Normally I would have been happily amused at the sight of a diglett poking out of the soil in front of me telling me I wasn’t welcome in his world.
That was absolutely not the case the moment that something that was orders of magnitude stronger than anything we had ever felt overshadowed the body and proceeded to vaguely threaten us. It made the killing intent we had felt in the Hokage’s office feel like a cold autumn breeze compared to a full force arctic blizzard.
We were outclassed by the Hokage, but had managed to arguably deal with him on a somewhat equal level. We helped his village and got some secret technique scrolls in return. Yeah Hinata and Anko were basically spies I couldn’t get rid of, but they had basically forced a marriage into my family along with a trainer to make us stronger.
That was not possible here… not yet. This was an elder god… there was no equality here.
Behind me I heard the sounds of several knees hitting the floor. Probably the girls that hadn’t had Amy’s modifications or were surprised.
Taking a shot in the dark I swallowed and spoke up. “Lord Arceus, please… we don’t mean any harm.”
There was a moment of pause before the pressure dropped. Yet the glowing yellow eyes on the diglett didn’t dim even a little. “Abomination, why are you here?”
Even as I winced at the description, I considered if I could pop us away. I might have been able to pull it off if I hadn’t still been recovering… and the god in front of me wasn’t specifically the god of space-time. A god that had theoretically created this entire universe… So no, no I didn’t have a snowball’s chance in hell.
I took a small breath and forced myself to calm down. I trusted Luna completely. If she had felt that we needed to be here then we probably did. It did make me wonder how she was doing this when she had said she couldn't see other worlds, but now wasn’t the time.
Swallowing, still trying to figure out what to say here I was interrupted by Luna walking out past me to kneel down in front of the Diglett, body language careful and smooth demonstrating how nervous she was, completely focused on this interaction.
Despite her strong start, Luna still cleared her throat once before she spoke. “Lord Arceus. I requested that we come here as I have come to request your aid. The man, my beloved, behind me was the accidental creation of some sort of entity. Yet while his creation might have been unnatural, he has done nothing more than try to improve himself and help people around him. He wishes to give refugees we have found who are broken and tired a new chance. Please give us a chance and we will balance the scales.” Luna bowed her head and waited.
I felt the gaze of Arceus move back towards me… weighing… assessing… judging.
After a few seconds, and to my immense relief, the pressure lessened some. Not all the pressure, but some.
Arceus’ next comment explained why, but also demonstrated how well he could read us. “You have dealt a lot of death for someone who claims to help people.”
I swallowed, deciding not to kneel as I did not feel I needed forgiveness for most of the fights but I compromised by bowing my head low. “I would like to believe that Luna’s generous faith in me isn’t entirely misplaced, but I still feel strongly that there are some people beyond saving. Those that murder, rape, and torture for fun do not deserve a second chance unless their better behavior can be guaranteed. We do not have that power yet, especially when they come at us with force. Mercy is the privilege of the strong and we are not there yet.”
Arceus scoffed. “Yet jumping to violence is the brute and the warlord's path.” Then quieter so that I wasn’t sure I was supposed to hear or not, “Not again…”
I momentarily considered back talking to the literal god and telling him the quote ‘that evil wins when good men do nothing’ before good sense won out. Correcting a god that was annoyed with us was… unwise.
I was also pretty sure there was a Pokemon movie where Arceus had to be convinced not to enforce his premature punishments on the world. I hadn’t seen it, but maybe he was talking about how the legendaries below him had sometimes run amuck.
Yet as I thought about it I realized that he had a point. Killing any and everyone who got in our way was exactly the reason I didn’t want to go to a cultivation world. Eye for an eye was easy, but it also was everything that was wrong with worlds like Naruto.
Oh, I really doubted that I would ever become like Batman who saved the joker’s life just to throw him back in Arkham Asylum. The same Arkham Asylum that the Joker would inevitably break out of in order to kill more people. People like the Joker, the murderers of Yamatai, Voldemort, or the pedophiles in Alice’s London just needed to be put down as the rabid dogs they were.
Yet… I now realized that I wanted the ability to win so decisively that we could kill only those that actually deserved it.
