When Dawn finally caught up to Maylene, the Gym Leader was sitting at the edge of a river, staring into the water alone.
Dawn gasped for air, her face red. All this travelling had put her in pretty good shape, but apparently that was nothing compared to what someone like Maylene went through. She’d had to run as fast as she could to keep the pink haired girl in her sight, and this river wasn’t exactly right next to the gym either.
The impromptu workout had allowed her to calm down a bit, collect her thoughts, but her stomach was still in knots as she walked up to the water’s edge, taking a seat beside Veilstone’s best.
Maylene jolted. “Oh! You… you were with that other challenger, weren’t you? What are you doing here?”
Dawn took a moment to examine her before responding. Maylene had seemed pretty torn up before she ran off, but now… now she still looked sad, but there were no tear tracks on her face and her voice was even.
“I…” Dawn hesitated. “...don’t know, really.”
Maylene’s eyebrows furrowed. “What do you-”
“I mean!” She panicked, not having intended to come off that way. “I just, um, I guess I can sort of relate to your situation, in a way, and when you ran off I thought that I should try to help you out, but… well, now that I’m here, I’m realizing that I don’t really know how to help you out.”
The pinkette only looked more confused. “...thank you? I’m fine though, so you really don’t need to do anything, you can just go back to your friends.”
“You’re not fine, though, are you?” Dawn all but whispered the words. “I’m the same way, you know. Granted I’m just a run of the mill coordinator, not a Gym Leader, but every time I fail I tell people that there’s no need to worry. That I’m fine, and I’ll just do better next time or something. I’m not sure they believe me any more than I do you, right now.”
There was silence, for a beat.
“I’ve only been the Veilstone Gym Leader for a few months, you know,” Maylene suddenly explained. “Before that Lucario and I were just a normal trainer and Pokemon duo, taking on battles when we felt like it. We were pretty good, or at least that’s what everyone told us. They called me a warrior, and all their praise made me so confident…”
“Do you…” Dawn prompted after an awkwardly long pause. “Do you think they were wrong?”
Maylene let out a bitter laugh. “Of course I do. Don’t get me wrong, Lucario is an amazing partner and I’m lucky to have him, but… apparently you can’t be a Gym Leader with only one Pokemon. The League wanted it to be someone else, but everyone supported me so much that I was gifted a Machop on the verge of evolution so that I’d have the minimum to take on official challenges. But in the end…” Maylene’s tone turned from bitter to defeated, “in the end the League was right. It shouldn’t have been me.”
“What makes you say that?” Dawn asked.
“Lucario and I won a few battles at first, but… it all went downhill after the first loss, really. And that’s so stupid because Gym Leaders are supposed to lose! Not all the time, but… if I didn’t lose on occasion I’d just end up like Volkner and that’s a whole other problem…”
Dawn briefly wondered who this Volkner person was, but Maylene moved on before she could ask about them.
“I’d been riding high on the rush of becoming a Gym Leader, of winning those first few battles… and when I lost, my confidence wavered. And Lucario… Do you know much about Lucario?”
“Ah, no, I don’t really know anything about them,” Dawn quickly explained, eager to learn more about what had Ash so on edge.
“Lucario can use this stuff called aura. It’s like… like a life force, but they can use it for moves, and also to understand people and their feelings and…”
Dawn’s confusion at that explanation must have shown on her face, because Maylene sighed and started over.
“I guess the important part is that it gives Lucario a sense for how other people feel. They’re also extremely loyal Pokemon, one of the few that evolve through a bond with their trainer. And I think… I think the reason Lucario is so upset with me is because I lost that confidence I used to have. And Lucario being upset with me made me lose even more confidence, and losing confidence made Lucario more upset with me…”
So she was stuck in a cycle, constantly getting worse until it ended up like Dawn had seen today. Lucario ignoring everything Maylene said and just accepting hits from Torterra.
