CHAPTER 157

"Here's Jerry Heo's face," Denzel said, showing us his phone. Jerry was a man on the heavier side of things, but I wouldn't call him overweight. "Found him on the 'meet our staff' page on the tournament website. We have his schedule, so we can probably wait until tonight to go speak to him."

"I want to bring him into a back alley and beat him up," Pauline said.

"That's not at all what we are doing," Cecilia chided. "Please be serious."

"I was serious."

"We wait until seven-thirty then," I nodded. "Then we strike. Offer him to spill the beans about everything he knows. He'll probably ask to not say that he talked, and we'll agree immediately when he does. After that, we're golden. Obviously we'll still record the conversation."

"Fine. Meet outside the tournament building at seven-thirty," Denzel nodded.

—

I picked up Angel from the Pokemon Center as soon as we all left and spread out, since he'd finally been healed. I released him outside, and he was as good as new. His battle with Will Bowman had definitely been his hardest since Fantina, and he wasn't exactly used to feeling pain, so I wanted to make sure he was alright before we went to find Jerry Heo. The majority of our friends would be busy with their battles in the morning anyway, so I had time. We weren't going to go alone. Everyone needed to participate. With our strengths combined, we could actually pack quite a punch.

"Hi Angel," I smiled. The grass type wriggled and snaked a vine around my ankle. "Want to see the others?"

It had been a few days since all of my Pokemon could just sit and hang out, and I considered it important for them to do so. I was still at the Pokemon Center's entrance, so Sunshine and his anti-social ways would have to wait, but the others were fine. I couldn't exactly go off on my own. Not anymore.

Sweetheart tackled Angel into a bear hug, which didn't amount to much due to the size difference. He raised her with a few vines and placed her on his head— which she had designated as her spot. Angel had been rather sad these days, since she now split most of her attention between him and Sunshine. He wasn't about to lose an opportunity to hog her. I kind of felt bad for her since I had only used her in a single battle, but I was planning on using her against Harry whenever the time came.

If the time came. I wasn't sure if the tournament was going to unravel at this point.

Princess and Buddy stuck by my side. The water type stood behind me with his usual vigilance, especially now that he knew how bad things were. He solidified his body for me and I leaned against his head. I could almost sink inside of him with how soft he was. Togetic was in my arms, as usual. She'd always been a mama's girl. She softly chirped as I pet her head, and I felt the floor shake under me.

She was always prepared.

Honey kept practicing Protect even though I hadn't told him to train. It seemed that he was determined to perfect the move as quickly as he could.

"Don't go too hard!" I smiled.

He turned toward me and gave me a sharp nod. Trainers were filtering in and out of the Center and giving Buddy strange looks.

"Chill out. No death stares," I whispered. He let out a series of clicks and booms that rumbled in my ears. "I know, but these trainers won't do anything. It's the adults that you've got to watch out for— but still, no death stares!"

Togetic giggled mockingly at him.

"I know what you've got under my feet, don't act like you're any better," I said. "But good. Keep it up."

We never knew when someone might strike.

"Hey, I was thinking about finding hobbies for you guys," I called out. "Mira told me that her Kadabra was into research and stuff and that Haunter played catch, so it made me think. I want you guys to be into more than just fighting, you know? Hell, you don't even enjoy it," I told Buddy. "If you ever have something that comes to mind, let me know okay?"

"Tar! Larvitar!"

"Destroying stuff doesn't count," I chuckled.

Togetic let out a series of cries.

"Ancient Power… wait, hold on say that again? I've never heard you use that other word before."

She chirped again, this time raising a small ball of earth from the ground and molding it into a star.

"Molding… did you mean molding? Oh wait, like sculpting! I got it!"

"To!" She cheered.

"Great! With how good you are with Ancient Power, you'll probably get into it quickly. What about you Bud?" I asked, bending my head back to see his immense head. "And don't say protecting us, or I'll pout."

I swore I heard him sigh.

"Think on it then. It's important to me."

It was a bit early to bring it up, but he'd… he would outlive all of us. It was important for him to discover other things.

I snapped my finger. "Honey, your turn!"

The electric type stopped practicing Protect awkwardly scratched his head. Larvitar sniggered at him from Angel's head.

"Don't make fun of him. Your turn is coming," I playfully said. "Don't be shy. You're with family."

Electabuzz looked around the trainers and people passing by.

"Come on, it's not like they'll understand what you just said. I won't say anything out loud."

He answered with cooking, which honestly came completely out of left field for me. I'd see if I could figure something out for him whenever we uncovered what was going on in this hellhole. I should have brought him to the Poffin House after we went with dad… if I had known, I would have.

