand falling to another pokéball by her side. “Jeez I didn’t expect you to spot the razor wind so quickly, and just going for a grapple was pretty smart. I guess I should take you a bit more seriously.” Aidinza feels a flush of warmth at the praise, though he did not let it distract him when Skyla threw out her next pokémon.
“F Thirty-Five B Lightning Two, come fly with me!” Skyla had not been kidding in the slightest, when she said she was going to take this more seriously.
To call Skarmory just a bird, would be like calling Driftveil bridge, just a bridge. Correct on all accounts, but failing to convey the inherent majesty. Well over three times the size of Astazhei, the Pokémon's steel-grey frame gleamed in the sunlight, as its two wickedly sharp three clawed talons dug deep into the earth. A terrible screech fills the arena, as it flexes its blade like feathers, the sanguine underside an unspoken threat to its enemies. The three plated bands that protected its neck twist, as the Skarmory surveyed the field with beady black eyes, before it's attention flicked up to where Astazhei had reclaimed his perch.
Its wickedly sharp beak splits open, exposing six terribly jagged teeth lining its mandible, before it lets out a scream that could be best described as crashing metal.
“You’re gonna have a lot more trouble pulling F Thirty-Five B Lightning Two out of the sky than you did Hawker Hurricane! She’s a real mean one up close!” Aidinza had little trouble believing that, F Thirty-Five B Lightning Two’s steel plate skin looked nearly as thick as a Durant’s carapace, on top of being nearly three times the size of Astazhei.
She would be a terror in close combat, and Aidinza could only hope that he could keep Astazhei on a tight enough rope to keep the armored bird at a distance to chip away at her with gust.
“Gust.” Aidinza seized the initiative, this was going to be a long, gruelling fight and Aidinza had…
Something to do? Why did it feel like he had forgotten something?
“Lightning Two! Take off check!” Aidinza snapped out of his momentary lapse of attention, to watch as Astazhei’s gust slammed into the Skarmory, and barely budged the powerful steel-type. Then watched as it shuddered from her head to her sharp talons, small flakes of something drifting off her into a pile on the ground.
Something told him that was not good.
“Keep it grounded! Gust!” Another buffet of wind, this one sending the skarmory sliding backwards the barest of inches.
Something told him, this was about to go very poorly for him.
“Steel Wing.” Her segregated wings flex, as her talons crush the earth beneath her, and as another gust slams into her, sending dust and dirt swirling around her, she surges forward.
And despite the gust that Aidinza had seen bend trees far enough backwards to crack them pressing down on her, Lightning Two rose into the air with a terrifying ease.
“Keep your distance Astazhei.” Aidinza warned, but it was a hopeless task, now that she was in the air, the skarmory proved that its hefty bulk did not mean that she was slow. Her wings beat powerfully, each feather independent, as she rose above Astazhei in moments. “Don’t let it hit you!”
Lightning Two did not give Astazhei a choice. Her speed rising into the air was nothing compared to her dive, an insane eye blurring pace that could cross entire planes in moments.
Astazhei had no hope to avoid the pursuing white wing, no matter how he strained to keep away.
The terrible noise of steel crunching into flesh filled the arena, as the skarmory’s wing slammed into Astazhei, sending the rufflet hurtling towards the ground in an uncontrollable spin.
“Keep up the pressure! Steel Wing!” Came Skyla’s relentless instruction, and the skarmory wasted no time at all in deepening it’s dive, banking tightly and chasing after Astazhei with raptorial focus.
Aidinza fumbled with his belt, trying to rip Astazhei’s pokéball and return the eaglet before he could be hurt any further. But Skarmory was too fast, crashing into Astazhei before Aidinza had even managed to get his pokéball off his belt.
“Nice try bud.” Aidinza mutters out of the corner of his mouth, as he finishes recalling Astazhei, guilt chewing at him for being so slow. But a loud crash ripped him from his self recrimination, and his head snapped up to see Lightning Two push herself to her feet, having crashed into the ground.
The reason took only a moment to reveal itself, two of the skarmory’s feathers were twisted and crushed, both with three distinct dents. Astazhei did not let himself go down quietly, managing to use his powerful three taloned claws to crush Lightning Two’s feathers.
