Ten thousand bucks.
Her dad's old stunner.
Her scarf.
Her jacket.
She strapped the stunner to her side with a quick-release latch, bundled the money into her pocket, and made sure her jacket covered everything before heading downstairs. Just before leaving the house, she called out to her mom, "I'm going for a walk. I'll be back."
"How long?"
Her hand lingered on the doorknob. "For a while. To relax."
Her mom looked out from the living room doorway. Dawn couldn't keep eye contact for long.
"Okay," her mom said. "Be careful. Get back here in time." She cracked a smile. "You know your father would hate it if you were late."
Dawn stepped out, the cold night enveloping her. Sinnoh's summers were cool, but they had never been this cold until the incident with Hoenn's god - the land god. Groudon. It threw the entire world off-balance, and even now, three years later, there was snow in summer.
That was what the scarf was for. For the cold.
Judging from the position of the moon, she had three hours to get this done. Three hours before the memorial for all the dead trainers began. Three hours for her to make things right.
Three hours to betray her mom - but to secure her future. Until she stepped outside that night, it seemed so uncertain.
Because seven years ago, Dawn's father had died.
Five years ago, the lab at Sandgem turned its back on her.
Three years ago, Red overthrew the Indigo League, Hoenn's gods nearly destroyed the world, and Barry took off on his journey without looking back.
But tonight, in spite of all that, Dawn was going to get her starter.
The place where she was going wasn't Sandgem. She didn't cut through the grass that had already grown past her knees. She headed into Twinleaf's dark, overgrown forest, where there was a broken tree trunk that looked just like all the others. Except this one didn't have rot or a Kricketot's den inside, but a hole plummeting into the pitch black earth. Into the Underground.
Tonight, Dawn would either get her starter - or get herself killed along the way.
One or the other. There was no question about that.
1. the sun
"I hoped you would come. It's the least I owe your father." The old man tapped his jaw in thought as he looked over her license. "Mister Berlitz…he brought us our best sales. I admit to missing him at certain times…" Although his eyes were like dark caves, she saw his face crinkle with squinting. "Your eye?"
"…I'm sorry?"
He flipped her license in his fingers before returning it. "Your photo. You hurt your eye."
"I got into a fight." She fidgeted with her pockets. "I won, though, so, uh—"
"I see, I see. We've relocated our operations tonight. Just to be safe." The old man, the overseer in these parts - the man who everyone knew but whose name no one knew - gestured to his left. "Follow these tunnels. Stay close to the wall. Auctions begin in ten minutes, battles in seven."
She walked away, but the tunnels carried his hushed voice: "I hope luck swings your way, Miss Berlitz."
Dawn anchored her hand against the cold, slippery wall to guide her way through the Underground's crappy, miserable lighting. Single lightbulbs popped and flickered among knots of exposed wire, and the long darkness to all sides of her made her skin prickle. This early on, that was all the Underground was - dim, silent, and empty.
At least, she hoped it was empty.
There were rumors that these tunnels housed Sinnoh's high-ranking officials during the war. These stories said there was some insurrection that led to the execution of one hundred and eight rebels in these halls, and their ghosts watched everyone down here, ready to curse, ready to devour.
Others said this was only a failed project to create a safe passage to bypass Sinnoh's wilderness and winters. And supposedly, under cities held by the League, the Underground really was safer than the surface. But here? Dawn kept her eyes out for traps and the hollow eyes of drifters, murderers, demons. For the bodies of the disappeared. The lost.
To keep her mind off the tension in her muscles - and the distinct feeling of being watched - she focused on the wad of bills in her pocket.
Ten thousand dollars. One year of tuition and board for Sandgem's finest academy.
One future sacrificed for another.
She pushed thoughts of her mom to the back of her mind. Those words, those fights - all of that would come later.
You have to become champion. No matter what the cost.
Screw the labs, screw the League, screw it, screw it, screw it - Barry hadn't waited a day after he turned ten, and she at thirteen wasn't going to wait anymore. She squeezed through the last thin, crushing tunnel, and came out to an explosion of noise and activity, the smell of sweat and metal filling her lungs.
She immediately side-stepped a chained Houndoom snapping and spewing hot spittle all over her jeans, banging her head against a caged Swablu dangling from a thick support beam. Roars from criminal chatter, monsters and machinery filled her ears and shook the air, and Dawn weaved her way around huddles of strangers reeking of alcohol and white herb. To her left was an old woman's stand reeking of bitter herbs that even the sassiest Swanna would refuse, and to her right was a 'supplement' booth, and someone rushing by with a painting that Dawn was pretty sure had been last seen in a Kalosian gallery - but none of that mattered. The auction hall was coming up, and after that was the colosseum - just a few minutes more and she would have everything—
"Hiya!"