“I only recently caught Meditite, and Machoke was given to me a few months ago… that’s not enough to run a Gym with. Gym Leaders are supposed to be strong, but the one Pokemon I could really rely on hates me now. I have no right to be a Gym leader. I think the League is starting to notice, too. They keep sending Crasher Wake over for friendly spars, but I’m pretty sure they’re just having him test whether or not I should be kicked out of the position. I’ll probably get a call from Cynthia as soon as he makes his report…”
That was even worse than Dawn had assumed. Still, though, part of the story nagged at her, reminding her of an interaction from a while back.
“I can’t say that I’ve been in quite the kind of situation that you’re in…” Dawn spoke up, “but I was given some helpful advice by…” a scary person and terrifying Pokemon. Helpful person and slightly nerve wracking Pokemon? No, that wasn’t quite right either… They weren’t travelling together, and even if being around them brought up bad memories she was trying to avoid, she felt like she owed it to at least N to call them “...some friends.”
She paused, trying to figure out how to convey the same message she’d been given in this situation. “When you feel like giving up because of how you think someone else feels… you should at least talk to them first, and make sure you’re not misunderstanding.”
Contemplating giving up Pachirisu wasn’t exactly the same as Maylene thinking her partner hated her and she was going to lose her job, but the advice still applied, right?
“Talk to them, huh?” Maylene slowly repeated as she palmed a Pokeball. “Maybe you have a point.”
There was silence again, but this time it was more comfortable.
“You said that you were having problems, too, right?” Maylene asked. “Tell me about it.”
“Well…” Dawn wasn’t sure where to start. Her constant failures? How despite the fact that she’d watched Lucas’ battle, her views on them were becoming more like N’s with every Gym match she watched? “I’m a coordinator who keeps losing contests, and no offense, but Gym battles make me feel a bit…”
----------------------------------------
Ash stared down at the empty field, his mind filled with thoughts of the battle, with thoughts of Lucario, with thoughts of-
“Ash?” Brock placed a hand on his free shoulder.
He jolted, and Pikachu made a concerned noise while adjusting his grip to stay on the other shoulder.
“Ah, sorry about that Pikachu.”
“Pii-kachu!”
It was nice to have someone so understanding as his best friend.
He turned to Brock. “What is it?”
Brock had a weird expression on his face. “...are you okay? I know how hard it must be…”
“What? Of course I’m fine! It was a Gym battle, how could-”
“Ash,” Brock interrupted. “You barely noticed when Zoey left. You’ve just been staring down at the field for a few minutes now. Everyone is gone already.”
“Pi-kaaaa….”
Ash let out a sigh. He couldn’t really cover this one up, could he? Not with a Lucario involved.
“I just… I’m just thinking, is all.”
His eyes fell from the field to his hands, and for a moment he imagined them donned in blue.
His fists clenched.
“It’s not like it was the first time I failed, but… I was right there, you know?” Losing Latios had been devastating, but Lucario had been on a whole other level. The bond that they’d shared, however short a time it might have lasted, snatched away when Ash was close enough to touch the Pokemon…
Pikachu rubbed against his cheek reassuringly, but his buddy’s affection wasn’t enough to make the pain go away.
“Ash, there was nothing you could do. You know that, right? Lucario… Lucario shouldn’t have even been there. If Lucario had lived a normal life, he would have died of old age a long, long, time ago.”
But he hadn’t. He had been there, alive, with them, and he’d needed Ash’s help, and…
It wasn’t the first time they’d had this conversation, and it probably wouldn’t be the last. Ash knew how it would go. To save them the trouble, he just nodded in agreement.
They all knew he didn’t mean it.
----------------------------------------
“Commander Saturn, I don’t mean to question my superiors, but I’m very confused…”
Saturn let out a sigh.
To be a member of Team Galactic was to strive for perfection. Though their perfect world was not yet within their grasp, that did not mean they could slack before that goal was achieved. He spent every morning ensuring his blue hair was styled perfectly. That his stylish uniform was in perfect condition. That any machinery he would require the use of was in perfect working order.