Looking up from my bow momentarily to meet the Diglett’s eyes watching me from two or three meters away, I tried to show my sincerity before I bowed my head again at the creator god of this universe and tried to explain. “While I don’t think I will ever feel bad about killing those who are truly guilty and who have no desire to change. The ones that just hurt and destroy the people around them, I do want strength so that isn’t our only option when threatened.”
Arceus didn’t respond for several seconds at my moderate rejection of his advice. Yet before I could get too worked up I heard him give a neutral humm. I breathed out a sigh of relief that he wasn’t going to take umbrage at that.
Seeing the opportunity, Luna spoke up next. “Lord Arceus, with your permission, we would still like to leave those that need the healing of your world with you..”
There were several moments of silence as the tiny 8 inch or 20 cm pokemon judged us before it gave a slight nod back. “Very well.”
The eyes began to dim as Arceus seemed to lose interest in us before Luna spoke up quickly. “I have two last requests, please!.” Moving forward silently she whispered her request and I saw the Diglett turn towards me. “... Fine. I will grant you this. However you will do your best to help assist when called for while you are here. For the second, just two creatures will not be good for a healthy population… they are close to an Eevee, maybe a new variant… hmmm, that will work.”
Once again I saw the eyes dim, but after a moment of hesitation I gathered my courage and spoke up one last time. “Lord Arceus. You said I was an… an abomination. I know my soul is a patchwork of other souls. I know it is being held together by the bond with my girls for which I am very grateful. Yet I want to support them and I can’t do that while like this. Would it be possible for you to… fix me?”
I felt Arceus’ power spike momentarily as he stared into my very soul. Yet after a moment he hummed. “No… You are slowly pulling your fragments together and changing that now would change who you would become. I will not become a tyrant.”
Thus, as the eyes dimmed and in front of us the Diglett seemed to come out of some sort of trance. “Diglett, Diglett, Diglett. Dig, Dig… Diglett.”
It was then, to my shock, in my head I heard ‘What are the two-leggers doing here? This is my hole, mine. Get your own.’
Once again I blinked, poleaxed. “Huh, apparently this omnilingual thing works on Pokemon… Cool.”
That seemed to be the signal for Luna and Xeno, who had obviously been holding themselves back, to jump forward to better study the little pokemon.
As I watched them, starting to calm down, I did see the wisdom in coming here though. It would make a good world for the refugees to retire to.
Deciding I didn’t need to be present for the Lovegood’s examination of the Diglett, I turned away from the exclamations of ‘Amazing’ and ‘incredible intelligence’ and ‘beautiful form’, only to focus on the rest of the family.
Seeing as everyone had gotten up from the ground even if Hinata and Anko looked particularly shaken, I gestured for everyone to sit down.
While everyone was doing that I turned to Amy. “Why don’t you wake up our passengers. Luna is right. This is exactly the type of world that worn down heroes would like. A world where friendship and love actually makes a real difference. I think it would help Vista, I mean Missy, in particular.”
Amy smiled at me and nodded. “I will have them up in a few minutes.”
Seeing Amy walk away seemed to use up the rest of Anko’s patience. “What in the hell is going on here? Who are you? What was that? Where are we?”
I was glad she hadn’t pulled out any weapons yet, but I winced at how she was eyeing Ahri. It didn’t take a genius to notice how the two of them had counted Ahri’s nine tails and were now extremely uncomfortable.
Rubbing my forehead, I gestured for everyone to circle around. I suspected that it would take Amy some time to wake our refugees up so now was as good a time as ever. I also noticed that several of the other girls were getting amused at me for how often I had to do this. I mean, it was necessary, but man did it get repetitive during all of these jumps. Even the short talk took time.
After some consideration I gestured for everyone to take a seat. “Well, what do you understand about other worlds?”
I watched as those words seemed to have blown their minds already.
“The fantastical truth is that the number of universes and worlds out there are either infinite or so close to infinite that we would never know the difference. If you can imagine it, it is out there somewhere.” I rubbed my forehead before I continued. “The thing is, we have noticed that fictional worlds we are familiar with often show up many of the realities that we visit. Perhaps some authors are able to piece the veils of their worlds or we are able to spot worlds the the great cosmos that we are more familiar with. Regardless and believe it or not, many of the worlds we visit we have seen before in fiction.”
I could see their confusion so I waved to point at them. “Yet the truth is even stranger because we have begun to notice that those realties often follow certain patterns. Even when the world we visit is different from the stories they seem to follow the same general path.”