Dawn hissed through her teeth and whipped around, relaxing her fists when she realized it was just some tall, scrawny girl who was barely older than her, wearing some dinky female sailor suit. "Um, hi?"
"Berlitz, right?" The perky girl waved her hand dismissively - her nails were long. "I gotcha, I gotcha. What's your business? Gonna buy a little something?"
"…Not yet. I just—" Have to keep cool down here, she reminded herself, don't cower— "Money, first."
"Ah-ha." The girl leaned in and gave her a big, exaggerated wink that baffled Dawn. She leaned her arm against Dawn's shoulder and said, "Well, Mister UG says if you need a favor—"
"Thanks," Dawn murmured, brushing off the girl. Her hands itched for the stunner, but it was a last resort - ironically, being seen with a weapon would only make her a target.
At least she was lucky this time - that girl was just working for the overseer. The keeper of the asylum. He curated everything down here based his sketchy, almost alien moral code. Dawn had seen her share of bloody fights, desperate addicts and bodies caught in fire traps, but as bad as that was, this place would probably be an outright terrorist cell or human trafficking network if it weren't for his influence.
Because of him, poachers were willing to operate here. And because of that, people could get a pretty solid deal if they were willing to take some risks.
In the auction hall, the computers gouged into the walls buzzed with shifting text and images. Dawn glanced at one reading Deino, newly hatched, ninetieth percentile in size and boggled at its known techniques before the screen abruptly changed to SOLD - BIDDER #1108. The overseer had recommended her to come tonight, that there would be good deals - but she didn't expect them to be this good. She briefly imagined herself with a Hydreigon, but she needed a pokemon that wouldn't raise too many eyebrows. The League was keen on investigating poaching. Probably because Cynthia didn't want people taking the cheater loopholes and tactics she must've abused to become champion.
Seriously - the champion could go on and on about how my starter was gift from someone who cared about me, but it didn't change the fact that Gible were just about extinct after centuries of Sinnoh's ice and snow. No one had seen a wild Gible in years. No one caught a Gible. No one got one as a "gift." The most hardcore collectors, oh, they would claim they received theirs as a "gift," and often found themselves in prison shortly after. Of course, this didn't apply to Cynthia. Cynthia was the champion, Cynthia was the face of Sinnoh, Cynthia had everything—
Whatever. It didn't matter. Buying something would come later. She needed money. More money than she had now.
And as she approached the colosseum, she was more than ready to get it.
"Hot damn! Tyrunt is blasted back into extinction! Another point for Sinnoh, while the Kalos reps are zero for six in losses, which goes to show what chowing down on snails does for you—"
The winner of the round, anonymous and unknown as all the others, recalled a bellowing Gyarados before snatching his winnings in a meaty fist. He beamed at the roars of approval from the crowd, smiling grimly as a Salamence crawled out and took the dead Tyrunt for its snack. Dawn's gaze followed the Salamence to two women chatting on the arena sidelines - one was the owner of the Salamence, and the other kept her hand on a Magnezone as her blind Alakazam's glowing blue eyes cast an uneasy light in the arena.
"All right, all y'all wimps and wusses!" The announcer strolled onto the colosseum floor, twirling the microphone cord around his finger. "Who's taking on our oh-so inimitable champion of the UG, mister fifteen minutes of fame, mister blackjack and hookers? We're firing up Realgam Roulette and this could be your chance to walk out a bazillionaire or a big, fat L-O-S-E-R—"
Dawn moved through the crowd with a tightened jaw, ignoring the taunts and jibes - they were more general coked-out insults than anything aimed directly at her. Not like the kids at school. With her hood drawn, no one could tell she was Berlitz's kid. If anyone even remembered who Berlitz was.
Mister Fifteen Minutes of Fame stood with his arms crossed as she matched his bet with the full sum of her money, handing it off to the announcer. She stared down her opponent with an expression as stony as his own until another contestant shuffled into the ring. Dawn glanced to her side - just some tall guy. Old. Rich, judging from how casually he tossed over the money. And, judging from his icy expression, capable of slapping bears.
"Awright, let's give it up for this little power trio we got going on here! Brace yourselves, people, cause the roulette starts now!"