“Sheesh, maybe we should start calling you heaven’s surprising girl instead. A rufflet that’s willing to try to keep away from a bigger opponent, and makes sure to inflict some real damage on the way out?” Skyla shakes her head with a grin, as Naazin appears on the field with a flash of red. “Just hold on a moment, gotta make sure that spitfire didn’t do anything serious kay?”
Skyla skipped across the field to where Lightning Two was prodding at her twisted feathers with her beak, and Aidinza watched with some level of interest as Skyla squatted down and grabbed the feathers herself, examining them with a keen eye. “Well… she’ll be alright with a bit of elbow grease and some potions. But that’s something for after the battle yeah?”
She retakes her position on the far end of the field, as Lightning Two bit at her feathers some more. “Only fair I give you the first move no?”
“Naazin, Bubblebeam.” If there was anything that the fight between Astazhei and Lightning Two proved, it was that the skarmory needed to be slowed down.
“To the skies!” But maybe he should have trusted Astazhei’s pyrrhic wound, because the gulf in speed between Lightning Two when it first took off, and now was difficult to describe. Before the skarmory was a lethal, graceful predator, slicing through the air with brutal ease. Now it was a hobbled pidove, hardly able to keep itself in the air, and far from being able to dodge Naazin’s unnerving accuracy.
The viscous bubbles splattered all across the ungainly skarmory, steel feathers coated in a thick layer of cloying mucus. She stuttered in the air, her wings twisted and clogged, hardly able to keep herself flying.
“Flash Cannon!”/”Smack Down!” A feeling of dejavu washed over Aidinza, as Naazin sent dozens of sharp rocks hurtling into the air towards the skarmory. But unlike Clay’s second pokémon, the vividly silver beam that slammed into Naazin just washed over his heavy plates, unable to even push him back, with how he was anchored to the ground with his smaller claw.
Though Aidinza only saw that out of the corner of his eye, confident in Naazin being able to handle himself. Instead he watched as Naazin’s Smack Down finished Astazhei’s work, ripping the skarmory out of the air for the second, and final time.
“Aw man, we hardly even moved your little lobster.” Skyla gives Aidinza an exaggerated pout, as she returns skarmory, before her eyes turn serious. “Be careful with that Rufflet, flying types willing to go that far… they’re the type of pokemon to get hurt in a serious way.”
Aidinza’s hand falls on Astazhei’s pokeball, tracing his fingers along the cool metal surface. As much as the eaglet’s sacrificial brutality had sealed the next battle, it was borne from Aidinza being too slow to stop him from getting hurt.
“Ah man there I go, getting all serious and stuff. Good job! You’ve won the Jet Badge!” Skyla’s gloved hand dips into a pouch at her hip, pulling out a badge shaped like a stylized feather. Aidinza paused for a moment, as he looked at it from across the battlefield, the tiny badge colourfully stark even at this distance. Swept up by the energy of Skyla, he had sort of forgotten why he was here. What all this was heading towards, and despite himself he found himself briefly longing for it to not end so quickly.
Despite all of Skyla’s… eccentricities, Aidinza had not met anyone who just clicked so quickly, so easily. Certainly no one outside of the Ya’an-ah Desert.
Someone who left him feeling like there was something he was… forgetting?
“Commere and get it!” There was something about Skyla’s energetic gesturing that kicked Aidinza into scurrying over to collect his badge, not that Skyla made it that easy on him, hooking an arm around his neck, pulling him down, and rubbing a knuckle into his head. “Hey, don’t worry too much about that rufflet yeah? Just gotta be careful when a pokemon gives a hundred and fifty percent like that.”
Maybe it was his subconscious reminding him in an effort to stretch his time with Skyla just that bit longer. Maybe the knuckle digging into his head had special memory properties, but the realisation slammed into him with all the force of a skarmory’s steel wing.
“Chargestone!” He blurts out, pulling himself from Skyla’s warm grip around his neck, and earning himself a confused look from the red haired gym leader. “The electric rocks at Chargestone, someone’s taken them and has upset the Galvantula.”
Sky blue eyes sharpen, and the easygoing air that had swept up Aidinza was drowned underneath the heavy weight of one of the eight strongest trainers in the region.
