It took 20 minutes of constant attacks before Arun’s group managed to open their Security wing. Whoever had taken care of it last however apparently didn’t understand proper manners, as most of the room was a mess.
“Half of this barely works.” Hazel grumbled, tapping at the inert computers.
“We should-hrng go back.” Arun said, clutching his side, “We don’t know if my brother made it.”
“Not happening.” Emily said, taking one of the unbroken chairs, “You’ve gone and healed wrong, Grimer’s out for me, Hazel’s Snowrunt’s also taken a little too much.”
“You’ve got others, don’t you?”
“They’re not as strong.” She said, her thumb tracing over the devices on her belt, “And if we end up fighting another one of those things because we double back, I’m haunting your dumbass.”
Arun let out a sigh, collapsing into his own chair, “You’re right. Fuck, you’re right.”
“Always am.”
Arun shot her a look, to which Hazel said, “Don’t bother, she’s always smug about this stuff. Anyways, how worried are you about Felis? Both our halls end up at the same dream wing. You could check it out. And then double back.”
Arun pondered his suggestion for a moment, standing and stretching to get a feel for his body. Instantly, he could feel the issues as he collapsed back with a groan. His ribs had healed wrong, they were pushing into him too much. His arms felt wrong too, stiff.
Joy would probably shout at him again.
“I’m out of commission.” Arun said, his eyes downcast, “I made a mistake, I won’t be able to help him.”
“Remi’s with him.” Emily said, “He may not be the brightest in battle, but Croagunk packs a punch.”
“...hm.”
“How worried are you?” Hazel asked again.
“If I’m being real. I’m 90% sure he’ll be fine.”
“90!?” Hazel asked, incredulously. “ Then why the hell are you so damn worried?”
“Because there’s still that 10%.” Arun looked between Hazel and Emily, “If you knew that the other had a 10% chance to die, would you be sitting here, praying the 90 will take its course?”
“...shit, when you put it like that, then.”
“Exactly. I…I know my brother. He’s crafty, clever. But once he gets an idea in his head he doesn’t think about alternatives, he just makes whatever he’s concocted work.”
He thought about when Pranav had rushed off to handle Al. The two had argued for days about what to do with the man, Arun wanting to head south before the winter hit, and Pranav too angry to even consider letting the man get away with what he did.
And then that stupid plan of his. The only reason it worked was because that idiot of a gang boss was just as prideful as Pran. The explosives were a good idea, he’d give that much to him, but seriously, his plan just boiled down to “get him alone, stab him”. Why didn’t he bring a gun? Why didn’t he throw something? Fuck, why didn’t he just rig a final bomb?
“...it doesn’t always work out the way he wants it to, though.”
“Is that where that dumb idea of robbing Galactic came from?” Ems asked.
“Ha-ow.” Arun coughed, grabbing his chest, “Ehem. Yeah.”
“You’re the older one, right?” Hazel cut in, “Figured you’d put a stop to an idea like that.”
“Do I have to talk about this now?”
The judging gazes of Hazel and Emily said ‘yes’.
“Fine.” Arun sighed, he was always weak under pressure, “At the time…at the time I was lost, couldn’t really believe everything I was seeing.”
Pranav died. Hell, Arun died. He wasn’t supposed to wake up, the fact that he did still surprised him. The fact that he was in a Pokémon world surprised him. Nothing made sense anymore. What was his God in a region where a god already existed? What was death if he was still alive? Why was he still alive? Was it for a purpose?
“We were brought here from a faraway place.” Arun continued, “We didn’t know why, or where we were. We had no id, no form of official documentation, by all accounts, we didn’t exist. But at the same time, we also knew if we were going to get anywhere, we needed Pokémon.”
“But why Galactic?”
“We’ve seen you. Prowling about the streets, the respect and fear in the average civilian's eyes when they see you. We knew a mafia when we saw one, and decided nobody would miss anything if we stole from you.”
“You thought we were bad people?” Hazel asked.
“You’re gangsters.” Arun said, “Galactic participates in racketeering, bribery, extortion. If what I’m hearing from the others is true, you also participate in Pokemon smuggling and drug deals.”
“You’re looking at us the wrong way.” Hazel countered, “I won’t argue we get up to some shady shit. But we’re also the reason Sinnoh runs on 100% clean energy. Even Galar, despite talking about their new innovations, their readings aren’t as stable as ours.”
“Does that make it right? Everything I’ve seen shows Sinnoh wholly reliant on Galactic as a company in order to function. Am I wrong?”