That seemed to ground them a little so I continued. “Yet there are differences. Sometimes the third Hokage dies in the Ninetales attack. Sometimes it is the fourth. Sometimes Naruko is a girl and sometimes she is a boy. Sometimes Anko is a Jounin Sensei that teaches your group, Hinata, and sometimes she works exclusively in T&I.”
That got their eyes to widen at the implications and I nodded. “It is weird, but you are kinda forced to get used to it after the first or second time you find a world you knew in fiction.”
Anko was frowning, looking extremely serious. “What do you know about our world then?”
I sighed. “We know a path your world might have gone down. However, you need to keep in mind that any and all of what we know might be wrong.” Narrowing my eyes here I let my challenge enter my voice. “I would think that ninja, of all people, would understand the concept of being wary of bad intel.”
That got Anko to slowly nod at me. “Was that how you knew who I was?”
I blinked and then realized that she hadn’t told us her name and the Hokage had only called her by her ANBU designation. She had taken her mask off once I had called her by name, but I shouldn’t have known it. “Yeah, it was.”
That actually made Anko relax. Thinking about it, I suspected that she had been worried about how her identity had been leaked. Dimensional travelers having alternate timeline knowledge was a little hard to guard against, not really something that could be considered a failure on her part.
As I went through the full description of our situation, a basic explanation of our pasts, and a simplistic description of our powers, I smiled as I saw Hinata relax. Specifically she seemed somewhat calmer after hearing the histories explained in each girls’ own words.
I wasn’t sure if it was because she was empathizing with the others since she was someone who truly cared about the people around her or if she was feeling like she finally belonged. I had told her that we specifically recruited her because we knew her life wasn’t great. That might have made her feel like a pity case and knowing that everyone came from problematic pasts would have helped.
I then turned to look at Hinata’s caged bird seal. “Next thing we are going to do is get that seal off of you.”
I saw Hinata do a full body flinch as her face went frozen. Obviously she had resigned herself to being sealed for her entire life. I hadn’t thought that she was over what her father had done by sealing her, but it was obvious now she had been hiding and ignoring her feelings. Really, I should have known she would have been devastated.
I nodded. “The Hokage watched me breaking curse marks and seals for an entire afternoon before you were brought in. As much as you two are both are probably a honey pot combined with the threat of a dagger in the back if we ever attacked Konoha, your father probably wanted to give you a way out of your clan’s politics. I think he was trying to protect you in his incredibly… dumb and emotionally stunted way.”
Hinata was still for a few moments before I noticed small tears starting to form in the corners of her eyes. “... I am sorry.” There was a soft breath where she obviously tried to gather herself. “I am sorry. I was the one to report your offer to the ANBU.”
I winced now that it was confirmed that my policy of being completely honest was an incredibly reckless idea in a village of literal ninja. Rubbing the back of my head I sighed. “Yeah no, don’t apologize for that. That was actually pretty dumb on my part. I wanted to demonstrate that we could actually do what we claimed, but regardless of our intentions that also made us a threat that you needed to report. So… don’t worry about it.”
Holding out my hand I offered it out to shake. “So, with that, why don’t we actually start again. My name is Max. I am building my family. We want to help you a bit if you will let us. If you want to join us we will do our best to empower you with all of the methods we have managed to come up with.”
Anko was the one to speak up. “What do you mean, empower?”
I smiled. “Exactly that. I don’t think you will stay with us permanently, Anko, as I am pretty sure you are loyal to Konoha, but we will still do our best to get you a biological tuneup and any help we can. However I am trying to do more for my wives and permanent members of my family.”
Turning to face Hinata more directly as I figured she might consider it. “We want to be stronger, help people, and see the multiverse. If you stay with us, then you will be coming with us as we gain all the power we can. Then you will help us with our three goals. We didn’t even have Chakra before we stopped in your world and we still have next to no idea on how to use it.”
I paused and considered. “Actually, while we are on that, I am going to be asking you, Hinata, and Anko to really put us through the gauntlet. We want you to really beat us into shape. We are way too weak for some of the worlds we have come across.”
Anko’s look was both incredibly erotic and sadistic as she heard my request. Actually, I was beginning to believe those two things were different sides of the same coin for her. “Oh, you had better bet your cute ass that I will. I love nothing more than having my men begging for mercy.”