Hot blood pumped in Dawn's veins as the Alakazam raised its spoons, forming a shimmering barrier around the battleground. Meanwhile the Magnezone zipped into the ring, its roulette wheel blinking wild colors as a pokeball popped out to each fighter.
People called this round Realgam Roulette - you either got a predator, or you got its breakfast.
Luck, they called it. Pure luck.
Dawn wasn't one for luck.
She forced a grin as she caught the pokeball. The second it was in her fingers, the bell sounded, and the old guy fired off his pokemon - a brawny Electivire that thundered its chest as it manifested. The other guy's pokeball burst like a grenade and sent a spear of light up, and up—
And up.
Dawn didn't think the Underground could get any darker until she saw the Rhyperior. It must have been at least half as tall as Twinleaf's forest and was sure as hell taller than the Electivire, and her chest brimmed with a little bit of fear and a lot of awe when she heard the deafening roars of its revving drills.
The crowd went nuts, and she wasn't sure how she'd bring it down, but she'd find a way. Realgam Roulette gave players one of five predators or one prey - she had a chance.
She chucked her pokeball at the Rhyperior's head.
She wished for a Dragonite. She wished for a Kangaskhan.
Her stomach dropped when the pokemon came out.
Because she had seen it, five years ago - when she and Barry escaped from their houses and charged onto Route 201 in the dead of the night. When the old professor they'd been looking for yanked her back home by her scarf, when his gentle assistant had opened the suitcase for Barry because while the two of them had been stupid, feckless, reckless and irresponsible in every way - good gods above, are you incapable of considering the world outside your own self-centered brains? Do you know how terrified your mothers would be if they realized what you'd done? How they would feel if they found you dead? But you, boy, at least you show humility, and little girl, if you had just apologized, if you knew when to give in—
She had seen it, five years ago, when Barry had been given a choice between the slow but absolutely certain Turtwig, the proud and power-packed Piplup, and—
Chimchar.
She saw the little monkey clinging to Rhyperior's horn with narrow, wary eyes, and thought, Well, nice knowing you.
"Iron Tail!" Rhyperior's trainer hollered.
And that was all she could think - she swung under Rhyperior's tail as it lunged into battle, and tried to keep her eye on Chimchar while dodging fists and flying rocks. It was impossible - totally impossible - but she tried. She would see a bright orange flash, but then a boulder would smash a crater inches to her left, or lightning would char the earth inches to her right. Maybe it was better for a trainer to stay still for these things, but she'd gotten a stupid Chimchar, and she'd thrown him right at Rhyperior, and she'd put her entire goddamn life on the line for the sake of cashing in on her winnings—
A shrieking meteor crashed into her, slamming her into the dirt and then the barrier as jeers flooded her ears and claws ripped into her cheeks. She tore off the little bugger and was about to thrash him against the wall before she realized - it was Chimchar.
He glared at her with wide and furious eyes, squirming out of her grip.
She clenched her teeth and sat herself up as he clambered onto her shoulders. "Look," she snapped, "you just stick with me until they kill each other—"
Her insides turned to ice as a godawful crack pierced the air. It was like splintering bone. Rhyperior was falling, cracks spidering on his shell. The Electivire stood tall, eerie light dissipating from his legs - a rolling kick.
There wasn't any time for outrage. Just the boggled, dumb horror of something so colossal getting thrown off-balance by something so small—
The Rhyperior crashed, and the whole earth broke.
Dawn scrambled away. She only caught the announcer's "Whoa, goddamn, back off people!" as the Rhyperior shattered a huge part of the psychic barrier and smashed into the wall. She barely hoisted herself onto a chunk of unstable earth as the crash of the falling wall exploded behind her, and sheer instinct made her scramble the rest of her body onto her feet.
Right next to the Electivire.
The old man was as far away from the Electivire as he could go, ignoring the crowd's shrieks and howls, hands in his coat pockets. He wasn't giving any commands. Dawn looked back to Electivire, who didn't move, save for his shivering limbs and the electricity between his tails. Blood came out of wounds on his torso, matting inches of fur.
There were a lot of things wrong with him - bulbous growths on missing patches of fur, pink foam coming down his mouth, watery eyes. His breaths were fast and heavy, like he couldn't suck enough air.
Chimchar snarled, his claws digging into her shoulder, even through her jacket.
"One down, one to go! Talk about out with a BANG! The crowd is getting restless, people! I'm guessing this is a case of ladies first but there's no chance of getting outta this one—"
The one elemental type where a stunner was completely ineffectual. Of course. Forfeiting wasn't an option, either - if she left without a starter, she'd have no future. But looking into the dead gaze of a mutant Electivire wasn't much of a future, either...
