[Pokémon] Greed

Summary: A dark, corrupt and mean-spirited version of The Pokemon World has been tainted with greed. Humans and Pokemon alike live as miserable chattel to the rich, and a cartel of all-powerful corporations, as a vestigial government rots away. One group of unlikely heroes find a mysterious opportunity to risk everything for a chance to make a difference. To take a stand.

Warnings: References to mutilation, vivisection, kidnapping, child labour, adult peril, execution, gender dismorphia, economics and mass-murder.



The surveillance Combees circled ahead, the three sets of eyes on each of them darting from side to side in the huge typing pool, watching out for 'slacking,' 'gossiping,' or some other form of punishable minor vice.

The buzzing of all those sets of wings would have been nauseating if it weren't for the equally deafening thudding and clicking of the countless typewriters, each manned by a tired, demoralised human.

The capitalists had once boasted that Pokemon 'would be made to be our tools,' but they had not, as far as Florimel could remember, specified who they meant by 'our.'

Had they wished to avoid confusion, they could have put their point clearer, Florimel thought, as she clacked away, copying up line after line of text, fingers smashing the tough keys down so that every afternoon they stung and before too long she knew, they would be gnarled, arthritic claws. They could have said: 'Pokemon will be our tools, just like you are.'

But, she thought sadly, the countryside had been more or less purged of 'wild' Pokemon, 'wild,' that had been the word they'd used, although maybe 'free' Pokemon would be more accurate. Each being confined to a Pokeball, and yet, the work-load of most humans had got tougher? She wasn't laid on a deck chair as Machoke-butlers brought her drinks, she knew some people were, a few very rich people, somewhere out there, but they were far removed from the reality of her, and her typing pool.

Florimel picked up a small green paddle and placed it into a stand on her desk, after a few minutes a floor-walker noticed it, and nodded to her, but tapped her watch reproachfully. With this permission, Florimel got up to go to the toilet, grabbing one of the day's tokens that would let her through the bathroom door.

**********

'Theft (noun): Stealing from the rich.

Capitalism (noun): Stealing from the poor.'

It was an odd piece of graffiti, but it made her laugh, and was hard to argue with.

The rest of the toilet walls were covered with more familiar slogans such as: 'Why are Pokemon superior to humans? Pokemon don't imprison us in balls!' and 'Death to the Silph company!' Florimel gazed around dreamily looking to see which were new as she sat. She didn't need the full five minutes her token allowed her, but since these trips were the only breaks she'd get in her 10 hour day, she wasn't going to leave the bathroom until the timer was down to the last few seconds.

'The scouring of talents, and readying of land' had been the grandiose title for sending soldiers out into the wild to capture any 'dangerously wild' Pokemon in balls, and then studied, and if they were found to be useful, like the Combees had, they were bred vociferously and pressed into servitude from birth, those that were considered too dangerous, or without a great use, were kept in small sample-sized populations in zoos and labs.

She'd once talked to one of the Pokemon handlers employed to look after the Combees. She'd told Florimel that most Combees were male, and they were very easy to handle, they were obedient, docile, and not very dangerous. But around one in 50 Combees were born female, and they were a problem, they were aggressive, dominant and powerful, natural born leaders. And once they grew old enough, they would evolve into Vespiquens, a huge and very powerful Pokemon. To eliminate these traits, they had used to remove the female Combees ovaries, mutilating them to prevent them from developing these unhelpful personalities and traits. But they found that this was not cost effective, so now they simply killed the female Combees as soon as they were born, and just kept the males. Florimel had commented about how unfair and brutal this practice seemed, but the handler had just shrugged. She'd said that the Combees 'Wouldn't be bred at all if they weren't useful. They're lucky we've found a use for the boys at least, otherwise none of them would have even been born.'

There were still Pokemon deep in the sea, but on land, even though the policy had only started around forty years ago, there were few if any wild Pokemon left, and those that still existed were small, flighty birds and bugs, hiding deep in caves and forests. Florimel had been taught about it in school. It was supposedly all based on the idea that humans were better, because they could build and make art and technology, and were developing and getting more advanced all the time. So they needed to take their position at the top, and 'inherit the earth,' whereas Pokemon, who archaeologists believed had lived basically the same lives over and over for thousands of generations, would all be slotted into their own 'most suitable' place in society, wherever they each fitted best, but all far below humans.

So the world was cleared of Pokemon living in their 'natural habitats' in very short order. Repel, that chemical which Pokemon couldn't stand, had been sprayed from huge carts to concentrate trap and stun Pokemon, and then Pokeballs had been used to catch them all. The land could then be made to best fit humans, mainly as Pokemon-tended farms, which would be needed to fit the anticipated rapid expansion in human population.

She thought it was all bunkum. She thought that humans were only told they were above Pokemon because the capitalists hadn't worked out how to capture them in balls, so needed to throw them a bone lest they rebel. Or maybe? Maybe if you tell people they are superior to Pokemon, then if they don't work harder than Pokemon you can punish them for laziness. But since she was barely 19, she hadn't even known a world before it, so couldn't be sure it wasn't for the best.

She washed her hands in the freezing water and left the bathroom, avoiding the mirror as she always did, since she hated to see those old burn scars on her face, and headed back to her desk. She took the paddle down and started typing away again. The next thing she knew, she was being prodded awake.

********

"But I've never done it before!" Florimel wailed, slightly ashamed of how her fear had made her voice squeaky.

"That's not our problem." The woman from Human Resources said. "There are plenty of people who want to work for Silph. It wouldn't be fair on them, or our shareholders or customers, if we kept a costly slacker on our books when we could be employing a genuine striver."

"But I just fell asleep? We have to work so long."

"That is no longer a problem from which you suffer."

"So do I get the money from my last two weeks? Since my last paycheque?"

"No. You're paid a month in advance, you owe us two weeks."

"I didn't get paid until I'd been here a month!?"

"That's because your first paycheque goes to paying for your uniform."

"This thing?? She said, pulling at the thick, cheap material she wore. ?It's like a sack!"

"The bill will be in the post. You don't have to pay us straight away."

"How kind."

***********

"No way." Said Page flatly.

"Way." Retorted Florimel.

"For your first? Well I don't want to say 'offence,' because we're not talking about a law you've broken? Except Silph are a law unto themselves. Believe me, I'd know." Page said, scratching his chin.

"I fell asleep, and now I'm unemployed, in debt and about to be homeless." Florimel replied, staring down into her beer.

"You don't have any savings?" Page asked, reaching across the table and rubbing his friends shoulder.

"Do you?"

Page shook he head solemnly and drained his beer. Florimel had asked him to meet her for a drink. He had agreed, but insisted that it be at a bar on the other side of Pallett Town, as Page still worked for Silph as a cleaner, and while drinking was perfectly legal, drinking on a work night could see you sacked.

"There is a wild conspiracy theory, believed by an alarmingly large number of otherwise sound-minded people." Page began in a mock-sagely voice. "That I hesitate to speak aloud, lest the mania be allowed to spread any further, and this theory suggests: That not all is fair in this world." He smiled grimly.

********

Florimel wandered aimlessly in the vague direction of home, it wouldn't be her home for long, and frankly it was a dump, but she was out of ideas and very nearly out of time. Being fired by Silph made you unemployable, not only were almost all jobs in the town provided by Silph, or one of it's partners, but none of the other employers would take someone who had been given the sack if they had a choice, and they always had a choice, because joblessness was such a terrible prospect that it was always an employer's market. In a couple of weeks she would be out on the street, and homelessness is a crime, so she'd be forced to join one of the brutal workhouses or end up in jail, both cases broadly equaling slavery. She walked through an alley, completely interchangeable with any other in this broken town, where the smashed glass from a shattered window littered the ground, so her head was down, as she carefully stepped through it. And perhaps for this reason alone, in the low-light of the crummy, cheap street-lamps she noticed the card that would change her life forever.

She hunched down to pick up the small plastic rectangle. It was a 'Pokemon Licence,' apparently the category was 'H,' which she'd never heard of, but strangest of all, it had her name on it.

'Florimel Gardner,' as clear as day, and there weren't many people with that name in the world. This was a Pokemon License, in her name. A license to own and train Pokemon.

Her heart pounded in her chest, she picked it up, slipped it into her pocket and ran. She wasn't sure what she was running from. She wasn't sure of anything anymore. Someone out there wanted her to own a Pokemon it seemed. It was insane. Inexplicable. Who would do this? How could it end up on that street? Was she meant to find it? Her head spun trying to take it all in, she couldn't handle it alone.

********

She hammered on the door of the building Page rented a room in, she couldn't think of anyone else to turn to, and she didn't want to be alone, in fact, she wanted answers.

"Oh, it's you." Answered Page wearily when he was summoned to the door by one of his neighbours. He seemed to be wearing a pair of pink Pajamas with Lopunnys printed across them, which distracted Florimel, and she shook her head and decided to come back to it later, once more pressing issues had been handled.

"Charming. Not: Oh, nice to see you again Flossy!" She retorted.

"I need my sleep darling, some of us still have jobs."

"Can I come in?"

"The landlords don't really like us to have guests at night? Ah screw it. You look like hell, you're probably bringing down the property prices just standing here."

They went in to Page's 'Room,' fully half of which was consumed by the single-bed. Under the bed were a few boxes filled with everything Page owned. "Nice." Flossy said, sarcastically as they sat on the bed. "Better than your last place."

"Better than a lot of places, better than where you'll be living in a week or so."

"Check out what I found in the street Page." Flossy said, suddenly entirely serious, and showing her friend the inexplicable card.

Page's jaw dropped when he saw the name written on the plastic. "Is this a forgery? How on earth did you get this?"

"I just found it in the street. I've no idea what, where, who or how? Maybe someone up there loves me, but if so, they've waited a while to show it? Is it a forgery, do you think? I've never seen one of these up close before."

"If it's a forgery, it's a damn good one. What's category 'H'?" Page inquired, staring at the card.

"I was going to ask you that."

"Hmmm? I've never heard of it before, but it's not one of the common ones, I can tell you that for free. Like 'W' which is work-general, 'G' which is government, 'D' for Devon, 'S' for Silph and so on."

"Do you think I can sell it?"

"No. They're chipped so even if you could change the name they'd know? Plus if you're caught with someone else's you'll be charged with more than just homelessness, it's a pretty serious offense."

"Then it's useless? I couldn't possibly afford a Pokeball, there aren't any Pokemon to catch, and usually you get one of these from your job, you can't get a job from having one. Plus I don't even know what I'm licensed to do."

"H, H, H? I think I know someone who could tell us what that means. I'll meet you outside, I need to get changed."

"Lopunnys, really?" she asked with a smirk on her face.

"They're cute? Well to look at anyway, I've heard they can punch a human's head clean off."

Florimel stamped her feet on the floor to keep warm in the cold night as she waited for Page, who strolled out barely a minute after her. He passed her a spare coat which fit surprisingly well and clicked on a torch to light their way. "Look, this guy's pretty crazy, but he works for The General Archive, he'll know about these categories."

"And he'll be up?"

"He's always up? That's a guarantee."

********

Page knocked on the door of a small end-of-terrace house in a relatively upmarket part of town. It was unlocked and swung open at his touch. He took as step inside, leading Florimel with him. Finding the light switch eventually, he clicked it on to reveal the figure of a young man, laying on the floor, with an empty whisky bottle by him.

"Florimel" said Page. "I present to you: A historian."

A light kick in the shoulder from Page woke the historian up, he opened both eyes, which focused slowly on Page. "Ah, Page you ugly sod. I was just thinking about you. I was just going to tell you that if you ever woke me up I would rip your eyes out and stuff them down your throat."

"Shame you never got round to-" Page began, but the historian cut him off when he saw Florimel.

"-And you brought an equally ugly friend. Why is everyone and everything in this world so ugly? Get me a drink or leave." With this he closed his eyes.

Page went into another room for a moment, and came back with a bottle of wine. He stood over the historian and dangled the bottle in front of him. When the historian reached up to grab it, Page pulled it away. Then took the cap off and started drinking.

"Get off my wine Page, I've beaten people senseless for less." He said, struggling to his feet.

"Dusty, this is Florimel, she needs your services."

"Perhaps if she put a bag over her head-" Dusty began.

"-Your services as a historian." Page replied. "We have a problem only a genius of your caliber could solve."

He gave this some thought, appealing to his ego seemed to be a winning strategy. "Okay, hurry up then. I'm missing prime drinking time here."

Florimel cleared her throat: "I've found this Pokemon Trainer's Licence, we need to know if it's legit, how on earth it was issued to me, and what category 'H' is." She held the card out and Dusty snatched it.

"Hmm? It's legit all right."

"You're sure?" Florimel replied.

"I'm never wrong Ms 'Flo-ri-mel Gardner,' H-category? As I live and struggle-to-breathe. This is a rare one. It stands for 'Historical,' basically there used to be? Well, back before you needed licenses, there used to be this thing called 'The Pokemon Gym challenge,' where people would travel round the world, catching Pokemon and challenging each gym leader to a battle. If you won the battle you got a 'gym badge,' and if you got all 16 you could challenge the Elite 4 and then the champion, if you beat all of those, you'd become a new Gym leader, pushing out the weakest existing one- Power, influence, money... You know what Gym Leaders get, it would all be yours... Except back then it came with a bunch of responsibilities, defense of the town, education, you name it. But, here's the twist: If, during your hunt for the 16 badges you lost a single gym battle, you lost your right to train Pokemon at all, forever. Later on of course, when the licenses came in and virtually no one could train, that forfeit was pretty meaningless, so they upped it to death. Then they banned it all together, no normal license allows for it? This one does though. This may be the only 'Historic' license ever printed for all I know? But it's 100% genuine, completely unforgeable." He finished the speech by tossing the card back to Florimel, then he turned to Page and said: "Now can I have my damned wine?!"

As Page and Dusty squabbled over the wine, Florimel stood there, just taking in what this strange 'Dusty' character had reeled off. It was insane. Somehow she had been granted the ability to bet her life on a one thousand to one chance of becoming one of the most powerful people in the world... Fortunately, her life right now was worthless, and one thousand to one were actually quite favourable odds. ?I'm going to do it.? She said. ?I'm going to take the challenge.?

"What?" exclaimed Page, releasing his grip on the wine. "Even if you could get a Pokemon, gym leaders are the best trainers in the world!"

"What have I got to lose? A life that's as good as over already? And if I win, I'll be famous, so I can shine a spotlight on the inequity in this world. I'll be on the front page of every paper? People would listen to me. I'd be the pawn who got to the other end of the board, who railed against kings that sacrifice us pointlessly!" Continued Florimel, a glint in her eye.

"I like this one Page, she's madder than you. Madder than me even." Said Dusty as he swigged away. "Come on, we'll go to the archives, the computer there will be able to see who's issued the card."

Without complaint they left for Dusty's workplace. As they walked, Florimel asked the historian why he drank so much.

"Because I'm brilliant. Because I'm incredible. Because I'm too damn smart? If I told you to picture the perfect historian you would see me. And you know what they have me do? I work in town at the archive, where we are assembling the 'Devon Corporation Sponsored History Of The World.' It will be the longest book in history, the state-endorsed and official historical record, and entirely fictitious. A book of entertaining and re-assuring lies to pacify the populace, to have them believe change is impossible because it's all been tried before and it's all failed. My role in particular is to erase from the final copy any indication that government can be a force for good or that corporate greed has any negative impact. You know there used to be free healthcare for all pokemon? All paid for by taxes, free at the point of use and cheap at twice the price?"

"Yeah." Replied Florimel. "The Pokemon Centres, we don't need them anymore."

"Indeed not, but did you know that there was free healthcare for all humans too? The CHS they called it. The Citizens Health Service, we all paid in a fair amount of what we could, and took out what we needed, so none of us needed to worry about falling ill, even the poor."

"But doesn't that mean that a lot of people would get out way more than they put in? I couldn't afford health care if I paid in all of my wage? Well, the wage I was earning until a couple of days ago?"

"Sure. But you want healthcare right?"

"Obviously."

"And you work as hard as you can, at the best job you can get, right?"

"Yeah?"

"And you still can't afford it? Do you know what that means?"

"What?" Florimel asked, genuinely intrigued. She hadn't heard talk like this in her entire life.

"You aren't getting paid enough? And who's fault is that? Not yours, you already told me you work as hard as you can for as long as you can. It's your boss's fault. They pay you the minimum you're willing to work for, and that the people you're competing for the job against are willing to work for, and since the alternative is debtor's prison, you'll work for so little you can barely keep alive right now. Much less prepare for the future."

"But if healthcare is free for everyone they don't have the option to pay you so little you can't afford it?" Finished Page, who evidently had heard this before.

"So I, the greatest historian you'll ever meet, must spend his days deleting the true history, and implanting a fake version, in which free healthcare is somehow evil and cruel." Sighed Dusty. "And don't get me started on Pokemon? They tell you that Pokemon being trained by everyone was a disaster because it lead to gangs like Team Rocket and terrorist attacks like The Gary Oak Incident etcetera, but these are a couple of rare examples, that we have to conflate and over-emphasize, whilst deleting all the thousands and thousands of responsible trainers from the record-book. If Gary Oak hadn't have had a Pokemon, he'd have had a gun. In the end he was stopped when his Pokemon refused to kill, and took it's own life to stop Oak... Guns can't do that."

********

Their shoes echoed around the grand hall of the national archives, an impressive entranceway of marble and hanging tapestry. "Are you sure we're allowed in here this late?" Florimel asked in a whisper.

"No. I'm sure you're not allowed in here at all, and that it seems like a lot better an idea to try and sneak you in now when it's empty and I'm drunk, than it will tomorrow when it's full and I'm sober enough to know how stupid this is." Replied Dusty with a scowl. "Come on, Julian's this way."

Julian, it transpires, was the huge computer the national archives used. It took up the entire western wing of the building, and hummed and whirred noisily even before Dusty sat down at the terminal.

"Okay?" He said. "Give me the card."

Florimel passed it over and he scanned it against a sensor and then typed in a long code from the back of it. Taking care in the low light to not make any mistakes. "And now, we play the waiting game."

The whirring increased in volume as they waited. "How long will it take" Asked Page?

"Only about 20 minutes. Then it'll feed out a name of the person who printed it, who authorized it, when and why."

"20 minutes? Damn, what are we going to do for all that time?" Page replied with a huff.

"I don't know about you, I shall be drinking my wine." Dusty said, taking a swig.

They sat in silence from that point on. Dusty draining his bottle, Page sat on the floor with his back to the far wall, and Florimel pacing the room. After what seemed like an age a rotund, white-bearded old man walked into the room. "Ah Dusty! What a surprise to see you here out of hours. You're barely here when you're supposed to be? And you brought friends? Now that is not acceptable, it really isn't."

"Mr Elm. I'm so so-" Dusty said, leaping out of the chair so fast it fell over behind him.

"What is this here?" The old, bearded man said, as he covered the distance between them with surprising speed for a man of his apparent age, and picked up the baffling trainer's-license.

"A category H? And genuine." He said, turning it over in his hands slowly. "How on earth did you get this."

"That's what we're here to find out. Sir. I'm sure you can understand how the alarming nature of this card, which my friend here found printed in her own name, caused me to break protocol. By bringing her and her associate in under my vigilant guard." He pointed towards Florimel as he said this, and as Mr Elm looked that way, Page grabbed the empty wine bottle, which Dusty was holding behind his back, and slipped it into his bag.

"Haha, I can certainly understand that young one? and frankly, if I was going to fire you for an indiscretion, I would have done so long ago. But I can't afford to lose your talents, plus, your ridiculous excuses amuse me. Ah, let's see what Uncle Julian has to say shall we." As he said this, the huge computer's frantic noises reached a peak, and a small slip of paper shot unceremoniously from a small slot. "Perhaps Ms Gardner should be the first to see."

Florimel leaned over and tore the paper out. "Redacted. That's all it says. Issuer: Redacted, Authorization from: Redacted. Justification category: Redacted, Date and Time: ? What..? That's almost 4 months ago?"

"Truly a mystery" said Mr Elm, with an excited smile. "Do you three plan on taking the gym challenge? Surely such a bizarre occurrence could not be ignored!"

"The three of us?" Asked Page. "Only Flossy here has the card."

"Yes, but what young Dusty here would know were he a better historian, is that the H category allows for up to two companions, to travel with you, and to even keep Pokemon of their own? Of course in the event of failure the, ahem, forfeit does not apply to them."

"I want to." Whispered Florimel. "But how would we even get our hands on a Pokemon?"

Mr Elm thought for a moment before replying: "Well? I'm an old man, and even if I lived another 20 years I doubt I'd ever find a more auspicious moment? You can have mine."

"Wait? You have Pokemon?" Asked Dusty with a raised eyebrow.

"Yes, young brat. I used to be quite an important Pokemon researcher I'll have you know, and by the time the licensing came into full effect I was already an important enough person here to get a R-Category license, far more restricted than this one of course." Elm said, passing the license to Flossy. "But enough to keep a few little Pokemon around at any given time, as long as I didn't use them for anything worrying? Actually to be honest I rather think they've forgotten I have a license at all."

"Great!" Announced Page excitedly. "It's decided, we leave our awful lives in our awful town behind, and try our hardest to get good at this Pokemon training thing so that Flossy doesn't get killed!"

"Hey!" Exclaimed Dusty. "You two may be on your uppers, but I'm on the up and up. I've got a great job and my own house and-"

"-I'll tell you what." Interjected Mr Elm. "If you leave now, then if I'm still alive when you get back, you can walk straight back into your job. If you don't leave. I'll fire you for bringing these two in to a restricted area, trespassing after hours, drinking on work premises and all the thousands of other infractions you've done in your time here."

"Well, you can't say fairer than that." Replied Dusty with surprising calm. "Let's go see these Pokemon."

******

It turned out Mr Elm lived in a little cottage a short walk from the archive, and the Pokemon were kept in an orangery at the back. As they walked to his house, Page asked Elm about which Pokemon he kept and any advice he had on training them, while Florimel whispered to Dusty "Could Mr Elm be the one who printed the card? It seems like a bit of a coincidence that we have a card, and he has Pokemon to spare?"

"No chance. His clearance isn't anywhere high enough to redact his name on an official request." Dusty responded.

"Who's is?" Florimel whispered to the historian.

Dusty thought for a moment and asked: "Do you believe in God?"

"No." Florimel shook her head.

"Well Gods boss might? Maybe."

The Pokemon were all sleeping in the orangery. But they leaped awake when Mr Elm flicked the lights on. They came running, flapping and crawling towards him, presumably expecting food. They were a Squirtle, the water pokemon, a little Sewaddle, the Bug-Grass Pokemon, and Spearow, the tiny little bird Pokemon.

"Take your pick." Said Elm, to a taken aback Florimel. The Sewaddle was cuddling up against Page's leg, and he knelt down to pick it up and it made happy squeaking noises in his arms. While the Spearow landed on Dusty's satchel, poking it's beak inside to try to get at the bag of crisps he had in there. "Hey, off! Off you! Okay We'll share!" Said Dusty with cheerful mock-annoyance. As Page just squeed as he held a Pokemon for the first time in his life, something Flossy knew he'd always wanted to do. The Squirtle gave her an appraising look, and then, seeing that no food was forthcoming, picked up some weights and started lifting.

"I pick the-" she said, but stopped as he slipped a Pokeball with a blue 'raindrop' hand-painted on it.

"I know." The man said smiling widely.

They spent the rest of the night getting to know their new Pokemon, and reading Mr Elms handwritten books on their behavior, and their capabilities, as the old man brought them snacks and cups of tea. Finally, as the new day dawned, they fell asleep, each with their new Pokemon in their arms.

********

Page sprang into the centre of the Gym leader's training and battling area, sporting the Black heeled boots, thigh high black and white socks, white cardigan and home-made dark grey skirt that had become his or rather 'zer' signature garb over the previous two weeks. 'Flick,' Page's Sewaddle hung in its papoose grinning with excitement.

Page lifted the megaphone to zer lips and belted out to the small crowd: "Ladies, gentlemen and others. I, the great herald Page Voss and my genius associate the ledgenday historian Dusty Noon are proud to present, from right here in Pallet town, 'The Human Battling Machine,' the undefeated, the undefeatable, the incredible, the inedible, the non-biodegradable, the next Pokemon champion of the wooooorld! Florimel Gardner."