I winced while ignoring the innuendo while nodding. “Sounds good, I really want to be able to use shadow clones. Making and puppetting temporary bodies is incredibly annoying. Plus I want to be able to give my wives more individual attention.”
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Anko smirked, deciding to push harder. “Ah, you understand that, but what is even better is when you can use multiple bodies at a time to really… please… your partner. I can demonstrate… if you want… maybe blow your little juvenile mind.” This time Anko walked forward speaking in a voice that dripped with implications as she ran her nail under my eye and pressed her substantial breasts into my chest.
Around her I noticed that Amy, who had just led the rest of the refugees back in, stopped and stared at me wide eyed, suddenly extremely excited.
To the side I noticed Aisha looking at me with a perverse giggle.
Behind her I noticed that Luna had gone wide eyed, an almost too wide smile on her face. “Multiple Maxs… Mmmmh.”
Confirming the girls that were full blown perverts were excited by the idea of having more than one of me at a time, the rest of the girls still seemed to have perked up at the idea of having more opportunity to have me one on one. It wasn’t that I wasn’t arguably a pervert as well, just that it was just interesting to note the ones that shared that theme.
As for my defense, well I had to admit internally that my girls knew me too well and none of them seemed to be worried I was about to be taken away. That was actually unfortunate as I was now without help as I began slowly backing up while Anko followed me across the room.
Finally ducking around a chair away from Anko, I smiled. “Sorry, I appreciate the offer, but just training for now. The rule in the family is that the family comes first. So while I don’t mind what my wives do among themselves or even if they abstain all together for intimacy from even me. No one is going to sleep around outside, divided loyalties when we plan on staying together forever would be pretty stupid.”
Anko scowled at me before clicking her tongue. “Tch, all the pretty ones are teases.” Then she sighed. “Fine, you figured it out already, but I am supposed to keep the princess here safe, get information and technology that Konoha can use, and keep an eye on you. That leaves a lot of time for me to be bored. Throw in some good booze and you got yourself a slave driver.”
I was about to correct her that I wanted a trainer not a slave driver, but I realized that to Anko, those were the same things.
Sighing, I nodded before turning to the rest of the refugees that were waiting for our conversation to end.
I expected the annoyance I saw on their faces as they arrived. They had obviously saw the new people and it was clear they had been asleep for a while. Still, I wasn’t about to feel bad about keeping them out of danger and out of Amy’s hair. Which, if we were being honest was kind of the same thing.
To my surprise, Victoria was the first to spot the pokemon outside the portal and basically threw herself outside to fly up to one of the Pidgey. The Pidgey in question seemed extremely startled at having a flying human suddenly so close and squawked at her, but after hearing the praise Vicky was heaping on it, how cute it was, how beautiful it looked, the Pidgey calmed down.
Addressing the rest of the refugees I pointed out of the portal. “As you may or may not have recognized. We are currently in the world of Pokemon. We have received permission for you to settle down here from the local god. And well… honestly if you are looking for a fun, but safe place to quietly retire from the super hero business, this would certainly be the place.”
Amy’s mother Carol looked at me, mouth turned down in a frown. “What are you talking about? Are you abandoning us here?”
I sighed, annoyed, as some of the refugees tensed up, eyes hard. Deciding to cut them off I said “Are you all expecting me to take care of you for the rest of your lives? I would have thought that you of all people wouldn’t want to trust me that much.”
Holding my hand up to stop the tirade from one of fiction’s best examples of an overbearing, emotionally manipulative Karen. “I am sorry, that was completely uncalled for. The last few weeks have been stressful and I am still a bit rattled from meeting the god of this world.”
That got Carol to calm down some and give me a nod so I let my gaze run over the group. “I should have explained the options here first.” Gesturing behind me I gave them my pitch. “For those that are potentially unaware. This is the world of Pokemon. It seems like in most worlds it is an animated show, a game, or both.”
That still got some weird looks as quite few of the refugees still had trouble believing it even though they had visited Star Wars, but I continued regardless. “In this world, either some or all of the animals are hyper intelligent, somewhat magical beings called Pokemon.”