“I have one of the cut rocks.” Aidinza offers his wrist, where the glowing stone that Sandile had found days ago still sat glowing against his wrist. Skyla reached out, grip firm as she brought the stone up to look at.
“Tell me everything.”
-
Skyla had decided to investigate chargestone personally. She had also decided that Aidinza had volunteered to show her what he had found, which was fine with Aidinza. Walking back to Chargestone cave was not ideal, but he would have dealt with it. Fortunately Skyla had another plan.
Unfortunately, it had been taking her personal bi-plane.
Aidinza stumbles out of the side of the cockpit, landing heavily on his feet before collapsing to the dirt, hands desperately digging into the soil just to feel something truly solid.
“You know, I’ve never heard of a ground-type human before.” Aidinza groans, as he feels Skyla rub at his back with a giggle. “Come on. You’ve got some rocks to show me.”
“I want to walk back to Mistralton.” Aidinza half begs, half pleads as he slowly wrenches himself up to his feet.
“And I want an SR Seventy-One Zekrom.” She shrugs, as she grabs his wrist, and pulls him towards the not very distant plateau that sat above Chargestone Cave.
“I find one of them and I get to walk?” Aidinza offered hopefully, glancing around the clearing as if whatever an SR Seventy-One Zekrom was would suddenly appear. Then he glanced further into the sky, knowing Skyla however briefly, it was probably another plane.
“If you get me an SR Seventy-One Zekrom, I’d carry you back to Mistralton.” The two of them pause for a moment, as Aidinza sized up the five inches smaller Skyla, before they both break down into laughter.
“There’s no way I’m getting out of flying back to Mistralton is there?” He manages, as the two of them reach the entrance of Chargestone Cave.
“I’m going to do so many loop-de-loops on the way back.” She giggles, as he hangs his head in mock despair.
Then they cross the threshold into Chargestone, and Skyla’s easy grin falls away, leaving behind the serious mein of Mistralton’s Gym Leader.
Aidinza’s own smile drifts away, as he forces himself to focus on the situation at hand, stepping in front of Skyla and gesturing for her to follow.
It did not take long for the two of them to reach the first of many things that Aidinza had wanted to show Skyla, the chipped and deformed remnant of one of the many glowing rocks throughout chargestone.
Skyla examines it without a word, her thickly gloved hands running across the sharp edge of the rock, as the scent of ozone fills the air.
“Pressure cut. They had to have serious equipment to do this without electrocuting themselves.” She pulls her hand away, as a spark flicks between her hand and the rock. “How many Charged Stones did you see cut up like this?”
“Dozens, in the other half of the cave they were all whole, but after a point every one I saw was cut up like this.” Aidinza gestured at the stone - Charged Stone, which he supposed made a certain amount of sense - as Skyla’s hand fell to one of the pokéballs at her side, one she specifically grabbed before they left.
“Fly with me, SR Seventy-One.” A four winged, thickly purple furred pokémon appears in a flash of red, and a high-pitched chitter. “SR I need you to locate the Galvantula left in the cave. Be careful, they’ve been agitated.”
The pokemon gave another high pitched chitter, before taking off like a startled dugtrio, navigating the cave at an insane speed, and leaving both trainers behind in moments. Moments passed in complete silence, as Skyla frowned down at cut rock, lips pressed into a thin line.
“So… if I catch that pokémon I get carried back to Mistralton?” The flying-type trainer’s sky blue eyes flicked up to Aidinza, and for a moment he regretted opening his mouth. Before Skyla’s lips cracked into a smile.
“Catching SR might be harder than stealing a proper Zekrom from the league. That crobat can leave Accelgor in the dust.” Aidinza did not know what an Accelgor, but considering how quickly SR had disappeared into the cave, he did not need to. Skyla’s eyes trail away from Aidinza, over the roof of the cave. “You know, a fast flyer is pretty important to have on a team, if you want to compete at the highest levels. Your rufflet, when it evolves into a braviary, is going to be a monster that’ll rip a Hydreigon straight out the sky. But they’re not meant to dog-fight, in a match up against something faster, they don’t have many options.”
