“Ready for a rematch, losers?” asked Howie, a nasty smirk stretched across his pug-like face. Along with his blue baseball cap, Howie wore red shorts that clashed horribly with his unbuttoned, green-checkered shirt, and a yellow t-shirt sporting a picture of a Silph ball.
“He’s not worth it, Sla—” April started.
“You’re on!” Slate responded, raring to go. A rematch with his first official League opponent, and one who had defeated him, was the perfect chance to see how far he had really come. The idea of thrashing the bratty kid added extra appeal.
“Enjoy losing, do you?” Howie taunted.
“That’s not happening,” Slate warned.
April folded her arms, and asked casually, “I take it you want to fight him solo?”
“Do you mind?” Slate replied.
“Not really,” she said, shrugging her shoulders.
Howie smirked. “If you two are done making googly eyes at each other, I’d like to get this show on the road,” he mocked.
April pouted but didn’t rise to the boy’s provocation. Instead, she instructed, “Kick his butt, Slate!”
“I will,” he promised, and the two opponents moved from the roadside path to a nearby patch of grass.
Howie turned his blue baseball cap backward and unclipped a Silph Ball from his belt. “It’ll be a three-on-three battle. Sweet cheeks can referee.”
April’s face burned scarlet and contorted with rage, but after a reassuring nod from Slate, she appeared to bite back a retort.
BATTLE: Slate VS Howie
“This should be enough to deal with you,” said Howie, casually tossing his first capsule.
A beige, orange-spotted Chumster appeared with a flash of white, sniffing the air curiously as it took in its new surroundings with its little nose and big dark eyes. It seemed surprised to be there.
Slate shook his head. Howie had made his first mistake. This was surely the Chumster that rumor had it, Howie had recently received in trade for his contest-winning Larvex. It couldn’t have had time to train or even bond with its new master. “Go, Eevee!” said Slate.
“What did you say?” Howie asked, but his question was answered as Slate’s faithful friend emerged. “Where did you…? How…? There aren’t any Eevee in Nutera!”
Slate took great pleasure in Howie’s obvious envy. “Eevee, Double Kick, but not too hard.”
“Hey, wait! I meant to choose another Pokémon!” Howie protested.
Eevee approached and knocked out the untrained creature with one super-effective thrust of its hind legs.
April grinned gleefully from the sideline.
Howie, who was now looking very unhappy, returned the poor Chumster to its ball, muttering angrily, “Useless idiot! Go Akant!”
Slate glared at his obnoxious foe. He had been tempted to stick with Eevee, his strongest Pokémon, to make Howie’s defeat quick and painless, but now he felt like making it hurt. W What he was considering could backfire, but given Howie’s rash nature, Slate proceeded.
“Eevee, return,” said Slate, recalling his active Pokémon, and releasing his next. “Go Crimsant!”
“A Crimsant? How?” Howie exclaimed with frustration. “Akant, use Bug Bite now!”
Slate smiled wickedly. He couldn’t be sure his disobedient Crimsant would battle, especially against its pre-evolved species, who it had demonstrated loyalty to previously in Hazell Woods, but as Slate had predicted, Howie made the first move.
When the Akant’s move harmed the insect queen, she responded in kind. With three ferocious swipes of her flaming mandibles, the Akant was subjugated.
“Tell me how you got that Crimsant!” Howie demanded. “I’ve been training my Akant non-stop, but it won’t evolve!”
At that moment, April let loose a derisive laugh. She held her Rotom Phone aloft, which she had apparently used to scan Howie’s Pokémon before it was returned to its container.
“You mean you don’t know?” she ridiculed. “Only a female Akant can evolve into a Crimsant, and yours is male!”
Howie looked ready to explode. “Whatever! I don’t need a Crimsant, I have…Sercuit!”
Howie’s blue snake Pokémon appeared, its long body coiled vertically like a helter-skelter.
Once again, Slate returned his unharmed fighter. He would be pushing his luck to keep Crimsant in play. Besides, his partner Pokémon deserved a shot at redemption. “Go, Cryote!” he called.
The pup emerged and barked happily, but upon registering its hissing foe, its expression turned serious.
“Sercuit, beat that weakling just like last time,” said Howie.
“Cryote use Headbutt!” Slate ordered.
“Get ready,” said Howie, and the creature lowered its head as Cryote approached. “Now, Sercuit, wrap this up with Live Wire!”