Realizing that either this world or Arceus must either encourage or reward the behavior I saw I decided I needed to explain that as well. “In this world, most children travel around battling and capturing wild Pokemon to create teams to battle each other and become the strongest. This would be insane or a horrific dystopia in any other world, but here the bond between the human trainers, based on friendship, trust, and effort really do seem to be the determining factor. Plus if what we saw in the media is true, Pokemon are like stupidly durable and rarely do Pokemon actually die from these battles.”
I could see Brian looking surprised and I noted him as someone who must not have been exposed to Pokemon back on Earth Bet along with most of the adults.
I sighed, “That right there is actually why I would encourage you to stop here. Here is somewhere where justice, friendship, and trust usually win… basically the exact opposite of Earth Bet.”
I didn’t mention the fact that I was pretty sure that the bonds of friendship here would help heal these people from their emotional scars. However there was also the fact that if any of them went rogue they wouldn’t get overly far. Professionally trained Pokemon could treat even Vicky, who was arguably the strongest of New Wave, like a misbehaving toddler if they wanted. That was to say nothing of there were the legendaries and the higher tier pseudo-legendaries who could treat us all like ants.
That got Sarah to speak up for the first time in a while, voice incredulous. “What about all of the world ending plots from the anime?”
That got me to realize that if she hadn’t watched it herself, her asian heritage had her getting the general plot via osmosis.
I nodded. “That is a good point, but as we have just seen, it also has a god actively watching over it.” Then I considered my answer again. “Well I will admit that if the anime is to be believed then it is a bit weird that Arceus apparently gets Ash, a young boy, to go around saving the world for him, but there are still definitely way worse worlds out there to end up on.”
Then I shrugged. “Plus… I mean, it is Pokemon. If we didn’t have people back at Hogwarts, the Elemental Nations, and future worlds that could use a little bit of help. This would probably be where we would retire as well. Also, we aren’t abandoning you. I plan on heading into town with you and unloading a lot of the gold we got from selling the basilisk to get you all started with your new lives. So, while we can’t give you everything, we should be able to get you some money and help get you started.”
Seeing the general agreement, I gestured for everyone to leave the shuttle. “I don’t know where we are, but I think I saw some buildings that way and I think everyone could use some time out in nature.”
Watching everyone leave made me realize that Thea was now stuck there alone. She had already sent out a drone, but I made a note to look into getting her a body. Dragon had her suits which we could replicate with our portable fabricator given enough time, but I was sure there was technology out there that should work even better.
Sighing as that was one more item on the list of things to do, I turned towards the Lovegoods that were still fawning over the Diglett. I also saw some of the girls starting to stray nearer to some of the Caterpie, Rattata and Pidgey we were passing along the way.
Speaking up so everyone could hear me over the group’s chatter of being in a new world I said, “Hey, Try to avoid annoying any of the Pokemon. Once we can get into town and get some Pokeballs then you can start looking for a partner to join you.”
That got our group to move and I did a quick headcount.
My wives were a little ways in front of me. Amy and Taylor were being pestered about what happened while the refugees were asleep. I was happy to see that Sabah and Ahri were hanging around, probably as a show of solidarity or maybe they just liked spending time together.
As I looked at the largest group of refugees, I took note that Vicky and her parents, Mark and Carol Dallon, had a large amount of tension between them. While her uncle and aunt, Neil and Sarah Pelham, seemed slightly less on edge. Crystal, aka Laserdream and her fiance and mother-in-law were in awe while Mark Shielder and his boyfriend just looked happy to be safe.
Hermione was just a bit behind Sabah and Taylor and I was really beginning to notice how the three of them had started to bond as the quieter part of our group.
Luna was basically pulling Dinah along with her as Xeno and her basically fawned over every pokemon they spotted on the road along the way. Dinah’s parents seemed overwhelmed, but were following the strange trio. I was pleased to note that they at least seemed happy to see that Dinah was enjoying her time with Luna.
After them, Thea’s robot seemed to be enthusiastically scanning all of the Pokemon that the trio were pointing out.
Alice looked like she was unsure how to feel and I felt a little better to see her seeming to be eyeing me with a little less hostility. I wasn’t sure if that was because I had been judged by a god and found not to be a monster, or if seeing me actually trying to help the rest of the Earth Bet refugees had helped.
I was also happy to see that Riley was no longer quite as glassy eyed even if she still looked like she didn’t really know how to feel.