He understood that much of what Cyrus said was a matter of manipulation, that the truth of the matter was hidden within his mind, that what he told the general members of Galactic was little more than propaganda, but… even still, Saturn felt that propaganda resonate within him. If asked for the truth of why he held the position he did within Galactic, he would likely say that Cyrus’ ambitions and actions made him curious, but… he couldn’t help but strive for that perfection that Cyrus spoke of.
Unfortunately, the masses of this world were not perfect, and as a Commander, a position entrusted to him by their glorious leader, it was up to him to cover for the imperfections of the ones currently in their employ.
Turning his gaze away from the aerial view of Veilstone and onto the grunt who had spoken up, he ensured that his tone of voice, his mannerisms, his very being, were all perfect as he explained. “For reasons that you need not know, we are to be a distraction. Through methods that are perfectly legal, we are to incur the curiosity of those who may wish to cause harm to Galactic. As the meteorites are both a major attraction in the city and a good distance away from the headquarters, they serve as the perfect tool for this task.”
“I-I understand that sir,” the grunt replied nervously, “but why aren’t we… you know, doing something more? We’re so far away from the meteorites that I don't think we’ll really draw any attention…”
It was only Team Galactic’s need for manpower that prevented Saturn from pushing the man out of the helicopter. Well, that and the fact that it would be against his orders.
“Because interacting with the meteorites directly without express permission from the League would be a violation of Sinnoh code 104-2-9. Because private aircraft being within the airspace of the meteorites would be a violation of Sinnoh code 208-4-3. The code only allows for restricted airspace up to a single meter below where we currently are, so as long as we stay precisely where we are at the moment, we will be close enough that law enforcement will be keeping an eye out for infractions, and yet still perfectly within the scope of the law.”
He would prefer to be precisely on the other side of that arbitrary barrier, but with how unpredictable the wind was he could not risk violating the law due to an unexpected dip in altitude. Saving a meter of breathing room would give the pilot enough time to correct if something were to happen.
“I-I see…” It was clear that the grunt, in fact, did not see. “Thank you for explaining, Commander, sir!”
The things that he had to put up with in order to reach a new universe…
When he turned back to the view of Veilstone, he saw that they had finally attracted some interest. A couple was pointing up at them, their Pokemon at their feet, and…
“Uh, Commander Saturn?” A grunt spoke up from his side.
“Yes?” He replied.
Stolen from its original source, this story is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.
“Aren’t those the morons we hired for the job at the museum?”
For a moment, he had believed his eyes were no longer perfectly functional.
Perhaps that would have been preferable to reality.
The crackle of a megaphone was just barely loud enough to be heard within the helicopter.
“What do you weirdos think you’re doing?!” Their Meowth shouted into it. “We’re trying to run a job here, and we don’t need you mucking it up!”
Having their affiliation with a known criminal entity announced was not within the scope of his orders. Picking up the microphone for the helicopter's own speakers, he vehemently denounced them.
“We don’t know who you losers are, feel free to do as you wish, away from us.”
Hmm. The insult had slipped out on its own. It hinted at a previous connection. How troublesome…
The woman stole the megaphone from the Meowth. “Your stupid team has much more to lose!”
She shoved it in the man’s face. “Look in the mirror at the haircuts you choose!”
Saturn’s eye twitched. They dare to insult his perfectly styled hair, especially when they went around looking like that?
But he was reasonable. He had orders to follow. He would not allow petty insults to blow this operation.
He ignored their little song and dance. He focused instead on the future, on tasks he needed to complete.
He could not ignore the way that the helicopter suddenly jerked to the side, leaving him unbalanced.
Before he could turn on his subordinates and grill the pilot for just why he would do such a thing, they began shouting.
“Are they insane?!”
“They’re trying to shoot us down!”
“Let’s send our Golbats to take them out!”
Peering down at the buffoons on the ground once more, Saturn noticed a very notable change.
The trio seemed to have pulled some sort of rocket launcher out of the bushes, and were aiming it up at his helicopter.
Perhaps it was time to reevaluate his estimation of them.
They were not simple morons.
They were dangerous morons.
And if he had his way, they would soon be dead morons.
“Commander Saturn, sir, what should we do?!” One of the grunts finally asked.