“Yeah I’d agree to that.”
“Galactic doesn’t need to operate underground then.”
“Do you really believe that?” Emily interrupted, cradling a Pokeball in her hand.
“What do you mean?”
Emily’s eyes were melancholic, her usual cheeky demeanour replaced with a somber one, “If Galactic refused to participate, do you think the problem would go away?”
Arun knew it wouldn’t. In the Before, if it wasn’t Al’s group it would have been another. Perhaps another upstart coming from down South, or perhaps Alicia Langsley. She was Al’s biggest opposition, but she wasn’t opposed to getting her hands dirty, it was why she employed the two brothers after all.
“Do you believe that makes it right? We still hurt others at the end of the day.”
“I won’t disagree. But the alternatives would be letting Chronos or Astrai run their game. And believe me, that isn’t something you want.”
“Is that why you joined?” Arun asked, leaning forward in his seat to regard the two, “Because Galactic is the lesser of the two evils?”
The two shared a look between them and Hazel let out a sigh, pulling off his wig and tossing it to the side so he could run a hand through his brown hair. “If you want to keep it simple, yeah, that’s the reason.”
“I know you like telling stories Hazel, stop dragging this out.”
Emily snickered, “He’s got you there.”
Hazel shot them both a wan smile, “It’s because we were there, before Galactic really decided to expand into the underworld. The two of us come from Snowpoint, you know that?”
“It explains the Snowrunts.”
“Heh. It's tradition to catch one for yourself when you’re 15, a rite of passage, from child to a member of society. But ah yeah, back then things were bad. It was Chronos that held power over us, at that time I think they held everything west of Hearthome. Astrai held everything East aside from Veilstone.”
“Off topic again, sorry.” Hazel sighed, “Anyways. Snowpoint is isolated, we rarely have any contact with anybody from the south unless the circuit is active, and even then it’s just the few trainers that make it far enough to challenge our gym. The point is, nobody really cares about Snowpoint, so nobody really knew about what was happening to us., and we didn’t know about what was going on along the rest of the region.”
This tale has been unlawfully lifted from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere.
Hazel absentmindedly rubbed his arm, “I think it began when we were…5? Yeah…a new mine opened up, people were excited because it meant more jobs. It was owned by Chronos, the adults didn’t know what that meant. Wages were not the best, and the work was dangerous. Dangerous Pokémon, biting cold weather, bad equipment.”
“Of course people complained, so Chronos pushed a bunch of…boosters that would ‘improve work’, and ‘keep them warm’. The first batch was free, of course.”
Arun could see where this was going, leaning back in his chair, “Drugs.”
Hazel nodded, “The adults got hooked, giving up their wages for another hit of the booster. Anyone that spoke out disappeared, and people just kept getting weaker and weaker.”
“Where was your gym leader in all this?” Arun asked.
“Just as hooked as the rest of them.” Emily said sadly. “She and her husband worked the hardest out of all of us, you know? They’d come back with stories, bravery and heroism, tales that they’d tell around the fire.”
“But the boosters made them sloppy.” Hazel added, now gripping his arm tighter, “Its after effects have you woozy. The more you use them, the worse it gets, but the more you crave them. They shouldn’t have died, let alone lost to an Abomasnow horde, even if they were panicked.”
Arun stared at Hazel for a long while, watching his scratch at a phantom itch. “You were an addict.” He observed.
“I had to.” Hazel said softly, as Emily walked over to lay a comforting arm on his shoulder “I was the oldest. But it was a different type of cold down there, Sirius. It seeped into your bones, chilling your very soul. My fingers were numb, I could barely move my mouth to speak. The booster was the only thing keeping me from falling apart.”
“It was Jupiter and…another. I forgot her name.” Emily said.
“Venus.” Hazel smiled.
“Yes, Venus. The miners were sent home early that night, and I remember all the adults ushered us into our homes. We heard the fighting, heard the shouts and the roars, all of us too terrified to step outside. But in the morning we saw Candice alongside the two Admins, declaring Snowpoint to be free.”
“Candice…” Arun murmured, settling back into his seat, “Snowpoint City’s Leader?”
“Mhm.” Hazel nodded, “The daughter of Celia. But what I’m getting at Arun is that yeah, Galactic does some bad shit, but they care for Sinnoh. They care for the children and the innocents. They care for the people who just want to live life.”