Anko and Hinata were obviously overwhelmed, but I could see Hinata eyeing me confused while Anko’s eyes were carefully blank. I didn’t doubt that she was considering how to best leverage my skills to help Konoha.
Ahsoka was wearing an illusion by Ahri, but was the least agitated by the world. I didn’t doubt for a second that she had seen a lot of alien worlds and alien creatures in the Star Wars universe so that wasn’t surprising either.
The rest of the Earth Bet survivors, aka Missy, Lisa, Brian, Aisha were in open shock. I was amused that Aisha had dropped her stranger field after she had snuck up on the pokemon and started petting them. I thought about warning her that that wasn’t a good idea, but we did have Amy and the sooner she learned, the better.
Missy looked like she was finally coming out of her shell while Brian was fussing over his sister and trying to ignore Lisa as she focused on all of the details her power was feeding her about the creatures around her.
Off to the edge of the group I noticed Sarah. I saw her considering face and I realized that Bakuda was probably going to take this chance to leave as well. While I didn’t want her causing problems, she had seen the god like the rest of us so I doubted that she would try to do anything too drastic. She was also smart enough to get any number of jobs. Heck, she might be in better shape than the rest of the refugees in that respect having almost finished an engineering degree.
It took over an hour of strolling through the forest at our leisurely pace, but we finally arrived at the next town to find the sign that said. ‘Welcome to Pewter City’
I blinked and looked around.
I now knew where we were, the question was when and if this world was closer to the anime, the games, or the manga.
While looking around I noticed how big the city was. It honestly looked like a city of perhaps a hundred thousand. Definitely not the few dozen buildings you saw in the games. I knew that was obviously simplified, but it was definitely a difference. The question was…
It was at that moment that my suspicions that fate was somehow drawing us into the plot of these worlds got another small bump. Looking over I noticed two very familiar trainers hopping down a small rise to the north of us. They were too far to hear clearly, but the bearded hobo they ran across made me nearly face plant.
“Well, I guess we are in the anime then…”
Everyone who hadn’t noticed them yet turned and I noticed how most of the Earth Bet younger crowd recognized Ash Ketchum and Misty. They had just unknowingly found Brock’s father and were now following him into town and towards the Pokemon Center.
I spoke over the rest of the group's noise. “We should probably follow them. The Pokemon Center is probably the best chance for us to be able to start building anyone who wants to stay here an identity and a paper trail.”
That got everyone to start moving and we were able to see the sights as we walked into town.
Along the way I spotted a cocky looking kid getting into a car followed by six older women carrying pompoms. It took a few moments before I realized that I was looking at Gary Oak. Ash’s rival throughout the first season.
However the strange thing was this time I noticed how much older the girls were than Gary. Gary was just like Ash, probably 12-13. Roughly in that awkward stage before puberty kicked in. The girls, or more accurately women following him around were more like 20.
Suddenly I didn’t feel like Gary having a cheer squad was as funny as I did as a kid. In fact it was bigger than the gap than Dinah and I had when we first met. Even back then, compulsions and all, I had shied away from having a relationship with her and part of the reason I was still keeping them at arm’s reach was because of that age difference even if they were 17 to my approximate 23 now.
Heck, Even with the age of consent in Massachusetts being 16, I had still felt a little weird about dating Taylor when we first met even though she was already 17. For Gary here that definitely crossed my line and no, having the gender reversed didn’t help.
Yet as we approached while being only slightly amused that Ash and Gary had apparently somehow missed each other despite being on the same road, one of the cheerleaders spotted me and my frown and sighed before turning and walking over to us. “Hello, nice to meet you, my name is Susan, here is our card.”
Looking down and spotting the card that said ‘Lavender Support Group: Discrete body guarding, Daycare, Monitoring Services for Pokemon Journeys.’ As I picked up the card I also noticed four well used pokeballs on her belt.
Behind me I noticed Ahri and Ahsoka had stopped and were now standing behind me in a show of support. Taylor had also noticed and was walking up, obviously checking the surrounding area for threats.
Then I saw this newly named Susan actually give Ahri and Ahsoka a slow but deliberate once over and suddenly everything made sense. Professor Oak must have been worried about his grandson and paid for these girls to watch over him… girls that were only interested in each other based on the way I saw them brushing against each other and how Susan was eyeing my girls.