Aidinza followed Skyla’s gaze, catching a flicker of orange - the miracle of the sunset to reach even this deep below ground was awe inspiring - as he did so. “So what do you think I should do?”
“Keep an eye out for something fast. A pidgeot, or a crobat. A Noivern if you can swing it… or maybe a Talonflame if you spot one.” Skyla’s eyes glitter as she says the last pokémon, and Aidinza felt like he was missing something.
Then Skyla perked up, her head tilting to listen for a noise that Aidinza could not hear. “That’s SR. Come on. I want to give the league at least some idea of how long fixing this mess is going to take before I call in the rangers.”
Aidinza nodded, and silently followed after Skyla once more.
-
Aidinza might have a new nightmare.
In fact, he was pretty sure that anyone he told about what he and Skyla found deeper in Chargestone Caves would have a new nightmare.
The Galvantula and their Joltik offspring had obviously not migrated out of Chargestone cave. An event that could manage that would be unmissable, mostly on account that it would take the destruction of much of Chargestone cave to do it. But what they had done was retreat into the less defined corners of the cave. Into the tight crevices and hidden dark places.
Thousands of them had. The sight of at a minimum, hundreds of Joltik crawling over each other in a pulsating fuzzy mass, of hundreds of beady, hungry eyes and skittering yellow legs would stay with Aidinza for a long time.
The sight of Galvantula along with them, coiled underneath their offspring, watching Skyla and Aidinza with dripping pedipalps would stay with him for even longer.
Thankfully, it had not taken much for Skyla to be satisfied, and none of the bugs had wanted to even think of tangling with the powerful Gliscor - A Ten Pignite Two, whatever aircraft that was - that Skyla had released as they travelled deeper into the cave. A single crack of its purple claws, and a glance at its sharp toothed grin were enough to keep them in line.
But now the two of them were done, and regrettably, it was time for them to head back to Mistralton.
Which meant that Aidinza found himself eyeing the Swanna D Three with trepidation, as he waited in the dwindling afternoon light for Skyla to finish making her pre-flight checks. “You know, a thought occurs.” Aidinza looks up as Skyla jumps from the wing of her plane back down to the ground, landing in a crouch. “You gave a pretty decent battle, helped me with my gym leader duties, and you’ve been a pretty good sport all day. But I haven’t even given a single thought about a reward yet.” She pauses, as she wipes some grease on her gloves onto a towel that she throws back into the cockpit. “Aside from getting to spend time with me.”
“Just doing my duty, honoured leader.” Aidinza demurred, strange as it felt to do so to Skyla, which in itself was strange after so little time knowing her.
“Nonsense! Besides, if I don’t do anything, that poor fletchling is going to tear its feathers out!” Skyla spun around, and pointed a finger at an empty branch in the trees. Or maybe at the burnt orange glow of the sky as the sun began its descent below the horizon…
Aidinza’s brow furrowed, something clicking in his mind. “Ah jeez, I kind of expected him to come out after that…” He heard Skyla speak, but for the moment ignored her, running briefly over the past few days.
“You were looking at something in the cave. I thought it was the sunrise shining off the cave roof, but… something’s been following me since Route Six.” Aidinza focused more intently on the trees and almost hidden entirely from his view, was a black and white feathered tail peeking out from behind a tree. “You can come on out now. I’ve spotted you.”
The tailfeathers shook for a few moments, and after a moment of waiting, out hopped a bird of lively reddish-orange and sky blue feathers on two spindly feet. Its jet black beak split open in a trill, as its wings fluttered open exposing a fluffy white underside that glittered in the sunlight to a mesmerising dance.
“You’ve been following me since route six.” The flying type - because what else could it be - gave a gesture that Aidinza could only decipher as a shrug, its dark eyes curling up in a way that he could only characterise as mischievous.
Or smug.
“Why? If you’re looking for a fight, you’re not going to get it slinking around.” The bird - fletchling? - whistled, and flexed its wing again, diving to the ground, and once more flaring the white underside of its wing.
Aidinza’s hand drops to where Astazhei’s pokéball usually was, but meets nothing but air. His dedicated rufflet had been left back at the pokémon centre after his fight with Skyla’s skarmory.