"Angel?"

The grass type blinked twice. He was a lot tougher to understand than the others, but I was getting better and better at his vine-speak. I kind of felt bad for my friends. I didn't know if I would have been able to be happy if I couldn't speak to my team this clearly. Apparently Justin could understand his Pokemon even less than me and Tangrowth.

He needed to work on that!

Anyway, he answered something akin to taking care of something… it was still blurry. Children, maybe? It was either that or Pokemon as a whole, but the first option made a lot more sense. For some reason, his word for the two was indistinguishable. He always did that slow little vine twirl to the left and that soft blink whenever he spoke of them. The blinking was important with Angel. A quick blink meant that he was irritated or excited, or angry, although I had only seen him angry when our lives were in danger. A slow blink meant that he was happy, but it could also mean sadness or just neutral. Hell, sometimes when he was happy he didn't even blink, he just did that weird eye smile thing. That was why you had to combine the blinks and the motions of the vines to truly understand what he was saying. It was this whole ordeal.

"I'll write you down for taking care of children, cutie," I said. "But you've got to take care of yourself too!"

His vines tensed excitedly, and he smiled with his eyes. How the hell was I going to manage that? Well, he had Larvitar and to a lesser extent Togetic for now, so that would do.

"Sweetheart?"

The rock type stared at me and blanked.

"Think on it, okay? It can be anything."

"Toge," Princess grumbled.

"It can be anything as long as you leave your sister's sculptures intact…"

After around ten seconds, Larvitar lit up like a lightbulb and grinned.

She wanted to swim.

"Arceus," I sighed. "How are you going to swim? Without Angel to act as your lifeboat, you'd sink and drown, and you won't stay this tiny forever."

"Larvi!"

"Okay I did say anything. And sorry, you're not tiny, you're huge. But my point still applies!"

The rock type huffed, turning away from me and almost fell off of Angel's head, but he thankfully caught her before she could create a massive crater on the floor. I knew she would have leaned into that fall to increase the size of the hole.

"I'll figure something out," I sighed.

Could Pupitar skid across water with their jets? Like a stone skipping or a jet ski? The internet had no answers for me because I must have had the first rock type obsessed with water.

"Sculpting, Cooking, Caretaking, Swimming," I muttered to myself.

Now there was only Buddy and Sunshine left. If I had to guess, Turtonator would probably answer with sleeping, because that's all he did in his free time. It was a wonder such a lazy Pokemon could be so powerful when he wanted to be. I would need him to be in top form when the time came, so hopefully he wouldn't be too rusty. He hadn't fought anything since battling us Mount Coronet, but he'd been on the brink of passing out from his wounds.

How powerful would he be when he was at full strength? I was starting to think that the seven-badge approximation I had placed was underestimating him a little bit. I couldn't even imagine all of my Pokemon being that powerful, and yet it was just scratching the surface compared to what Gym Leaders could do with their true teams, nevermind the Elite Four and the Champion. There was still a lot of climbing to be done.

—

It was seven-thirty, and there were thirty minutes left until the tournament building closed. Justin had lost his battle today, but he'd done extremely well, and I didn't say that lightly. Taking down two Pokemon from a five badger at his level was proof that he was just as good as any of us here, even if he lacked the self-confidence to think so. Louis had unfortunately also lost, and so had Maeve, but she had apparently gotten two evolutions in that battle, so she was quite cheerful.

Not that they even cared about the tournament this point. Maeve wanted out and Louis was entirely focused on taking down the Hunters due to his past experience with his father.

Pauline, Denzel and Justin weren't going to be a part of this— at least not at the start, so they were hanging out outside. Jerry Heo knew their faces and we didn't want to scare him off before we even had the opportunity to speak. It was me, Cecilia, Louis and Mira this time. We stepped inside of the building and were glad to see that Jerry was indeed working. Luca's sacrifice hadn't been in vain.

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Cecilia strode up to the man and smiled. She'd be taking the lead for this one since she was the best actor after Pauline. It felt weird to be back here without trespassing. See, because it was so late in the day, there were very little people in the building. Mira went over to distract the only other employee in the room. She could be very persistent when she wanted to.

"Sir! We need your help," she exclaimed. "A fight's broken out on the street! Something about a tournament loss."

"Shit, as if my day couldn't get any worse. Are they using Pokemon?"

"No," I immediately said. "It's just physical."

If he thought that Pokemon were involved, then he'd possibly bring more people in.

"Fine. Benji, I'm going to fix this."