Smiling, I nodded back. “Ah, I see, you are doing good work then.”
Susan smiled and nodded. “Yep, give us a call if you ever need some discrete supervision for youth on their Pokemon Journey.”
Behind Susan I heard Garry call out. “Come on Girls, now that we have beat the gym and got the boulder badge I want to head out to Cerulean City before it gets dark.”
Waving goodbye Susan winked at Ahri before scampering back to the car and hopping in the back seat.
Shaking my head while I explained to the rest of my girls, we followed Ash as he finally arrived at the Pokemon Center to get his Pokemon healed.
It was a bit interesting to see the process as we watched Ash drop off his Pikachu and two pokeballs. Yet we were already attracting stares so I waited until Ash, Flint, and Misty left to eat lunch before walking up to the counter.
Addressing Nurse Joy, I layed out our issues. “Hello, I am sorry to bother you, but we are actually refugees from another region. There was a lot of fighting and I grabbed these people and got a teleport away so we could start a new life. The problem is we aren’t entirely sure where we are. Can you help us get started?”
The interest that several people in the building had in us spiked as our actual situation was described. Still, I couldn’t really lie as I was sure they were going to attempt to verify our story however they could and direct lies would only cause issues.
Sure enough Nurse Joy looked over at a Drowsy in the corner and at its nod, she smiled a little sadly. “Let me call over Officer Jenny and we can get you started.”
There was indeed a lot of paperwork, but I shouldn’t have been too surprised that there was already a form for this. In a world of teleportation, ghosts, magical animals, fights between the minor gods that created the world, the bureaucracy had been forced to be a lot more flexible than expected in other worlds.
Obviously I wasn’t staying personally, but having an identity here for any time we stopped by would make things easier moving forward.
As we were wrapping up, I had to ask. “Is there a reason that all the Nurse Joys and Officer Jennys look so similar?”
The two looked at me surprised, but then there was a laugh before their faces turned oddly serious. “Let's just say that our genetics run really strong throughout our family.” I blinked and frowned so she continued. “...Really strong…”
I blinked and realized that genetic tinkering and cloning was a thing here. I swallowed, reminded that for all of this world’s innocence and kindness it did have some dark actors that Ash and company would eventually have to fight.
Still, I dropped the topic as the two obviously wanted us to.
Heading down to a pawn shop I smiled before I dropped several gold bars on the counter. The man in question blinked in surprise before his eyes widened.
Haggling got us a surprisingly large amount of money. Not enough for a house, I checked, but each bar was enough for nearly a year’s worth of rent for a small apartment. I had quite a few of these small bars so I should be able to get them started off strong in their new life.
I was considering how to best divide it up when I noticed how New Wave was eyeing each other and I remembered their past that I had forgotten about with all of the craziness that had happened since we left Earth Bet. I wasn’t sure what would happen with New Wave now that it had been revealed that Vicky was born after an affair, but I didn’t want to poke it with a ten foot pole.
Deciding to just give everyone the same amount regardless I pulled out quite a few more bars.
As we walked out I turned to them. “For everyone who is planning on staying here, I don’t really care what you do with your money, but keep in mind we may not be back for quite a while so you are going to have to plan for your future long term. As for now I think we should show you around a bit more to see what this world is like.”
As if the universe was talking to me I noticed Ash walking out of the Pokemon Center with his Pokeballs and Pikachu on his shoulder.
“On that note, why don’t we watch Ash as he tries for his very first Pokemon gym badge.”
I saw Misty notice and start to give us some strange looks as we followed the two of them towards the gym, but lost interest when we took the side entrance. Once there we paid a Graveler standing by selling tickets for a few Pokedollers for the entire group and headed up into the seating above the arena.
I wasn't sure how Ash didn’t notice, but there was actually a schedule of matches posted that would happen today. Ash just happened to catch Brock in a gap between two of them.
Hearing Ash’s proclamations of “So you must be Brock! I am Ash from Pallet town. I have come to challenge you!” I cringed a bit even as I smiled, yet it also gave me the strongest case of Deja Vu yet. This was something I remembered…
I momentarily paused. Why did I remember this when I didn’t remember almost anything else from my past?
We waited as Brock explained the rules of the Pokemon Battle, how since it was Ash’s first badge and how he had Pikachu for only a few weeks, then it would be a 2 vs 2 and I blinked in surprise.