“How long would that last?” Arun wondered, though he did not voice his thoughts aloud. Hazel and Emily’s eyes were shining, there was belief there, they truly did think Galactic was Sinnoh’s saviour. All Arun saw however, was blind faith. He saw the same look in Al’s followers, in Langsley and all the other groups that populated the Before.
When Chronos was crushed, when Astrai was removed, would their beloved Galactic stay the same? Would it not devolve into the mess of thugs that he remembered?
“But is that really what's going to happen?” Arun wondered, taking in the broken room they were sitting in, “Only names and locations are familiar. The ‘main story’ isn’t set for another year, but who’s to say it’s going to turn out how we expect it to? Maybe we could check if the ‘protagonist’ exists, but will that not change the story as well?”
For the hundredth time since they’d arrived in this strange world, Arun once again thought he was out of his depth. He wished he could just…pause the world for just a bit in order to think things through. But no, they were tossed into situation after situation, and he had to rely on what he always did, survive.
But Pranav didn’t want to just survive, and neither did he. This world was simply too beautiful to just survive in, no, they wanted to thrive, but how? They could barely use past knowledge to help them.
“Pran…what would he do?” Arun wondered, as Hazel and Emily waited on his word. Arun immediately knew the answer. Push forward, take what he could, burn what they couldn’t, play it cautious but throw the dice of fate when they could.
“Okay.” Arun said, “I get it. Galactic’s done a lot for us as well.”
“Right?” Emily smiled, “Galactic pays well Sirius, you’re strong, I’m sure you can get far.”
“You mean we.” Arun corrected.
“We like…you and your brother?”
“No as in, we. You, Hazel, Jaxon, Elys. You guys stood up for Felis, if I move up you’re coming with us.”
It was a classic strategy Pranav liked to employ. ‘Us against them’ and ‘You’ve done this for me, so I owe you’. Arun was certain that wasn’t the actual terminology, it’s just what Pran liked to say. Establish an obstacle, one that is more figurative than literal, and place yourselves on the same side.
“First humbling Leland and now this.” Hazel grinned, “You guys are too sweet.”
“It’s a genetic charm.” Arun smiled back, “Let’s take it easy for now though. Check our supplies, heal what we can, break for a couple hours and then meet up with the others at the Dream Wing.”
“Do you think Felis will be alright?” Emily asked.
Arun chewed his lip, leaning back to stare at the ceiling. “He has to be.”
“He has to.”
—------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Felis was not alright.
Why?
“And over there you can see that statue was made to fully embody the beauty of immortality. And that one also embodies immortality, but it’s different. To the three on the wes-”
“Please.” He begged, “Shut up.”
“Unfortunately.” The AI said smugly, “This is a preprogrammed automatic response. Anyhow–”
“RAAGH!” Aken screamed, spearing the AI’s body with a Shadow Sneak. Unfortunately, like the last dozen times he tried it, nothing happened.
“Stop his accursed speech!” Aken wailed, “No! Return me to my prison! I would rather rot away than hear this again!”
“And leave me all alone?” Felis asked, though he couldn’t put his usual energy into it, “How could you.”
Aken stopped himself in front of his face. “I would rather face a thousand more monstrosities than hear that bastard preach about art.”
Felis sighed, returning his partner to his ball, before glancing at the other member of his party. Remi was listening with rapt attention, admiring the closest statue (Also immortality) with awe. It was a nice looking thing, the figure of a humanoid with a thousand gold arms and hands all arranged to form almost a peacock tail.
“I see, I see.” Remi nodded, “And this ‘Tree of…?’”
“Yggdrasil”
“Yggdrasil, did this exist in the past as well?”
“Oh no not at all! It was simply a myth, one many artists used as their muse.”
“Ahhh, an artist's take. How wonderful! Quickly, show me the next one!”
“Jesus fucking christ.” Felis muttered under his breath, before raising his voice, “Can we not focus on getting to the Dream wing?”
“I thought you wanted to stop by the Labratory first?”
“If that stupid AI keeps talking then absolutely not.”
“Lab doesn’t have art–probably.” Remi pointed out.
“That’s true!”
“Then please hurry up and take us there.”
They did not, in fact, hurry up. Rather, Remi’s appreciation for the arts had cost them an extra half hour of walking. Truth to be told, it wouldn’t have been so bad, some of the things they’d seen were impressive. Moving paintings, shifting figurines, hell, there was a piece that visualized sound based purely on thought.
Really sucked to have Bezos ruin that with his talking though. Classic.