There were a few whoops and claps from the audience, who were mostly townsfolk and journalists who had gathered for the novelty of the thing. Although there were a few Police, and Devon and Silph Security Officers who had checked the Trainer's License dozens of times over, sure that there was something dodgy about it, but unable to find anything wrong.

"Why are you drinking so much?" Florimel whispered to Dusty, as they waited for the last few preparations to be made.

"Hey, if I'm going to watch them kill you, I'm not doing it sober. They've already set up the guillotene, this is serious business." He said, between glugs of wine.

"I thought you said Jackson would be out of practice, and wouldn't try too hard?" Florimel said, angry at him.

"No. That's what I said that Elm had said. I personally think you're the craziest person who's ever lived, and will soon be the craziest person who's ever died."

Alf Jackson, the aged Pallet Town gym leader met Florimel and Dusty at their side of the battling area. "What a novelty." He said, as he shook their hands. "I can't remember the last time someone battled for a gym badge? There's still time to back down, I'll tell the people you were hysterical and feverish, if you'd like? To avoid embarrassment."

"That won't be necessary." Florimel told the old man.

"Good luck then? You brave fool." With this he walked away, chuckling to himself as he tottered off on his cane.

"Do you want me to make Bigwingboy take a dump on him?" Dusty asked quietly. The Spearow in question was circling around above.

"Maybe later." Florimel replied.

Page, having finished zer heraldry was walking towards them, when ze passed Jackson, Page held out a hand for the old man to shake, but he took one look at the impromptu-herald's bronze and silver nail polish and shook his head.

"How rude." Stated Florimel blankly as Page reached them.

"Ha, you didn't hear what he said, now that was rude?" The Herald replied. "Are you ready?"

"About as ready as I'll ever be? Two weeks of training? Why did I set myself that target?" Florimel asked the world in general.

"Because that's how long Elm said he'd keep feeding you." Replied Dusty.

Dusty and Page each hugged Florimel and they took a few steps back from the trainer's podium, to the sidelines. "Oh, by the way, one of the Silph guys told me I was fired for this." Page said to Dusty, glumly.

"They can do that?" Asked the similarly jobless historian.

"They can do whatever they want. I didn't tell Flossy because I didn't want to pile any extra pressure on her? Heck, now I say that out loud it sounds pretty dumb bearing in mind her life is on the line."

The referee, who was a local volunteer shouted down her megaphone. "By agreement between the challenger and the gym leader, the following is an official Gym Challenge, and will be a one on one contest. Only one Pokemon will be used by each trainer, and those have already been shown to me, so no countering is possible. Can both trainers now release those Pokemon!"

Jackson pulled one of his Pokeballs from his belt and clicked the button, Florimel picked her only ball out of her pocket and did the same. Shots of red light darted out of each ball and Jackson's Machamp materialised in front of him, Florimel's Squirtle 'Hydro' appeared before her, then glanced back and they shared a nod.

"Ready!" Bellowed the referee? "Fight!"

"Machamp!" Screamed Jackson through the megaphone mounted in the trainer's podium. "Pick that Squirtle up and smash it to pieces. Don't let it move and don't worry if it hides in its shell. Take it now and kill it!"

"Bubblebeam, Hydro!" Shouted Florimel in response, and as the huge, hulking 4-armed fighting type bounded forwards towards the little Squirtle it was hit by a jet of bubbles which exploded all over it, hitting it with a series of strong concussive forces which seemed to cause pain, but failed to slow its stride.

"Eat it up Machamp!" Yelled Jackson.

Dusty and Page's hearts pounded in their chests as the Machamp covered the distance between itself and the Squirtle frighteningly fast. They knew that if it managed to get one of its four huge hands onto the little squirt it would all be over, for both Hydro and Florimel. But Flossy still looked calm and collected, as if she was unaware of the danger she was in, or as if she knew something they didn't.

"33, left, now!" Said Florimel, voice calm and level. With this coded instruction Hydro shot a jet of water along the ground to the right of the Machamp, who paid it no attention, and just as the four-armed beast closed in on Hydro, he used frosty-breath and froze the wet ground into an ice slick, and then threw itself forwards onto the ice, sliding along the slick on his shell, with incredible speed, and firing more concussive-bubbles at the Machamp's side as he did so. When he reached the end of the slick Hydro leaped to his feet, and bowed to the audience who cheered and whooped with amazement. The squirtle was now as far from the confused and frustrated Machamp as it had been when the fighting-type had begun it's charge, but now the beast had taken damage, not much, but it all added up.

Time and time again, the Machamp tried to close the distance, getting pelted with bubblebeams as it did so, and time and time again, Hydro slid away on a jet of ice before it could reach him. Eventually the ice criss-crossed the battlefield and this was as much of a danger to Jackson's Pokemon as the bubblebeams were, in its rage-filled haste to reach Hydro it was slipping on the ice and smashing it's heavy bulk into the rocky earth.

A more compassionate trainer would have called off the battle much earlier, and handed Florimel the win. But Jackson kept shouting out orders to the outmaneuvered Machamp. Who got slower and slower, more and more battered and pained as the match continued, he even commanded it to throw rocks at the Squirtle, but those were easily dodged. Finally, the last bout of bubbles knocked Machamp out, and as he fainted he crumpled to the ground, one massive joint after another, until he laid flat-out. At long last, the referee shouted out those sweet words:

"Jackson's Machamp is unable to continue. Florimel and her Squirtle are the winners!" There was a small cheer from the gathered crowd, and Florimel jumped up in the air, punching the sky in triumph. Hydro ran over to her and they embraced.

"-And as a result of this, Jackson must sacrifice a copy of the Pallet town gym badge, and a cash prize of eighteen-hundred Pokeyen to Florimel, and a prize of 450 Pokeyen to each of her companions!"

Page and Dusty ran out to the podium and shared a massive three-way hug with Flossy. Flick leaped from its papoose into Hydro's arms and Bigwingboy landed gently on Florimel's head. "A picture of the triumphant team for The Mercury?" asked a young journalist, holding a huge professional-quality camera. "Sure" said Florimel and with a bright flash the misfit bunch's six grinning mouths were captured for the front page. This was the first gym badge to be won in nearly 40 years, every paper wanted to report on it, after The Mercury came The Bugle, then The Chronicle, then The Post, and so on.

"Any words for our readers?" asked one reporter.

"Yes." Florimel responded slowly. "Something terrible has happened to our world. We live under an economic system that has robbed us all of the product of our labour, that has destroyed our institutions and that has ravaged our environment. We are little more than slaves, chattle to the rich few, who get fat by standing on our backs. We work ourselves into an early grave for tyrants who can fire us at a whim. I have risked my life for an opportunity to speak out: This isn't the only way, this isn't how it's always been, and this isn't 'the natural way,' it is the product of a concerted effort to make a lucky aristocratic class wealthy regardless of the cost to everyone else. Don't let my victory here distract you. Let it inspire you. Stand up. Come together. Fight. Let's take back what is ours."

********

"? Me and Flick can gather leaves together, ze really doesn't eat much, plus I'm sure Bigwingboy can fly around for fruit, right? So we're only really paying for one Pokemon's food." Page said, pen and paper in hand.

"Yeah, but after the tents and outside clothes and stuff there's really not much money left for even our food." Dusty responded. "It's a shame we had to spend so much on the Pokeballs, but the fact is we did. The next gym leader won't be willing to make their match a one vs one, not after what happened to Jackson, so Flossy will need to have captured and trained up at least two new Pokemon before we even get to Viridian City, otherwise they'll have three and we'll only have one, and we'll be at a huge disadvantage? Correction, another huge disadvantage? How are we even going to find any?"

"We'll, we have aerial recon, and Hydro can search the waterways. So if there's any out there, we'll find them." Page replied.

"We better find something, we got lucky against Jackson. If that Machamp had gotten one hand on Hydro, it would have been all over, and most Pokemon don't even need to get close to you to destroy you." Dusty retorted.

It had been an eventful couple of days since the badge had been won. Gangs of journalists, officials, private police and the like had been hassling them, making it difficult to get anything done. But they had to act fast. Florimel was training and practicing with Hydro day and night. Having studied Elm's books, they seemed sure he would Evolve into a Wartortle soon, that might be enough to give them a victory in the next gym. They knew the next gym leader wouldn't hold back, and they suspected, due to the high number of private security they'd seen, and Page's firing, that the big companies were actually scared that there was an off-chance they'd use Florimel's new fame to inspire change. Maybe it was dumb of them to have railed against inequality in that Mercury article, but she had been overwhelmed with joy at her triumph, and she hadn't held back. Frankly they were all surprised it had been printed, but it was such a big story they figured that they'd lose out to their rivals too greatly if they didn't. And It had been under the headline: 'Deluded radical embarrasses Gym Leader with upset victory.'

They had been crashing in Dusty's little house, but the rent was due in two days, so they'd be tenting after that and they would run out of food-money shortly afterwards, so they had a gigantic task in front of them: Trek to Viridian City, capture at least two Pokemon on the way? Despite the fact that no one had seen a Pokemon on that route in years, beat a gym leader who would be prepared for their every move, and then use the money won in that fight to get to Pewter City.

Dusty had suggested that they give Florimel Flick and Bigwingboy, much to the Pokemons' despair, but apparently the rules stated that the companions needed at least one mon of their own, and frankly, neither had much fighting ability, not yet at least.

Dusty had taken to wearing sunglasses, a leather jacket and jeans. And with his jet black hair the others had to admit that he looked pretty cool, albeit also like a bit of a twat. As the only one of the three of them with too many possessions to carry, he'd sold a lot of his things and that money was pretty much their only resource, so Florimel was so greatful for him. He'd even gifted Florimel a simple but practical outfit, as he had deemed Flossy's cheap rags as too fragile to last the journey.

**********

"Okay guys" Florimel said, as they started the long walk, packs on backs, "Viridian Way, sixteen miles of rolling hills and meadows. Previously the home of thousands of Pokemon. Are there any left?"

"Bigwingboy, fly wide circles above us and tell us if you see any movement." Dusty said, and the Spearow dutifully sprang off his arm and into the sky.

The three people and their associated mons tracked through the unploughed land, desperately searching for any sign of remaining Pokemon. They had mused trying to fish in the sea, but the only nearby water was The Gulf of Pallet, which had been pretty much cleared out, plus, another water-type Pokemon would possess the same weaknesses as Hydro. Hours passed with no result, until, at long last Florimels walking stick, which she was sweeping through the long grass in the hope of disturbing a small, undiscovered mon, hit what at first seemed like a perfectly normal clump of vegetation, until it jumped out of the ground and gave out a surprised yelp. Once it's whole purple boy was visible, it was clear which Pokemon this was.

"An Oddish!" Page bellowed as it scurried away into the grass.

"Bigwingboy!" Shouted Dusty. "Get that Pokemon and pin it down!"

"Here goes." Said Florimel with a note of anxiety as she and her Squirtle ran through the grass to where they could see that Bigwingboy had landed. They came out of the grass into a clearing where they could see the Spearow holding desperately on to the Oddish's leaf, whilst the little creature battered away at it with tentacle-like vines. The grass Pokemon must have been strong, as it was overturning the natural disadvantage grass types have when fighting birds, and was smashing Bigwingboy to pieces. When the Spearow finally noticed his friends had arrived, he let go and fluttered off back to Dusty, who held him in his arms. But before the plant-Pokemon could flee once more, Hydra fronted-up to it, growling at it.

"Hit it with your icy breath Hydro." Florimel instructed, and the Squirtle did as told, a wave of frosty air hit the Oddish and knocked it off its feat. The plant type tried to strike back with frantic, desperate, blind blows with both its long, thick vines.

One vine flew hard into Page's neck, and ze leaped onto the ground in a ball, protecting Flick under zer. The other flew out and hit Florimel in the crotch, she fell to her knees clutching herself in agony, and as the vine flew back down and smashed with considerable force into her shoulder she fell onto the floor. Dusty flinched back away from the torment. One Vine then whipped into Hydro repeatedly who staggered away with each blow, and then retreated into his shell. Florimel managed to grunt out the words: "Bubblebeam Hydro," and the Squirtle stuck it's head out of its carapace just enough to fire out a jet of concussive bubbles. The Oddish gave out a pained wail, and the movement of its vines slowed and became even more clumsy. Florimel prayed that the troublesome little shrub-beast was now too weak to break from a Pokeball, and grabbed one out of a pocket in her jacket, lifted herself up and threw it right at the Oddish's little face. The ball shaked frantically as the digitized Oddish struggled against its confines, before finally it clicked closed.

After a very long pause, the silence only broken by Hydro's exhausted panting, Dusty finally said: "Well thank goodness that's over."

"What are you talking about!" Yelled Flossy, hand still between her legs. "You didn't even get hit!"

"Nope. I don't rush in, I'm not a Pokemon." Replied Dusty.

"Well at least you caught it." Grumbled Page. "I think I'd have screamed if that tough little bugger had broken out."

The day was still young, and after Dusty had cooked a simple meal while the rest licked their wounds, they all got down to examining Florimel's new companion's fighting ability. With trepidation they released the Oddish, and it sprang out of its ball with a squeak. Its temperament was now somewhat subdued. It understood that through holding its pokeball, Florimel held power over it, and it might as well cooperate.

"Hey there chickadee." Florimel said to it sweetly. "Are you ready to go on an adventure?"

The Oddish looked nonplussed, unlike their existing Pokemon, this one was untrained and had been in the wild all its life. But with some convincing, especially from Flick, who it seemed to have befriended, it was eventually willing to show off its attacks, along with its powerful vine whips, it had a serviceable razor leaf. And the rest of the day saw Oddish, who the gang had decided to nickname 'Spud,' mock-battling Hydro, Flick and Bigwingboy.

"The thing's probably had a pretty tough life, escaping the scouring and then fighting for its life on its own in an artificially baron habitat." Page suggested.

"That would explain its power." Added Dusty.

"It's pretty strong already, but it definitely needs a bit of practice and smoothing out. It's all strength, no technique." Surmised Florimel.

The trio set their Pokemon battling Spud again and again for the rest of the day until the light was too low for them to see, then they all curled up in their big tent for the night.

********

A bright light woke Page, ze felt around next to zerself for Flick, but couldn't find it. At the other end of the tent was what looked at first like a bright, glowing orb. It was only after Page's vision had adjusted that he could see the details within the glow. It was Flick, it was emitting a bright, pulsating light? He'd read about this. It was evolving.

"Guys. Get up." Ze whispered as ze crawled down the tent, shaking awake Flossy and Dusty as ze passed them. They murmured in confusion as they woke, and Page added, excitedly but still in a low voice "Flick is evolving."

When ze was close to Flick, Page reached out a hand and stroked the little bug on its head. "You can do it, little buddy. Come on now." The light got more intense, until it was hard to see anything of Flick within it, before finally it subsided, and sat there, looking at its own, new little body with intrigue, was Flick, the Swadloon.

Woken by this happy and unexpected event, Florimel realised that her bladder was full, and excusing herself, trudged off into the night to answer a call of nature, while the others hugged and congratulated Flick. A respectable distance away from the tent, but still close enough to see the torch-light, she squatted down, and as soon as she could be sure that the stream was traveling away from, rather than towards her shoes, she let her mind wander to the subject of how much her life had changed in the last few weeks. It promised to be a lot more interesting and exciting, but also a hell of a lot briefer. Could she really win the league and become a Champion? Could she even use her fame to shine a light on the hideousness of the world and how things were? Could her historian friend stay sober long enough to help her show the world that there was another way? That there had been happier times and that those days could return? Or was she just going to die on the executioner's slab in Viridian. And who the hell issued her with a Trainer's License?

Her business done, and walking back to the tent, she noticed an odd series of humming and squeaking sounds off to her left, heart pounding with fear, and feet frozen to the spot, she turned her head slowly, trying not to breathe in case she made too much noise, and then she saw it. A little grey humanoid figure, with a huge bulbous head, facing away from her. It was glowing slightly in the starlight, and it's little hand hand was slowly moving side to side in front of it, in a seemingly playful manner. As the hand and it's three little gem-like fingers, one green, one red and one yellow passed in front of plants their leaves detached and danced in the air in front of it.

Suddenly the leaves all dropped to the ground at once and it turned to face her. She was glad she'd just emptied her bladder or she'd need a change of pants. It made startled noises and jumped backwards in an almost comical display of surprise, then it raised its hand and pointed it at her, she flew backwards through the air as though propelled by an unseen force, and landed on her rump in some disturbingly wet grass.

Hydro was still in the tent fawning over the newly Swadloonified Flick with he rest of the guys, but she felt on her waist for the Pokeball of her new Oddish, Spud.

"Go Spud!" She exclaimed "Pin that... Whatever it is down!" The little shrub-monster rushed out of it's Pokeball and shot out its little vines, expertly wrapping around the strange Pokemon's body and holding it to the ground. But in the limited light Flossy could see that this wasn't enough to stop the thing attacking, it's huge bulbous head glowed purple, and then a moment later so did Oddish's, and Oddish wailed in pain.

"Hydro! Guys! Help!" Wailed Florimel. And moments later the gang rushed out. Her Squirtle in the lead, and Page, holding the now much heavier Flick taking up the rear. "Hydro" She yelled, "take this thing out with a Skull Bash!" The Squirtle didn't need telling twice, it leaped through the air, and smashed into the strange psychic beast, it's bony head making hard contact with the mystery Pokemon's huge one, it hit right on target as it was still wrapped up in the vines and unable to evade the attack. The Pokemon looked dazed and out of it, and Florimel took her opportunity and threw a Pokeball. It barely even shook before the Pokemon was caught. But she didn't have a moment to celebrate before the victorious Squirtle was engulfed in a ball of light. Her heart pounded as she knew what was about to happen. She rushed to her little Squirtle and embraced it, as it made that step into becoming a Wartortle.

"Alright!" Exclaimed Florimel, still with an arm around Hydro, as Spud nuzzled against her ankle. "I have three epic Pokemon for the gym!"

"Yeah" Replied Page. "An Oddish a Wartortle and an Elgyem! You'll be unstoppable!"

"Elgyem?" Asked Florimel. "Is it powerful, I've never heard of it."

"I'm not surprised, it's pretty rare. But powerful, heck yeah." Ze answered.

"It's all coming together guys." Said Dusty as he hugged the jubilant Florimel, before recoiling back. "Ergh.. What's this on your bum, smells like pee-"

"-Heck I'd have wet myself if that thing had spooked me, so I don't blame you." Interjected Page.

"I didn't wet myself! I went for a pee and then on the way back that 'Elgyem' thing threw me into the puddle!" She wailed in frustration.

"Sure, I believe you..." Replied Dusty. "... Thousands wouldn't."

**********

Dusty spread his arms wide as he crested the hill, encompassing the sprawling mess below them that was Viridian City. "Behold!" He exclaimed, grandly. "The once great regional capital, Viridian!"

"Was it hit by a meteor?" Asked Page sarcastically. The city truly looked awful, shambling, soot-stained buildings huddled around a trickle of dark, noxious ooze that probably was once called a river. Huge factories churned out thick, black smoke and hives of clumsily built slums creaked in the breeze.

"It was struck by something far worse: Industry. They found coal in them there hills, and for a while, they used it to get rich. They harvested the coal slowly and safely, ensuring that it wouldn't run out too quickly. And they used the coal in factories, producing goods so quickly and cheaply, that they were able to pay the human workers well and keep the Pokemon ones safe, and tax the factories and use the taxes to pay for cleaning up the mess the factories made!" Dusty explained as they walked down the road to town.

"Sounds perfect." Florimel remarked. "But how does a town getting rich turn out to be a bad thing?"

"Well eventually a few 'business leaders' complained about the taxes and the rules being unfair. And so they bought an election, and stripped all the rules away. Soon enough they were mining coal so quickly and unsafely that people and Pokemon in the mines were dying every day. Explosions, collapses, floods, gas. You name it. But people had to work there because the factories were even worse! Twelve hour shifts in dark, hot, smoky rooms amongst machines that could tear limbs off you if you miss-stepped. Life's short, hard and painful in Viridian now, oh, and plus the run-off from the miss-managed mines pollutes the water as badly as the chimney stacks pollute the air, oh and there's the occassional mud slide that crushes buildings... Isn't 'progress' fun?"

"But people are getting rich right?" Asked Florimel.

"A handful. They mostly live in big mansions in Cerulean." Dusty scoffed.

"Careful now! You're sounding like a communist!" Florimel said sarcastically.

"And you sound like a teacher in a Silph-run private school! This is what we have to teach the world, that there are other ways. That someone like us, who complains that things aren't fair, isn't necessarily endorsing ludite primitivism, agrarianism or communism or whatever." Dusty remarked with a smile.

The trio walked through narrow streets of rickety shacks, grimy residents beamed when they saw them. One man rushed over to Flossy and grabbed her hand and shook it strongly. "I saw you in the paper! You three are insane! But you're an inspiration! The things you've said in the articles! The way you tore into those rich Silph bastards! They'll kill you, I swear they'll kill you!" He murmured as he shook Flossy's hand, then patted the other two on their arms and wandered off chuckling to himself.

By the time they reached the town hall to register their battle request, they were followed by a small group of people seemingly keeping a respectful distance. Mainly children, but a few adults as well, mostly in work-gear, but a few were, Florimel thought, dressed in clothing that was a suspicious combination of high quality and unmemorable.

********

The secretary gave them a cold look and told them to take a seat in the lobby, while they waited for the Gym Leader, a woman named Stephanie, to be summoned. But informed them that Pokemon were not allowed inside the building, waving a dismissive finger at Hydro, which was the only one out of his Pokeball at the time, that 'That thing will either have to stay in it's ball or outside.' Flossy didn't make a fuss, although Dusty swore not-quite under his breath, which the officious secretary pretended not to hear.

With Hydro in his ball the threesome sat down on some disturbingly soft sofas that threatened to suck them in, and prepared for what, based on the secretary's attitude towards them, promised to be a long wait. Dusty let his head flop backwards onto the back of his sofa as if he'd fallen asleep, although Florimel doubted this, she suspected he, being the avatar of chaos and rebellion he seemed to be, was simply insisting on being as laid back as humanly possible in this formal, granite-floored, mahogany nick-nacked setting. Page on the other hand pulled out one of old Mr Elm's books on Pokemon anatomy, and read diligently with zer tongue slightly poking out of zer mouth in a display of intense concentration.

Flossy herself took in the scene, this whole building was owned by the Silph company, Dusty had told her, which explained it's luxury, the 'Town Hall,' had few actual administrative functions any more, as local government had so few powers left that hadn't been handed over to the corporations, and so it only occupied the top floor, the rest was a local Silph headquarters, and the two shared a lobby... A fairly unsubtle indicator of who was truly in charge.

After she had drunk in this sorry state of affairs for a few slow minutes, a person, who to Florimel's eyes seemed to be a transwoman, who was dressed in the drab garb she recognised as that of a Silph company cleaner, like Page had been until recently. Walked out of a side door and made a half-hearted and extremely nervous attempt to look like she was busy mopping, but did so in a direct line towards where the three of them sat, yet never looked at them. She passed Florimel, still mopping, and dropped a note serupticiously onto the sofa next to her, which Flossy quickly snatched up and shoved into her pocket.

"Ahem!" Called out the shrill voice of the secretary, her heels clicking on the granite as she walked swiftly over to the cleaner who froze in fright. Page put zer book down and Dusty's eyes opened with a look like her was ready for battle. "You are not to be out here when the lobby is open! Imagine if someone important was in here, and their first view of Silph-Viridian was you trampling about!"

"I'm sorry, I-" squeeked the cleaner. But before she could go on, the secretary was back to shouting at her: "What's your name again?"

"Rose Hall, mam-" She squeeked out again.

"-Mister Hall." The secretary barked, emphasis placed on the mis-gendering word. "You are extremely lucky to have this job, and we tolerate you based on the assumption that your role is not customer-facing."

Florimel knew that this was sadly true, the trans community were at the bottom of the pile, and most were forced to remain miserably trapped in their birth gender if they wanted to avoid being beaten to death in debtor's jail. Florimel was horrified to think that this woman, whose even more than averagely desperate state was likely exploited to the point that she would be barely able to afford food, let alone hormones, might be about to be fired in front of their eyes.