Chimchar smacked the side of her head. Electivire's gaze shifted - and Dawn smiled.
Might as well go down swinging, right?
"You go for his eyes," she said, and she snapped her hands to her shoulder and flung Chimchar, her whole body swinging with the motion—
The old man screamed, "Now!"
Dawn threw herself aside from the electric blast, which arced into the overhead wires and blew up the lightbulbs with a rain of sparks. The arena went black, and a loud "Goddammit!" and a Salamence's bellow boomed over the outrage, but she saw Chimchar. His fire was tiny, though, a matchstick in the dark flying through the air—
But as he Chimchar landed, that tiny fire felt like the sun.
The Electivire's scream made the already outraged crowd lose their minds. A thunderbolt he had been charging veered far away from Dawn as the Electivire howled. He beat his fists against his face, stomping and stumbling left and right while people called out, "What the hell?! Holy shit! Get the goddamn lights on! Look at that! C'mon you stupid jackass, kill him already!"
Dawn eyes adjusted to the dark as she shuffled around the fight, trying to get a better look, trying to put her thoughts in order, shouting 'advice' all the while - "Get him! Kill him! Oh crap! Go, go, go!"
But when the Electivire got a lucky shot and ripped the Chimchar off his nose, holding the squirming monkey in his fist - Dawn ran.
The Electivire was so absorbed with crushing the little twerp that he didn't see her grabbing his leathery tail, and once she had a tight grip she threw her weight into the dirt and pulled.
Electivire dropped him and spun around so fast he sent Dawn flying, and she struck the dirt, eating mud. Jeez, she thought, wiping her mouth, this guy's attention span is shorter than Barry's…
She got herself upright, tensing when the Electivire twisted her way, staring her down with his bleeding eye squeezed shut. Her blood was a cocktail of bravado and idiocy and absolute terror—
And she remembered her father's words:
Everyone is your enemy—
The Electivire bared his teeth.
Make them fear you—
He clenched his fists.
Never cower—
Dawn sprung to her feet and gestured to herself like Flint, like Crasher Wake in the ring, and yelled, "Come on! Hit me! Hit me!"
Chimchar shrieked again and Electivire twisted around too, recoiling at the sharp leer the Chimchar shot, and as she blocked out the sounds of the crowd, Dawn knew the little guy and her agreed on one thing.
This asshole can just die.
She charged in and smashed a hook into the Electivire's belly, striking his kidney, judging from the choked sound he made. But his fur, riddled with static, zapped her and seized her limbs, but she didn't let up - she smashed him again. The Electivire tried swatting her away before clawing at Chimchar, who scrabbled onto Electivire's tails, trying to get onto his face. When Electivire went for Chimchar, Dawn struck again, back and forth, back and forth.
The Electivire snarled and clutched his face - more froth and blood spilling out than ever, and Dawn was certain that if they kept this up, if they kept tiring him out, he'd lose too much blood and they would win—
Until the Electivire grabbed his tail - the one Chimchar was climbing - and tore it out of its socket.
Dawn staggered back at the awful sound. At first she thought that crack was Chimchar, and with that, all of her money and effort crushed into dust and blood - she didn't feel relieved when she saw Chimchar clinging to the dangling tail. The Electivire was uneasy on his feet, but grinned at Chimchar's struggle. Dawn flexed, urging her body to move move move but too little, too late - the Electivire swung his tail and smashed Chimchar on the ground a few bone-crunching times, then reared his fist back—
Dawn threw herself forward as the fist came down.
The crowd sucked in a collective breath—
The barrier flashed pale blue—
The old man's eyes were dark, glinting—
"Stop your attack!" he screamed.
Dawn heard the crack.
She felt the impact, but not the pain.
Her vision went white, and then it went black.
She swore she heard the crash of an opening pokeball, a roar of a creature she had never heard - but then all sound was gone.
She wanted to think about her mother, her father, Barry and his family, all of them together - but the whole world was dark.
That should have been the end.
But it wasn't.
\-|-/
"Get your stupid ass up, monkey girl."
Dawn opened her eyes. Her mouth was raw and stung with bitterness and blood. Her entire body ached, but she could at least move around, eventually propping herself up even as her vision spun.
"Still as pretty as ever, aren't you?"
Dawn whipped her head to see an old woman standing over her with a three-toothed grin, her skinny Hypno enthralled by its own swinging pendulum.
"Gave it all up for a monkey." The woman's snicker was more like a rattling exhalation. "Hell if I know why."