The snake Pokémon took the incoming Headbutt but quickly recovered, and like in their last battle, looped itself around the pup. However, unlike last time, the Sercuit’s binding move was Electric-type. Not only was Cryote squeezed tightly and trapped by its foe, but it was also shocked, too.
Cryote yelped in pain.
“Sorry chump, but Sercuit’s new move is boosted by both its type and ability. It’s the end of the line for your stupid Shiny.”
Despite the circumstance bringing bad memories to the surface, Slate remained calm. He had a strategy in mind. First, Slate had Cryote used a close-range Bellow, just as he had previously.
Sercuit visibly shuddered from the audial assault but didn’t release its quarry.
“It’s over. Wrap its jaw like before!” Howie ordered.
Slate was waiting for this. “Now, Cryote, use Bite!”
The snow-white pup chomped down on the tail approaching its snout, causing Sercuit to writhe in pain, unwind its body, and fling Cryote into the air.
Slate smiled widely. “You know what to do, boy!”
Cryote understood and fired off an airborne Echoed Voice. When it landed, it fired another before its foe could perform Howie’s final command.
Sercuit’s head wobbled for a moment before dropping to the floor with a thud.
BATTLE WINNER: Slate
*Ping*. “Battle win recorded,” Slate’s Rotom Phone announced.
Slate felt immensely satisfied as he scratched Cryote’s ears.
“Wha—you cheated!” accused Howie as he returned his Sercuit.
“What?” Slate and April objected together.
“That’s the only explanation for it!” Howie continued. “There’s no way a weakling like you could have improved so quickly! And you used an Eevee, which don’t even live here! You cheated, and I’m reporting you!”
“That little Ratatta!” April remarked as Howie departed at a run. “I’m glad you taught him a lesson. Whoever parented him obviously hasn’t!”
“Not any good ones,” Slate agreed, shaking his head. “Come on, let’s get to Pistachion.”
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Within minutes, the wilderness gave way to signs of civilization. A variety of structures came into view, including buildings with many windows and others without any, warehouses, cooling towers, a huge parking lot, and more.
“Is that the city?” asked Slate.
April chuckled, “No, that’s just Nutera Power. It supplies all the region’s sustainable energy, water, and waste management services, all in one place, which is why it’s so big. The city is just beyond it.”
Slate visited Kanto’s power plant on a school trip once, but Nutera Power was at least three times the size and far more modern-looking. There were no windmills in sight, but the roof of every building was covered in solar panels. It was surely less of a burden on the environment. He supposed this made sense, though. Nutera was a somewhat new region, after all.
Love this novel? Read it on Royal Road to ensure the author gets credit.
“Straight on leads to Cashoo Cove,” said April dreamily when they reached a junction. “We used to have fun there on vacation, back when my brother wasn’t quite so annoying. The beach, the aquarium, and the best food… And left leads to Pistachion.”
After crossing the road and turning the corner, the city became visible. The buildings were so high, Slate was shocked that they had been concealed by Nutera Power. His sense of perspective was all off. “Whoa, I wasn’t expecting this!” he said, the surprise clear in his voice.
“I know, right?” April replied.
“I get that it’s the capital, but I figured it would resemble Saffron or Celadon. It seems more like Castelia in Unova! What happened to ‘reducing the impact of humans on the region?’”
April informed him—in great detail—that before Pistachion City was built, the area was nothing but a rocky valley. The barren land that sat at the foot of Mt. Legume had been completely transformed, and the small amount of wildlife that occupied it now resided in the large man-made park at the center of the metropolis.
“…so all things considered, it balances out, really,” April concluded as the pair passed under an enormous arch, bearing:
Welcome to Pistachion City
Slate could better understand what April had been telling him now. To his left and right, each end of the busy road was lined with near-identical buildings, which continued around corners to the north. Directly ahead, lied a gap between two skyscrapers, where a vast green space could be seen beyond. From above, the city must have resembled three concentric squares of concrete and asphalt, housing a hidden green oasis.
He couldn’t decide if the conformity of design made the city as a whole look more or less imposing than those with drastically different architecture. The clean lines and angles were attractive but somehow oppressive and devoid of spirit.
“What if the Pokémon in the park want to leave?” Slate asked as he tried to comprehend the paragon of urban planning.