Luckily, this is when Dusty spoke out: "Actually you can blame me, I opened that door over there." He said, indicating roughly where the cleaner had come from. "And hollered for someone to come and clean up a drink I'd spilled. I said I was the Vice President of Devon Corporation, and I think this fine young lady is so diligent in her respect for her socio-economic betters, that she rushed to help so fast that she didn't stop to think that I might be joking about who I was, or that she might be breaking the rules by entering the lobby." In Dusty's case, he emphasized every use of the word 'she,' and Florimel beamed as he played on the concept of social hierarchy which he didn't believe in at all, but that in their few minutes with the secretary, they could be sure she was obsessed with.

"I didn't see you go to the door..." The secretary said slowly, but most of the venom was out of her voice.

"You were very busy with your work." Dusty replied with a huge grin.

"Just make sure you get back upstairs right now!" The secretary said, and then harrumphed and went back to her desk.

The cleaner gave a shy smile to Dusty and rushed off back through the door she'd entered through, and as soon as she was sure the woman at the front desk was not looking towards them, Florimel pulled the note out of her pocket and unfurled it, her heart raced as she read it's contents:
'A gunman will shoot you as they leave the building. False witnesses will claim to have seen a man in a Team Rocket uniform with a gun. They are stalling you while they prepare. Instead say you need the toilet. Take the blue door. The door after the Ladies room is a cleaners closet. It has a window out. You will be met by allies.
- A friend of The Wake'

Just as she'd reached the end of the note a woman in an older woman in an extravagant and highly impractical purple dress came down the stairs and made a gesture of presumably disingenuous warmth towards them: "Ah! Are you the fun little threesome of challengers?" She exclaimed in an incongruously upbeat voice. Flossy stuffed the note hastily back into her pocket and panicked. Florimel's mouth was dry. She wasn't sure if she believed the note, but it seemed impossible not to. Delivered as it was by someone who risked penury just to get it to them, and they had been forced to wait for so long, and there were those shady figures following them here, and what had that old man said, about them being killed? All this flashed through Flossy's mind and she was stunned into silence, so that the woman was forced to ask again: "Well are you?"

Dusty answered, covering the silence: "Indeed we are, my friend here must simply be taken aback at the sudden arrival of a gym trainer, you are the wonderful Stephanie I asume?"

"Indeed I am!" She squawked, with a flourish of her arms. "And I won't keep you long, I've just come down to tell you that I'm happy to challenge you to a battle, but it will take some time to prepare the old arena on the hill, let's say... Three days from now at noon. In the meantime you should spend a night on the tiles, you never know when it might be your last." With this she left them, and Page and Dusty got up to leave, Page saying: "Come on Flossy, three days is some good training time, lets make the most of it!"

"Erm... I need the toilet." Florimel butted out. To which the secretary informed her that they were down the hall through the blue door. "Do you need the toilet too?" Florimel asked Page, staring into zer eyes, pleading with zer to take the hint.

"Nah, I'm good-" Ze began to answer, but Page understood her when ze saw the look in her eyes, and finished: "Actually I might as well while I'm here." Dusty seemed to get the idea straight away as he added: "Yeah, sure, me too." and the three departed through the blue door.

"Follow me, trust me!" whispered Flossy urgently after the blue door had closed behind them, and she rushed passed the bathrooms and opened the cleaning closet.

Dusty remarked: "Why not, I've been trusting you for a few weeks now, and so far it's lead me to the most luxurious of places, a cleaners closet must be the best yet."

Ignoring his snark, Flossy scrambled up through the high window, until she was sat on the sill. She found herself looking out at what must have been a narrow man-made meander in the fetid river. Only about five metres in front of her was the back of another brick building, both it and the town-hall they were escaping from were so tall that the sun barely reached them from a postage-stamp sized sky above. A couple of metres below her was a battered and nondescript narrowboat, three people stood on it, one huge, leonine, bearded man with an eyepatch who must have been a full seven foot tall, yet equally, bearishly broad at the same time. Next to him, tending the narrowboat's quiet little engine, was an incredibly pale-skinned woman dressed all in black, and finally stood the transgender cleaner from before, with a sheepish smile.

"Step on down Ms. Gardner." Purred the huge man in a rhythmic Seviian voice. "We don't have much time, or they will kill you like they killed me. And trust me. Death is not much fun."

With barely a hesitation, Flossy jumped down on to the boat, she stumbled, and the huge Seviian man steadied her. ?Are your friends in there?? He asked, and before Florimel had a chance to answer, the cleaner responded: ?They are, both of them.?

?They better come on out, we don?t have much time.? Said the bearded man.

Page?s face appeared through the window and asked: ?What?s going on Flossy??

?Come on down, quick!? Florimel responded.

?This is the only exit you can take if your future plans involve breathing. I?m sorry for the lack of introductions, but we really don?t have much time.? The Seviian explained.

?They passed me a note, the cleaner risked her job, just to pass me a note saying that if we left through the front door we?d be killed. I believe them.? Florimel said.

With a shrug, Page jumped out on to the boat, as did Dusty. The Seviian man hurried the three inside, and they all sat down on rough wooden benches in the cramped interior, with the exception of the woman in black, who piloted the boat around the corner and into the main expanse of the river.

After a moment?s thought, Flossy released Hydro, and sat him on her lap for mutual protection. Page and Dusty did the same with Flick and Bigwingboy. ?Don?t worry.? Said the Seviian man. ?We shall go to a safe-house for the time being.?

?Would you mind awfully, explaining what on earth is going on?? Asked Dusty, passing a glance between Florimel and the man.

?Mr. Noon. A pleasure to meet you. I believe you worked in the archives in Pallet Town before this adventure began? I understand you have a penchant for drinking, and something of a nihilist sense of humour?? The man said, in an almost soothingly sing-song voice.

?Well? You know a lot about me, which frankly isn?t making me any more confident about being stuck inside a tiny boat with you.? Dusty responded. ?How about you tell us who on earth you are??

The man laughed, it was a huge, larger than life explosion of laughter. ?I do apologise. I am so used to hiding my face in this town, I forgot that so many people would not even recognise me. I, It could be said, am a predecessor to you. A man smart, brave, or possibly stupid enough to speak out against the injustice of this world, and I was struck down for it. I even have the scars on my face that you have." He said, touching the jagged scar leading down to him black eyepatch, the comment made Florimel instinctively flinch and touch her own burn scars, something she didn't like to do. "My name is Hereward Bourne.?

?Wait a minute? You?re The Wake! I?ve heard of you! Didn?t you try to kill some factory owner and you got killed by his guards?? Page exclaimed in a burst of revelation, before zer eyes widened with the sudden realisation that this was probably not a particularly sensible or safe thing to say.

The cleaner beside Hereward snorted, and Hereward chuckled again. ?Indeed not. I was murdered in my bed by Devon guards, and while they could easily have pinned it on a random act of violence, as there are certainly thousands of those in this town, they decided to say that I had attempted to murder my tyrannical martinet of a boss, and that his guards had killed me. Unluckily for them I escaped, I lost an eye in the process, but beyond that I survived? But that is very much skipping to the end of my story. Perhaps if you?d indulge me, you?ll let me tell the whole tale.?

As they sat and patiently listened, he recounted a story of life in the Devon Corporation-owned factory. Of abused and misled staff, of Pokemon who spent their life, from cradle to premature grave, forcing treadmills down holes in the dark. Fatal ?accidents? blamed on workers, poverty wages and more. Hereward, it seemed, had led a group of workers who tried to fight for better conditions and pay. They had garnered some level of support around the city, and even a name for themselves: ?The Wake,? but the bosses had cracked down on them, some had been found beaten, others dead. Many had ?left? notes in someone else?s handwriting, explaining that they had left the city to be with family elsewhere. Hereward himself, as leader had ran from his slum home as it was peppered with bullets. Luckily for him he had more ?Wakist? friends than Devon and it?s allies knew about, and he had managed to lay low with them. In the meantime the boat was piloted into the outskirts of Viridian, and moored up against a tall, nondescript building.

?So why don?t you leave the city?? Dusty asked, not unreasonably, once the Seviian man had finished.

?I could never truly be safe anywhere, there is no escape from the powers that be in this world. I may as well hide here as hide anywhere else, a large city is a finer place to hide than a tiny village, there are more eyes to see you, but also bigger crowds to hide amongst. Mainly, I have allies who can keep me hidden, and I have knowledge I can use to help people. I can still be of some use in this world. After all, I saved you guys.? Hereward replied at length.

?How can we be sure you really saved us?? Asked Page. ?Because you passed Flossy a note??

"Excellent curiosity... I believe it's 'Mx' Voss, isn't it? By the way, I have never been one to follow rules simply because they are there, I follow them only when they make sense, the gender binary, I think, is a rule which is followed because it is there." Hereward said as he opened his satchel and lifted out a camera, one of the expensive instant types artists used, this one had ?Property of Devon-Viridian? written on it in white paint. Clipped to the side were a set of photos, he passed them over to Page. Dusty and Florimel leaned over zer shoulders as ze flicked through them, they were taken from inside a building that overlooked the entrance to the Town Hall, the back of a figure dressed in dark colours stood central in the picture, illuminated by the light through the window in front of it, and holding a rifle.


?Here?s his hat.? Hereward said as he threw a blood-covered cap across the table to Page, who shrieked and batted it on to the floor. ?We followed you from the moment you entered the City, and I?ve seen the signs before, the people who followed you, the things they said to each other, the way they dispersed the crowd, the types of people they moved away from you. So I climbed up to the vantage point that I would pick were I to assassinate you, and thankfully for you, I was right.?

"Okay, you've convinced me." Page said, tossing the photos back and clutching Flick to zer chest. "Where, other than from our certain deaths, are you taking us?"

"I thought I'd invite you into my extremely humble abode for a while, It would be a safe place to dwell while I give you all the advice I can on how to stay safe." The Seviian man replied.

Hereward pulled his hood on, covering his face and they left the boat, leaving only the female pilot, who took the boat on without a word as soon as they had all departed into a dingy alleyway. Hereward opened a stained basement-window near the floor of the alley and slid his huge frame in. The young transwoman followed, and the trio of Pokemon trainers did so too, Dusty winging all the way. Inside was a dusty and dark room filled with old furniture, not solid-wood antiques carefully preserved, more remnants of old crap that in richer times would have been considered fit for nothing more than firewood. They followed Hereward as he trudged a seemingly well-trod path to a ladder leading to a trap-door. Through this was hallway on the ground-floor, there, Hereward pointed to a door and said: "Through there is the solicitors office of an ally of mine. A great place to hide many things, as people expect rooms upon rooms of documents in such an office, my friend keeps most of his elsewhere. I translate some tomes for him from the old languages in exchange for my keep, as I refuse to be a parasite on him." They headed up a set of stairs to the next level and there they heard what seemed like several hushed discussions through a thin door, which Hereward pointed too and said quietly "Through here is a chess club. A perfect thing to keep close to hand, a great recruitment area for people with analytical minds and an eye for keeping close to danger but out of trouble." They forgoed the door however, and travelled up another set of stairs. This lead to what seemed like a small storage room containing files, Hereward stepped over to the far wall and put a finger into an otherwise unremarkable area of wall, he pulled the whole section of the wall back, revealing that it was a door, and on the other side were several people, all ostensibly trans, who looked up at the opening of the door, but smiled when they saw Hereward, clearly this was not an irregular occurrence. "Something of a support group." Said Hereward as the trans cleaner left them to sit down with her friends, and the rest continued to a ladder leading to a room on yet another level. "A place they can be themselves, even if only for a few hours a week. It must be a terrible thing to keep up the facade everywhere else." Finally, on the other side of another trap door was a tiny, sloping-ceilinged, windowless attic room, Hereward lit a safety-lamp and sat on the floor. The three did the same, each clutching their Pokemon.

It was grim, barely tall enough for Hereward to stand, even in the centre of the room where the ceiling was highest, there were a few files, what seemed to be a plumbed in sink and toilet, and a collection of rags and sacks that must have formed Hereward's bed, otherwise the place was featureless, although the room wasn't big enough to fit much more in any case, and the four of them barely squeezed into it.

?If I may make a suggestion, you spend some time here, the day and the night at least. I?ll send someone down to the solicitors to pick up some books he has on raising Pokemon, old ones, from before all the censorship, and you Ms. Florimel can read them while I teach your two friends how to keep you safe and breathing in a hostile world.? The Seviian said warmly.

?With all due respect, this place is a little small?? Page began.

?The support group will break up soon, and you can use the room below, there will be plenty of blankets and pillows to sleep on, and of course, you?ll have your Pokemon awake and on the lookout.? He responded.

Florimel sighed, and thought for a few seconds. She didn?t know whether to trust this strange man, but she saw the photos, and it was a hell of a thing to fake. Someone had tried to kill the three of them, and had lost his life over it. In a way it made her feel like they were actually achieving something, she had a single badge in her pack out of 16 in the country, and yet they were causing enough of a stir for people to try and kill them, on the other hand she was freaked out, she hadn?t realized ?the powers that be? would be so direct, she thought she guessed they were idiots for being so careless, not watching their collective backs at all, walking blatantly through the streets without at least Bigwingboy on the lookout for them. More than anything she felt they were tiny and vulnerable, in a huge and dangerous world. They really did need all the help and advice that they could. She said at last ?Frankly, I?m sick of the tent and this sounds as sensible as anything else we?ve done over the last few weeks. Let?s stay here, if you two are Okay with it. I?m more than happy to read through these books of yours, as I?m unwilling to sacrifice a day where we should be training, but we really do need all the self-defence advice you can give us, so I?ll have one ear open for that too.?

And so, it was decided. Hereward had stack after stack of ancient, dusty tomes brought up to them and Florimel sifted through them as the other two listened to him talk at length about ?watching corners? and ?aerial reconnaissance.? Flick kept a patient watch over them, but all the other Pokemon slept while they could. Flossy had decided that she wanted at least one Poke? out of its ball and awake, watching over them whenever they slept, and Elgyem, Spud and Hydro would be taking turns throughout the night, on Hereward?s urging Bigwingboy would be reserved for the daytime, when they were out of doors.

It was in this fashion that they spent the rest of their day, at first in the attic, and latterly in the room below. The books, each written in Hereward?s surprisingly neat and elegant script opened Florimel?s eyes wide. Unlike the censored propaganda-pieces in the libraries, which told you nothing interesting about Pokemon other than the ?fact,? or rather the lie, that they were tools, like hammers or screwdrivers, to be used by the appropriate human with the appropriate need, and unlike Elm?s scribblings, which were little more than diary entries about responses to different feeds, these were inspiring. Many of them were journals by legendary, pre-reform Pokemon trainers who?d been on mystical, awesome adventures throughout wild, untamed regions, in between all the anecdotes about death-defying bravery, there were detailed reports about battle strategy using a host of Pokemon, including Wartortles and Blastoises. In one, she even saw a mention of Elgyems, apparently they were first seen in the far southern wastelands around 50 years before today, and they did not seem to be linked in any way to their neighbours, implying they had arrived from some distance. She wasn?t sure what to make of this, but she knew that Silph and Devon wouldn?t be publishing these books any time soon.

Later in the evening an old, white-haired man brought them up bowls of hearty but rustic stew, and introduced himself as ?The solicitor downstairs.? He shook each of their hands in turn, before returning downstairs without another word. They talked and read, and read and talked for what must have been hours, until long after the noises from the room ceased, signalling that the chess club had too gone home. Finally at long last Hereward signalled that he would be calling it a night and said that he?d be down in the morning before anyone from the support group arrived, to make sure they weren?t caught off guard. And with this, he ventured up the ladder, leaving them the safety lamp, and closing the trap-door behind him.

There was a bathroom affixed to the room they were in, and they took turns to get what was probably the best wash they?d had since they?d left Dusty?s house. Flossy released all three of her Pokemon from their balls and blew out the lamp, so that the only light in the room emanated from the strange Elgyem?s glowing fingers. She gave the psychic Pokemon her pocket-watch and told it to keep guard for three hours, and then to wake Hydro so it could cover the next three, and then finally tag-in Spud for the rest of the night. The Pokemon nodded, made an odd, buzzing squeak and raised it?s strange little arm in a salute.

Page snuggled up with Flick in a pile of blankets in the corner, and seemed to fall asleep almost instantly, but Dusty whispered to Florimel: ?You should organize strategies with your Pokemon tomorrow, what to do if Stephanie has this type, or that type or whatever.?

?Not train?? She replied quietly.

?Hereward says not to, we?re not going that get much stronger in just two days, and if we train in the open Stephanie will see our Pokemon and learn our strategies. We?ll lose way more than we gain.? Dusty responded, after a yawn he continued: ?In fact, Hereward says we should stay here until the battle, lying low. And his allies will spread around the rumour that we got spooked and are going to no-show, to lull Stephanie into a false sense of security.?

?It would be a believable story.? Florimel said, eyes drooping closed. ?After all, she sent an assassin after us, which as far as she knows we killed. But don?t you think it could be some sort of elaborate ruse? We?ve never met this person before after all.?

?I don?t think so?? Dusty began to trail off as he too began to fall asleep. ?I doubt people try to trick people they want dead, by teaching them to use extra vigilance? Plus, he has a fire in his eye. You can?t fake that.?

?Hmmm.? She responded, eyes fully closed now. ?We?re lucky to have met him, we were so na?ve.?

Hereward woke them the next morning in a frankly disgustingly good mood for so early in the day, singing: ?Good morning to you, good morning to you, good morning, good morning-? There were probably other words, but by this point in the song Dusty had thrown a pillow at their host?s head, to which he just laughed, a booming roar like everything else that came out of his mouth. It was bizarre, Florimel thought, he was both a fugitive, hiding right under the noses of the most powerful people in the world, and the single most conspicuous person in existence.

?Boy, girl and variation-thereupon, rise and shine! There?s plenty of time to sleep when you?re dead, which if you follow my advice, won?t be for a very long time.? The Seviian bellowed as Flossy looked around to see Spud stood on a table, surveying the room below it with an intense look on the tiny shrub?s face. Evidently the little Oddish had taken it?s guarding duty very seriously, either that or Hydro had beaten sense into it during their guard-change.

Florimel got up and slunk off into the bathroom to get dressed, hearing a lot of cajoling from Hereward, moaning from Dusty and laughing from Page behind her. She took the moment to look into the mirror at her scars. Ever since that faithful night in the factory when she?d got them, she had recoiled when she accidentally glanced into mirrors or brushed them with her hand. She had only been a child really, only 12, but that was considered old enough to work, by both the law and the factory owners? By the owners of the factory her parents worked at too, she guessed, since they were not paying their adult employees enough to look after children who didn?t earn anything themselves, and where else did they expect their next generation of employees to come from?

Perhaps it had been 12 year olds who had fire-proofed the building? She wondered, perhaps not. Frankly she had been lucky, many others had lost their lives, Page?s mother was one of them. That?s how the pair had met, in the charity hospital, factory workers crammed willy-nilly into any available spot, Page and zer auntie, weeping over the make-shift bed and it?s screaming, wailing contents, and Florimel, face heavily bandaged, unable to see, worrying if the pain would ever subside. It had, the physical pain had in any case.

The clothes Flossy was wearing were Dusty?s so were a bit loose on her, although the historian was skinny, too many liquid-only meals she suspected, but she was on another level of slim, she?d missed a lot of meals altogether, and not out of choice.

She slipped back out into the meeting room to see Hereward physically drag Dusty out of his makeshift bed and across the floor by his feet, to peels of laughter from Page, and, she was happy to see, from all the Pokemon, even the wild-hearted Spud. Although she hadn't known Dusty for long, she felt that she could read his facial expressions, and figured his scowl was partially put-on, and that he was willing to play the stooge to give everyone a good laugh.

Hereward disappeared downstairs while the other two got dressed and cleared up their sleeping areas, before returning with bowls of soup and copies of various newspapers. He informed the trio that he had sent allies out, some to spread the word that the challengers had been spooked and left the city, and were to be considered unlikely to show up for their gym battle, and others to see if they could spy on Stephanie and her own preparations.

They all went back upstairs to Hereward's tiny room to give the trans support group their space, and began to read the newspapers. They were truly quite a genius use of Pokemon's super-human abilities. Until quite lately, the fastest way of getting a message from one city to another, was to ride a tamed-Rapidash cross-country, or to send a homing Pidgey, both of these were dangerous and unreliable, especially before the wilderness was 'tamed,' and 'cleansed' of wild Pokemon, and even now certainly not fast enough for a daily news report, not one which covered the whole world anyway. But some boffins had in the last few years developed a technique using the rare Psychic Pokemon 'Mr Mime.' These weird little psychics could create a sort of 'Telepathic Link,' to another member of their species, especially a close relative, which would persist even over long distances, one could then be shown a message on a piece of paper, which they would broadcast over to their kin, who would display the message, perfectly replicated as letters hanging in air, as if painted on to a sheet of perfectly transparent glass that the recipient Mr Mime held. In this fashion the local newspaper journalists could send lies, mistruths, selective representations and self-serving propaganda across the nation in minutes, while the public could never hope to afford such a luxury.

Many of the stories in today's papers did indeed come from far flung places, such as a water-shortage in Fuschia, apparently to be blamed on 'wasteful home use,' and a gun-murder in Vermillion, but more than a few centred on events right here in Viridian City, one interview from the local gym leader caught her eye, apparently Stephanie was 'nobly insisting on still fighting the aloof Florimel Gardner, despite her unwillingness to show up to the public events she had been invited to, and despite the numerous rumours of Ms Gardner's criminal past.' It would have been funny, if it wasn't so depressing, the power that the self-elected wealthy wielded knew almost no limit it seemed.

********

?As Ms Gardner has until twelve noon to arrive in time for the start of this Official Pokemon League gym battle, otherwise she will be disqualified from this and any subsequent battles, and she will have her license revoked for life!? The referee announced through a megaphone. To boos and hisses from the capacity crowd, which gathered in the knackered old stands of what was usually the football stadium. ?This gives her twenty more seconds to enter the stadium!? He yelled, pointing up to the stadium?s huge clock. ?After that point, I will be forced to officially call the match in the favour of Stephanie.? The gym leader, dressed in a flamboyant puffy pink gown, waved to the audience at the mention of her name, a few more people booed and hissed this gesture.

?Ten!? The referee announced, ?Nine! Eight!? As he continued a chant rang out around the stadium, ?Give her time! Give her time!? But there was no sign of Florimel whatsoever, unless you were a particularly eagle eyed viewer, who knew where to look, in which case you may have noticed a tiny little Spearow on the roof of a stand, bouncing around on its little talons in excited anticipation.

As the referee reached ?five,? and as the smile on Stephanie?s face, and the faces of the more expensively dressed audience members grew, Page opened the huge leather great-coat that Hereward, the giant of a man had loaned him, and Flick, who was snuggled up inside it, in zer papoose, shot out two iron-hard leaves and effortlessly and harmlessly, with the deceptive strength all small Pokemon possessed, pushed two stewards, who were guarding that area of the crowd, apart, giving Page the space to vault over the barrier and shout into zer Megaphone, this too, gifted to them by Hereward, who frankly Page couldn?t imagine ever needing one, since his voice was almost comically booming.

?Well, well well?? Said Page, while ze walked into the centre of the field, taking the cowl of zer head with the free hand and letting the greatcoat fall to the floor as ze walked.

The crowd must have recognised Page?s outfit from the newspaper pictures, because the response was incredible. Less a cheer and more just a scream of uncontrollable excitement. It was so shocking that even the stewards were distracted by it, giving Flossy and Dusty the opportunity to jump out onto the pitch from the other side, without Hydro having to barge a hole open in the security for them.

If Page had thought the crowd couldn?t have gotten louder, then ze was wrong, as soon as the other two also removed their disguises, and people saw the valiant Pokemon trainer herself, they exploded, it was deafening, exhilarating, the hairs stood up on the back of the young herald?s neck.