So it was with relief did Felis finally see the metallic shining gates of the Lab. According to the map they could take the lab up to the Dream Wing, or completely ignore it to more hallways and…art.
Yea, fuck that.
The doors were interlocked with a circular device, but one motion from Bezos had the door opening with a slight hiss.
“Step in please.” He said cheerily, “You’ll be going through a decontamination process so please do not panic.”
The two stepped in without issue. There was a brief moment of panic as the cage they were in flashed red, but after being blasted by smoke, the lights turned green, and they were able to enter the laboratory proper.
“So,” Remi said, “You wanted to look around for something, right? What are we looking for?”
“An office, probably. Maybe records.” Felis said, taking in their new environment. It was what he imagined a lab to be, white halls with various rooms filled with machinery. It was a little underwhelming to be honest, he was hoping for vats of unidentifiable critters and creatures, strange potions and all that cool shit.
“We’re not checking the machines? The computers?”
“I don’t know shit about anything here. Computers are a good idea, I’d rather just find the one that’s important though.”
“Why don’t you go do that?” Remi said, “I want to see if we can use any of this for Galactic.”
Felis shot him a glance, “You okay with me going off on my own?”
“I trust you.”
He raised an eyebrow, but Remi had already disappeared into the closest room, taking stock of the machinery there. Shaking his head, Felis decided to press forward. The place was well maintained, which meant whatever people worked in this section had left voluntarily.
“Or it could be they didn’t get the chance to fight back…” He mused aloud.
He wasn’t scared at the thought, but it did make him feel uneasy, so he tossed Aken back out.
“Hm? Is that bastard gone?”
“For now yeah, left him with Remi.”
“Hmm, why are you scared?”
“Not scared.” Felis corrected, taking a glance at another room. This one looked like an equipment room, flasks and beakers and a dozen other things Felis never bothered to memorize. “I’m just uneasy.”
“I can taste it, Pranav.” Aken laughed, “Don’t deny it.”
Alright, maybe he was a little scared.
“There is…melancholy too.”
Felis’s steps faltered for a moment, but he kept walking, “You know what this place is, Aken?”
“It reminds me of the Pokemon Center.”
“Yeah. Kind of. It’s a research lab. From my time they did a lot of things, off the top of my head I can say artificial organs, body part replacements, some machine type shit too. I don’t know if this lab does that sort of thing, but the one I learned about did that sort of thing.”
“Did you belong to one of these ‘labs’?”
“Na, but my best friend did.”
Aken flew just a tad closer to him, “The one from the pictures?”
“Ivan.” Pranav said, smiling, pulling out his phone. 2% but he pulled the photo out anyways, “This dude was smart, man. He didn’t smile a lot back then, but he got so excited when he talked about the lab. Heh, nerd. He gave us a tour before things got crazy, he looked happy.”
They lost contact with each other soon after he took the job though. Nobody in their group could find a way to contact him, even his family had suddenly moved, so it was just left up to messages the guy barely responded too. At the time Pranav didn’t mind too much, he was busy with his own life and was always low maintenance when it came to friendships.
And then all the bullshit happened, and here he was, possibly in the future.
“Ivan would’ve liked this place…”
They continued walking, stopping by what looked like a file storage room. Pranav said looked because while they did have boxes, they looked high tech as fuck. Black boxes with pulsing lines of blue light with no observable openings that he could grab onto.
He briefly considered asking for Bezos. But then remembered there was no real mute button.
“Guess we’ll have to settle for an office then.”
The lab was a mess of maze-like hallways, and whatever asshole made the place decided having maps was for idiots, and so Pran was left to wander about like a lost child in Walmart, and he would have been frustrated had it not been for one thing.
This place was freaky.
“Fuck do you think that is?” Felis asked, staring at the rows of see-through vats that bubbled and broiled. Within the clear blue liquid was a cocoon of sorts, whatever was within constantly undulating and pulsing with flashes of light.
“Not a Pokemon.” Aken said, looking a tad nervous.
What surprised Pranav the most was that a lot of the machinery worked, he just didn’t know any of their purpose. Figuring it was best to leave the sci fi shit alone, Pran continued to wander until at last he began to reach something of an office.
“Now we’re fucking talking.” Pranav grinned staring at the locked door. Hm, he’d probably need Bezos. “Let’s see, Doctor…” His voice trailed off.
Because on the card was a familiar name, one Pran didn’t think he’d see again.
Ivan. Ivan Sokolov.
His best friend.