He thought for a moment, considering the possibilities and how they might affect their mission.
“According to Sinnoh code 62-0-1, in response to the use of deadly force, citizens may respond in kind so long as their lives are in imminent danger.”
“...sir?” The grunt looked at him with a foolish expression.
His hand falling to the pokeballs on his person, Saturn glared at this so-called Team Rocket.
“Take us down for a landing. We are going to show these losers their place.”
“Yes, sir! Of course, sir!”
Saturn would not allow this insult to stand.
----------------------------------------
Lucas peered at the shiny new Gym badge as he placed it in the case he kept the rest of them in. Part of him felt like he hadn’t truly earned it, what with the way that final bit had gone down, and yet, what was he supposed to do? Go chase after Maylene, tell her that fight wasn’t good enough as he throws the badge down and demands a proper rematch?
Not exactly a reasonable thing to do.
Though perhaps more reasonable than what he expects Barry might do, like trying to fine her for a billion dollars or something…
With a sigh, he shoved it all into his backpack and started towards the Pokemon Center. What’s done was done, and he needed to heal his team up. He was a bit concerned about just how intense that blow Eevee took was, but Nurse Joy would have the little guy healed up in no time.
But his plans were interrupted by the unexpected reappearance of Rowan’s assistant. He should really learn her name at some point…
She looked nervous as she ran up to him. “Oh, thank goodness you’re still here! Please, can you help me?”
Lucas raised a brow and nodded for her to continue. What trouble could she possibly have gotten into in the short time that Gym battle took?
“Some Team Galactic goons took my Pokedex away from me, and I need your help to get it back. I’ll be waiting in front of the warehouses, so please come!”
With that, she ran off towards the part of the city that he and N had entered from.
Lucas frowned. She seemed really desperate. Which, given that her Pokedex was on the line, was pretty understandable. Rowan was an intimidating man after all, and he wouldn’t be happy to hear that his research material was in the hands of those crooks. But even then, running off without even confirming that he’d agree to help her was pretty reckless.
Though he supposed there wasn’t really a question about him helping her at all. What kind of jerk would he have to be to just ignore her in her time of need?
He just hoped that whoever stole from her was still around. In his experience, Galactic was pretty good at running away. If they ran off with her Pokedex now, there was no telling whether they’d be able to track it down.
Lucas quickly made to follow behind her, though she had quite a lead on him now. It was a bit risky to go straight into an unknown fight like this directly after a Gym battle, but apart from Eevee his team was in pretty good condition and there was no telling how long Nurse Joy might make him wait. He also briefly considered stopping by the Game Corner to see if he could grab the Looker, but it’s not like the man had been particularly helpful in Eterna and time was of the essence.
When he and the professor’s assistant reached the warehouse district, he immediately spotted two Galactic grunts leaning against one of the larger warehouses, chatting with each other while one tossed a pokeball up and down.
“Hey, you jerks!” she shouted at them. “Give me back my Pokedex!”
The one tossing the ball laughed. “Or what?” His gaze fell on Lucas. “Are you gonna bring more little kids to give us their stuff? Go right ahead!”
Lucas narrowed his eyes, holding up Torterra’s pokeball in a clear challenge. He’d just been in a tough match, but his partner was still in good fighting condition.
“I’m not letting you bad people get away with your dirty deeds!” The assistant shouted. “We challenge you to a double battle!”
The grunt turned to his partner, who shrugged before standing up off of the wall and approaching them. “Fine! Have it your way, but don’t start crying when we wipe the floor with you brats!”
What followed was… well, a pretty embarrassing battle if Lucas was being honest. He’d felt bad about how his battle with Maylene had gone, but these guys were just awful. Torterra and the assistant’s Clefairy made short work of their four Poison types, though the constant Metronome use made Lucas wary of his partner the entire time.
As the cocky grunt recalled his Croagunk, he shouted out. “Done in by two kids?! This isn’t right!”
The other sighed miserably. “I should have kept my head down and just watched our warehouse…”
That was an interesting bit of information. So this warehouse belonged to Galactic as well? Add that to the Game Corner and the huge building on the edge of town and it was painting a pretty poor picture of Veilstone.
