A wild update has appeared! Seems like people are reading and liking my story. That makes me so glad and compelled to keep the story going. Once again, thank you to those who left a review.

If you like what you see R&R.

Disclaimer: I don't own Pokémon. Property of GameFreak and Nintendo. Yadda-yadda-yadda. You know how that goes.


Chapter 3: The Hunt is On

So now I knew what I was looking for. But I wasn't going to wildly look for it like I did before. The girl in the ice cream store said it was some kind of delivery van. I knew of one main delivery company that operated in Kanto. They were known for showing up at Pokémon Centers or Poké Marts to drop off strange "Mystery Gifts" to random trainers. I had passed by the Kanto branch in the past. I'm sure it was two streets away.

I bolted over to the location in my memory. This does seems to be the place. It had the appearance of one of the many generic business-y looking buildings in the area. It had two levels full of grim looking windows and one visible entrance. What set it aside was a loading dock full of the delivery vans. Hmm, that's odd. I couldn't see the company name anywhere. Perhaps it was to keep the company all mysterious like their gifts? Or maybe the author of this story was just too lazy to think up a name.

So now I needed to know which van was outside the ice cream store yesterday. To do so, I needed a schedule roster and a delivery route map. Those shouldn't be too hard to find... Ugh, who am I kidding? I don't have a clue where to start. But first things first. Should I just waltz right in like a confident client, or should I keep my presence unknown? The sight of a guard with a Growlithe near one corner made that decision for me. I do not want to be caught snooping around a place like this.

I made my way to the entrance, failing to avoid glancing at the Growlithe who looked at me with murderous eyes. Pushing the glass door open, I came into an administration office which had seen better days. Dusty cardboard boxes were carelessly piled up around the room. A few guest chairs, torn and stained, stood facing away from the windows. At the far end of the room was a desk, with an open door behind it. At the desk there was a bored looking bespectacled receptionist, with steel grey hair kept in a bun. She was preoccupied with typing on a computer, not even looking up when I approached her.

"Umm hi," I lamely began. "I'm like... umm, a customer that has a delivery that... umm, hasn't been delivered yet." *mental face-palm* What the hell was that?

"Number?" she answered in a flat monotone, not even bothering to look at me.

"Sorry, what?" I asked confused.

"All inquiries here need a booking, please state your inquiry number." she explained, her tone sounding like she had recited this a million times.

"Oh, I'm sorry. I wasn't aware of the bookings." I responded lamely.

"Then you will have to take a seat and wait for our next vacancy." she droned on in the same mechanical tone.

"How long will that be?" I asked, not liking where this was going.

"Next vacancy at 6:00 PM," she said.

Whew, that wasn't so bad

"...on Friday."

WHAT!?

"But that isn't for 5 days!" I protested, my nervousness subsiding. "I'm on a tight schedule here."

"Guess you should make a booking next time," she replied "In the mean time read take a pamphlet and check out our website."

Ugh, I don't have time for this crap.

"Thanks for your time miss," I said, turning away. "I'll be off then."

I slowly walked towards the door, but kept my looking over my shoulder at her. As I suspected she never even looked up the whole time. I reached out my hand to open the door, still keeping my eyes on her. I swung the door open, but instead of leaving, I nimbly darted to side of the room where her back was turned to. I squatted in the corner, making sure she didn't turn to look and notice I was still here. So far so good. Keeping my couched position, I carefully inched towards the front of her desk, doing my best to avoid making any sounds. All those times playing hide and seek with Scoot must have paid off, I barely heard myself moving forward. Now comes the tricky part. I peered around the desk. The receptionist still paid me no attention. Still kneeled over I made my way past her and to the door behind her desk. Finally crossing the doorway, I slowly stood up and glanced back one final time. Nothing, she hadn't even changed her pose. Thank you Arceus!

Turning to my front I took in the room before me. Whoa! A massive room of shelves and conveyer belts, wheeling packages everywhere. I guess there's a chance Scoot could have ended up back here, but right now I needed to know the exact van that she got on yesterday.

I cautiously walked along an aisle between the rows of shelves. A few Magnemites flew across my path, paying no attention to my presence. I always wondered why those guys could be found in factory areas. Magnemites were attracted to electricity, but this wasn't exactly an electric rich place. I saw a few Magnemites using their magnets to pick up a metal box, and a few more zapping a coil to power a machine. Hmm, maybe these Magnemites performed tasks which humans were too lazy to do? Ah, who cares? It's not my business.

Now then, if I were a delivery roster, where would I be? I glanced around the many doors that led out from this chamber. They pretty all looked pretty much the same and I had no way of knowing where they led. Hold on, I paused at one door. Is that coffee I smell? Coffee meant it had to be a place where someone was relaxing. The employee's lounge perhaps? That would be a perfect place for a roster to be posted. I pressed my ear against the door and listened. After hearing no sound, I slowly turned the door handle and pushed the door in just an inch and peered inside. Empty, excellent!

Fully opening the door, I slipped inside and closed the door behind me. I was right; it was some sort of lounge room. The odor I detected was from a coffee making machine on a side table. The room contained a round table in the center, with a few chairs carelessly strewn around it, as well as a fridge at the far end of the room. I instinctively gravitated towards the fridge, my stomach hijacking my motor controls from my mind. It was a double door fridge. I opened up the left door, ah the freezer with most of several shelves removed to make way for a huge hunk of meat. I shut that one and tried the door on the right, the refrigerator. Oh look, someone's Rage Candy Bar. Well it's mine now. I had opened the wrapper and downed half the bar before I even realized. Hey, don't judge me! You have any idea how low my sugar level would be after everything I've been through?