“You’re smarter than you look,” April quipped with a smile. “There are nature bridges to the north, east, and west. They span from the park, over the road, to the city perimeter, so the Pokémon can come and go as they please without worrying about the cars.”
“I have to see that!” Slate exclaimed.
“There’s plenty to see and do here, but let’s check-in at the Pokémon Center first,” April advised.
“It’s a little early for that, isn’t it?”
“The Pistachion Pokémon Center is different. Look,” said April, pointing to one of the many tall buildings.
Slate’s jaw dropped. “That’s a Pokémon Center?” he asked with consternation, his neck craning as his eyes traveled the length of the glass tower.
“Yep, the world’s biggest!”
The pair of them entered what Slate had presumed would be an office building or hotel. He was immediately blown away by the gigantic lobby area, which was full of familiar green Pokémon Center sofas and other furniture, with a small selection of stores along the left side and eateries on the right.
A huge Center healing desk spanned most of the far wall. To the right of the doors that undoubtedly led to the Center’s specialist treatment area, there was a separate station for something else.
“That’s the concierge desk on the right,” said April.
“Huh?”
“Didn’t you wonder where I was staying while you were training, and your mom was living in my room? I was living here. Free of charge!”
“You’re saying this whole building is Trainer housing? How can the League afford that?”
April shrugged, “Mayor Douglas is always talking about attracting Pokémon Trainers and tourists from other regions. But until standard Poké Balls start working in Nutera, people won’t want to visit. You’re probably the only Trainer here with a usable non-native Pokémon.”
----------------------------------------
After Slate and April got their Pokémon healed up, they checked in using their League IDs, and were each given a key to a vacant room on the building’s sixteenth floor. They reached it in a gleaming glass elevator, which gave them a bird’s eye view over one corner of the square city.
Slate was shocked to find his free room had a double bed, a big-screen TV, a kitchenette, an ensuite bathroom, and a stunning view of Pistachion Park. People would surely have paid a pretty Poké Penny to stay in a room such as this in Kanto. It was so odd. Not that Slate was opposed to the luxury digs. He did worry that his capsule tent would seem a lot smaller and less comfortable the next time he camped out, though.
As agreed, he had a rest—playing with his more obedient Pokémon—before meeting April for lunch an hour later. “Right, to the newspaper offices, then?” Slate suggested after they bought sandwiches from the lobby café. He felt a buzz of excitement about their first mission, for loss of a better word; to seek out his mother’s colleague at the Pistachion Chronicle.
“Yeah, but I was texting with August earlier,” April agreed with a stipulation. “He recommended stopping at the Gym on the way.”
“I don’t know if I’m prepared for a Gym battle yet,” said Slate.
“I wouldn’t worry about that,” April replied. “August said he had to book his battle in advance because Mayor Douglas is always so busy.”
“Wait, the mayor is Pistachion’s Gym Leader?”
“Yeah. Didn’t I tell you that?”
Slate rolled his eyes as the pair exited the Pokémon Center. April had rambled at length on a multitude of topics as they traveled to Pyne Village and through Hazell Woods. Slate had been content to let her do so, he was more of a listener anyway, but she had somehow neglected to mention this interesting detail.
“What do you know about the mayor?” he asked.
“Not much. He’s a politician, after all,” April answered dryly. “August mentioned he battled a Despupa, though, the evolved form of Larvice. I guess it makes sense that Douglas would have a Bug-type given the city’s proximity to Hazell Woods.”
“So, he’s a Bug-type specialist, huh?” Slate muttered under his breath, already considering battle strategy.
“He hasn’t been his usual jolly self during TV appearances lately,” April noted. “People are criticizing his response to the region’s communications blackout.”
“Yeah, I heard businesses have been closing.”
“That much is obvious. Just look around.”
Slate observed the city’s many storefronts as they walked along the busy sidewalk. On closer inspection, many of them had closed signs on their entrances. Some were even boarded up. He shook his head. How and why was Team Shade doing this?
“Did August beat Mayor Douglas?” questioned Slate.
“Yes. But he’s been at this longer than we have, so it’s not that big of an achievement,” April said dismissively.
“Are you two much alike?”
“Absolutely not!” April responded readily. “August’s a hyperactive idiot with the haircut to match! I told him the punk look wouldn’t suit him, but he wouldn’t listen. You’ll see for yourself if he ever arrives.”