Ignoring the brief guilt, he instead grabs Naazin’s pokéball, expanding it and sending the orange crustacean out in a flash of red. The bird sang for a moment, its wings twisting in a way that drew attention to its orange head feathers, and definitely smug eyes.
Aidinza was pretty sure that if the bird tried that on Astazhei, the eaglet would smash it into the ground with vindictive glee.
As it was, Naazin lazily glanced back towards his trainer, his left antenna squeaking as it bobbed upwards. Aidinza shrugged back at him, the sting of Astazhei’s, however temporary, absence lessened at the realisation that this was probably going to go a lot smoother with Naazin.
“Last chance to back down Fletchling.” The sky-blue pokémon rolled its eyes at that, and without another word spat a ball of flame at Naazin as it thrust itself gracefully back into the air.
Naazin, as the somewhat lazy water-type was prone to doing, simply ignored the flames that splattered across his thick plated body, as he turned away from his trainer to face his flying foe.
“Smack Down.” Naazin’s claw smashed the ground in front of him into dozens of sharp pieces, and with a surge of speed that shocked Aidinza no matter how many times the placid water-gun pokémon did it, he rammed his claw into the rocks, sending them flying into the air in a wide spread net, perfect to clip a flying pokémon out of the air and put an end to them early.
Which was why it came as such a surprise when the Fletchling all but danced its way through the hazardously sharp rocks, ducking and weaving with a graceful agility that Aidinza felt no shame in being impressed by. He already had a feeling that it was going to be a good idea to catch the pokémon after Skyla’s theatrics. This display of acrobatics only confirmed it.
“Bubblebeam.” Naazin’s smaller claw buries itself into the ground as his back arches, and his large claw tracks the Fletchling banking hard right, spitting out another ember that did little more than blind the water-type.
But maybe that was all the Fletchling wanted, as instead of strafing by Naazin once more, it blurred forward, diving at the crustacean with blistering speed. A quick attack, or at least a very very fast tackle. Fast enough to blur around the oncoming bubblebeam.
“Vise grip.” Not fast enough to avoid Naazin’s massive claw closing around its chest, as it bounces off the braced water-types hard carapace. “Don’t tighten.” Aidinza said quickly, as Naazin studied the struggling fletchling, and just as quickly threw one of the empty pokéballs on his belt, before Naazin decided that ‘don’t tighten’ was code for ‘let it go’.
He certainly took his opponent disappearing in a flash of red light as code to wander away and take a nap in the soft sun-set warmed grass.
“Did you see how fast that little birb was? That’s a real keeper right there, would fly rings around other birds in the sky.” Aidinza was not entirely sure how he managed it, but the fact that Skyla had been there the entire time had slipped his mind entirely. “Pretty good reward from your pal Skyla huh?”
“You could have told me it was there in the cave.” Aidinza complained back with an easy grin, as he bent over to pick up the still pokéball that housed his new pokémon. Of course, Skyla did not leave that alone, and Aidinza grunts as she bumps into him, slinging a hand around his neck, and digging her knuckles into his head again.
“Jeez if you’re gonna be ungrateful maybe I’ll take the Talonflame myself hey? I’ve been looking for something to shut Brycen down, you know?” Aidinza clips fletchling’s new ball to his belt, and ignoring the - surprising weight - of the honoured leader hanging around his neck, straightens up to his full height, leaving the red-head scrambling to avoid sliding off and falling on her ass “Just for that I’m adding another two full loop-de-loops on the way home, and a stall turn!”
Aidinza glanced apprehensively at the plane sitting only a few metres away, and then back at the smirking Skyla. Without a word he unclipped the pokéball holding Fletchling, and proffered it, but he already knew his fate was sealed.
Skyla simply shook her head, and with heavy shoulders Aidinza climbed his way into the co-pilot's seat to the soundtrack of a gym leader's giggles.
“So…” Aidinza glanced over to Skyla, as she took her seat and flicked on the engine. “You saw a flash of orange, and you thought the sun reflecting off the cave roof half a kilometre underground when the entrance pointed north, instead of a pokémon?”
Aidinza’s tanned face reddened, as he looks away and stares out the other side of the Swanna D Three's cockpit. Between Skyla’s giggles and the surge of the plane underneath him, it was an unfair war on two fronts.