"You got it. It's been pretty dead around here, so you should probably take off early. I'll close up."

"Thanks my brother," he said. "See you tomorrow."

Okay, Jerry was a lot more normal than I thought he would be. I had already pictured him as some kind of evil mastermind, but life wasn't often black and white. The rest of our friends were waiting further down the road and were a single call away. Now this was the riskiest part of the plan— as if this entire thing wasn't risky in the first place. We weren't going to threaten him to speak to us, but we did have to convince him to stick around before he realized that there was no fight.

"How much further?" He asked. "From the way you said it, it seemed that it was closeby—"

"We know you're corrupt, Jerry," I smiled. "We know you paid off our friend Pauline and that the Hunters are probably paying you to do their dirty work."

"What the fuck—"

"We can offer you a lot more than what they're paying," I interrupted. It was technically a lie, since I didn't know how much he was being paid, but I just needed him to speak to us. "Our friends are rich."

"Richer than you'd ever know," Mira added. "Come and talk to us."

"I don't know what you're talking about—"

"Five million," Cecilia said.

Jerry Heo stopped and licked his dry lips.

"Ten. Then I can get the fuck out of this town. Ditch to Sunyshore and retire with my wife."

"Ten's fine," Cecilia nodded. "Will you come and talk to us now?"

"Fine."

—

At first, Jerry wanted us to come speak inside of his hotel room that BattleZone was booking for him and his fellow employees, but there was no way we were doing that. We opted to do it in a public place— but not too public so that we could actually talk. It wasn't like public parks were swarming with people during the evening. Of course, we had Slowking, Kirlia and Kadabra out for protection. Together, they'd be able to sense anyone that was suspiciously booking it toward us and shield us from any attacks coming our way to leave us enough time to release the rest of our Pokemon.

They were notably having an effect on Jerry Heo too. He twitched nervously every time Kirlia glared at him, Kadabra bent his spoon or Slowking silently studied his face.

"What do you kids want to know then?" He shakily said. "Hurry it up. You wouldn't believe in how much danger I am in here. You don't know what you're messing with. As soon as I get my money, I'm getting my wife and I'm on the first plane to Sunyshore."

"We know how dangerous it is, so spare us," I said. I nodded at Denzel.

"First and foremost, do you have any idea of where our friend is? His name is Luca Antonovich."

"Luca… Luca… I don't really know any Lucas. I speak to a lot of kids for these tournaments—"

"He owns two Cutiefly? Does that ring a bell?" I asked.

"Oh, that kid. We heard a bit about him. He's an information broker, right? I don't know where he is."

We all sighed in disappointment. Well, it was time to get into the real meat of this.

"The Hunters and BattleZone are rigging this tournament for Harry Rodriguez. Why?" Denzel asked.

Jerry clenched his forehead and leaned forward with an exasperated groan.

"Look… this is tough to say—"

"Then stop wasting time and say it," Pauline hissed.

"There's a… a third party that isn't from here and that has nothing to do with us or the Hunters. They want Harry to win to promote his image. The Hunters like this third party very much, especially the head of the family—"

"Stop it. Stop skirting around shit, or we're not paying," Pauline said. "Be brave for once in your fucking life."

"Team Galactic! It's Team Galactic, okay! Or at least it's what I heard! Wait, wait, don't— I'm not a part of them okay? I have nothing to do with them, I just know things because I'm in charge of this rigging thing on the BattleZone side of things and I'm the only one the Hunters will speak to. I don't even want to do all of this! At first I was just in it for the money but then when I learned how deep it went it was already too late and I couldn't leave or they'd kill me—"

I took deep breaths, but I couldn't stop myself from panicking. I took a few steps back and let my friends take over. Cecilia noticed immediately and grabbed my hand. It looked like I might have to cash in that promise with Sunshine a lot earlier than I thought.

Come on, this was stupid. I was already throwing myself in so much danger. I could do this.

"Why the hell would Team Galactic care about a random trainer? Is he a part of their organization?" Mira asked, suddenly very aggressive.

"I don't know that! But it looks like he might be? The Hunters and Team Galactic have some kind of special relationship… they covertly ship them high quality Pokemon sometimes, but that's all I know! I don't know anything about Harry!"

"Keep going. Why did you pay Pauline off?" Denzel asked. It was an obvious question, but I assumed he just wanted to keep him talking.