“Looking forward to it,” Slate said with a smirk, mentally substituting April’s high ponytail for a mohawk. “And what about you? Are you taking the Gym Challenge?”
“Didn’t I tell you that either?” April said without a trace of her previous venom. “During my time here, I decided I want to be a Pokéologist, like my mom! Getting into the Pokéology degree program at Pistachion University is my new goal.”
“Cool,” said Slate. “How does one do that?”
“Usually, the program entrance requirement is two years of intensive study, but there’s also a Pokémon League-sponsored route for Trainers.”
“And you’re going to try the Trainer’s route?” Slate guessed.
“I’ve already started,” April shared. “The first step is graduating from Pokémon School, which I’m working on. After that, there are the Poké Exams; four special tests held across Nutera. I’ve got a lot to learn if I want to pass them, but I’m determined!”
“Sounds like you’ve got it all planned out,” Slate approved. “I guess if we’re traveling the region to investigate Team Shade anyway, we might as well both aim to get stronger and smarter along the way; me through the Gym Challenge, and you through the Poké Exams.”
“I know, right?” said April, evidently glad that Slate was on board. “Plus, I spoke to my mom earlier. If we can, she wants us to gather data on the Five Pillars for her, too.”
Slate grinned. The casual conversation had probably just decided the course of their futures.
“Here’s the Gym,” said April.
Slate took in the modern façade of another skyscraper. The Gym, it transpired, also housed City Hall and the mayor’s offices. He never would have suspected it was a Gym had it not been for the League logo on the windows. Then again, he reminded himself, Almony Island’s Gym had doubled as a pharmacy.
Inside, they crossed a bustling grand lobby with floor tiles so clean and shiny, Slate could see his reflection in them. A huge reception desk on the right side served the public, while a separate one on the left dealt with Gym matters. A young male receptionist with slicked-back hair greeted them politely at the latter, “Welcome to Pistachion Gym. Can I help you?”
“He needs to book a battle with the mayor,” April relayed on Slate’s behalf, which irked him a little.
Slate presented his Rotom Phone for scanning, and after a few moments, the receptionist confirmed happily, “Okay, Mr. Davy, you’re all booked for your battle with Mayor Douglas, one month from tomorrow!”
“A month?” The pair exclaimed in unison.
----------------------------------------
“It could have been worse,” April commiserated after they left the Gym. “You said you weren’t prepared yet, anyway.”
“I meant I wanted a couple of days to prepare not a whole month,” said Slate bitterly. “What are we supposed to do in the meantime?”
“Well,” April pondered aloud, “depending on what we learn from this reporter, we might have some investigating to do. At a minimum, we should have a snoop around Silph Co. HQ. Aside from that, I’ve got classes, and you should probably be training if what I saw at Pyne Farm is any indication.”
Slate frowned at this glib remark, but the girl had a point. Crimsant didn’t obey him, Uglay seemed like a lost cause, and Larvoid… Well, it had won him the battle against Parker from Team Shade, but would it be all that useful a partner in the future?
“What about you?” Slate jabbed defensively.
“My Pokémon listen to me,” April retorted.
“Even Mossym?”
“Oh,” she said with an involuntary shudder of realization, which Slate privately enjoyed.
Upon arriving at the Pistachion Chronicle, Slate and April were directed to the fifth floor. After relaying their wish to speak with Joseph Quinn, the man that Slate’s mother believed had information on Team Shade, the Chronicle’s receptionist made a quick call.
A few minutes later, a man in his forties, wearing a tan trench coat over a brown suit came out to the lobby area to meet them. He had short dark hair that spiked out in front of him, and well-defined eyebrows, which gave him an inquisitive air.
“You asked to speak with Joseph Quinn?” said the man.
“Yes,” said April, folding her arms, and eyeing the man suspiciously for some reason.
“This way, please,” he said simply and turned on his heel.
“What’s the matter?” Slate whispered to April as they followed the man to a small meeting room adjacent to the newspaper’s bullpen.
“He didn’t say that he was Quinn,” April replied surreptitiously.
Slate supposed this was true but didn’t think much of it. Why would this man have come to meet them if he wasn’t who they had asked for?
In the small windowless room, the two Trainers took seats across a table from the man. Slate felt suddenly apprehensive.
“I’m with the International Police,” the man announced, flashing a badge and ID in a black leather holder. “I’m here investigating the disappearance of Joseph Quinn. The name’s Looker.”
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