After waiting for a moment to let the noise die down enough so that ze would actually be heard, and while still walking towards the podium, to meet Flossy and Dusty there, ze repeated: ?Well, well, well? If it isn?t the underdog?s underdog, the master of the Poke-craft, the blood and guts socialist herself? Florimel ?She must be Viridian City dreaming, because she?s about to leave the crowd screaming, because she?s a Wartortle-raising demon! Who?s about to give Stephanie a creaming!? Gardener!? By the time ze had finished talking, the crowd were chanting ?Flo-ri-mel, Flo-ri-mel?,? and Stephanie looked disgusted, Page gave her a small wave, and she forced a smile and gave a little clap and courtesy, clearly pretending to be amused by the whole scenario, when she was obviously disgusted.

?Thanks for that Page.? Florimel said as they met in the middle of the muddy field, at the challenger?s podium. ?We?ve really got them pumped up, and it looks like Stephanie was genuinely surprised we showed.?

?Speaking of which?? Said Dusty with a grin as a woman ran over and checked the challenger?s podium?s microphone was working, clearly they were so sure that they wouldn?t be battling today that they hadn?t bothered to do this earlier, before the crowd turned up.

They all shared a smile at this, but it was serious business. As much as it looked like a happy day out for all the family, and the audience was certainly enjoying themselves, well except for the rich few in suits in their own cordoned-off little corner, who looked deadly serious, as much as this seemed like fun and games? There was still a guillotine in the corner of the pitch, and if Flossy failed, it would be used.

With the crowd still amusing themselves with chants, Flossy hugged Page and Dusty in turn and they walked off to the dugout behind Flossy?s podium, and at last the referee began to start the match.

?This is an official Pokemon League battle!? He recited, although Florimel could barely hear him over the noise of the crowd and the pounding of her own heart. ?? official Viridian City Gym Badge?? She was confident that her days of learning Pokemon anatomy and researching successful strategies of former, pre-reformation trainers were well spent, unfortunately the research into what Pokemon Stephanie would be using was less fruitful. They had tried to work out which Pokemon she had using Bigwingboy?s aerial recon and Hereward?s spies, but Stephanie seemed to train only in her gym, and as well connected as Hereward was, he had not worked out a way of seeing inside that building. ?? each trainer will be using three Pokemon, the first of which to be selected now-? At this point, as rules dictated, both Florimel and Stephanie picked a Pokeball out of their belts, and held it at arms-length in front of them. ?-And shall be released at the sound of my whistle, after all three of one trainers have been rendered unable to battle, due to unconsciousness or death, the other trainer is declared the winner!? She felt so small and so alone in the middle of this arena, and wanted desperately to glance back at her friends, as she was frightened to death, and wanted to see their reassuring faces, but she daren?t break her gaze, as she stared at Stephanie. ?Get ready!? The ref bellowed. ?It would be an interesting way to die,? she thought, ?to just faint from nerves right now, wouldn?t it?? ?On your marks!? He shouted. ?Show time Flossy,? she thought, taking one last deep breath. The ref blew his whistle, which rang out across the stadium, and both trainers clicked the button on the front of their selected Pokeballs, Flossy releasing Spud the Oddish, and Stephanie releasing a Pokemon she?d never even have heard of if she hadn?t read through the books Hereward had provided her.

?Go Trevenant!? Stephanie exclaimed, Flossy didn?t bother to announce Spud?s name, she knew the creature would already be in a battle-ready state of mind, and would only be worried about commands. Trevenant was a giant, ghost-infected tree, a six foot, walking wooden beast, capable of using both grass and ghost-type attacks, grass being strong against Hydro, and ghost being strong against Elgyem, she was stuck with keeping Oddish in, which was hardly a favourable match-up.

?Trevenant! Use Will O? Wisp!? Yelled Stephanie, and the giant tree opened it?s gnarled, wooden mouth and a deep, moaning, disturbing wail rang out, accompanied by a single, small blue fireball which the beast belched towards Spud.

?Spud, 22, now!? Flossy shouted instinctively, and the Oddish shot out it?s vine whips, and used them as giant stilts to lift itself up and spring to the left, neatly avoiding the flame. ?It knows fire moves too,? she thought to herself, as the little Oddish fell back to the muddy floor. ?That means it counters my whole team.?

The contrast between the giant, gnarled, ancient-looking ghost-tree and her little Oddish was alarming, it looked like one good hit and her Pokemon would be down for the count, and Oddish knew few attacks that would make much impact on a fellow grass-Pokemon.


?Spud!? she yelled, ?Use Poison Powder, now!? The little shrub scrunched itself up as it prepared to release the spore-like poisonous pollen, and then leaped into the air as the powder shot out from it in a jet that struck the giant tree-monster square on, coating it in a glob of poisonous sludge which burned it?s bark. Although the tree didn?t look particularly fast, it did come as something of a surprise to Flossy that it didn?t try to dodge at all. Her confusion lifted a moment later, as the giant tree shook itself and grunted, and the toxic sludge seemed to boil off it, leaving the Trevenant ostensibly unharmed.

?Good job Trevenant, now use Phantom Force, I?m tired of playing around with this little shrub!? Stephanie instructed, in a patronising and off-hand manner. The giant wooden Pokemon scampered forwards, it?s six legs moving in a complex, many-kneed fashion that was slightly off-putting to watch.

?Dodge it spu-? Florimel started to say, as the Trevenant halved the distance between itself and her Oddish, but then it disappeared with a flash of purple light, she gasped, as did many in the crowd, as with another flash it appeared just behind Spud, and smashed the Oddish hard into the ground with a giant, heavy wooden fist. While her attack had been completely rebuffed, the Trevenant had managed to teleport right behind her Pokemon and take it unawares!

?Get out from under there, for Arceus? sake!? She screamed as the Trevenant pounded down on her little Oddish?s head again and again, to the cackles of Stephanie over the microphone. With some struggle, Spud managed to wiggle out from under the beast and bounce away, but she knew that escape was hopeless, you can?t outrun a Pokemon that can teleport at will! She had to turn around and go on the offensive, but ?Toxic? had been shrugged off, and grass-based attacks would be virtually harmless against a giant tree? She was desperate to try anything.

?Try a Moonblast!? Florimel yelled, this was not a move she figured she?d need to use, so she hadn?t even bothered to teach Spud a code word for this, but dutifully, the little shrub blasted out a pink ray of arcane light, that smashed into the Trevenant and made it stagger backwards, groaning unpleasantly in pain and surprise.

?Will O? Wisp again!? Shouted Stephanie in disgust, and her Trevenant shot out another glob of bluish flames, this time it did connect, and Spud staggered back in pain and rolled around on the ground to stop the burn.

?Counter with a number nine!? Barked Flossy, which was code for an even more desperate strategy. Hearing this, the Oddish managed to pull itself back together, and flailing leaves and vines and limbs, Spud performed a ?Teeter Dance,? a mystical manoeuvre which confused and befuddled the Pokemon it was used on.

?Shake it off and use a Wood Hammer!? Stephanie screamed at her Trevenant, as it stood, swaying as if in a heavy gale, and looking around as though it couldn?t tell where the instruction had come from. ?Come on! Use Wood Hammer!? She barked at it in frustration, and it tried to obey, smashing it?s huge arms into random patches of grass which it must have thought contained her little Oddish.

?Hit it with another Moonblast!? Flossy instructed, and it did, this time an even larger blast of silvery light, cracking the bark of the Trevenant and eliciting another wail of discomfort.

?Damn it Trevenant! Hit the little sapling with another Phantom Force!? Stephanie called out, and the beast complied, disappearing from existence once again, and then reappearing a moment later, but this time it must have misjudged its destination, as it materialised with a purple flash about ten metres above the field, and crashed down heavily onto the grass, completely knocked out.

?Trevenant is unable to continue! Florimel leads the battle three Pokemon to two!? The referee called out, as Stephanie?s eyes opened wide in amazement and disbelief, and as the crowd erupted into applause. Florimel leaped up in the air and cheered, unable to control herself or keep cool. Spud gave a bow, or as close to a bow as an Oddish can manage, but they didn?t have long to celebrate, as Stephanie was readying her next Pokemon.

Looking furious, the gym leader threw her next Pokeball hard onto the ground and yelled: ?Go Crobat! Destroy this weed with a Brave Bird!?

The huge bat with a wingspan nearly as long as Florimel was tall appeared in mid-air, bursting out of its ball and flying down in a lightning-fast swoop, and before Flossy could even instruct Spud, her Oddish had been nailed head-on by the poison/flying type. ?Well,? she thought to herself as she pushed the button on Spud?s Pokeball, retrieving her Pokeball, ?That advantage didn?t last long.?

The crowd didn?t boo or jeer as the referee declared that they were now tied at two Pokemon left each, and the Crobat returned to a higher altitude, where it circled around in large, wide loops, like a carrion-feeder circling Flossy?s corpse.

?Good boy!? Stephanie yelled, praising her Crobat and giggling like a little girl in an infuriatingly childlike manner.

Florimel felt lucky though, what Crobat had going for it was speed and the aerial advantage shared by all Flying Types, but if Hereward?s old books were anything to go by, she knew that they were seriously lacking when it came to stamina, they couldn?t take many hits and stay up in other words, especially not from a psychic-attacker like Elgyem, which she released without a word.

She didn?t call out its name, because she figured there was a chance that Stephanie had never seen one before, because it was, by all accounts a rare and mysterious creature that few had come into contact with. So she didn?t want to announce its name due to the possibility that Stephanie would know what an ?Elgyem? was, and how to counter it, but not recognise it by appearance alone.

The odd little creature made some happy, excited squeaking noises as it appeared outside it?s Pokeball, floating in the air telepathically. ?Psyshock now!? Florimel cried out, and the little creature held up its stubby grey arm and prepared to mentally devastate the Crobat, but Elgyem is not a particularly speedy Pokemon, and the flying-type came in for another Brave Bird at its owner?s order, and it smashed into Elgyem before it could get an attack off. The contact sent Elgyem flying and tumbling backwards through the atmosphere, but not falling out of the air, unperturbed, and with barely a squeak of protest, it carried out it?s Psyshock attack anyway. It?s large, bulbous head and Crobat?s sleek, aerodynamic one both glowing pink at the same time, as Crobat wheeled away to perform another circling loop around the stadium and come back for another attack.

The poison-bat screeched in agony and confusion, and before it got back up to the top of it loop, it slowed, jerked to one side and suddenly plummeted out of the air. Stephanie returned it to the Pokeball before it hit the ground, but it was fairly obvious that the Crobat would be taking no further part in the proceedings. The referee announced it to make it official: Florimel lead once more, two Pokemon to one, Elgyem was hurt, but still standing? Or floating anyway. The advantage was hers, but that didn?t steady her heart, she had no idea what Stephanie?s last Poke was going to be, if it was something that could dispatch a wounded Elgyem and then still take on a Wartortle, she was dead.

She released her last Pokemon, an almost human-sized flying bug with huge sythe-shaped arms by the name of Scyther. Once again this Pokemon was vastly quicker than Elgyem, and it had swooped in for an X-Scissor attack as instructed by Stephanie, long before Elgyem had been able to charge up a psyshock powerful enough to be of any real use. Once again, the one-Pokemon advantage she had managed to earn herself had ended up being worthless, Scyther was completely unscathed, and the gym battle was reduced to a one on one, her little Hydro, against the gym leader?s big bad monster, she could only hope that she managed to pull off the same result. The problem was, she figured, the fact that Stephanie doubtlessly had many Pokemon to choose from, and must have known from Flossy?s previous battle, and from the spies that had evidently been following her, that her ace was a Squirtle, or rather, a Wartortle, so while she was heartened by the fact that she wasn?t forced to face an electric type or a grass type, who would have an innate advantage over her water type, she figured this Scyther must have something up its sleeve when it came to fighting Wartortles? Perhaps it was simply the creature?s ability to fly, something that would have saved Machamp in Florimel?s last battle.

?Go Hydro!? She announced, and out came her Wartortle. This elicited a huge cheer from the crowd, she doubted many, if any recognised him from the previous battle, as the crowd in that event hadn?t been overly large, and for most people travel was an unaffordable and needless luxury, but they must have read the report of that battle in the newspapers, and recognised that this was a returning victor.

?17, now!? She yelled, this was code for an Icy Breath attack, a move which would be powerful against the Scyther, since it was a thin Pokemon, lacking bulk or volume, but possessing a huge surface area, meaning moves which effect a Pokemon?s temperature were hard to stand. It was also a move which effected a large area, and Hydro knew to spread the blast as wide as possible when fighting a flying type, so the Scyther, quick though it was to dodge and dart as it flew towards Hydro, couldn?t quite avoid the blast, and clearly took a lot of damage from it. Much like Crobats, Scythers were strong, fast, but frail. Florimel had to hope that her Wartortle could inflict enough damage to take it out in the short time she had before it inflicted a knock-out blow on Hydro.

The Scyther jerked in the air, but managed to pirouette around and continue on its swift course. Hydro was smacked with an X-Scissor before it was even able to retreat into its shell, luckily Hydro was much more resistant to such attacks than Elgyem had been, and although he was thrown backwards through the air and slid across the ground on its back, he jumped straight back onto its feet, looking all business. The Scyther charged through the air at Hydro once more, but this time Florimel quickly ordered her Wartortle to perform a ?Number 99.? In other words: A Head Smash Attack. The Scyther landed in front of the water-type, and slashed both its razor-sharp sickle-like arms in hopes to decapitate Hydro, just as Hydro?s hard head disappeared inside it?s skull with surprising rapidity. The Scyther was facing straight at Florimel, and she could see, for a split second at least, a sick, smug grin on its face, evidentially the huge bug must have seen the head disappear, and assumed it had been cut off. But before it could celebrate, the hard, thick head of Wartortle re-emerge from it?s at the same moment as Hydro jumped in the air, meaning the Wartortle?s huge, heavy head smashed straight into the thin, frail exo-skull of the Scyther with a loud ?thunk? noise. The Scyther staggered backwards, it?s head pointing straight upwards, then teetered around for a moment, and finally fell over to one side, unconscious.

The crowd roared so loud that she could barely hear the referee announcing the result, Florimel slumped to her knees and started sobbing, as Hydro ran towards her. She embraced the Wartortle when it reached her, and a moment later was glomped from behind by Page and Dusty too. It was an overpowering moment, but Dusty soon cut it short, dragging her back to her feet and telling her: ?Well done, kiddo. But the real show starts now.? He said this pointing at the crowd, who were screaming with excitement.

?Yeah. I?ll grab my new badge, and then lets hit the town centre.? Florimel replied. ?Page, are you still up for taking the money and hitting the Pokemon Infirmary with Spud and Elgyem??

?Sure, no problems, I?ll have Flick with me, and not to mention Rose.? Page replied, taking Elgyem and Spud?s two Pokeballs from Florimel?s belt, as they walked towards the referee?s stand to shake hands with Stephanie and accept the badge and cash. Rose, was the girl who?d saved them at the Town Hall, by passing Florimel a note.

?Pokemon heal fast when they?re cared for.? Added Dusty, which was true, it was in many ways one of the most incredible part about Pokemon? Or perhaps one of the most incredible parts about humans, as we are the only sentient creatures on the earth for which it is not the case. If you killed a Pokemon, they stayed dead. But it takes a lot to kill one, and anything less than death could usually be fixed with the right medicines and a few hours of recovery time. ?So we?ll swing around in the morning, so long as they?re healed well enough to leave, Hereward will be getting us out of the city discretely.?

?It might be fairly obvious where we?re headed, but Viridian Forest is still pretty big and there are a few different ways to the gym, so we want to give the spies as much trouble following us as we can.? Florimel confirmed. ?I?m sorry you have to miss the chaos, but I don?t trust anyone but you two with my Pokemon, not even Hereward himself, and I?d rather Dusty gets practice with Bigwingboy?s aerial recon role.?

"Good luck guys." Page said once they'd hurriedly grabbed the badge and cash, shook begrudging hands and headed off. Page kissed each of them on the cheek and hurried off in another direction, towards where Rose and a few of Hereward's other friends would be waiting to escort zer to the closest infirmiry. With so many impossible to control witnesses, and with Flick, they figured ze would be about as safe as anywhere from the potential of assassination, although frankly Florimel really hoped that she herself was the only target they deemed worth 'snubbing out,' and that they would leave the other two alone.

********

Dust and Florimel lead an ever increasing flow of supporters through the streets, who clapped pans together and chanted songs, as Florimel screamed into the megaphone which Page had used previously: "This inequity is not 'the only way,' it is not 'natural,' it is the result of a concerted effort to enrich the few at the cost of the many." This rhetoric continued as they reached the very centre of town, an empty stone plinth stood in the middle of this large opening, and Dusty and Florimel scrambled on top of it. "The papers will spin me as 'an inspiration,' as 'proof that anyone can make it if they work hard enough, or have a bright idea.' But the fact is that I have worked as hard as I could since I was eight years old, and I've had many bright ideas, but it has got me nowhere, in the sweatshop and typing pools I have worked in, I spent every waking hour of each and every day toiling closer to an early grave and into further and further economic strife... And there was no way out, not in this world, not with the ladders so well and truly greased, not for people like us. The fact is that in the last couple of weeks I have made an impact in this world, achieved something that many would call 'great,' due to luck and incredible coincidence. And this is the tale of this modern world, the age of oppression, the age of division... The hard working are exploited as wage-slaves, the bright have their ideas ignored, and the lucky, in almost every case, those lucky enough to have been born to wealthy families, make nothing, progress nothing and take everything." The crowd roared and whistled with appreciation, they knew this was true. "I know you know this." She continued. "Few say it, but we all know it in our hearts. But we must stand up, not violently, not through chaos or ransacking. This is what our oppressors want to slander us with, that we are a mob. We must stand up and challenge everything: Demand fair wages, demand dafety at work, demand a re-distribution of land, of money. Demand fairer elections, with greater oversight, and use that power, that democratic power to take some of the power grabbed up by the big companies over the last few decades and put it back in the hands of the people, of the democratically elected representatives! And if they should happen to write in the papers, that I told you to riot, or that I told you to love the system and bow down to your 'rightful economic betters,' or if they tell you that there were only a few people here, and everyone else had gone home... Then demand that the papers will be called out and punished for willfully printing mistruths."

?Let us take back knowledge and culture, let us throw open the doors of the museums and galleries, have the state control them, and make them free for all, rather than just those richest few who can afford them. Let us do the same with the libraries, let us challenge what we have learned in school! Why should we die in the streets in front of hospitals we can?t afford? Why should our children have to work, when they should be in school?? It carried on like this for hours, with Hydro stood at their side like a proud sentinel, she spoke, Dusty spoke, and eventually members of the crowd got up to speak, but wearing hoods to hide their identities, lest they be spotted by their employers. Technically, everything they were doing was legal, apart from possibly breaching a minor law on obstructing traffic, and they figured no one would try charging so many people with that, especially for such a popular gathering. Eventually no one was left speaking, and the gathering just turned into a party, people shared food and played music and in time, as the night got old and morning approached, they all drifted homewards. Florimel, Hydro and Dusty did too, that is to say, with Bigwingbow flittering protectively between roof-tops above them, they were led by Hereward through a winding maze of alleys until they reached his boat, on which they spent the last few hours before their planned meet-up with Page and the over Pokemon having a well-deserved sleep. Hereward shook her hand firmly and then embraced them both, as soon as they were safely inside the boat, telling them that he had heard it all from a hiding place, and was extremely proud of them.

Page, having paid up at the infirmary met them at the river?s edge in the morning, unrecognisable in Hereward?s giant hooded coat, but whistling a pre-agreed tune. Ze jumped aboard and they headed off to their next challenge. One of the largest wooded areas left on the continent and probably one of the best places for finding new Pokemon, namely: Viridian Forest.

Hereward filled their packs with free food and Pokemon supplies took them downstream to a shallow reed-bed in a swampy, marshy area at the edge of the forest, somewhere which Hereward promised them was ?off the beaten track,? and ?unlikely to be a spy?s first guess,? he gave them a map, and although he told them it was a little out of date, she thanked him hugely, as she had feared they would be trampling around dangerously at random, and although there was a road through to Pewter City, there objective was to avoid this in order to be harder to track. It was clear that the pollution in the river was having a major effect on this area of the forest, the trees were blackened, sparse and dying, luckily the Viridian River was only one of a few which supplied the forest with water, and the others were, Dusty assured them, cleaner sources.

Hereward wished them a fond farewell as they stepped off the boat, he told them they would always have a safe place to stay if they were ever in Viridian City again, and then the boat started chugging off, and he left them alone in silence. It was true silence as well, the river was wide and sluggish here, so made virtually no noise, and there was obviously no noises from Pokemon, at least not this close to the edge, where Pokemon Rangers with rifles and trained Braviary?s would be a constant threat.

********

?I?m genuinely sad.? Said Page, as they trudged up the mud bank in their wellies.

?I know, I?ve met you.? Replied Dusty, sarcastically.

?Hardy-ha-ha.? Replied Page, flashing him a scowl. ?I mean about leaving Hereward behind. He?s changed our lives forever, maybe he?s given us the opportunity to change many more ourselves, to do what he never managed to do. Maybe, just maybe.?

?If you had been there in the town square you?d believe it. I?m starting to think it?s possible, that we could make an impact in people?s lives? Florimel stated as they trudged into the tree-line. The floor was rough and uneven, and they were forced to climb over rotting tree branches that threatened to take their legs out from under them.

?I heard it from the infirmary. Nothing specific. The roar of the crowd at least.? Replied Page as the three of them began to fall into step behind Hydro, who seemed perfectly sure-footed, even in this rough environment. Following him looked to be a good way of guaranteeing you were on the safest path. ?By the way.? Page continued. ?The people of the infirmary were very nice, overworked, undersupplied, but nice. From what they talked with me about I think they saw our point of view. I think the people who spend their lives looking after sick Pokemon probably don?t like the way things are right now very much.?

Following map and compass, the group continued for hours, although with every natural landmark masked by the increasingly thick trees around them, they needed Bigwingboy constantly flying up above the canopy and taking a look around to make sure they were still heading in the right path, and translating his squawks was a long process. They planned to do what would be a long, looping path avoiding the road, but eventually reaching the Viridian Camp, which was quite a large settlement in the centre of the forest, originally built on top of a silver mine, but the silver had long since dried up. The camp had remained however, as a central outpost serving loggers, naturalists, travellers between Viridian and Pewter city, as well as those brutes who purged the forest of Pokemon all those years ago, and the Rangers who still to this day made sure Pokemon nests didn?t make a return. It was one of the smallest settlements to feature a Pokemon Gym, and even Dusty knew little of what else took place in the forest nowadays, although he knew that there were a few other, smaller settlements elsewhere within it, and that it was not earmarked for pasturalisation any time soon, as the land was determined to be less suitable for farming or settling than other available locations, primarily because there were too many slopes and hills. Dusty had said that there used to be a science in hill-farming, building a series of flat, step-like terraces, but no one bothered with that anymore since it required too many human experts, and he said experts could demand higher wages, strike or withdraw their labour, since they were harder to replace, and so the companies preferred to farm on the flat using untrained labourers and Pokemon-muscle. Florimel supposed it was the same with the factories, everyone was given as minor and repetitive a task as possible, so that they never learned enough to be valuable, to be hard to fire, expensive to replace. She supposed it hurt the products they made: If someone made one cog every day, but had no knowledge of the machine it fit into, the role it performed, the other cogs it moved, then surely they would make inferior cogs? They wouldn't know which feature of the cog was most important, and they certainly wouldn't be able to help innovate a better cog.

It was clear from the map that the forest was shrinking however, it was only a few years old and according to what it showed, they should have been able to see the forest very clearly from Viridian City, and yet while they were there, it had only been a smudge of green at the very edge of vision.

Many, many hours and far too few miles into their arduous journey, something happened which stopped them dead in their tracks. As Flossy was scrambling up a small but steep slope, grabbing tree limbs on the way, lest she slide all the way back down, there was a scream from behind her. She swung around, Elgyem?s Pokeball already in her hand and finger on the button ready to release it by the time she was facing Page, who was stood stock still, eyes wide open as the shape on zer chest, which Florimel knew to be Flick, was glowing bright white. Flossy relaxed and cracked a smile, pocketing the ball. And Dusty slapped Page on the shoulder supportively.

?Oh goodness it?s happening!? Page whispered minutely. ?Flick is about to be a Leavanny!? Ze daren?t move an inch throughout the entire process, and even stood still as the expanding shape of Flick burst through the papoose Page carried it in. Finally, after what seemed like hours, but was probably only a few seconds, Flick stood tall and proud, in its final evolutionary stage. It was a Leavanny.