The old man was still there. In the dark, she only saw his furrowed brow. His cold gaze felt like a skewer through her eyes. "What compelled you to pull that stunt?"
Dawn squinted at them both, back and forth. "What?"
"…I expected to deal with a fool, but not an idiot. When the Chimchar you sent out was attacked, you dove in to stop it. With your own body. Why?"
"I - I don't know." She racked her brain for answers, but - no. Nothing. "I guess it just felt right." She looked at the woman when the man's relentless stare became unbearable. "If that attack hit me, shouldn't I be dead?"
"Herbs, monkey girl." The lady snickered again. "Blessings be to Shaymin. If I were you, I'd be one of her nuns 'til the end of my days."
She was about to ask, White herb saved my life? before realizing it was the other kind of herbs - the traditional sort of medicine. She didn't know how they worked, but they were capable of some wild, miraculous feats, like potions. So long as you got them in your mouth in time.
They were disgusting, though. And expensive as hell. She wasn't sure if the old woman was generous or if she was about to owe the debt of a lifetime.
"The pokeball didn't work. It must have been modified for these matches," the old man said. "Otherwise, I would have called it back before it struck you. I'm relieved to see you're alive."
Well, he didn't sound like it. But she didn't speak.
Her eyes fell onto the pit. It was an immense hole, as if it were a grave dug for an entire village. "At least you won," she murmured, putting her hood back up. "You must be rich."
"There was a riot," the old man said. "The Electivire and the Rhyperior are dead, and the money was stolen."
"The Chimchar?"
"I believe it is still alive."
"Oh." Dawn shrugged, feeling a slight, satisfied warmth settle in her. "Hey. Good for him."
The old man handed money to the herbal medicine woman. Dawn boggled at the amount. What the hell? What's that for? She thought of the awful feeling on her tongue, the nausea in her belly - Did he buy those for me…?
"The Electivire, he needed it," the woman remarked. "He and all the others who fight. They're dead on the inside." When the money was accounted for, she tucked it into her dress. "It was the Rockets that did it to them. Evolved them too soon."
"It seems so," the man said, walking away. "I had my dealings with them in Kanto, and they may still exist."
Rockets this, Rockets that - the words were meaningless to Dawn. She stood up on uneasy legs when something hard smacked against her skull - a pokeball.
"While it wasn't possible in this scenario, I'd suggest recalling your pokemon next time." The man stopped to glance back, his mouth curled in what was either a smile or a snarl - she couldn't tell under his moustache. "What you did was stupid, and rather bad for your health."
She clutched the pokeball, felt its solidity before stuffing it into her pocket. Exhaustion seeped into her body, and she didn't think about what she had lost today - and what exactly she obtained.
She jumped when the old woman started laughing, wheezing, looking down at Dawn with look that made Dawn's insides wriggle. "You just be careful, now. You didn't die this time, but that's no good thing. Your daddy would know - you slip away from Death, Death slips a string round your neck."
"What?"
The woman's Hypno pushed an unsteady cart of jars and herbs to the woman's side. She patted its arm. "I'm just going to ask - have you ever met a trainer who's outfoxed death?" She smirked before she and her pokemon walked deeper into the dark. "Just get yourself to bed. It's already past midnight."
Dawn shook her head to clear it. "What are you talking about? I don't—"
And then it hit her, all at once.
"Wait, it's already midnight?!"
But there was no response. Everyone was gone.
Oh crap. Oh crap. Ohhhh crap—
A final fit of adrenaline burst through her limbs as she took off into the unusually empty halls. She clawed her way through the tight tunnel and hurtled all the way down to where she came in, scrambled up the ladder, nearly slipping off a few times, the stunstick stabbing her side, and when she came out—
A bright light shot in her face. She shielded her face with her arms, but saw the army of cops gathered around the tree trunk, guns aimed, the barks of their Houndour ringing through the woods.
"I have no idea who the hell you are, but you're under arrest!"
Grimacing, she threw her hands up, and the will-o-wisps from the Houndour illuminated the forest like the rising moon.
a/n: sorry for the delay - i was close to the hurricane and got hit by a power outage. eh, it figures.
so, yeah - when i said the opening had changes, i wasn't kidding. i tried to play the game's opening straight, messed around with how diamond/pearl did things, probably rewrote this chapter several dozen times before finally settling on this approach. as for barry and the other characters who normally show up this early on...don't worry. their time will come. for better or worse.
if there are any questions, let me know.
to those who reviewed - thank you.
and to you - thanks for reading.