Still upset, the first grunt kicked a rock across the ground. “This sucks! Our Pokemon are total chumps! We should get new ones from the headquarters that can actually put up a fight!” He angrily huffed. “Whatever. Who cares about some stupid Pokedex anyway? Team Galactic’s going to own all the Pokemon in the world… no, the universe!” He pulled a bright pink box out of his pocket. “There! Take it! Take your stupid Pokedex!” Throwing it towards the ground, it was only Torterra’s quick thinking that saved it, a bundle of leaves cushioning the fall before Rowan’s assistant hastily scooped it up.
He stomped away angrily, all the way to the inside of the warehouse.
The second grunt looked between the two of them nervously. “Yeah, haha,” he awkwardly laughed, “Those things we had in the warehouse’ve already been moved to Pastoria City anyway, so it’s not like this is a real setback or anything! You kids haven’t seen the last of Team Galactic!” He proceeded to run off after his… friend? Coworker? Muttering something about how Saturn didn’t need to know about all this.
Left alone, Rowan’s assistant started thanking him profusely for his help, but Lucas mostly tuned it out, instead thinking of what those grunts had said.
Pastoria City, was it? That was where his next Gym battle would be as well…
“Have no fear!” A voice suddenly called out, interrupting the assistant. “I have come running!”
Looking back towards the voice, Lucas found that they had indeed come running. Wouldn’t you know it, the Looker had shown up once again, and once again he was doing a whole lot of nothing to actually stop the criminals.
“I heard of children feuding with the Team Galactic. It turns out, of course, to be you!”
Hm. When he put it that way, Lucas supposed it was actually pretty reasonable. He hadn’t stopped to get the man after all, so of course he’d only show up after hearing about the battle…
Rowan’s assistant leaned in towards Lucas, whispering “Hey, isn’t this that funny guy from Jubilife?”
Looker frowned. “You insult me to my face? How very uncouth of you.”
Lucas blinked. Looker apparently had very good hearing. That was good to know…
The assistant blushed. “Ah, um, I’m terribly sorry! They stole my- and I was- I just blurted- um…” With a defeated sigh, she sagged. “...I should be going now. Be wary of Team Galactic.”
Lucas and Looker watched her leave before continuing the conversation. Or, well, Looker continued the conversation. “It is of no matter. Of more interest is the criminal behavior of the Team Galactic. They attempt to steal the belongings of a child?” Lucas tilted his head. Child? Rowan’s assistant was old! Well, compared to him at least… “The scale of their criminality, it seems rather miniscule. The triviality of their action makes them more sinister, perhaps. Their warehouse needs investigation. Come with me, and we’ll take a look!”
Without pausing, Looker ran into the warehouse, the door having been left open just a bit by those grunts as they fled.
The inside of the warehouse was pretty barren. A handful of things were scattered here and there, but it seemed the grunt was serious when he said they’d moved their stuff to Pastoria. The grunts themselves, however, were nowhere to be seen.
Their escape route was rather obvious, though. Against the far wall was another door, one that looked a lot more high tech than the simple one they’d just entered through. Looker approached it, tapping on it, inspecting it closely, trying to make it budge.
“Hm… A key is necessary for us to go on. For the time being, we cannot give chase to those who run away.”
Lucas didn’t think they’d get much out of those two anyway, so it was no big loss.
But with the path forward sealed off, that left only one thing left to do.
Search for treasures!
Looker seemed to have the same idea, practically turning the room upside down as he “looked for clues”.
In the end, though, there only seemed to be one item of note, which Looker held out for him to take. “Ah, this HM, it is of the hidden move Fly. Lucas, this, you should be keeping. It will not do to leave this item here to be used by the Team Galactic.”
Lucas wasn’t about to argue with that logic! Eagerly stuffing it in his bag, his mind raced with the possibilities. He could… hmm…
Could any of his team even learn that move?