The first thing it did was look down at its body and squeak in delight, the second was hug Page tightly, who squeaked in zer own joy.

?You know, in captivity, Swadloon are said to evolve when they feel a sense of intense friendship, similar to their familial links in the wild.? Dusty pointed out, although the others knew this already. ?I guess this little shrubble-bug really loves you.?

?It sure does, and I love it too!? Exclaimed Page from within the joyous bear-hug.

Like all Leavanny, the newly evolved Flick stood nearly as tall as a human, and was a bipedal bug disguised as huge, fresh, green leaves, and with two long, slim arms shaped like curved leaves. These could be held ridged and used like blades, as they were presently being, as the Leavanny hacked and slashed its way through the undergrowth ahead of them, or they could be soft and supple arms used for holding objects.

The cute bug type kept pausing to eat leaves off the trees they passed through, clearly hungry from evolution. But apart from this surprise evolution, no new Pokemon had been spotted, or even signs of one, and the sun seemed to have long since passed above them, meaning they must have been travelling for at least six hours.

?The next clearing of any size, we?re setting up camp.? Florimel declared. ?We can?t keep walking all day, and I want to do some more practise bouts.?

?Good idea.? Dusty agreed. ?If we really can?t find any more mons we will be at an immense disadvantage. The next gym leader will know exactly what we?re going to use, before the match even starts. So we need our guys to be as powerful as possible.?

Page looked around at the expansive forest. ?We?ll find something. If we could find Pokemon on the Viridian Road, we?ll find some here.?

They trained, ate, laughed and slept hard the rest of the day. By the time they?d finally got their heads down they were so tired that they instantly fell asleep. Spud had been spared battling duty for the day, so he kept guard all the way through to the morning.

At some point in the night, Florimel awoke as a weight landed on her chest, in the pitch blackness of tent she panicked, and moved towards her Pokeballs, but as she did so, she disturbed the weight on her torso and a squirming, groan came from a shape next to her. She could tell it was just Dusty, who must have rolled on to her in the night. Florimel laid back down, unwilling to wake the historian up and have his sleep be as ruined as her own already was. The three of them sharing one big tent was a necessary evil, they simply would not have the time or energy to pitch three separate tents throughout their journey, even if they could afford to buy them, and in any case, if crowded sleeping arrangements were the worst thing they'd have to endure on this near-suicidal mission then they'd all be very lucky. Dusty squirmed in his sleep again, and his arm travelled further up Flossy's torso, so it rested on the bare flesh of her clavicle.

Quite to her surprise, feeling the hairs on his thick, masculine arm on her bare skin, and his soft breathing in her ear excited Florimel slightly. Perhaps it was the long, warm day after long warm day of being over-stressed, over-worked and over-tired, perhaps it had just been too long. 'Arceus sake,' she thought to herself. 'You're on a quest in which death is on the table! In which you've already dodged being murdered by the skin on your teeth! And you're going gooey because a boy's put his arm around you? And he doesn't even know he's doing it! Get a grip woman!' When had the last time been? A year and a half ago? Around that length of time... She remembered her first. It had been Page. Florimel was a cynic, and had long ago concluded that most people's first time wasn't 'special,' or 'magical,' and was instead usually a nervous and forgettable fumble. But still, it felt like if it was possible to 'waste' your first time, she had done it. And that was no slight on Page, ze was her oldest and dearest friend. Florimel had no siblings, but she assumed that the relationship she shared with Page was closer and stronger than any she could share with a brother or sister. But there had been no attraction between them, in either direction. They had just been two young, scared people, desperately lonely and afraid, and grasping out for some feeling of safety and intimacy. They'd both regretted it, and they hadn't mentioned it since. They were the best of friends, and they shared a deep love for each other, but not a romantic love. Between then and now there had only been a handful of other 'fumbles.' While it is often said that there's 'a lid for every pot,' Florimel had so far discovered that very few men had a particular penchant for facial scarring. And while she was sure there would be plenty of people who would eventually manage to look passed a thing like that, and instead concentrate on her 'sense of humour,' or her 'bright eyes,' and all the other things her mother had convinced her that she possessed on those teenaged occasions when the depression that her face gave Florimel had her crying into her mothers lap. The fact was that she had so little free time, a barely noticeable causeway between work and sleep in which to get personal with men and convince them that underneath her scarred exterior was a sarcastic, self-loathing and paranoid girl they could fall in love with. Flossy squeezed her thighs together, before stopping herself suddenly. 'Seriously!' She thought. 'You're just tired girl. Get back to sleep!? She started to nod off, and her tired mind wandered to the sight of Dusty getting up and out of bed the first night they'd all camped together. He had a wirey frame, and a slender, toned physique, and the sight of him getting to his feet in nothing but boxer shorts which tented over his morning-glory was shocking, but just about the most rawly masculine thing she'd ever seen- 'Dammit girl!' She thought to herself. 'Get to sleep!'

It wasn't Dusty in particular of course, in fact, she knew that in the cold light of day she'd see him just as she saw Page, a friend, a colleague, it was just the idea of having someone, anyone who loved her in that special way which was so appealing, just the fact that it was someone's arm on her, someone's breath in her ear. Someone close to her, who could care for her, share the pressures of this world with her, trust her, confide in her...

She must have managed to fall asleep at some point, since she woke up to see Dusty sat cross-legged in the tent, a foot or so away from her, brushing his teeth. Seeing her eyes open he flashed her a smile. The sun was fully up and shining it's way through the tent, and from the sound of it Page was outside fixing breakfast for them.

The next day they decided to ignore progressing towards the gym and instead perform a more methodological search for critters, Bigwingboy and Elgyem both flew over the canopy of the forest above them in loops, as they slowly moved forwards, attempting to spot anything from the air, and Flick climbed from tree to tree above them as they walked along the ground, to see if this intermediary vantage point would allow them to spot anything, and it was this tactic which eventually paid off.

A few hours into their walk Flick started making squeaking noises from far above them. Florimel looked up, but she couldn?t see a thing, other than the tree and the frantic Leavanny, but Flick stuck out an arm, pointing at some part of the foliage seemingly identical to everything around it, and gesticulating down to Flossy, Dusty, Page and Hydro on the ground.

?What?s your bug complaining about?? Asked Dusty, putting an arm on Page?s shoulder.

?Not a clue, I can?t see up there! But ze?s super excited about it!? Page replied. ?Maybe we should climb up there and look??

?Are you volunteering?? Asked Dusty, gazing up at the huge, towering height up to the branch which held Flick.

?Hey, I?m not the Pokemon trainer. That?s our good buddy Florimel?s job.? Ze replied.

?Wait a second guys, Beheeyem and Bigwingboy have noticed the commotion and are going to have a look, we?ll see how they react first.? Florimel said, as the two other Pokemon came flapping and floating down to the branch to have a look.

?Yeah? Maybe Flicky?s just found some claw-marks or something.? Dusty added.

The Elgyem and Spearow both made just as much commotion as Flick had, dismissing this theory out of hand. Bigwingboy even flew down to them, and then grabbed Florimel?s sleeve and then flapped it?s little wings as though it was trying to carry Flossy up to the branch, in an effort to show how important it was that she went up there.

?Fine, fine, fine!? Florimel said, shaking the little bird off her arm. ?I?ll climb up. You get back up there in case I need you to fight.? The bird fluttered back up and she started her climb. Luckily she wasn?t afraid of heights in the least big, and the tree was old and knotted and easy to climb, even for someone like her, who had grown up far removed from the nearest wood or forest.

?Good luck!? Cried Page from below as she made her swift progress upwards. Her heart was pounding, but not from the fear of falling, rather for the first opportunity in so long to capture a new Pokemon. She was still sceptical that she would find anything, as surely she would be able to see it from the ground if there was a Pokemon there?

She reached the high branch on which Flick was stood, the Leavanny helping her up on to it with surprising strength for a Pokemon so light and slender, and she instantly saw what the Pokemon had been so excited about. Right there, in the crux between the branch and the tree-trunk, nestled into a corner, was a Metapod. Effectively a large chrysalis, which acted as the short-lived middle stage in the evolution between a Caterpie and a Butterfree, it couldn?t move beyond a shake, and was useless in battle, but if she caught it, she could very soon have a Butterfree in her party, and that was quite a different story entirely.

She sat on the branch and waited for a moment to catch her breath. Metapod stared at her with what seemed to be anger, but it was hard to tell with a Pokemon more-or-less incapable of movement. She was lucky really, because a real Pokemon fight up here would be incredibly dangerous, but with this, she could just throw a Pokeball at it and be done with it.

?What is it!? Shouted Page from below, snapping Flossy out of her daydream.

?Yeah, quit leaving us hanging, is there a Pokemon there or not?? Yelled Dusty from beside zer, and Hydro concurred with a squawking noise.

?It?s a Metapod!? She replied.

?Cool? Page shouted. ?Butterfree?s are great!?

Florimel pulled her backpack off and rummaged around inside for a Pokeball, careful not to drop anything from this huge height. She pulled an empty ball out and clicked the button on the front, and a red beam of energy shot out and entered Metapod, digitizing it and pulling it back into the Pokeball. But shockingly, the Pokeball shook violently in her hand. The Metapod was too strong, it was trying to escape! She knew Pokemon that hadn?t been weakened by battle first would try to escape their balls, often succeeding and destroying the ball in the process, but she had figured this wouldn?t effect a near-immobile Pokemon like Metapod. She was wrong. She tried to clamp both hands on the Pokeball, one beneath it and one above it, in a desperate attempt to stop it snapping open, but it was no use, the shaking became more and more violent until it flew open, and the red beam of energy shot out again, and the Metapod reformed on the branch where it had been before, but no longer attached to the tree and now shaking violently. The Metapod promptly slipped off the branch and fell to the ground below. Florimel screamed in shock, waving her hands and dropping the now-useless Pokeball. She was just desperately praying that the Metapod didn?t hit one of her friends below. Flick screamed too, and the other Pokemon flew down to the ground instinctively. But luckily for her friends, who dived out of the way, the Metapod smashed into the earth? It was less lucky for the Metapod.

?Oh no! Oh no!? Quavered Page from the ground. ?It?s really hurt Flossy. I think it?s cracked right open? I can see it breathing.?

Breathing was good. Thought Flossy, being able to see breathing in a Metapod was bad. Page must be able to see right through the shell?

?What happened?? Yelled Dusty. Not accusingly, but in her mortified state Florimel could barely tell the difference.

?It struggled its way out of the Pokeball and fell when it re-appeared!? Yelled Florimel. ?I?m so stupid. I didn?t even try weakening it first.?

?Just get down here and catch it, otherwise we won?t be able to carry it to the?? Dusty?s voice trailed off, presumably as he came to the realization that they were no way near to an infirmary, possibly they were no way near anyone who could treat this. ?? To somewhere. Wherever the nearest settlement on the map is. Hurry up anyway!?

The trip down the tree was much more harrowing than the climb up it had been, she obviously couldn?t see below herself, and she now had the added difficulty that her hands were shaking, her heart was aching and she felt like she was about to burst into tears. She was furious with herself, she had invaded this poor, innocent Pokemon?s life and had potentially murdered it through her own incompetence and stupidity. And she had a feeling that having your shell cracked open was not an example of an ?easy way to go.?

She reached the ground with barely more than the a couple of life-threatening stumbles that saw her nearly plummet to her own death, but which she ignored as her personal safety was of less than usual significance at the moment. There she could see the others, huddling around the shape of the injured Metapod. The Pokemon was heavy and weirdly, quite aerodynamic, so it had fallen fast and landed hard. There was indeed a thick, jagged crack running down it?s carapace and you could see something soft and tender writhing rhythmically within, as though it was taking sharp, desperate breaths. The Pokemon had no mouth with which to scream or cry, put its eyes were barely open and she could tell it was in immense pain. She yelled ?I?m so sorry! We?ll save you I promise!? as she whipped out a second Pokeball and unceremoniously captured it. She closed her eyes and took a few deep gulps of air, her body shaking and her eyes streaming. After a moment or two with her eyes closed, and the only noises being Page?s gentle weeps and her own heart pounding so hard and so fast she felt it would burst out of her chest.

?Okay? Okay.? She said after achieving something approaching ?calm.? ?We don?t have long. Bigwingboy, Elgyem, fly up until you can see the nearest clearing that could be a settlement and then fly straight to it. Elgyem you stay above us and point out the direction. Then we head there as the Murkrow flies. No detours, no deviations, no distractions, no dealys. We run through streams and over bolders. If you need a pee, wet yourself. We stop for nothing, we are now ?Operation Save Metapod.? Go. Now!?

Dusty put a comforting hand on the small of her back as his Spearow and Florimel?s psychic type flew up into the air. The Spearow went so high up it was barely visible, and then swung around in a few loops before deciding on a direction and darting that way. Elgyem on the other hand stayed just above tops of the trees, and floated above them, little stubby arm outstretched in the direction they needed to travel. And in this manner they headed straight towards whatever settlement Bigwingboy had found for them. With any luck they?d have some form of medical equipment for the injured Metapod, but worst case scenario there would be someone there who knew the area and could tell them where to go. Just as Florimel had claimed, they climbed up hills and waded through streams. Hydro and Flick taking the lead, the Leavanny slashing through thorns and bushes greatly sped up their progress. She felt terrified, but action made it better. She was taking command and she was doing everything she could to try to rescue this situation, and there was a certain comfort in that. Then suddenly they heard a loud bang, something like a rifle being fired, which filled her heart with terror, why had she sent Bigwingboy off on his own? She knew there were Pokemon Rangers in this forest! Their job was to kill ?wild? Pokemon, and without his trainer beside him, that?s exactly what Bigwingboy would look like.

?What was that?!? She yelled up to Elgyem above them. ?Did something happen to Bigwingboy?? The psychic Pokemon gave a shrug-like gesture and Dusty put his hand on her back again. ?Don?t think about it, just keep running, if we don?t get there, we can?t help either Pokemon.? He said.

She knew he was right, but she was in a state of pure panic, Page had stopped crying, but looked like the effort of running through the forest was all that was stopping zer from bursting into another bout of sobs. Dusty himself was pale, she could tell he was as scared as they were, but desperate not to let his care-free fa?ade crack. Finally they reached a large clearing, and saw before them a huge, scattered set of brick buildings, surrounded by a wire-link fence with barbed wire on top and a manned guard tower overlooking each corner, and a fifth above the front gate.

She stood there at the edge of the tree-line, wheezing and gulping in air for a few moments, scanning around for signs of Bigwingboy, her heart sinking deeper and deeper with every beat, until the little bird shot out from the undergrowth and straight into Dusty?s arms. The historian beamed and snuggled the little bird up saying: ?Oh thank goodness you?re okay!?

?Are you sure he is okay? Look!? Asked Page, pointing to an area in the Spearow?s feathers which were blackened and torn.

?Must have been a near miss.? Replied Dusty, as he examined the area closely ?There?s no blood, the skin isn?t broken.?

?It must have been one of those guys.? Said Florimel, pointing up to the guard towers. ?He must have been flying around above? Whatever this place is.?

?It looks seriously scary. And it?s not on the map, so it's either new... Or secret, and it doesn't look new enough to npt be on this map...? Said Dusty as he sent Bigwingboy back to his Pokeball to rest.

?Nonetheless, we have to give it a go? At least to ask directions. Let?s hope they don?t shoot humans.? Said Flossy as she returned Elgyem and Hydro to their Pokeballs and began to walk out of the tree cover and towards the large main gate. ?You don?t have to come with me guys.?

In any case, they did both follow her without a second thought, although Page returned Leavanny to its own Pokeball and Dusty noticeable walked a couple of steps behind Page, keeping zer body between himself and the gunman. As they got closer to the complex, Florimel noticed the symbol of a clocktower with the sun behind it on one of the buildings inside, and another, and another, they all seemed like functional wooden barrack-like buildings, but they all sported this sign as their only decoration. She whispered back to the other two. ?That?s the symbol of The Church Of The Heavenly Spire. Why on earth do they have a huge, armed? Camp thing, hidden in the middle of the forest?? The Church of the Heavenly Spire was an extremely strict and austere religion, and therefore had few followers and little resources, the local chapel in Pallet Town was tiny and near to collapse, so it was insane to think they would have the recourses for anything this large. Her question was answered by silence from Page and a shrug from Dusty, so she turned back and walked right up to the gate, deciding to ignore the rifles that were being cocked and aimed at her and her friends. As she reached the gate she called inside, to a small gatehouse, still ignoring the gunmen. ?Is there anyone in there? We have a serious medical emergency.?

After a few moments of silence, one of the gunmen called down from above: ?This is a private facility. There?s nothing for you here.?

?What is this ?facility? anyway?? Dusty asked.

?Private.? Came the one world response from above. The man?s rifle was pointing straight at them, and all of a sudden this seemed like a worryingly good place to bury three bodies.

?Do you at least know of anywhere nearby where we can get some medical help?? Florimel pleaded. ?If we don?t get help soon, one of our Pokemon will die.?

The tension of this moment was broken, by an off-tune whistling noise coming from behind them, Florimel turned, as did Page and the gunman, although Dusty?s eyes remained fixed on the gun, like he was trying to ?stare-out? a barrel. Coming out of the woods in the same direction that they had, was an old woman in a long, undyed robe, humming and whistling as she meandered slowly to the gate. Everyone else stood in silence as the person approached, in a seemingly random, meandering gait across the grass. When she?d eventually drawn level with the trio, she called up to the guard. ?It?s only me Gerald, please do let me in, I?ve just been out on my morning constitutional, and to grab a bushel of herbs. I left by the other gate, but I must have got a little turned around.?

There was another moment of tense silence before the guard called down again. ?Good morning Sister? We?ll just need to wait a moment while these lost people leave.?

?Ooh!? Said the wrinkled old woman, looking at them for the first time with wild eyes that darted from point to point, seemingly independent of each other. It was as though she hadn?t noticed any of them until they were pointed out. ?A young man, presumably a heavy drinker based on his eyes. A woman with quite excellent facial burn scars and what seems to be an Alstoe.? She described them in an off-hand and emotionless way, as if listing specimens to a stenographer, Dusty scowled at his description, Florimel winced and touched her face, while Page gasped as the old fashioned gender-slur was spoken, it was a slur from forty or fifty years ago, not something you would hear in the modern age, which made it seem almost cute, quaint, but really quite rude. All of this seemed to be missed by the woman, who called back up to the same guard, her eyes still darting around from person to person. ?Why are they here Nigel??

?They seem to be lost on their way to some medic-? The guard began. But Dusty interrupted. ?-Our Metapod is severely injured, and will likely die before we can get to the nearest infirmary, are there any facilities capable of healing a Pokemon in this complex??

?Ooh!? Exclaimed the woman again, still addressing the same guard, rather than talking directly to them. ?Horace, why didn?t you tell me that these people had an interest in Pokemon anatomy??

?I?m sorry Sister, I was just advising them that this is a private facility and they would have to leave-? The guard, whose name she couldn?t be sure of, but assumed was neither Horace, Nigel or Gerald, called down, before he was again cut off, this time by the woman, who in many ways was scaring Florimel more than the gunman.

?-Please let them in! They have a Metapod for me to examine! Pokemon anatomy is my passion and my vocation you know!? The woman this time looked intently around the three, as though it was possible that they were holding the Metapod, or that it was in one of their pockets or something.

?Erm? Heal, not examine. We want the Metapod alive.? Florimel stressed to the lady, while trying in vain to make eye contact with her.

?Oh silly girl, so do I!? Said the woman, surprising Florimel by talking directly to her for the first time. ?Examining a dead Metapod is no use, and no fun!? Florimel was getting seriously worried, and she dared flash a glance at her comrades for support. Page looked like drained white, like ze was about to pass out, but Dusty looked more like he was ready to knock someone out. But what choice did they have.

?Let them in Simon! On my authority!? She called up to the same guard again, who sighed. He disappeared from view and they stood in nervous silence as he descended the guard tower?s stairs, before re-appearing through the bars of the gate, which he unlocked and opened a crack for them to walk through. As they passed him, they caught sight of his name badge, which showed that his name was in fact ?Troy,? and that he was an employee of Devon Corporation, rather than the church.

?So you have a Pokemon infirmary here?? Asked Dusty, as the woman lead them into the complex in an infuriatingly slow manner. Were they not reliant on this crazy old crone for help, Florimel would have picked her up and ran with her to wherever this clinic or infirmary was.

?We have the facilities necessary to do a multitude of things to the bodies of both humans and Pokemon young man.? The crone said disturbingly as she meandered alone the earthen path, seemingly towards one of the barrack-like buildings, although the randomness of her movements made it difficult to work out which one.

?We are in a bit of a rush as a matter of fact...? Florimel said, trying to urge the woman onwards.

?Oh all you young people always are. What?s your name by the way? Mine is Sister Superior Ignis Factum.?

Florimel felt that there was something odd about that question, and it took her a moment or two to realise what it was, the woman didn?t recognise her! And neither had the guard! They must have been the first people they?d met since they left Pallet Town not to know who they were, was this place so sheltered and secluded from the outside world that no information got in? Or more importantly out? In any case and she wanted to keep hold of this advantage, even if lying about her identity to a woman seemingly incapable of remembering her own colleague?s name, or even noticing she had got it wrong, was somewhat redundant.

?I?m Florence Hydrangea, and this is Zip and Flip.? She said, gesturing to Page and Dusty in turn, as each one rolled their eyes. ?Now please can we hurry up!?

?There is no need to hurry child, we?re right here at my laboratory.? Said the woman, who veered violently to the left, and ended up at the door of a building quite removed from any of the ones it looked like she might have been heading towards. ?Here we are.? She said, opening the door and then pulling a cord to lift some of the heavy black-out curtains which covered every one of the barred windows.

Inside was a dusty room which smelled of iron and earth and some other, more organic scents which Florimel didn?t care to name. There were huge, long lab tables and desks everywhere. Each wall was lined by cabinets full of jarred ?specimens,? namely the bones and embalmed body-parts of Pokemon. An iron door lead to what judging by how large the building looked from the outside, must have been fully half of the structure?s space.

?Oh Arceus.? Gasped Dusty instinctively as the other two came inside behind her.

?Quite a sight isn?t it!? The woman said, clearly mistaking the horror in Dusty?s voice for admiration. ?I am something of the Pokemon expert here. Me and my brothers and sisters examine the lesser creatures of this earth, inside and out, to find the clues God left for us humans.?

?Is this a church operation?? Page asked, feigning vague disinterest. ?The security guard?s badge listed him as a Devon Corporation employee??

?Oh, Devon have been most generous to us. But this is a church facility. They simply provide us with a safe environment to do our good work, and we voluntarily-? She stressed this word, the first thing she?d said to them so far which sounded like it was important, rather than thoughts that tumbled out of her skull at random. This made Florimel instantly think of lawyers, this was some sort of fiddle, this woman was using specific language to shield Devon from the blame for whatever it was that was going on here. ?-share our discoveries with them, those that are of interest to them. Now where is this Pokemon of yours??

Florimel released the Metapod from its new Pokeball and it appeared on the table, cracked open and struggling to breathe, it was quite a disturbing sight, although it didn?t seem to affect the Sister. ?Ah!? She said, brightening up as if a creature in obvious pain and struggling to breathe was a great and rare treat. ?Tegminius Metatarcius! Or the noble Metapod in the modern tongue. These are easy to fix, if you?re sure you wish for it to live??

Florimel nodded furiously ?Of course! of course!? Thinking ?fix? was an odd choice of words when talking about a living creature.

?And would you like a sample of its spleen while it?s in this exposed state?? The woman asked earnestly. ?It?s said to be good for the fluids.?

?No!? She yelled, with an exasperation that the strange old lady seemed to miss.

?Very wise.? Said the woman, nodding as if a piece of rare and arcane wisdom had been recited, rather than the obvious decision not to mutilate a living creature. ?That is just an old wives tale, simple superstition. We have no time for this here. This facility is dedicated to science!? She said as she pulled jars out of a cabinet and mixed them in bowl. ?After all, God created the universe in his image, and the human as a microcosm of that creation, so it is the moral duty of all of us, is it not, to learn more about the world and ourselves, in order to truly know more about God??