As the fridge door swung back shut, I eyed the many sheets magnetically pinned on the door. Let's see: ads, personal reminders, sign-up forms. Ah-ha, just what I've been looking for. Among the mess of papers was a timetable showing which vans were assigned to which delivery routes. Besides the timetable was a map, highlighting the actual streets the route followed. Hmm, the route passing by the ice cream store was delivery route 3. Huh, that's weird. The van stops by the Pokémon Centre before ending up at a factory that was thought to have shut down.

My mind began to race with possibilities. Why would a delivery van travel from a Pokémon Centre to some abandoned building? Who would even be there to receive a delivery? What could possibly be delivered from a Pokémon Centre on a regular basis? Perhaps some Pokémon meds or treatment being sent over? But why would hire a delivery van to send something like that over? It makes no sense unless the meds were delivered in bulk. There was one obvious thing that could come from a Pokémon Centre, injured or recovering Pokémon. Come to think about it, I had presumed that Scoot was snatched up by force. But what if Scoot had boarded the van voluntarily? There were only two things that would incline her to head towards an unknown place: the scent of her favourite food or a fellow Pokémon in trouble. I highly doubt a Pokémon Centre would distribute her favorite Poképuffs via delivery van. Could Scoot have heard a Pokémon in distress and jumped on board for that reason? If that's the case there might be something more sinister going on. Pokémon being stolen? If this is the case, Scoot could be one of the captive Pokémon by this stage. There are a few facts I need to clear up first. Who hired the van? Has the Pokémon Centre reported any missing Pokémon? What is at that factory's location?

So many questions, so little time. I took out my phone and photographed the schedule and the map. As I was about to head out, I heard noises from outside the room. Oh no, no, no, no, no. If I'm caught I'll be charged with trespassing. I frantically looked around the room for a hiding spot. Hiding under the table wasn't an option, as there was no table cloth and I'd be spotted immediately. That leaves... the fridge. I can't seriously be thinking? Door handle turning. No time to change my mind. I opened the left freezer door and climbed in, with the door shutting behind me.

Now I know what you're thinking. How can a 17 year old teenage boy of my height possibly fit in a freezer? Well that hunk of meat I mentioned before. I think it came from a Tauros, because it was massive! Also, cramming in there was not comfy. I was crushed by this hunk of flesh, with my arms being forced into angles I never knew were possible. Oh, and did I mention it reeks? Trust me. You do not want to be in the same room as hunk of frozen meat, much less in a crammed freezer with it! Why was this thing even here, was it someone's delivery?

During the time it took for me to rant about being in the freezer to the readers, whoever came in earlier seemed to have left the room. I waited for about an extra minute to make sure that was all was quiet, before slowly pushing open the freezer door and out of that Arceus-forsaken hunk of flesh. Ugh, that experience almost makes me want to go vegan. Now let's get the hell out of here.

I opened the door of the lounge room and cautiously peered outside as I did earlier. Coast is clear! I silently sprinted out back into the chamber with the shelves and conveyer belts. Umm, hold on. Where the hell did I come in from? All these blasted doors look the same! I don't suppose there's some convenient exit sign lying about this place? Nope, no such luck. Well I don't have all day to go door exploring. I headed to the opposite side of the chamber and opened the door directly in front. It seemed to be a changing room full of lockers that were adorned with combination locks. As I was hoping, there was a window at the far end of the room. A little high up perhaps, but still accessible. There were a set of lockers directly underneath it. I used the combination locks as footholds to clamber up. Very wobbly and unstable, but I've had plenty of tree climbing practice. Finally I got my arms over the top of the locker and pushed my whole self up. Oh, it's so dusty up here. I clapped some of the dust off my hands before wiping the rest on my pants. Turning my attention to the window, I was happy to see it had a sliding mechanism. But of course it couldn't be that simple. The window was hard to budge due to lack of use. After digging my fingers around the frame's grooves and putting my whole weight behind pushing my arms, I finally got the stupid thing to slide open. Just in time for the door of the changing rooms to open up.

"Hey!" someone called behind me.

Well I'm not staying around to find out what they look like. I dived out of the open window... and plummeted from a second floor into a tree below.

"Ow!" "Ouf!" "Ouch!" I got battered against several branches as I fell down the tree, before I finally grabbed ahold of one to halt my fall. Though as luck would have it, my branch wasn't strong enough to support my weight and broke. As I fell, another branch below went right up between my legs!

"Ow, my Pokeballs!"

The pain prevented me from holding onto this branch. I slipped to my left side, rotating a clean 180° before falling downwards head first right into a bush.

Seriously? How did I end up at this height? I don't remember climbing any stairs. Ah forget it. I clambered out of the bush, covered in leaves and Spinarak webs. Before I had any time to recover, alarms went off in the building behind me. Well that's my cue to go. I bolted off in the direction opposite the building, eager to get away from that place.


Wheew, that one was tough. I hadn't quite planned out the events in this chapter in advance. I was originally going to move right onto the next chapter, but that didn't quite connect up well. Zach had to find out the place, hence he gets to fool around in the Mystery Gift delivery company.

Here's to hoping the next chapter will be here sooner. ^_^