We got into Oreburgh City just as the dawn light was beginning to light up the landscape, and my breath would have been taken away by the impressive sight of the city before me if I had any left. Unfortunately for me, I was hauling a tarp covered with unconscious Combee and the Vespiquen.
The idea to haul the Vespiquen and the Combee to the Pokémon Center hadn’t exactly been the best one I had ever had, especially considering how much my arms and back were now screaming in pain, but it was the best option out of a long list of bad ones.
I couldn’t have just left them there, unconscious for any wild Pokémon to come and attack, but I didn’t have enough items to heal them all either. Nor did I have enough Poké Balls to capture them all, and I wouldn’t want to do that in the first place.
There was no way I would ever capture a Pokémon against its will, even if I would release it back into the wild later.
So faced with a variety of bad options, I had chosen the least worst one, and returned to the camp to pick up my bag and the tarp. The Combee that had saved me from the others followed me, apparently worried about what I was doing. I couldn’t fault the little thing, and with its help as a guide I managed to find my way back through the forest to the pile of unconscious Pokémon.
Carefully transferring them on top of the tarp, I grabbed a hold of the ropes attached to my makeshift sled, and began to walk.
It had been an excruciating experience, but it was finally over and I slumped to the ground at the entrance to the city. The rain had ended a little bit ago and although I was completely soaked and covered in mud, I couldn’t muster up enough energy to worry about getting a little bit dirtier. To my complete lack of surprise a police car quickly pulled up in front of me, and a familiar looking woman in a uniform jumped out of the car, one hand on a Poké Ball.
“Excuse me.” She called, and I weakly raised up a hand in greeting. “What’s going on here?”
“Hi.” I said tiredly. “Do you think you can help me get these Combee to the Pokémon Center?”
“What happened?”
I waved a shaking hand lazily towards the forest, the adrenaline finally starting to wear off. “Fire. Tree. Smoke knocked the Combee unconscious, I had to help them.”
Officer Jenny, and she really did look like her older sibling Commissioner Jenny, stared in confusion, then alarm.
“You mean you dragged all of these Combee from the forest?”
I nodded. It was really something how similar the two Jenny’s looked, but were they sisters or cousins? It would be a really, really big family if they were sisters. Nurse Joy had talked about being part of the “Joy Clan,” so was there a Jenny Clan that worked in law enforcement? Wouldn’t that be nepotism?
Jenny reached up to her shoulder and started talking into a radio, and I closed my eyes.
“Are you okay ma’am?”
“I’m really tired.” I said, unable to open my eyes to look at her. “I think I’m just going to take a little nap.”
“Wait, ma’am, please-“
It didn’t matter what she was saying, and a moment later I was already asleep.
/^\
“You’re very lucky things turned out the way they did.” A figure in a white Aether Foundation uniform lectured. “Combee hives can be very temperamental and protective of their Vespiquen at the best of times, and their home being on fire is certainly not the best of times.”
I tried my best not to cringe at the rebuke, which was the third one of its kind that I had received today.
After I had passed out, the Pokémon Rangers of Oreburgh City had been called in by Officer Jenny to help deal with the situation. That mostly involved taking the wounded Pokémon, carefully and with the presence of the awake Combee, to the Pokémon Center. Apparently once there a very nervous Nurse Joy had to heal up the Vespiquen first, with several Combee hovering literally over her shoulder the entire time.
Once the Vespiquen had woken up and been calmed down, with the help of a passing trainer and his Pokémon who had been able to talk to the Vespiquen, the Combee swarm had also settled down and were allowed to be treated for their own wounds.
For my part I was asleep for this entire process, exhausted from having to haul several hundred pounds of Combee to the city. Nurse Joy had apparently given me a check-up, pumped some drugs and saline into an IV, then stuck me on a gurney in the corner while she took care of the Pokémon. About ten hours after I had collapsed I had finally opened my eyes, only to find a very annoyed collection of people around me. I quickly explained what had happened the previous day, and then the criticisms had begun.
The Police Captain of Oreburgh, who was interestingly not a Jenny, chewed me out over the fact that I had brought several potentially dangerous Pokémon right to the city without letting anybody know that I was coming. My arguments that my phone didn’t have service in the storm had fallen on deaf ears.
Once the Captain had gotten a piece of me, it was time for Nurse Joy. She had been kinder about it at least, but she had warned me against trying anything like that again for a while. Apparently I had severely strained several muscles in my back, arms, and legs, and would have to be very careful about any physical activities beyond just walking for the next week or two. Thankfully that was all, Pokémon medicine was truly wonderful, but I decided not to tell her that I would be looking for Gible as soon as I was sure that the situation with the Combee was sorted.
Then came the latest of the group; Maximillian, an Aether Foundation employee who had set up a branch office in Oreburgh. He had gone on for longer than both of the previous tirades combined, and was just about finishing up.
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“As it stands, you’re also lucky the queen has decided not to take umbrage with you.” He continued. “With some help from my fellow Foundation members we should be able to find them a new home, but they’ve lost a lot of their resources. If things had gone slightly differently, the Vespiquen would be entitled to try and seek restitution.”
“She could do that?” I asked, astonished.
“There’s a law firm run by a Slowking in Jubilife City that helps Pokémon who have been negatively affected by human activities. If you hadn’t managed to save all of the Combee, I would be sorely tempted to recommend them to the Vespiquen.”
“Sheesh.” Said a new voice, and all eyes in the room turned to look at the newcomer who was lounging against the door frame. “Talk about missing the forest for the Trevenants. I have to say, I’m quite disappointed in all of you.”
“Ranger Kimura!” Nurse Joy said. “What are you doing here?”
Another figure stepped up behind the man, and waved his hand. “I brought him.”