"Because I wanted to keep her quiet. The plan went sideways from the very beginning… damn it," he exhaled. "Sally McCree, the girl that you were supposed to battle? She wasn't supposed to resign. We were only supposed to keep Harry from battling people with five badges. His first opponent would have obviously won. He was a lot better than Harry was, and his Pokemon countered his completely. I mean, Abomasnow, Gliscor, Altaria, Mamoswine and Darmanitan? He was fucked and everyone knew it, so we paid the kid off. The original brackets weren't made by us due to not having anyone in on the plan there, so we had no way of rigging them at the start."

"Wait, so you're saying that you were only involved with Harry's opponent resigning?" Louis asked.

"Do you know about the man who died? My boss, Connor Tyson? I think he was murdered. He was in on the deal with the Hunters— hell, he was supposed to be the Arceus damned leader and I had to take over since I was his second in command— but he only pretended to be. Evidently, he was disgusted with the whole affair, so tried to make the rigging really obvious by forcing that Sally girl to resign and sink not only the whole tournament, but the whole company. The Hunters threw an entire fit and shut him up real quick. From what I know, they threatened his life, and he stopped. They put me in charge right after that. It looks like they didn't want any loose ends though."

"So all this time…" I muttered. "All this time, it was just an inside job?"

"An inside job within the inside job," he nodded.

"It also means you're fucking incompetent," Pauline said.

"BattleZone as a whole doesn't really know about this. It's only a few select people in key places that are being paid off to influence how the tournament goes. That's why they've denied the rigging so publicly. They even launched internal investigations to make sure everything was clean. Obviously they didn't find anything."

"We didn't hear about any investigations," Justin frowned.

"They were held behind closed doors. They didn't want the company's image to be affected worse than it was. As it stands though, I think it's done for."

"Which is why you're hopping off the sinking ship like a rat," Mira smirked. "Tell us more about this Team Galactic connection. The Elder's chummy with the Team Galactic leaders?"

"I told you everything I knew. Mr. Tyson would have known more, but he's dead. Also, the Elder's not friends with Team Galactic. The family head is."

"Is there a difference?" Denzel asked.

"Of course. The family head is Roland Hunter. He's kind of like, skinny fat with a beard. I only met him once, since he hates stepping out of his property. The Elder they keep rabbling about is their Shiftry."

I blinked.

"What?"

"I know it's hard to believe, but it's true. That… that thing—" he spat. "—has been ruling over their family the whole time. I'm talking a thousand years here."

"Holy fuck," Denzel breathed out. "Oh Legendaries, oh fuck."

"Arceus," Justin sighed, running a hand through his hair.

"That's right. A Pokemon rules over fucking Solaceon. How does that make you feel?" He said, chuckling dryly. "The family head is just his second in command. His lackey."

"And the family head has connections to Team Galactic, not Shiftry?" I asked, just to be sure.

"Correct."

And yet, it seemed that Shiftry was perfectly content with them helping out Team Galactic by favoring Harry Rodriguez and sending them high quality Pokemon. Why?

"This is so fucking convoluted my head is going to explode," I said. "Okay. What else can you tell us about the Hunters? Just say everything you know."

"I know that most of 'em aren't trainers. If I had to guess, it's probably because Shiftry doesn't want any risk of rebellion. I know that the few that do have Pokemon capable of battling specialize in dark types."

"Good, but you have to have more than that," Denzel said.

"Shiftry has some kind of way of muting emotions. It's how he exerts control over the entire family. Stay on their property for a few days, and you'll start to feel nothing. No love, no joy, no sadness, no excitement… just nothing. The only thing he'll let you feel is loyalty. Every time Lisa met me, she was complaining about her emotions annoying her—"

"Lisa? Lisa Hunter?" Cecilia loudly asked.

"Yes, Lisa Hunter! Anyway, that's why none of them are allowed to leave the property for too long except the most trusted members of the family, like Lisa, Reggie, Lane… basically all the trainers. I also know they've been protecting the region from something, although I don't exactly know what. It's a huge deal though. They bring it up a lot."

I thought back to Isaac's story regarding Lisa. She had cried when they broke up, even though Shiftry was supposed to prevent that. Did that mean her love had overpowered his abilities for a few moments? She apparently never left the property when they were dating.

Or she could have been faking it. Reggie and Lane had shown emotions during their tour, like fondness for Ediva… did that constitute as loyalty for Shiftry? I assumed that their smiles and laugh during the tour had been faked, which is why they felt so hollow to me. If I had to gamble… I would say that Isaac could distinguish fake emotions from real ones, especially with someone he'd been dating. Lisa's tears had been real.

"Are you planning on doing more rigging in the tournament?" Pauline asked.

"At this point, no one cares about the tournament," Denzel shook his head. "That Shiftry. How strong is it?"

"How am I supposed to know? I'm no trainer!"