“We did not learn very much from that exercise…” Looker continued, “No matter. What concerns me is what I have overheard in the Game Corner. The Team Galactic has transported something to Pastoria. What they are up to, I do not know, but I have bad feelings about it.”
Lucas’ glee at having gotten a new treasure faded.
Looker wasn’t the only one worried about Galactic.
----------------------------------------
N was baffled.
Upon reaching the field of meteorite craters, he and Mimikyu had discovered that the helicopters which had worried his friend had come down for a landing.
The sky was instead filled with a veritable swarm of… what was probably an evolution of Zubat? Dozens upon dozens of the presumed Flying types were diving down at an unfortunately familiar trio, the air around them being stirred up into a vicious storm of sharp winds.
Not a single attack from the many Pokemon assaulting them seemed to do any real damage, however, as the trio was hiding behind a glowing blue Pokemon that looked like it was reflecting all the hits back at their origins.
“You cowards!” Jessie screamed at their opponents. “Who do you think you are, sending so many Golbat after us at once?!”
“You tried to shoot us out of the sky, you crazy bitch!” Someone from the other side shouted back.
James and Meowth cowered even further as Jessie erupted. “WHO ARE YOU CALLING A BITCH?! I WILL DESTROY YOU AND YOUR PATHETIC ORGANIZATION!”
N tuned out her screeching. “Theft of Pokemon and priceless artifacts is bad enough, but now they’ve moved on to attempted murder?” He asked incredulously.
Mimikyu waved off his concern. “I doubt they were tyna’ kill ‘em.”
N scowled. “We should team up with these other people and capture Team Rocket for the police. If that Wobbuffet’s abilities are based in its Psychic typing, then perhaps you’d be able to disrupt it long enough for the others to make a move.”
“Not so fast, N.” Mimikyu held a shadowy claw up in front of him. “I ain’ gonna disagree with ya on the Rockets bein’ bad guys, but what do ya know of this other group?”
“That Team Rocket tried to kill them.”
“That’s not-” Mimikyu took a deep, frustrated breath. “Beyond that, I mean. A whole lot of nothin’, right?”
N paused. “Well, yes, but even if I don’t know them I can still join with them to-”
“Team Galactic is worse than Team Rocket, N, and by quite a lot at that.”
“Team Galactic?” N repeated, unfamiliar with the name.
“Yeah. They’re a… problematic bunch, I s’pose. ‘N’ if they’re out causin’ a ruckus like this… there’s probably a Jenny on ‘er way, so we jus’ gotta make sure the battle goes on long enough that they can’t run away b’fore she gets here.”
N frowned, apparently having nowhere near enough information to understand Mimikyu’s line of reasoning. “Mimikyu, what are you talking about, why would-”
“Though at the same time, will interferin’ ‘ere cause problems later on? If they don’ advance far ‘nough ta pull that at the peak…”
Mimikyu seemed to be in his own little world, completely ignoring N’s words and speaking with such little context that N was even more lost than he had felt a moment ago.
Mimikyu let out a deep sigh. “Well, I s’pose it’ll work out somehow. Sorry for causin’ so much trouble for ya, N.”
N had a sinking feeling in his gut. “What exactly are you planning to do?”
“Well, I’m gonna see if my short bit of practice stands the test in a real situation.” Mimikyu took a deep breath, and then shouted. “HEY MORONS! HOW MANY OF YA FLYIN’ RATTATAS DOES IT TAKE TA KNOCK OUT A SINGLE OPPONENT?”
The fighting stopped in an instant as the swarm of Golbat turned in unison towards Mimikyu, thus drawing the attention of all the humans who hadn’t understood a word of that.
James pointed at him. “Wait, you?! What are you doing here? And you traded out that monster for a Mime Jr.? That’s my thing!”
His indignant shouting acted like a starting signal, as that’s when the swarm descended upon N and Mimikyu.
“Ah, shit, maybe I shoulda gotten away from ya before I did that…”
N wanted to facepalm, but the approaching swarm of pissed off Pokemon was a bit too concerning for theatrics like that.
He would be having a talk with Mimikyu once they got out of this mess.