She rambled on as she worked, mixing some sort of organic glue, and then applying it to the shell of the Metapod, resealing it with no more sign of the earlier injury than a single hairline crack. The beast seemed to lighten up as well, it?s eyes losing their look of fear and agony.

?Is it going to live?? Asked Florimel.

?Oh my yes.? Responded the strange woman, clearing away the tools of her trade. ?I have seen Metapods in far worse conditions!?

?How did they end up in worse conditions?? Asked Dusty, with a sideways glance towards Florimel.

?The road to knowledge is a bumpy one I?m afraid.? The woman responded, and that seemed to be all she was going to say about it. She then, with surprising strength, lifted the Bug into a glass box, and closed the lid. There were air-holes in the front, but they were covered with an odd looking bronze mesh. Florimel was stunned into silence by the image of some robed figures in a lab like this one cracking Pokemons? shells open just to study them suffer. ?I?m afraid that the Metapod will have to be kept still for around twenty four hours for the ?repair? to safely take hold, and that means no Pokeballs. You?re welcome to stay here in one of our bunkhouses until tomorrow morning, alternatively you can leave this little tyke with me.? She looked them in the face for almost the first time as she said this, flashing them a reptilian, hungry smile.

Florimel didn?t consider the second option for a moment. Although she was desperate to get out of this place as soon as possible, since every second here and around this woman made her skin crawl, she wasn?t leaving the poor little bug she?d injured alone with her. There was no chance. ?We?re staying.? She said, eliciting another scowl from Dusty.

They allowed themselves to be lead towards one of the buildings nearest the outer walls of the complex, they passed several other adults in the same unbleached, undyed austere robes that Sister Superior Ignus Factum was wearing. Compared to their guide most of them looked quite normal, and were talking in quite casual tones of voice, Flossy didn?t catch much of what any of them said, but it seemed to be all technical terminology and religious dogma all of which was lost on her.

The sister opened the door to the building she'd described as a 'bunkhouse,' and it was just that, rows after rows of spartan, empty beds going all the way back to the other end of the building. "Now If you don't mind me leaving you at this point, I am afraid I have duties to attend to. I will come around to escort you to the mess hall for dinner later, perhaps there I could encourage you to abandon your heathen ways and join the one true church?" She said, with a strange certainty in her voice. "Yes!" She said, answering her own question after a moment's pause. "Yes I'm sure I will! In the meantime I am afraid you will not be allowed to wander the grounds, you must remain here. Some of our studies would..." She paused here thinking of the correct word. "Confuse, yes, yes that's right, confuse the un-pious mind, and therefore must be kept amongst us true children of God until they are finished!"

As she turned to leave Page asked "Where are the bathrooms around here?" The Sister made an odd, almost conspiratorial giggling noise, which Florimel at first mistook for the pious lady finding the discussion of bodily fluids as risibly cheeky, but then the woman reached forwards and cupped Page's crotch through zer skirt. The young herald yelped in through surprise at the unwarrented intrusion, forgeting in the moment that they were surrounded by unscalable fences and gun-weilding guards Florimel instinctively reached forwards to grasp the sister's arm, while Dusty raised a fist, ready to punch the old woman in the back of her head, but the woman quickly took her arm away allowing them both to relax.

"For you. The bathrooms are down there, and to the right." She said, pointing to the other end of the building. ?To the left for the girl.? And with that she left, humming and giggling to herself. Page slumped backwards onto one of the little cot-beds, an ashen look of absolute shock on zer face. Flossy wasn't sure if ze had known the bed was there, or if ze had just got lucky not to fall on the floor. If the woman had needed to know Page's sex, she could just have asked, and frankly it was fairly obvious to begin with, Page wasn't ostensibly androdgynous. It was clear to Florimel, especially with the bitch's giggles before and after, that she had taken the opportunity to cop a feel.

"We need to get the absolute heck out of here." Said Dusty, closing the bunkhouse door.

"So what do we do?" Said Florimel, sitting down on the bed next to Page and rubbing zer back. "Grab Metapod and run? Hope that the guards aren't as strict with who leaves as they are who enters?"

"We might have to forget Metapod." Dusty replied.

"Never! It's our fault it's in here! ... Or my fault anyway." Florimel said, first angry at the suggestion, and then maudlin with guilt.

"She looked that building's door behind her, and that box it's in is a Blaine's Case, they prevent the Pokemon from returning to their Pokeball, so we have to smash a door and then smash a case, and if I'm sure of anything it's that Devon Corporation security guards aren't okay with people smashing and grabbing exhibits from their wierd, secluded, forest labratories and running away with them!" Dusty said, voice raised quite loud now.

"Keep it down guys." Page said, the voice of reason in this situation.

"Yeah..." Said Florimel, pacing around the bunkhouse, it's own windows barred. "Yeah... Yeah, good point Page." She slumped on another bed, laid back and stared at the ceiling. "Argh!" She exclaimed, putting her hands over her eyes. "Can you imagine if Hereward could see us now? He spent days teaching us how to be careful, and as soon as we leave his sight, we run headlong into a horror story! Some secret camp where they experiment on Pokrmon? Vivesection and stuff? What are we going to do?"

"Okay, okay, okay." Dusty said, taking his turn pacing around the room. "We just have to wait until morning, that mad bat will hand over the Metapod and we'll walk out. In the meantime we hang out in this bunkhouse. We stay up all night, Pokemon out and ready to fight, but hiding under beds or something, when she gets us for dinner, we'll tell her we feel sick so we'll give it a miss? Sound good?"

"Sounds good to me. Pokemon out especially. And screw bathroom breaks, we'll pee in a corner. Then as soon as we hit the camp, we tell the press about this." Florimel responded. Pulling out her Pokeballs and releasing Spud, Elgyem and Hydro.

"Thats it!" Dusty exclaimed, releasing Bigwingboy too. "That's why it's a church doing this stuff! Companies like Devon are still subject to some rules, we all know not many, but some rules regarding transparency. Religious organisations aren't!"

"So the church dunks a ton of Pokemon in boiling water and then tells Devon which of their Pokemon 'tools' won't die if they're sent to clean ovens while they're still running?" Florimel simplified.

"It's bound to be stuff like that. And then the church keeps all the gory details of how many Pokemon did die secret, stopping it from tarnishing Devon's reputation." Dusty concluded.

"Guys." Page said, in a whisper that was so quiet, soft and fragile that it grabbed Florimel's attention far more easily than any scream or shout could have.

"What is it Pagekins?" She asked, slowly and deliberately, her heart sinking as she saw the look of pure misery on Page's face, zer eyes streaming tears.

"All these beds are unmade." Ze said, even quieter and softer. It was true. They were just bare straw matresses, maybe a hundred of them, no pillows or blankets in sight.

"Okay?" Said Florimel, unsure of where this was going, her heart pounding in her chest once more.

After a few moments of nothing but silence in the bunkhouse, Page continued in a tiny squeek of a voice that threatened to break into huge, manic sobs. "When we where outside, there were priests everywhere, and guards on every tower. I don't think this place is understaffed right now... But the people this bunkhouse is for aren't here..."

There was another few moments of silence, in which Florimel daren't speak, lest she cut Page off whatever trail the herald was going down. She had never seen her friend so distraught, and it was making her want to look away but she couldn't.

"This looks like temporary accommodation... And no one's ever heard of this place, so I think the people who come in here don't come out... I think I remember the sister talking about her colleagues experimenting on humans too, and I think there are dozens of beds here, and I don't think they're really big enough for adults." Page squeeked out at last, cheeks streaming tears. Each point hitting Florimel like a hammer to the heart.

"Pagey honey." Florimel said, her hands and stomach tingling and her head feeling faint. "I think maybe you are jumping to conclusions..."

"Really!" Blurted out Page, zer voice breaking and squeeky. "Because someone's scratched the words 'Mummy save me' into the wall next to this bunk." The herald staggered forwards a feet feet and then fell on to hands and knees, burying zer face into the floor and weeping uncontrollably.

"Oh God..." Dusty blurted out softly, as Florimel ran over to the wall Page had been sat by. "There were so many Pokemon bones in that lab... i mean, I was freaked out, but there are Pokemon bones in zoos, in museums, I figured they'd just been found dead and examined... But what if they were all murdered! And what if they weren't all Pokemon!"

Florimel slumped onto her knees, praying that Page was wrong, but there, at the height that a child would reach if they were laid in bed, pretending to sleep but too petrified to, were the words 'Mummy save me,' scratched out by fingernails in the wood.

Florimel slumped onto her knees, scared she was going to faint or throw up, trying to shut her mind off so that she didn't have to think, but the thoughts came to her, each more disturbing than the last. 'Was Page right?' 'Was this a mass grave?' 'Had their deaths come quickly?' 'Had the kids known?' 'How had the kids ended up here?' 'Didn't Page say kids 'ran away' from zer orphanage all the time and were never heard of again?' 'Weren't their kids at her school and childhood factory who had 'disapeered' and where considered to have run away from home?'

As she sat there, these thoughts tumbling through her aching, screaming head, she could hear her Pokemon crying behind her. She wished she hadn't released them, she couldn't comfort them, she couldn't move... The three humans had no choice but to see this, but they could have been spared it. Maybe they shouldn't have been, she thought, maybe there wasn't a person or a Pokemon in this world who didn't need to know about this place.

She could also hear Dusty pacing again and ranting under his breath, although he murmured and she couldn't quite make out the words. This continued for some time, it could have been seconds, it could have been years, her knelt by a wall, knees in agony on the rough, hard, wooden floor, and face inches from the scratchings that signified such agony. Page head down weeping in abject misery, and Dusty, angry feet pounfing the floorboards. Eventually the tablou broke when the door opened, Florimel swung around, ready to order her Wartortle to fight, sure a priest had walked in on them, but was shocked to see that Dusty was stomping out of the building, Bigwingboy on his shoulder. With legs of lead she stumbled to her feet to chase after him, falling a couple of times. She tried to call out, but her voice came out as just a croak. By the time she reached the door and peeed out, she could see no sign of the man, she swore under her breath and turned back to the weeping Page, if she was going to stumble around after that fool, she wasn't splitting the party up three ways and leaving her oldest friend behind.

*********

Dusty stomped through the dirt-floored compound, a red mist clouding his vision as he picked a building at random and headed for the door. His vision was so tunnelled that he had no idea if any of the sickos who worked here had seen him and just assumed that someone walking through the place purposefully and with a Pokemon on their shoulder would have good reason to be there, or maybe he?d just got lucky and they were all elsewhere. Perhaps Ignus Factum was around and he could pay her back for what she had done to Page, and any and all of the other crimes that had happened here under her watch. He wasn?t sure if she was an authority around here, and how much decision-making power the woman had, but ?Sister Superior? seemed important, and he doubted anyone that mad was doing a regular nine to five. Eccentricity is generally more accepted towards the top.

He practically slammed into the door of the building he?d chosen to look inside, and it popped open to show a windowless, dusty cabin full of rows and rows of bookshelves. ?Perfect,? he thought to himself as Bigwingboy snarled and pecked the air on his shoulder, desperate for revenge of his own, hopefully this was some sort of records archive, like the one he?d worked at in Pallett town, which would show the details of all the horrific experiments that had taken place here, heck, even if there were financial statements he could work out what equipment they had bought over the years. Dusty staggered into the room and the door closed behind him. He swore his own stupidity as the room became entirely lightless, but he?d seen safety lamps on the wall, the modern ones which you could spark with a button on the side, He fumbled around for one of those and knocked thickly bound, heavy books onto the floor in the process, but finally managed to reach a lamp and click the button on the side. Luckily it was filled and it flared into a low, dull yellow light, slightly illuminating the room once again. He looked down at the books he?d fumbled onto the ground, and one was splayed open allowing him to see a peculiar picture inside it which disturbed him.

The picture showed something? Some combination of shapes he couldn?t quite tell what they were, it looked like a photograph of a human, but the limbs and body parts didn?t match up to where they would be, so his mind couldn?t quite process what he was seeing in the low light. He reached down to grab it but his forehead collided with the bookshelf in front of him and he fell on his bum instead. Swearing once more, he checked his forehead to make sure there was no blood with one hand as he reached out for the book with the other, unfortunately the book flopped closed as he picked it up, before he could get a closer look at the picture which had befuddled him. But this allowed him to see the cover of the book, it read ?Project Benediction,? followed by a date range, which ran from 18 years ago to 2 years ago, and the words Volume 3.

He opened the front page and saw that it was a book full of photographs, not drawings. Each right hand side page had a photo and each left hand side one a list of annotations. Photography was a brand new and extremely expensive technology 18 years ago, implying that this place was, or at the very least had been extremely well funded and advanced, well, technologically advanced, definitely not morally so. What were the odds that the huge, old, costly cameras they?d had back then all said ?Property of Devon Corporation? written on them? Probably pretty good.

The first photograph showed a group of twelve human children, male and female and all lined up against a wall which had lines across it indicating their heights, they all looked absolutely terrified. The annotations on the opposite page were lists of ages and 'subject numbers' for each child, going from left to right. No names. The children were all aged between six and eight.

Dusty turned the page and saw a photo of the same group, again lined up against the same wall and in the same order, only now they were naked and their heads shaved. The page of notes was also virtually the same as the one before it, although it was dated a day later than the first page, and it now included a detail that the other page had missed out, a batch number, 'Thirty Two.' Some quick mental arithmetic told Dusty that if each group was of the same size, these would be the three hundred and sixty-first, to three hundred and seventy-second children. The catalogue numbers were long, one of them was 1274-525-26AF, so it couldn't be that they had started at 0000-000-01AA, there simply weren't that many lost children in the world. Still, Dusty thought to himself, so far, so normal. Perhaps they were doing some skull-measuring and blood-pressure testing and then sending them back to their parents with a wad of money. Probably not. But there was hope.

As Dusty turned to the next page he noticed a small detail in the monotone photo: A darker mark on the wrists of the children? They had been tattooed. Not something you do to children who you look after for a few days before sending home. Something permanent. Something you do if you're keeping the children for the rest of their lives, however long that happens to be. And why would you tattoo children to catalogue them if you only have twelve of them? How hard would it be to tell twelve children apart? Dusty had the feeling that 'Batch 32' had not been the only batch in the facility at this time.

The next page was similar to that one, except that it was a picture of just one of the children, and more detailed notes on it, or rather her. Exact height, weight, age, etcetera, there were several categories listing details about her parents, most of these said 'UNKNOWN.' Dusty skipped quickly through the next eleven pages, as these were similar, one of each of the children in the batch. Dusty's immense rage began to overpower his instincts as a historian and he began to impatiently tear through the book, after he'd finished with these twelve individual pages he got to a page showing one of the boys genitals. He had clearly been castrated. The next page was a full body shot of the boy, he was stood in front of the height-measuring wall, but he seemed much shorter now as he was slumped against it, looking like he was unable to stand, his eyes were dark, and barely open, probably drugged. The next few photos were all of him, one showing he had been drained of blood for tests, the next a list of mind-affecting drugs they had given him, then, oddly enough, were a few pages of increasingly good quality photos, and wildly different dates, they had clearly studied him over a long period of time, and left these pages blank just for that purpose. They had obviously mutilated him to prevent him from entering puberty, but they seemed to be drugging him as well, a huge number of medications Dusty didn't recognise were listed across the pages, and the pictures seemed to show that he had barely grown, even in height, his body was massively out of proportion, his head looked too small and hair was growing in intermittent patches. Water droplets splashed onto the page and Dusty was so enraged that it took him a few moments to realise that he was crying, he wiped away the tears with a shaking hand and ploughed on.

The next pages got even more disturbing, the same mutilated, drugged, disfigured boy was shown his head clamped in a vice. Priests dressed in the same robes the evil Sister wore were cutting into his scalp. Dusty flicked through pages, they had opened his skull and examined his brain. The boy's hands were in different positions between photos, so Dusty could tell he was still alive, although his eyes were closed and his face looked slack.

He was shaking so hard he could barely read the notes, but it seemed they were examining his brain, and then excising portions of it. The last photos of the boy showed him in an infirmary bed, and walking between two Priests, his arms across their shoulders, struggling along. The final page of notes ended with '...promising research that has expand the realm of understanding, but overall, a failed experiment. The specimen has been destroyed.'

The next set of photos were one of the batch's girls. Scars across her abdomen showed that she had received a similar treatment to prevent her puberty. Again a set of photos showed seven years of strange and stunted development caused by a cocktail of drugs and notable for the girl's relatively tiny head, before an examination of the brain and a summation of the results. The final date of termination was in the same month as the boy's. This time followed by another strange comment: 'The specimen was terminated in the ice-house, as part of our research in human tolerance of cold.'

The next set was another girl, again surgically castrated, this time it was a much shorter series of photos. The girl had suffered an infection and died, despite it taking several days of what must have been hideous suffering, Dusty still considered her the lucky one.

The forth was another girl, her surgery was far more intense. They had removed not only her ovaries but parts of her brain. She was seven years old. Her photo set, which spanned eight years, was much longer, as it showed her attempting to complete several tasks, such as stacking blocks and writing. It seemed that she was having little success, even with jobs that a toddler could perform. Again it ended with an open skull, and a study of the brain, and with termination. This one was much more successful in the eyes of the priests writing this document it seemed. The notes showed excitement over the results of the experiment and what they had learned from it.

The fifth subject was a boy, and this was very different. Castration had not been committed on this poor soul, but something far worse had. The boy, aged eight, had had his skull opened and a part of his brain removed, much like the girl before him, in fact, based on the date his mutilation had taken place a day after hers. And based on the picture in the same dusty, dirty room. But unlike the girl he had not been left with merely a gap inside his skull. They had simultaneously operated on a Pokemon, an Audino in fact, and had removed from it's skull a piece of brain, presumably one which corresponded to the part taken from the boy, and they had implanted it into his skull. The next few photos showed the boy in bed, and documented him suffering seizures, losing his sight, and struggling to talk or perform basic tasks. It seemed the boy had managed to recover to some extent, and later photographs even showed him walking unaided, they came to a close almost ten years after they had started, with a examination on the boy's brain and a complete dissection, most of which occurred while the boy was living, clamped to an infirmary table and gagged. But the last page was full of incredibly hopeful and positive notes, apparently this had been a very rewarding experiment in their eyes.

The sixth was another boy, and Dusty felt that it was his photo which he had seen earlier, and which had confused him so much. He had the same treatment as the boy before him, a part of his brain replaced by a part of a Pokemon's, This time a Staryu. Over the course of the next few years it seemed, they had replaced his limbs one at a time with the arms of a Staryu, each operation was followed by months of recovery, the boy being pumped full of antibiotics and other arcane drugs to prevent rejection, but eventually the boy was able to live with the Staryu arms replacing all of his limbs, until he had died of disease ten years after his experiment had started. This study ended with reams of notes, as apparently this was incredibly interesting to the scientists.

The rest of the children had much shorter photo sets, they simply showed them being stuck in a glass chamber and bombarded with beams from psychic Pokemon for hours as they screamed in pain, and then studied for their effects. Which seemed to have included serious brain damage as well as infant reversion. Most of these experiments ended with the child's brain exploding inside the glass chamber. None of them had lived much more than a few days since their first photograph.

While Dusty had been crying with rage and sorrow throughout the whole book, it wasn't until he reached the last page that he screamed out, as the rage exploded inside him. Both the left and right pages were photographs, just with names underneath. They were a 'before and after' of all the priests involved in the experiments on this particular batch. In each they were smiling and waving and even pulling odd faces. Ten years separated the photos, but in both the Priests and Priestesses looked happy and joyous. They showed no apprehension in the first and no regret in the second. The Sister who had brought them in wasn't there in either photo, but there were far too many priests to have been working on these children alone, there must have been many batches begin experimented on at one time. Dusty remembered how many beds there had been in that barrack, and he was pretty sure The Sister Superior had described it as 'One of their bunkhouses.' Dusty screamed aloud she he saw those last two photos. It was insulting, pathetic, disgusting. How could they be so arrogant? How could they do this to human beings and not even care? To just stand there and smile like at a company picnic!

Dusty's exhalation must have been audible outside, as the door opened behind him, eliciting a squawk of surprise from Bigwingboy on Dusty's shoulder. The historian stood and swung around, to see the creepy Sister Superior standing in the doorway. Bigwingboy spread his wings and hissed, Dusty could tell by the way the Spearow danced about on his shoulder that it was desperately awaiting the order to fly off and rip into the woman. But Dusty decided to take care of her himself, after she opened her mouth to say: "Wandering off are we, heathen?"

He lunged forwards and grabbed the Priest, who was too slow to react; he threw her to the ground inside the building and slammed the door behind her; hoping no one else was on their way. He was still holding the thick book, and so threw it down at her head. She put her hands up and batted the heavy tome away from her face, so Dusty kicked her hard in the crotch, eliciting an impained yelpfrom the Sister, who cupped her vulva with one hand, keeping the other over her face.

"Bigwingboy." Dusty ordered, grabbing the woman's hand and holding it away from her face. "Land on her head, and if she screams, fails to answer a question or lies, pluck an eye out."

The Spearow eagerly leaped onto the Priest's forehead, gnashing it's razor-sharp little beak above her face. In this position they all froze for a few moments, Dusty sitting on the pinned woman's midsection, towering over her as she lay on the floorboards, and his Pokemon positioned threateningly on her head. After a couple of seconds, Dusty reached over to the side, not breaking eye-contact with the sister he picked the book back up and opened it to a page showing a particularly gruesome mutilation. "Explain yourself, twat." Dusty barked, showing the woman the picture. "What is this? What was it for?"

"Sin!" Shrieked the Priestess.

"Damn right it's a sin!" Dusty replied through tears of rage. "What was it for?!"

"Sin!" She said again, eyes both glued to the Spearow's beak which hung inches above her face, weaving around in the air and gnashing.
?You're talking very much like someone who doesn't put much value on her left eye.? Dusty barked. ?I'm going to ask you one more time, and if you give me a BS response, then that's the last thing you'll ever do with proper depth perception.?

?I'm trying to explain, heathen!? The Priest said, still eyeing the flying-Pokemon's sharp beak. ?Original sin. That was our true area of study. You see, the first humans were created by God innocent, and then our ancestors betrayed our Lord, and he cursed them, made them enlightened and punished them, their children, their descendants would each be born sinful, we would each inherit this sinful, fallen nature.?

?What has mutilating children got to do with that!? shouted Dusty, who had heard this before, it was a recurring theme in many faiths.

?Some people, like us priests and others truly dedicated to our Lord, we can fight our fallen nature, we can over-write that sin through good behaviour and make it to heaven. Heathens like you, the majority, the unbelievers. You could not hope to do that! Your will power is not strong enough, not only will you fail to do enough good to overwrite the sin you were born with, but you will keep sinning and sinning, because you have inherited this sinful nature!? The woman said, ranting now, her eyes glossing over and looking into blank state, a smile on her face, as if she was recounting a joyful story.

?Answer me woman!? Dusty shouted, impatient, thrusting the book, with it's incriminating photo into her face. ?What has this got to do with vivisection on children!?

?We were so clever...? She said wistfully, grinning still. ?... We came to the conclusion that if we were to de-enlighten average people, we would return them to their innocent state! As God intended! No more original sin, and no urge to continue sinning!?

?So you were removing the higher brain functions from children. That was your job?!? Shouted Dusty, so frustrated that he leaped up away from the woman and threw the book against the wall. ?That's what you did every day? Between clocking in and clocking off??

?Not me.? Said the woman, freed from Dusty's weight, but still pinned by to the ground by the threat of the Spearow's beak. ?My own experiments were more centred around adults... Although I can't say I didn't enjoy it when they brought in a new batch of children.? She said, squirming and wriggling about on the floor in a disturbing manner. ?Some of those boys would do anything if you told them they'd get to see their mummy again!? She added with a girlish giggle, as she rubbed her hands across her robed thighs.

Dusty couldn't help himself from running over to the woman and stamping on her crotch, causing her to yelp and whine with pain.

The door burst open and Dusty swung round, arms raised like a boxer, Bigwingboy too stretched out his wings ready to attack. But thankfully it wasn't a Priest, but Florimel, dragging Page behind her, although they were both dressed in the subdued robes the priests wore, and Flossy had an unfamiliar bulge in top part of hers, an area that was usually quite flat.