"Do you think you could convince one of the Hunters to switch sides?" Maeve asked.

"I told you I'm on a plane as soon as this is done, didn't I? I'm not going back there again no matter how much money you offer. But if you wanted to do it… you'd have to get one of them to get off their land for at least a few days to cleanse all of that dark type energy bullshit they have going on in there. I wouldn't do it if I were you."

"Okay, do you have Lisa Hunter's number?" Mira asked.

"Mira, we are not kidnapping anyone," Maeve hissed.

"We're not," I nodded. "That would be going too far. We're going to need to convince her."

"Good luck with that," Jerry laughed. "I'll entertain your idea and text her, but I'll have to set it up somewhere near their land. You'll have to do it quick though, because they'll know I'm gone pretty soon. Tomorrow's probably your cutoff line. Any later than that, and the Hunters will catch on that I'm gone."

"Grace, how are we going to convince this girl?" Denzel asked. "It's impossible. And even if we do, who's to say that she won't just change her mind the moment she gets back to their mansion?"

"Lisa cried when she broke up with Isaac," I said. "We have to get him to help. Hey, what Pokemon does Lisa have?"

"Good thinking. She might attack us," Justin nodded.

"A Mightyena."

"A single Mightyena?" Mira snorted. "Okay, we've got this."

"They're only allowed to have one Pokemon each," he said. "I know Lane has an Umbreon, but I don't know anything else."

"Okay, so that won't be an issue. Now we just have to call Isaac and convince him to do this."

"Wait. Grace, you're tunnel visioning," Maeve said. "We have a testimony of the Hunters being linked with Team Galactic. Call the League and it should be all over."

"You didn't record this, did you?" The supervisor panicked.

"No," she smoothly lied. "But Grace, what do you think?"

"Okay. We call the League and see what they do," I nodded after taking a deep breath. "You're right. They have a tip line, right?"

I had thought about this before. I didn't care who brought the Hunter family down so long as something did. If the League was going to step in, I would stand back and watch.

"I disagree with this," Mira protested.

Maeve snapped. "Listen, it just makes the most sense—"

"I disagree. You can't stop me. Not when Team Galactic is involved."

"But we're punishing them by doing this—"

"It's a thing I have to do personally."

I looked at Maeve, who shot me a worried look. We'd worry about her later.

The high from learning all of this was slowly leaving our veins, and we were starting to think clearly. This plan with Lisa would have been good if we didn't have Team Galactic involvement, but there was no way the League would ignore this. It would go at the top of the pile and the Hunters would be discovered. Luca would be avenged.

Jerry scoffed. "You think that'll do anything?"

"Yes it will," Cecilia said. "This is as far as our involvement in this goes."

"Didn't I tell you that the Hunters were crucial to Solaceon? They protect it, along with the entire region. Do you really think that the League would let them run free otherwise? They'll get a slap on the wrist and that'll be that. It wouldn't be the first time they got involved in a scandal."

"Explain," Mira said.

"You kids weren't born yet. It was right when Cynthia took over. That fucking Shiftry tried to expand its emotion-dulling bullshit to the entire town. The League said it was just some wild dark type, and I believed it until I learned what was really going on here a few weeks ago. Lisa explained it to me. Shiftry wanted to make the entire city his personal fiefdom, but the League stepped in and forced him to play nice in his little corner."

It took a few seconds for the words to sink in. The League knew about all of this and just… watched it go on?

"We'll submit the tip anyway," Cecilia said. "Right Grace?"

"Yeah," I said. My voice felt hollow. My respect for Cynthia had just plummeted.

"Are we done here? Should I set up the meeting with Lisa or not?" Jerry asked nervously.

"We're done," Denzel said. "Thanks for the help. Louis, the cash?"

The blond boy produced a huge suitcase full of money. "I'd recommend transferring this to multiple bank accounts. Ideally, you would delay those, but you don't have time. People will ask questions when they scan your luggage and they see that you're traveling with a suitcase full of cash."

"I know a guy," he dismissively waved. "So… I'm leaving?"

We cleared a space and let him go. Cecilia immediately messaged the tip line for the League and explained everything we'd heard about Team Galactic and the Hunters. Hopefully they wouldn't get away with just a slap on the wrist. Denzel said he would send out the recording to Emilia so that she could edit Jerry's voice. Then, we'd send it to multiple media companies— along with the League again for good measure. A deal was a deal.

"I'm going to clear my head," Mira said.

"Let me come—"

"Not now, Maeve."

Maeve's held-out hand went limp.

There was nothing we could do but wait for tomorrow.