Gym Leader Roark was dressed much as I remembered from the games, wearing a heavy gray miners outfit while carrying his red hard-hat underneath one arm. The other man who was still slouching against the door, Ranger Kimura, was wearing the standard Ranger outfit, black jeans and a black t-shirt underneath a blaze orange vest.
“I wouldn’t be a very good Gym Leader if I didn’t know what was going on in my own city, now would I?”
“So, why are you disappointed in us Kimura?” The police captain asked tartly.
“Isn’t this exactly the kind of behavior that we want to encourage in our Trainers?” He replied.
“She nearly set a swarm of Combee loose on the city!”
“Oh yes, Combee, the most threatening Pokémon in the local area.” The Ranger rolled his eyes. “Regardless of the fact that we have a Trainer here who willingly put herself in danger to rescue a hive of Pokémon that, by all accounts, she didn’t have a stake in. You walked into the forest upon smelling smoke, yes?”
I nodded mutely, surprised that I wasn’t being chewed out again.
“On your own volition?”
“I wanted to be sure that nobody, humans or Pokémon, were in danger.”
“Remarkable!” Kimura said, nodding. “And why, upon finding the Combee in danger, did you not use a Poké Ball?”
“I don’t want to capture any Pokémon if they don’t want to.” I explained. “I saw somebody doing that, and I didn’t want to be like him.”
“Yes, the poacher Kane.” Roark said with a grimace. “I read the report by Commissioner Jenny that he was back in Sinnoh.”
“So,” Kimura took up the conversation again. “After willingly wandering into the forest to make sure no Pokémon were hurt, and upon saving the Pokémon that were directly affected by the fire, you took it upon yourself to drag all of the afflicted Combee and their Vespiquen to the city over the course of a night, at great risk to yourself.”
He turned to the rest of the people in the room. “And this is the kind of behavior we are criticizing? These are the actions we should all be aspiring to. I would expect somebody like an Ace Trainer or a Pokémon Ranger to do these kinds of things, not a Trainer without a single badge to her name.”
“But Ranger Kimura, the risk-“ The police captain began.
“Did not outweigh the reward. Or would you rather have the death of an entire hive on your conscience?”
The room was silent, but I thought I saw Roark’s face tighten at the words.
“That’s what I thought. We should be thanking you Ms. Knighton, not criticizing you.”
With that announcement there were some more grumbles from the police captain and the Aether Foundation employee, but they eventually stepped out without any more criticisms. Nurse Joy was also called out by one of her assistants, leaving me alone with Roark and Kimura.
“Thanks.” I said eventually. “I appreciate you stepping in for me.”
Kimura waved his hand dismissively. “They meant well, but they forget that sometimes doing the right thing doesn’t always mean doing the safe or smart thing.”
He shot a glance over at Oreburgh City’s Gym Leader, who still had the sour expression on his face. “Something I think that some people should learn. Although I would ask that next time you do try and get in touch with somebody before showing up on our doorstep.”
I thought about trying to tell him that my old Poké Gear hadn’t been able to get a solid signal in the rain, but decided against it.
“I’ll try.” I said.
"That's all we ask."
“So now that that's done," Roark said, with a particular gleam in his eyes that unnerved me. "Will you be doing the Gym Challenge when it opens back up?"
“I was thinking about it, but I’m not sure that competitive battling is for me.”
“You don’t need to make a career out of it, but having some badges under your belt does help.”
“Yeah, I’ve heard that.”
Roark’s happy expression faded somewhat as he stared at me. “If you don’t mind me asking, it’s pretty unusual that you don’t have any badges at all. Suspicious at your age, some might say. Now judging by the way you worked to save those Combee I’m not one of them, but…”
Kimura coughed. “That’s my cue! I just wanted to say thank you, there’s only two of us here in Oreburgh and we were both busy yesterday trying to stop a flash flood from wiping out a Ponyta herd that wandered into the area. If you have some time you should come by the Ranger office, we’d love to talk to you more!”
With a slightly awkward smile and a wave, he disappeared into the hall, leaving me alone with a serious looking Gym Leader.
I sighed, wishing that Venus wasn’t being healed by the Pokémon Center employees so she could be here with me. “I’m from a small island just off of Unova. We didn’t have a Pokémon League or even any gyms.”
“So what are you doing here?”
“It was a weird situation with a Teleport.” I said simply, and Roark’s eyebrows tried to climb into his hairline.
“And you couldn’t manage to get a way back?”
“To be honest, I’m not really sure I want to. My home wasn’t very… kind. And here I have a companion.”
“Your Eevee.”
“Hm.” Roark was silent for a long minute, digesting the news. “Well, I guess that explains some things. Not everything mind you, but I don’t need to know everything. I just wanted to make sure I wasn’t letting some criminal or something into my city.”
“Will this be a problem if I go anywhere else?”
Things would get very complicated if every time I walked into a new city I would be questioned.
“No, I’ll make sure the news gets out.”
At my raised eyebrows, his smile returned in full force. “What, you didn’t think Gym Leaders talk to each other? Oh, we chat all the time about new and interesting things. I’ll drop your name next time we talk, make sure that you won’t face too much trouble.”
“That seems like a lot! You don’t have to do that!” I said, panicking slightly.
“Nonsense! It’s nothing more than what I would do for a promising gym challenger, so don’t worry about it.”
Roark’s face fell into a more serious expression, and I wondered at how openly he wore his heart on his sleeve. “However, despite my companion, I have to admit the stunt you pulled was quite risky. I would recommend against taking those kinds of chances in the future.”
Just then Nurse Joy came back into the room, looking a little harried.
“Ms. Knighton?” She asked, and I sat up a little from the bed, wincing a little at the pain in my back.
“Is something wrong?”
“The Vespiquen would like to see you.”