?Thank goodness we found you!? Exclaimed Flossy as she pulled Page into the room and slammed the door shut behind them. The reason for the bulge then revealed itself as Spud's little head and green leaves popped up out of the top of the robe. ?We heard a scream from outside. We're in enough danger as it is in here without splitting up-? She said this while panting and wiping sweat from her brow, but stopped immediately as she saw the woman laying on the floor with an angry Spearow on her head. ?Ah, and that would be the reason for the scream.?

?Did anyone else hear the scream?? Dusty asked, as Page released Flick and told it to keep an eye on the Priest.

?No.? Answered Florimel. ?Even in these disguises we've been skulking around in the shadows, and avoiding the Priests, there was no one near us when we heard the noise.?

?It's lucky the first place we blundered into trying to find you was a laundry room of some sort.? Added Page, throwing a sack at Dusty.?We picked one up for you too.?

Dusty opened the sack and inside it was indeed another demure robe. He pulled his backpack off and donned the robe, while bringing the others up to speed. ?I got even luckier with my blundering, this is a record room. Check out the books around here, reports of experimentations on children. Dozens were mutilated, lobotomised, and killed slowly. All in the name of eliminating 'original sin.' Basically these Priests wanted to rid people of their higher brain functions to make them 'pure,' to stop them from being sinners.?

?We did it for the good of everyone!? Exclaimed Sister Ignus Factum from the floor.

Page picked up a random book from one of the shelves as Flossy walked over to the woman and asked. ?What??

?We did it so that people can get to heaven! It was the noblest aim! We made people innocent! Like infants, or like Pokemon! Of course, Pokemon do not have souls like humans do...? The Priest said, eyes still glazed over and smile still stretched across her wrinkled old face.

?How many people died here, in your experiments.? Florimel asked, in a surprisingly calm and cool voice.

?Oh, I don't know exactly.? She said, as if dismissing the question out of hand as a trifling irrelevance, as if she was confused that a person would get held up on such a strange little detail. ?Probably around four thousand, maybe five. I'm not a record keeper, and my research was kept somewhat separate from most of the other Priests' work.?

Page burst into tears once more and held the book ze was reading out for Florimel to see, Flossy took one glance at the photograph and recoiled, disgusted. ?We need time to think.? Florimel said. ?And we have to be sure no one disturbs us. I reckon they'd be more than happy to kill us rather than let this information out.?

?Yes.? Said the sister from the floor, as if the question had been addressed to her. ?I imagine I would also be quite badly punished for having brought strangers into the compound... I couldn't help myself you see, I was really quite excited by your Alstoe. And was looking forwards to using my special 'sleeping powder' on it.? She followed this with more childish giggling and more off-putting rubbing of her thighs.

?You brought us in here so you could rape Page?? Dusty asked in disgust. ?You never cared about the Metapod??

?I brought you in for your own good too. After I put you to sleep, I could make you all innocent! Remove your sin!? The woman said, with more giggling.

?I'm tired of listening to this... Thing.? Dusty said as he walked over to the Priest and dragged her to her feet. ?Get up freak. You stand by the door, if anyone comes in, tell them you're doing something important and can't be disturbed. Bigwingboy, as much as it loathes me to ask you to do this, you fly up her robe and make sure she behaves, if she tries to run or says anything to elicit suspicion, peck at something sensitive.?

Flossy also left Elgyem under a dust sheet near the door, giving it similar instructions to punish the woman if she gave the game away or attempted escape. With this set up, the others hid around the far side of the room, Page rummaging through books, attempting to fully work out what happened here, while the others formulated a plan of action.

?We'll get this woman to escort us out of the complex.? Florimel suggested. ?By a different door to the one we came in through. We'll carry a sack full of the best books we can find, the most revealing ones, and we'll head off back to Viridian City, with this woman in tow. And then we meet up with Hereward. He'll have enough contacts that can make this public.?

?Good idea.? Replied Dusty. ?We need to make sure that this isn't buried. We also need to make sure that they don't know we've been here, otherwise they'll be able to cover their tracks.?

They all agreed, and after a short while spent filtering down through the books they'd looked through, until they had filled the clothing sack with a good cross section of evidence on the hideous experiments, and even some signed and dated accounts, showing the number of people that had been brought into the camp and when, they left, Spud still hidden in Flossy's robe, and the Spearow still hiding between the Priest's legs, all other Pokemon away in their balls. As they walked out of the building, Flossy with her arm linked with the Priest's, as a greater defence against the woman running away, she asked her a question. ?Where did you get the children from??

?Devon provided us with lost souls.? The woman responded. ?I did not care where they came from. But I got the feeling that they were homeless or orphans, those likely to die or live lives of crime in any case.?

?Why did Devon provide human beings, and presumably a lot of funding, for such horrific research.? Page asked from behind the two.

?Oh yes, so much money, so much equipment.? The woman said wistfully. ?They cared little for eliminating sin. But cared so much more for the knowledge of human anatomy, what stresses a person could survive, effects of poisons on people... I think their weapons wing gained much from what we learned here.?

?And of course.? Speculated Dusty. ?Factory owners could do with knowing how to turn their employees into unthinking, brainless slaves.?

?Oh yes!? Said the woman, as they walked with her to the far gate. ?That was one thing they were very excited about!?

Florimel was just thinking about how much fun it would be to gag this woman so they didn't have to listen to her deluded, insane ramblings, when a thought struck her. ?Crap.? She whispered, stopping suddenly, so that Dusty and Page walked into her and the Priest. ?We forgot Metapod.?

?Is it really worth going back for?? Asked Dusty. ?It's all the way back on the other side of the complex and I'm petrified these Priests are going to notice that we're not part of their evil team!?

?It's my fault it's here, and I'm not leaving any sentient creature in this place.? Florimel responded.

?Oh!? Said the Priestess with glee. ?And if we're going back to my lab, I will get to show you the results of my own experimentation, then you will truly understand the good work we have done here!?

?Okay, shut up you.? Responded Florimel. ?Come on guys, we can't leave it here can we??

?Sure.? Said Page reluctantly. ?But let's make it quick. And it really might be worth adding evidence of this dingbat's work to our pile.?

********

And so the group quickly walked back to the first building they'd entered in this demonic complex, eyes locked on the ground, and trying to keep as much of a distance from the other priests as was possible.

?Can you lock the door?? Asked Page as soon as they were inside.

?Sure!? Said the Priestess and pulled a large brass key out from a draw in one of the cabinets near the entrance. She locked the door and was about to return the key to a pocket in her robe, when Page snatched it out of her hand.

Florimel quickly pulled out the box containing her Metapod, opened it and, against insane-evil-doctors orders, returned it to it's Pokeball, it would just have to suffer the stress of transit. Dusty on the other hand went to the far side of the lab and tried to pull open the door. ?Unlock this one.? He ordered.

The wicked priestess drew another large bronze key from one of the seemingly thousands of little drawers in all the cabinets throughout the room, and eagerly rushed over to open up the door. ?I will gladly show you the wonderful results of my years of righteous service!? She said with an oddly child-like hint of delight in her voice.

She pushed the door open, and was about to walk into the other room first, but Florimel put a hand on her shoulder and pulled her back. She went in first, and stood aghast in the doorway. This room was indeed larger than the lab they'd been in, and this one was quite different. Along the walls to both sides were rows of cells, with thick, metal bars. In each of the nearest ones stood a human, or at least a human-like figure. They were naked, one male, and one female, and from their size, clearly adults, but little else in their appearance was recognisably similar to her or her companions. Their flesh was grey and looked strangely, sickeningly damp. She couldn't tell, but she got the feeling that if she touched them, they would be cold. Their eyes were dark, almost like the pupils covered their entire eye-balls, and there were strange growths on the top of their heads, little nobbles that resembled grey mushrooms with red spots. The only other things in the cells were a bucket, and piles of straw, which stank with the human waste which they seemed to have allowed to fall straight to the floor where they stood. There had been a safety-lamp burning when the door was opened, so at least the figures hadn't been in darkness, but they both just stood there, in the middle of their cells, the female one turned it's head towards her slowly after a few seconds, and then opened her, or rather, it's mouth to let out a sickening, heart-wrenching moan. This appeared to be all it could manage for speech. The other one took a few staggering, shambling steps towards her, clanging into it's cell bars as if it hadn't noticed they were there, and reached an arm through to make some grasping gestures towards her. She was thankful that it couldn't reach anywhere near her in the spacious room.

A tap on her shoulder had her scream and leap in the air. Luckily it was just Dusty, who asked: ?What's in there??

Before Flossy could answer, someone from the far end of this horrific jail called out in a rasping male voice: ?Is there someone there? Oh by the light let there be someone there who can help us!? This noise seemed to attract more moaning and mooing from various points down the line of cages, and Florimel walked nervously forward through the room, making sure to stay an equal distance between the cells on each side, so as to not come close to any of them. As she walked further down the line, she passed creatures similar to the first too, but each pair she passed got closer and closer in resemblance to a normal human, less grey in the skin, fewer 'mushrooms' on their heads, and more of a reaction to her presence, as if they were more capable of seeing her and taking her in, until she reached the 6th, and final pair of cells, right at the end of the building, and these contained two people, again one male and one female, and again completely naked adults. The man stood at the bars and smiled when he saw her, his skin was slightly palid, and there were two or three growths on his skull, but otherwise he looked perfectly normal, if incredibly dirty. The woman on the other side was similarly normal in appearance, again, just the odd nobble to her head, and the slightly off-colour skin showing beneath the filth. She was laid on the ground, weeping and shaking. ?Are you here to rescue us?? Said the young man, who looked to be around thirty, although it was difficult to say, bearing in mind the hideous state he was in.

Before Florimel could answer, Ignus Factum, who had come into the room behind her, Dusty gripping her arm, came into the man's view. ?Oh.? He said. ?I guess not.? The woman opposite him looked up at last, looking weary and nauseous, looked at them for a few seconds, head bobbing in the air as if she was having trouble keeping it up, she blinked a few times as if uncertain what she was looking at, then she let her head slump back down into the hay and she resumed weeping. ?Emily's mind's going faster than mine... She's had more of the convulsions too...? He trailed off and looked down at the floor, perhaps overwhelmed by the hopelessness of it all.

?What's your name?? Florimel asked, croaking the words out, overwhelmed with fear and sadness to the point where she just felt numb.

?Michael.? He replied, quietly.

?What did they do to you Michael?? She asked, as she heard Page break into tears behind her, evidently the young herald had just seen this horror show.

?Well, my experimen-? Began the Priestess, but Florimel cut her off, snapping: ?I didn't ask you, twat.? This seemed to get Michael on her side.

?Well.? Said Michael, clearing his throat, it seemed like he'd not really used his voice much recently. ?I was in the Cerulean debtor's jail. And they came for me in the night, the private security there-?

?-Devon's contracted to run the Cerulean jail.? Dusty interjected, with a raised eyebrow.

?Yeah, that's right.? Michael responded. ?I'm sorry about my indecent state, by the way. They took my clothes from me... They took everything from me.? Michael said, tears rolling down his face.

?That doesn't matter.? Florimel said, reaching out and taking his hand. ?We're here now. Well save everyone we can, and make sure no one else will suffer this fate. Go on, so you were in the debtors jail in Cerulean??

?Yeah, in the night, the guards came to my cell, they told me that there were too many people to fit in this jail and that I was being moved to Viridian. They loaded me in a cart with a few others, Emily included, she'd been in the female section of the jail. And they took us here. I haven't seen any of the others since we got here. They took us into one building here, stripped us and took loads of measurements and photographs. They said it was for 'disease prevention.' I asked them why we weren't in Viridian City but they didn't answer. Next they, put bags over our heads and they marched us in here. Before they took the bags off, they injected us with something in the neck, and we've been getting sicker and sicker since. Convulsions, passing out, vomiting, passing blood... and there's like this... This strange... Fog, it's getting harder and harder to think...? He pointed to the strange, grey, womanlike figure in the cell next to him. ?Her name was Alison. Maybe she still knows that, somewhere inside her... Maybe not. She'd been here a week by the the time we got here. Or so she guessed, I can see how she'd lost track of time. I think we've only been here four days, but I can't be sure... That means in four days time. We'll be like... That.? With this, he took his hand away from Florimel and rubbed the tears from his eyes.

?What did you do to them?? Florimel asked Ignus Factum, jabbing an accusing finger at the murderous Priestess.

?I have set them free! Liberated-? She began, before being cut off by Florimel once more.

?-None of the religious fluff. Tell me what you've done to this man.?

?Do you know of a Pokemon called Paras, and a Pokemon thought of as it's evolved form, called Parasect?? She asked, to which Florimel nodded slowly.

?I've seen pictures, why?? She replied. ?This better be damn relevant.?

?Oh it is. Paras is a simple and uninteresting bug type Pokemon, uninteresting that is except for the fact that it is born with a separate entity growing within it, a grass-type Pokemon similar to a mushroom or fungi, but Parasect is not in fact an evolution of Paras. It is what happens when this grass type infects the Paras' mind and takes over. The Paras is then just a brainless husk, and the plant controls it. The Parasect then lays eggs containing both it's and the Paras' DNA, so that the baby Paras' hatch, again all infected with the Parasects from birth, and the process begins again.?

?Okay.? Said Floeimel, letting the gruesome idea sink in. ?So you've injected these people with Parasect DNA, and they'll turn into Parasects??

?Not entirely. The Parasect and the human or not as compatible as Parasect is with Paras, so the Parasect itself will not form as such, but the effect of subduing the host-human's mind, as it does with the Paras, that will still happen. I've had to isolated parts of the Parasect DNA, changed proportions around, fiddled with concentrations. I am working on the perfect batch, which will leave the human being's higher brain functions switched off, only their basic needs, instincts and reactions will remain. They'll eat food if given it, shy away from pain, come towards warmth. But they will be innocent. They will lack a brain with which to sin, with which to offend god! These are the perfect humans!? She said, her arms waving around to take in the squalid contents of this hellish room.

?You think these people are perfect?? Dusty shouted. ?You think they're even people anymore??

?Oh, I admit that I still need to work on the formula. These subjects, I think, have lost too much.? She replied, wistfully. ?But I haven't even told you the best part yet.? She said, with another one of her sick smiles. ?We tried artificially inseminating one of early experiments. More to salvage something interesting out of a failed batch, you understand. These early subjects were nearly brain-dead and did not live long. But this one lived long enough to produce a baby... Which was as brain-dead as it's mother had been! It was born with the Parasect DNA in it's blood, just like every Paras is!?

?You're telling me you'll be able to reproduce these things?? Michael said with a whimper and a shiver. Pointing to Alison. ?You'll breed an army of Them? ? Of us??

?It's an interesting thought. Isn't it!? The Priestess said, again as light-hearted as if she were talking about growing flowers. Seemingly incapable of understanding the horrors she had inflicted on the very man she was talking to.

?Is there any cure?? Michael said, quietly, obviously without much hope.

?Oh, of course not. The damage is permanent and blessed.? The Priestess said, with a smile.

?I'm so sorry Michael.? Florimel said to the man, who slumped onto the straw-covered floor of his cell and started weeping, Emily's weeps also got louder and more intense, and this set off more murmuring and groaning from the other occupants of the room. ?Michael. I'm going to take this woman, and a bag-full of photos and evidence. And I'm going to come back with an army. I promise. We'll destroy this place. We'll burn it to the ground and we'll make sure everyone who had a hand in doing this to you is punished. We'll make sure no one else suffers a fate like yours.?

?Good. Hurry. Don't stick around talking to a dead man until you get caught. Don't mess it up. Go.? He said all this in staccato bursts, not looking up at them.

?You heard him.? Said Florimel. ?Let's get out of here, and get Hereward.?

?Look.? Said Page, the first she'd heard from zer in a while. It looked like the Herald had been rooting around in a cabinet by the door they'd come in through. ?More photo-books. Plenty of evidence about the experiments that took place in this room.?

?Put them in the sack and let's get out of here, we've wasted too much time. For all we know someone could be looking for this tool.? Florimel said, gesturing to the Priestess.

Page obliged and as they got ready to leave, Ignus Factum laughed at the comment and said: ?Oh, I can look after myself!? She grabbed one of a number of seemingly innocuous bottles from the top of the cabinet and splashed it's contents on her own groin. There was a squawk and a crunch as Bigwingboy reacted violently to the liquid. Ignus Factum winced as clearly the bird had bitten down on something between her legs, which didn't seem like it was part of her plan, but after a second in which the birds frenzied flapping could be seen through her dress, the Spearow fell to the floor beneath her, covered in green liquid. At a guess, it would be Repel. Something usually sprayed in tiny concentrations over huge fields to drive Pokemon out, as it was hugely repugnant to them, this had been dumped on Bigwingboy neat, and it had knocked him out. All this had taken barely a moment, and Florimel hadn't had a chance to react before the woman dove through the door, slamming it behind her as she ran and screamed: ?Guards! Intruders!? Now... They were screwed.

Dusty leaped to his Spearow's aid as the other two ran after the Priestess. Page weighed down by the sackful of books, and Florimel having to pause momentarily to throw the door open, by the time either of them were back in the front-most room, the insanely fast old woman had already unlocked the door somehow, and was back out into the main complex, screaming their positions to the guards. Only at that moment did Florimel remember that Spud was still in her robes, eagerly waiting for an instruction from it's trainer. 'Dammit!' She thought. 'I could have stopped her with a vine whip!' But it was no time to swell on past mistakes, not least the stupidity she'd displayed in even entering this hell-hole of a complex. There was now only one option and little time to take it. ?Okay guys.? She yelled to her friends. ?Walking out of here's no longer on the table. We either blast our way out, or we get buried here!" Not willing to waste time they didn't have making sure her friends were on the same page, she released Elgyem and Hydro as she sprinted forwards, and shouted the frantic instruction: ?Elgyem, rip a hole in the fence big enough for us to get out, and as close as possible to our position. Hydro, Spud, take out anyone you see before they have a chance to kill one of us, use lethal force if necessary!? She leapt out of the door and took a momentary glance around. There were already guards rushing towards them, guns in hand, she turned the corner, running to the east-side of the building, where it was nearly against the fence and shielded her and her Pokemon from most of the camp. Thankfully she saw Page Flick and Dusty join her a moment later, the last only just circling around the corner before a bullet zipped through the air where he had been standing only a moment ago.

There was nothing the humans could do but crouch down with Elgyem as he did his job, he raised one arm and gave sounds of strain as he mentally pulled apart the fence, creating a hole, small at first, but getting larger. On the near corner that they had just flew around, Spud was stood, low to the ground and shooting out bullet-seeds, presumably, based on screams and thuds she heard, they were reaching their targets. Hydro sprinted to the other corned and shot out jets of ice, in a similar defensive fashion. But while a couple of bullets hit the ground around Spud, or thudded into the cabin wall at his side, nothing hit him, possibly because he was so small and low, a difficult target, especially when it was firing back. On the other hand, before the hole was even large enough to fit Spud through, a couple of Mightyena's came rushing around Hydro's corner, they wore strange collars which Florimel had only previously heard described. They were the ultimate in an evil and remorseless Pokemon user's arsenal. They had tiny spikes, which would be shot, fatally into the Pokemon's throat when a clockwork mechanism wound down, and required a unique key owned by the trainer to wind up. It meant the Pokemon couldn't turn on it's trainer, no matter what the trainer asked them to do, as if the trainer didn't wind them up, they were doomed to die. But that wasn't the biggest concern for Flossy at this point, that was the fact that the Mightyenas were giant, four-legged, fanged, clawed, killing machines, and they had been sent to rip them and their Pokemon apart. Hydro blasted one with a jet of water, knocking it down, but the other pounced at him before he could react, grabbing Hydro in it's jaw and thrashing him about, before smashing him into the cabin, knocking him out with ease. It leapt towards Florimel, and she could do nothing but raise her hands in the air in fear, but luckily, Flick had her back. The newly-evolved Leavanny jumping nimbly passed her and slashing it's chest, sending it careering across the ground. But it got back up, and grabbed Flick's arm in it's teeth, and the two tussled around on the floor, Flick slashing away with it's free arm, and the Mightyena doing the same with it's front claws.

It was at this point when the other Mightyena got back to it's feet, and started to run at Florimel. She put out her fists in a desperate attempt to defend herself, but another fast-moving shape leaped passed her. This time it was Dusty though, sailing through the air with a grunt, and landing a perfect kick directly to the beast's forehead, knocking it out with ease. But before he'd had a chance to celebrate his success, a guard ran around the corner, possibly the owner of the Mightyena's, possibly not, but definitely the owner of a rifle, which he fired, straight into Dusty, who stood mere feet in front of this guard, a perfect target. Dusty slumped to the floor unceremoniously. As he'd been in front of her, Florimel hadn't quite seen where the bullet had hit him, but it hadn't travelled all the way through, as it would have hit her too.

The guard frantically grabbed a new shell out of his belt and started to re-load the rifle, Florimel looked to Flick, the Leavanny was still tussling with the remaining Mightyena, she looked at Elgyem, even if she redirected it's efforts away from making their door out of here, and towards knocking this guard out, it's reactions were way too slow, and she could still here Spud firing behind her, so he was clearly busy defending her back. She got up and started to rush towards the guard. Knowing she had never fought hand to hand with someone before, and that this was a trained fighter, maybe twenty centimetres taller than her, and with a weapon in his hands, and that even if this weapon was still unloaded when he reached him, it would make a superb club to hit her with. And on top of all that, even if she wrestled the gun from him, there'd be plenty more guards around the corner, who'd imminently rush into view and fill her full of lead.

All this thinking took less than a second, and she'd barely moved when it was all shoved out of her mind by a sight in front of her. A great, winged shape which appeared to be made from the purest white light arose from Dusty's chest. She was not a religious person, and nothing she'd seen over the last few hours had made her believe that there could be a God in this world. But for a split second it seemed to her as though Dusty's soul was leaving his body. This gigantic, white, glistening shape leaped through the air and crushed the guard into the ground with almighty talons, just as he'd finished reloading the gun. The light soon faded, and it was revealed to be: Bigwingboy. Dusty must have stuck him in his robe, as opposed to returning him to the Pokeball, and it had both shrugged off the Repel, and evolved into a Fearow just to avenge his fallen master.

Florimel leaped over to where Dusty's body lay, he was still alive, breathing and even awake. ?Damn.? He spluttered. Looking up at Florimel. He had been shot in the hip, it didn't look too bad, as far as gun-wounds went, although Florimel was no expert. ?Was that... Was that Bigwingboy?? Came Dusty's next words.

?Looks like it, and he's your saviour.? Replied Flossy. ?Do you think you could survive being flown to Viridian??

?I'll give it a go.? Said Dusty, sarcastically. Even at this moment of peril, capable of rolling his eyes at such a stupid question. ?I'm not making any promises.?

?Bigwingboy!? She shouted up the the Fearow, which was trying to hide it's enormous frame behind the cabin to avoid any more gunmen. ?Can you fly him to Viridian?? The beast nodded, walked over, and leaned down flat on the ground. Flossy loaded him up on the back of the Fearow, and Flick, who had just finished dispatching the second Mightyena, used String-Shot to stick Dusty to his Fearow, and the sackful of incriminating data to his robe. As they did this, Page grabbed the fallen gunman's rifle, and had just pulled it up as another guard ran around the corner of the cabin. Ze managed to get the shot of before the guard could, and Page felled him with a shot to the heart.

?Take Dusty to Hereward's attic. I don't care if you reveal him to the world, and I don't think he'll care either, once he sees the books. Good luck.? Florimel said to the Fearow, as Page reloaded. Bigwingboy flew up and out of the complex, flapping wildly as he soared away to Viridian as fast as he could on his brand new wings, squawking quietly out of concern for his precious cargo.

Elgyem squeaked urgently and Florimel saw that the little Psychic-attacker had finished making them their hole in the sturdy fence. Flossy returned the unconscious Hydro to its Pokeball and grabbed Spud. Page, Elgyem, Flick and herself ran, or in Elgyem's case: floated their way out of the complex and into the thick forest. They weren't safe yet, but they had a few tricks up their sleeves that would make them harder to follow.