Apparently the theory that gym masters controlled their challenges based on the number of badges you had was correct. The more you had, the stronger they would expect you to be.
I wasn’t sure if that was actually canon, but it made way too much sense for it not to be.
It was when Brock threw out his Onix and we all got a good look at what Pikachu was up against that several of my girls whimpered for the little guy. I didn’t blame Pikachu for trying to run away, he looked to be completely outmatched even if we knew Pikachu would grow up to be world-class strong.
Onix didn’t need instructions as it immediately lunged for Pikchu. Ash’s commands to ‘get away’ and ‘dodge’ didn’t really help.
Once Onix caught Pikachu, all Brock had to do was call out a ‘bind!’ and Pikachu was down for the count.
It was much harder to watch and to Ash’s credit, he nearly immediately folded after hearing Pikachu cry out, opting to take Pikachu back to the Pokemon Center.
Sighing, I turned towards our group while we waited for the next gym challenger. “You have a few hours while we watch the rest of the matches for today, but we really will need to decide who is staying here so we can start helping them get settled.”
I wasn’t surprised that Lisa and Brian agreed to stay while Aisha was pulled into their group. It was also probably a good thing that Rachel wasn’t here as this was probably too close to animal fighting for her despite the Pokemon’s obvious intelligence, enjoyment of battling, and getting stronger.
After another match between someone trying to get her third badge and a much more impressive match, the rest of New Wave besides Amy decided to stay.
Danny had spent a lot of time looking at his daughter before he eventually sighed and spoke up next to declare he was staying.
Sarah took only a few more moments before she declared she wanted to try living here as well.
The final group was one I knew was going to happen, but it still made my heart hurt.
Luna looked at me and smiled sadly. “We are going to be staying here for a while because you have let the nargles invade your brain and you need that reassurance. That way you know we actually care and you aren’t forcing us.” while gesturing to herself, Xeno, Dinah, Riley, Missy, Vicky, Aisha, Alice, and Dinah’s parents who just seemed to want to follow their daughter.
I breathed in deeply before I grimaced. “Yeah… I am looking forward to seeing what kind of Pokemon you find on your Pokemon journey.”
That left just Amy, Taylor, Ahri, Sabah, Ashoka, Hermione, Hinata, Anko, and Thea. From about two dozen people to just nine.
Swallowing, I turned to Alice. “I am going to need to borrow your knife.”
Interlude Luna
Luna watched, heart hurting, as Max slumped more and more as he cut his very soul away from her. Already she could feel the comfort of permanently and completely being tied into the family fade.
She hadn’t lied, there was no compulsion there, but she was going to miss that embrace.
Yet it was necessary. Max hadn’t even bothered trying to bring Hermione into the Family despite her basically jumping in with both feet after their date to that library.
Fabulous Flingerwingers, he hadn’t even mentioned the soul bond for several of the last few new possible sisters.
She could see it and that vision had shown it. He would hesitate to let anyone else near him and would even worry about the four wives he did have if she didn’t prove it to him and she needed to do it soon. Max had already started to show some new signs of fatigue even though he was once again in his main optimized body.
Plus, now that she had gotten Arceus’ help for her plan, even his main complaint would soon be a thing of the past.
Then she was going to get what she wanted and no one was going to stop her.
Seeing Max have a shiver run down his spine despite facing the other way made her smile.
The only question was what Arceus had managed to do for her two little red pandas that she had brought from Start Wars. Arceus had said something about they were already close to an Eevee. Hadn’t Dinah had said something about how that was the one with multiple evolutions…
Hmmm…. That had possibilities for their group, didn't it? A girl squad each with their own fox-puppy creature…
Luna smiled wider as she considered the possibilities… she would have loved the Spoink that Dinah had mentioned, but an Eevee would do nicely.
Interlude Ahri
Ahri frowned as she watched Max cut Luna and Dinah out of the family.
If she hadn’t been able to literally taste the emotions of both sides she would have thought it was something both sides actually stoically supported.
Yet she knew both sides were hurting and frustrated, but determined.
The only two people that seemed happy by the change was Alice and Sarah. Both seemed happy that the younger girls and herself were getting away from Max respectively.
Still, she trusted Luna and Dinah. If they said it would work out then it would.