Flick took up the rear at first, leaving trip-wires between trees which were invisibly thin yet strong as steel, before taking the lead to hack through parts of the forest too thick for the humans, swapping the rear position with Spud, who laid the same trap using his vine-whips. They'd never know how successful these things were, but whether through their use, or just speed and good luck, no pursuers ever caught up with them. It was possible that the guards had quickly lost their tracks, as the group constantly changed directions multiple times and crossed many streams in an attempt to throw them off, while always moving at speed, and always heading at least vaguely towards Viridian City.

They didn't stop to rest at any point, even when the adrenaline of their escape had long since faded, and their legs had begun to pump battery acid. It was only when they skulked their way out of the forest altogether and started to move through the swampy fields close to Viridian City that they uttered more than the odd barked instruction to one another.

?Do you really think that Hereward will raise an army?? Page asked.

?I think anyone with a beating heart in their chest will follow him once they?ve seen what's in those books.? Florimel answered, without a moment's hesitation.

?It's a shame they know we were there... If we?d managed to sneak out, we could take them by surprise. What if they destroy all the remaining evidence before we get there?? Page responded, glumly.

?There'll be piles of bones buried somewhere. And they can't destroy what evidence we a;ready have.? Florimel said, thinking to herself that yes, they probably were burning the place to the ground as they spoke, likely with Michael and any other 'experiments' still inside. ?We'll have to hope Hereward is quick with his army.?

After a moment's thought, Page chucked the rifle ze'd been carrying since the camp, into the river. When Florimel raised an eyebrow ze said: ?I don't want to get arrested over a gun with one bullet. I don't have a licence. And what use is one bullet compared to a Pokemon who can fight all day.? Ze said, patting Flick on the shoulder, who purred gratefully. Flick was the only of their Pokemon out of its ball at that moment, Spud and Elgyem having grown too tired during their long trek, and Flossy not risking re-releasing Hydro, in case it was still too injured to walk at their pace.

?Makes sense to me.? Said Florimel after a shrug. ?Look, about the gun... Are you okay... What with... Having killed someone??

Page nodded slowly. ?It was kill or be killed in there, and I have no problem with prioritising myself over the sort of person who would just stand by and let those Priests do those awful things, do them to people that the guard probably helped drag there... No. I have no problem with that at all.?

?Good. I'm glad.? Said Florimel, as they reached closer to the city. ?Wait a second...? Florimel said slowly. ?What's going on in Viridian.? She pointed at a huge amount of commotion, even from their distance they could hear a rumbling, a large amount of human activity, in the middle of the night, and they could see what looked to be scores and scores of torches, like stars scattered throughout the city.

?I think that might be our army.? Page said, with zer first smile of the day.

When they got closer still, they found that indeed it was. As they entered the city, they were met by Rose, the transgender cleaner who'd saved their lives in the Viridian town hall all those days ago, and who Hereward had tasked with waiting on the road for them to arrive, so she could ferrying them to him, assuming that he hadn't already marched his rabble off to that cursed camp. She explained the course of events that had taken place after Dusty had reached the city.

********

Dusty felt freezing cold as he sat on Bigwingboy, attached to the Fearow by that sticky, organic cord, and glad that he was, since he was shaking so hard he didn?t think he?d be able to hold on. Perhaps it was just the thin air rushing passed him as Bigwingboy tested the limit of his new wings, flying them both at top speed to Viridian, but maybe it was the shock and adrenaline too. Wasn?t that something that happened when you were shot?

His arms were free from the Leavanny?s string, so he was able to keep one arm pressed against the bullet wound on his side, he was no master of anatomy, but it certainly seemed to him that there were far worse places to be shot. He was even starting to allow himself the luxury of thinking that he might actually survive this, when seemingly out of nowhere, Bigwingboy plunged down out of the sky, and landed on a roof, claws skittering across the tiles as they found purchase. Dusty had no idea whether they had actually found Hereward?s loft, the tiles looked identical to any others from his vantage point. Before Dusty had been given a chance to catch his breath after the jolt of hitting the roof, he felt Bigwingboy?s neck thrust forwards and heard a crash, as the Fearow smashed a hole straight through the roof with its powerful beak. Dusty admired the simplicity of Bigwingboy?s approach, as he heard a shout of anger from inside, which he recognised to be Hereward?s voice, before he felt the Pokemon move around and shift position, so that Dusty?s head was pointed straight at the hole. Through which he could only see the end of a rifle barrel. He screamed, sure he was about to receive a bullet-wound far more instantly fatal than the one in his side. ?All my life,? he thought to himself, ?decades of living recklessly and annoying everyone I could, I?ve never been shot. And now it?s going to happen twice in one day.? He closed one eye and winced, preparing for the end, but the rifle was lowered out of site, and from behind it appeared the beaming, one-eyed face of Hereward Bourne.

?Why didn?t I guess that it was one of you three.? Started the Seviian. ?If anyone would be brash and stupid enough to land the biggest Pokemon in the region on the roof of my secret hideaway, and then smash his way into my bedroom! You better have a pretty damn good reason for this. Because thanks to you, I?m about to run out of here before the cops turn up and find a new place to lay low!?

?I think I kind of do.? Dusty croaked, smirking through the pain. ?Firstly, and most importantly, since it directly involves me: I?ve been shot. I need you to get me to a doctor. Secondly, and I admit possibly of a higher world-wide significance, I was shot whilst escaping from a camp in the forest, in which religious figures, under the careful watch and protection of The Devon Corporation, have been committing atrocious, and in most cases, fatal human experimentation on thousands upon thousands of children and adults. The most hideous mutilations? The most disgusting abuses? And I have proof.?

Hereward?s face cracked, and his brow furrowed. ?Where in the forest??

?You knew about this?? Dusty asked, aghast, temporarily forgetting about the pain in his side.

?There were rumours.? Hereward said, barely above a whisper. ?The: Some friend of a friend heard something some guy from Devon said when he got too drunk in a pub kind of thing. I didn?t believe it. It couldn?t possibly be true.?

?It is.? Dusty said, trembling again. ?Get me to a doctor you can trust, and I?ll show you all the proof you need.? He patted the sack that was bonded to him.

The Seviian wiped his brow, where a few beads of sweat had formed, before delivering directions to a doctor he trusted, as well as instructions on who to ask for and which password to give. He ended his statement with: ?I?ll be there. And I?ll bring everyone I can trust. Good luck.?

********

Bigwingboy leaped into the air instantly, and had soon swooped them off to what looked like a low-end Pokemon infirmary. Landing them on the front steps and tapping the door with his beak. A man opened the door a moment later and cowered in fear below the huge Pokemon, before Dusty, from over its shoulder, introduced himself, asked for the doctor Hereward had told him about, and gave the password. A short while later, he was cut free, and he was on an operating table with Bigwingboy tucked away in his Pokeball. Dusty kept hold of the sack, even as they operated on him, and only gave it up to Hereward, who arrived shortly afterwards with a huge and diversely dressed retinue, there seemed to be cleaners and longshoremen, artisans and experts, journalists and teachers. But all unified by a strange glint in their eyes, a fire, something ?different,? perhaps he was seeing the rebel spirit shine through, perhaps the pain and adrenaline had driven him mad. He recognised Rose, the cleaner from the town hall, and the woman who had piloted the barge the day he?d met Hereward, but the rest were strangers to him. They all ventured into another room, and throughout his time on the table, as they found and removed the bullet and stitched him up, he could here frantic talking, shouting and crying through the door.

The doctor, who was an old man without a single hair on his head, had told him that he was extremely lucky, he?d been hit in the hip, and the bullet hadn?t done much damage. He disinfected the wound, and told him he should be fine, so long as he rested and didn?t walk in the immediate future. ?Lucky I?ve just got a Pokemon who can carry me,? Dusty thought to himself, but didn?t say aloud. ?Can you get me in there?? He asked, pointing at the door through which the commotion was coming, and the doctor reluctantly obliged, fetching him a wheelchair, loading him into it, and pushing him through the door.

The conversation stopped when he entered the room, although those few who were weeping continued to do so. Hereward got up, his own single eye red, walked slowly over to Dusty, and hugged him tightly, nearly lifting him out of the chair. ?What?s the prognosis?? He asked. And Dusty confirmed that he was likely to make a full recovery.

?Do you think you can make it out tonight?? Hereward asked. ?We have a journalist amongst us.? As Hereward said this, a youngish woman with tears rolling down her face, and a pencil in her hair raised a hand, and attempted a smile. ?She has a license to use a Mr. Mime. We?re going to the town square, to the plinth you and Florimel spoke from, and we?re going to project these images onto the side of the old library, large enough for the city to see, and we?re going to tell the world what happened here. If I know people? We?ll raise an army tonight. An army ready for revolution.?

Dusty grinned at this. Aside from the doctor telling him he wasn?t about to die, which was always a bonus, it was the first good thing he?d heard all day. ?What if they shoot you?? he asked.

?Kill the people?s returning hero?? Rose said, from the corner where she was knelt on the floor with a few books splayed out in front of him, making frantic notes in a notebook. ?As he reveals the greatest evils in the history of the world? That would guarantee a revolution.?

Hereward smiled to her, and turned back to Dusty. ?If my guess is right, this will be too big to contain with a bullet. Tonight this Meowth?s let out of the bag, and it will be way too massive and too angry to fit it back inside."

*******

They left through the cellar, going through a long, underground passage, and coming up several streets away. Hereward explained it was an old part of the sewer, now unused except for getting ?sensitive? patients in and out, important people with health issues they didn?t want known. Hereward had sent some people ahead, so by the time they reached the town square there was already a large gathering, which parted to allow Hereward, the journalist and Dusty to get to the plinth. There was a minor police presence, there ready to clamp it down if it got too big. But by the time they realised how big it was getting, it would be too big for them to make a dent in.

As soon as Hereward had begun to talk, and the Mr Mime had begun to project images on to the wall, they had gathered thousands on their side, ready to march to the camp, and more were gathering all the time. The poor-houses, the mills, the hospitals, the brothels, they'd all emptied and everyone there was rallying for action. Even some of the well-paid professionals, such as architects, engineers and chefs were evidently on their side. Word had reached the farmers, who were beginning to come in from the farm houses around the city. A huge movement was occurring. The police knew they couldn?t tackle them, that attempting to break it up would just turn it into a riot, so they simply stayed away and let it happen. Dusty figured they would change their strategy from: ?Supress the knowledge. To ?Deny their own personal involvement.?

Even later in the night, many of the Pokemon who worked in the mills, mainly Machokes, had just busted their way out of the factories they worked all day in and were ready to join the cause. This seemed to be what Hereward had been waiting for, and he signalled to the crowd to ready themselves for an orderly march out, they were going to the camp.

He'd barely had time to say hello to Page and Flossy who were also both shepherded through the crowd and onto the plinth, because he?d just received word that they now had dozens of Machokes on his side, and with this he was ready to move. Dusty released Bigwingboy and had the Fearow fly him up in the air and in circles above the crowd, showing them which direction to travel in.

*********

As they marched on through the forest for the third time in the last few days, this time with Hereward at the front of an angry torch-wielding column of men, women and children, Florimel and Page both remarked that Hereward had managed to control an angry group which was baying for blood, with the exception of a few smashed windows in a small number of the Devon controlled businesses, and the damage the Machokes had done in getting out of their mills, none of their rage had spilled into mindless, random destruction. Hereward had replied with a laugh. Telling them that this was 'No foolish mob. This was a revolutionary army.' They both smiled at this.

This group took a more direct route, and they were armed with axes and machetes as well as guns and torches as they travelled through the forest, and so the undergrowth couldn't stop their progress, meaning this trip took a scant few hours. But when they arrived. They found the camp empty. Deserted. There was no one on the guard towers, and not only was the hole that Elgyem had carved unfixed, but every gate to the complex, and every door to every building was wide open.

They searched each building with caution. They found that there had been a quick clear out, leaving barely a scrap of paper or a vile of chemicals anywhere, and not a guard or Priest to be found. Except in one building. It looked to be the mess hall, and sat in there, chained to one of the tables which themselves were nailed into the floor. Was Sister Superior Ignus Factum.

?This is the one who brought us in.? Said Florimel, as she, Page, Hereward, Rose and a few of the other townsfolk gathered around her, cautiously as if she were a bomb about to go off. She looked like she'd been the one hit by a bomb though. The fingers on her left hand were all twisted in the wrong directions, and huge, black bruises covered her face. She had been tortured, it seemed so obvious it didn't need saying. But she voiced it anyway. ?Good.? Said one of the townsfolk, that Florimel didn't know. She couldn't say she disagreed with him.

The Priestess just sat there at the table, smiling vacantly as if with not a trouble in the world. On the next table over, out of her reach were four items. The first was a key, it looked like it fit the lock that was shackling her to the table, a rifle, loaded, and two pieces of paper. Rose picked the documents up and read them out in turn . One was for a huge tract of land, including the area the complex stood on, but much of the rest of the undeveloped Western part of Viridian Forest. It claimed that sole ownership had been granted to one Sister Superior Ignus Factum, and that she was being granted ownership and sole control over the land to build a religious facility. It was signed by the previous land owner, the Governor of Viridian, Mr Johan Spursperg. Who Hereward confirmed had been the Governor of this area at the time the document was dated: Twenty seven years ago. And the document looked at least that old... Apart from the name 'Sister Superior Ignus Factum,' which was written in fresh ink, by a shaky hand.

?Her name may as well be 'Sarah Capegoat.? Hereward said, mockingly. ?They blame her for the secret getting out, so they've tortured her into signing a document giving her all the legal blame, and they've left her here with a gun, expecting us, the uncivilised rabble we are, to shoot her.?

The second document was written by a Mr Stephen Kewerd, of the Devon Corporation. It explained that since they had recently become aware of the nature of the experiments that were being conducted by Sister Superior Ignus Factum, at her Viridian Forest complex, which they had previously not known about, the Devon Corporation would be immediately and permanently severing all ties with her group, and would aid the relevant authorities in finding any of the offenders, who escaped on mass once their secret was revealed in a recent affray.

It was obvious to everyone in the room that Devon had known all along, had helped the Priests with their despicable acts, and had helped the rest escape. It was a terrible cover-up, but one which would convince a Devon-owned courtroom, or a Silph-owned one, or a Miga-owned one... What difference did it make, all the companies watched each other's backs.

?Ms Ignus Factum.? Said Hereward, as he sat across from here, bringing the deed of ownership with him. ?I am willing to do you a fair trade.? She barely looked up, she just sat there with that demented grin still on her face. ?Your allies have fled, and they have left you in the fire, to burn. But in their attempt to do so, they have made a mistake. As a result. I can help you out. Johan Spursberg was a fool. He was one of Devon's biggest shareholders, and the Governor of this whole area, but we do not live in a meritocracy, so that does not mean he wasn't an idiot. His plan to distance himself from the evil he committed here was, in the event of it being revealed, to pretend that someone like you, a scapegoat, had owned it all along, as their own private kingdom, not just that you owned it, but that you were it's emperor! Nothing to do with him at all! However, what he didn't realise, or perhaps he didn't care, is that you can now pass this land on. You can sell it. And I'm willing to buy it.? He reached into his bag and pulled out a pen and a notepad. ?Rose, bring in every journalist and photographer who joined our side.? He called over his shoulder, and they quickly did. They gathered around, with cameras and even sound-recording devices set up. In the meantime Hereward drafted a legally binding document, a contract of sale, all of the land and the total control over it, that she had been given to hide a now-dead Governor's involvement in possibly the greatest crime in history, to The Viridian City Chess Club... Hereward explained that it was a democratic, constitutional organisation, with elections and a membership process, and was therefore, pending a few quick rule changes, a government. ?We are going to build a new republic. A better one. A free one, an equal one.? Hereward said, with a smile.

?Right here?? Florimel exclaimed. ?On top of the most hideous mass grave imaginable??

?We'd be making some good come out of it. At least...? Said Page.

?Exactly. Very good point Mx. Page, I couldn't have put it better myself.? Replied Hereward.

?You said a trade...? The Priest said slowly. ?What do I get in return??

?This.? Said Hereward. Pulling out a small jar containing a single pill. ?Beedrill poison. Suicide is not illegal, and it won't be in our new republic, and this is quite a painless way to do it. But theft is, and I won't give you this unless it's in return for your kingdom. I'm the current president of the Chess Club, therefore I can trade on it's behalf. And I'll trade you this pill.? With this he signed the paper, and handed her the pen. Without hesitation she signed, and then greedily snatched the pill up and swallowed it down. A few moments later she slumped forwards, Hereward pulling the new deed away from her before she landed on it.

?And so.? Said Hereward, with a smirk. ?A new Republic is born... Well, not quite, it will be a state within the world-government, same as Viridian City, or Viridian Forest, or Pallett Town, and we'll have to obey world laws, like the Pokemon licenses, but in every other manner... We are free.?

?Who's 'we'?? Asked Rose, smiling.

?Whoever wants to live here! This will be a new republic, a fair republic, with a fair system and a free population. Anyone who thinks that the companies are lying, that their way isn't the only way, can come here and help us build a modern state where people live in freedom and safety and an equitably distributed prosperity!? He addressed the room with that huge, booming voice which had everyone enraptured. ?We have plenty of land to support everyone who made this journey, even now, when the land is nothing more than a forest full of fruit and nuts, but we can support more once we develop it! We will build farms, then smiths, then factories! While the states around us stagger and limp towards the future, stagnated by the lost potential of their ignored workforce, and their inflexible system, we will outcompete them, we will outgrow them, outflank them, we are rugged and weak now, but one day, if we utilise everyone's skills and knowledge, and embrace the future, one day... We will lead the world! We have no need to fight anymore! We will win by out-competing them!? There were a few cheers from the dozens of people know gathered in this mess hall. There didn't seem like there were many people there who were desperate to rush off back to Viridian City, to probably be fired from their factories and end up in debtor's jail, but nonetheless, Hereward gave them the option, he said: ?Who here will become a citizen of this fine republic?? And there was a unanimous roar of support, then he said: ?And who will be going back to Viridian City?? There was silence for a few seconds before one woman cried out: ?I will! To bring back my brother and his family!? There were laughs from the assembled, including a booming, roaring chuckle from Hereward himself. The woman continued: ?He was a carpenter, although now he works in a cotton mill, because there's no money in building, he'd have some great plans for the lumber in this place!? Another set of chuckles passed through the room, and although Florimel was enjoying herself, a thought came to he.

?You say you won't have to fight, but what if Silph and Devon and the others come and burn your new state down?? She asked. ?You... Or rather the Chess Club, may well own this place legally, but they don't always obey the law.?

?We have scores of Machokes, and many people armed and trained with guns.? Hereward replied. ?In fact, someone will have to be elected Defence Minister, and will have to organize a response to this very possibility. Elections I think are the key, elections for everything, referenda, polls! One person, one vote. And the Machokes' will have votes too.?

There were more cheers, it was electric in here, the journalists were still snapping photo after photo, and others were writing down every word that was being said. Florimel had a feeling that what was happening this very day, in this very room, would shape the future. She felt this to an even greater extent than she had at any other point in her adventure so far.

Hereward, it seemed, had decided by this point that the large mess hall was too small for such momentous things to be discussed, as he gut up and went out into the open of the complex, mounting one of the guard towers and once again addressed the crowd as a whole through his megaphone. Most of the others in there followed him out, apart from a few who were tasked with taking the priestess away and burying her body. Florimel took Page over to where Dusty was sitting, quite far from the epicentre of the crowd, but close enough to hear the speaker. He sat on a chair that had been brought out of one of the complex's buildings, with Bigwingboy, who must have been exhausted by this point, sat behind him, towering over him protectively.

?So Hereward's building himself a country.? Florimel said, as she wrapped her arms around Dusty in a tight embrace that the usually gruff historian didn't even bother to pretend he didn't enjoy.

?I'm gathering that much.? Dusty said, in an uncharacteristically pleased voice, as he stared up to Hereward, who was extracting cheer after cheer from the rapturous crowd.

?He'll ask us to stay.? Said Florimel, matter-of-factly.

?We should.? Dusty responded, still staring straight ahead at Hereward. ?He'll need all the Pokemon he can get his hands on, defending this place, we're three of the only people here licensed to own them... But it's your call.?

?I don't know.? Flossy responded. ?Do you really think that Hereward's plan will work, he'll build a country out of waifs and strays, on a strip of forest not deemed worthy of deforestation??

?It's a safer bet than our crazy plan.? Page chimed in.

?That's true... That's very true.? Florimel responded, thinking to herself. ?We'll stay here as long as we're needed. If I ever think we'll be of more use continuing the adventure, then we'll do that.?

*******

The next few days were frantic, as people worked to adapt the rules of the Chess Club, so that it suited as the new state's government, others went back to town, gathering more people, and liquidating their assets so that they could buy and bring to the state, the much needed food and tents, many more worked alongside the Machokes, tearing down areas of the forests, stripping the wood and beginning to build homes, as well as clearing and ploughing land, so that others could begin to plant crops, for many more, their first task was foraging, for nuts, berries and fruit, as well as bog-weed, a nutritious plant that grew in abundance in the becks and streams within the new republic. Medical supplies were also abundant, the forest was a living, self-replicating drug store to someone with the knowledge to use it, and there were plenty of them amongst the refugees, and in addition to that, there were huge amounts of drugs, both benign and unpleasant, within the compound.

At first, the thousands of people lived in cramped conditions, mostly in the compounds existing buildings, and a tent city that erupted around it, but as the weeks went on, more and more small wooden and wattle-and-dorb houses popped up, rustic though they were, they were a massive improvement on the shacks and work-house bunks that most people in The Republic were used to, and these were given out to those who needed them the most first, the families with children, and elderly relatives. The command structure also changed, at first, Hereward was the ultimate chairman of the republic, and people came to him for commands on the biggest, to the most trivial issues, but this was a huge strain on the one-eyed man, and thankfully before too long the constitution and laws of the new republic had been laid down, by a committee of academic refugees, and this allowed elections to take place. Hereward was retained as the head of state, perhaps unsurprisingly as the most famous person in the new republic, with the possible exception of Florimel, who had made it clear she didn't want the position, but now he had far fewer powers, and there were many more people elected in positions below him, who would take that work away from him. There was a Minister for Pokemon, who looked after the Machokes and any wild Pokemon encountered, and that was one of the journalists, who had a Mr. Mime already, and was quite knowledgeable on the subject of Pokemon, a Minister for food, for housing, for children, for medicine, for justice, and even a minister for sewage, all elected, all given well defined duties and limitations, and the threat of a new election to replace them at any point, should the public as a whole lose confidence in them. Florimel was elected to Minister of Defence, she accepted the position with some trepidation. She wasn't sure how well she would do in the role, but with her Pokemon being one of the few forces that they had with which to defend their new realm, she could understand why she had been chosen, and with Dusty and Page on her staff, she was sure she could do something useful in the position.

There were many more elections, usually preceded with huge, public debates, one of which was to decide the name of their new country, in the end, The Republic of West Viridian Forest was chosen, a simple, mature name which seemed legitimate and honest.

West Viridian was thriving, perhaps it was that everyone's expertise was being used, rather than ignored, perhaps it was that everyone was so infused with the project that they were all working as hard as they could, but the country was rising at an impressive rate. The Compound, which had, following another election, been renamed 'Wyke,' named after a fictional city of prosperity in an old tale, was made the nation's capital, and was growing fast, but there were other areas of the forest which were bing quickly cleared, tilled, planted and turned into farming communities with houses made from the left over wood. They were not building any factories anytime soon, but they were on course to have plenty of food come winter time, when the forest would be less bountiful.

At one point, representatives of the government and business from Viridian arrived at the border, quickly spotted by Bigwingboy. They demanded to hear from the thieves who stole Machokes from their owners' factories. And so Hereward arrived with dozens of his citizens, and the scores of Machokes, and told them that he did not know of any stolen Pokemon, all the Pokemon in West Viridian were free, wild, uncaptured, and would remain that way, and since this Viridian City delegation had no proof, they were forced to leave them in peace.

It was difficult work, but the dream to build a new republic on the site of one of history's worst crimes was, incredibly, working. The weeks turned to months, and Florimel started to believe that her future was here, that this place truly could be a great state, a world-beater, that thousands could live here in bliss, and that millions around the world could look to West Viridian Forest and follow its example, lest they be left behind in its wake.


End of chapter one