Chapter 5: Windworks
"Please help me!"
Ceres stared indifferently at the obviously upset little girl before her.
"Some bad spacemen took my daddy! They won't let him go! I want my daddy back!" She then began crying.
Ceres turned on her heel, and began to walk the other way.
"Trainer, wait! Please wait!" cried the little girl upon noticing her departure.
Ceres didn't stop for a moment.
"I-I didn't wanna do this…but you aren't being very nice!" the little girl whined, "Go, Floony!"
Ceres stopped to let Marrow out of her pokeball. The Zubat was almost immediately hit by a Gust attack from the Pokemon apparently owned by the girl. Ceres noted the damage done by the attack, and recalled Marrow.
"Of course I'll help you," she said.
The little girl looked confused for a moment, and her Pokemon, a purple, balloon-like creature drifted over to float beside her.
"My Pokemon are all tired out from battling wild ones," Ceres stated dully, "They can't fight the bad guys who took your daddy when they're hurt, can they? You wouldn't want them to get hurt worse, would you?"
The little girl shook her head vigorously.
"You didn't give me a chance to explain, silly girl," Ceres said, smiling slightly.
The girl's Pokemon stared uneasily at her.
"Sorry…" the girl mumbled, looking ashamed of herself for so rashly thinking that the nice trainer wouldn't help her.
"I'll go heal my Pokemon at the Pokemon Center," Ceres said, "And then I'll come right back, and help you save your daddy, okay?"
"Okay!" chirped the little girl, looking suddenly happier. As Ceres walked away, she turned to her Drifloon. "She's gonna help us save Daddy, Floony!"
"Floon…" mumbled the balloon Pokemon uneasily.
"Cheer up," the little girl said, misinterpreting the Pokemon's unease, "the bad spacemen will be gone soon!"
"Drif…" the Pokemon muttered, giving the girl a falsely sunny look.
"You're happy too, huh?" she grinned.
They waited in silence for a few more minutes, until Ceres finally reappeared, Soot beside her. The Geodude's arm had re-grown entirely under the careful watch of Floaroma Town's Nurse Joy.
"My daddy is this way!" said the little girl as Ceres and Soot approached. She ran off towards some distant windmills, her Drifloon trailing closely behind her.
Ceres and Soot followed at a rather even pace, Soot trailing behind her trainer on occasion, until they reached the windmills.
"Daddy is in that place!" the girl announced, pointing to a large building a little ways away.
Ceres nodded, and headed for the building, Soot staying close by her side, ready to protect her if they were attacked.
The guard scowled as he noticed the girl standing near Ceres.
"I've told you about a jillion times kid, there's no way I'm letting you in to see your 'daddy'!"
"So to be clear, you are not going to let us in, is that correct?" Ceres asked listlessly.
"That's absolutely r-" upon noticing that Ceres accompanied the little girl, the man stopped mid-sentence, and corrected himself, "wrong! That's absolutely wrong! Of course you two can go inside!"
With that, the man stepped aside, allowing Ceres and the girl to enter the building.
The trip through the building was entirely uneventful. Each guard who'd been posted stepped aside the moment he or she saw Ceres.
"You aren't so tough!" the little girl dared to say once, sticking out her tongue at one of the guards.
He shot her a sharp glare, and began to retort, only to wisely remain silent when he remembered who was accompanying the girl.
"I guess…you're right…" he grumbled reluctantly, receiving nothing but an ambiguous glance from Ceres in reply.
"Let's keep going," she said to the girl, "Your daddy is waiting."
"Yup!" nodded the girl, running ahead.
"Hey! What are you doing here! Who let you in?" called a guard from somewhere ahead.
He spotted the guard who had let the girl pass by without so much as a fight, and glared. The aforementioned guard tried to discreetly signal to the other that what he was about to do was a very bad idea. His warning was ignored.
"Go, Wurmple!" shouted the guard, and an angry, but not very threatening-looking worm Pokemon appeared before him. "Tackle!"
Instead of hitting its attack's intended target, the worm slammed into Soot with a sort of 'sploosh' sound, and then fell to the ground, knocked out by the impact.
"Where did you get a Pokemon?" asked the shocked guard, before noticing Ceres standing nearby, watching him closely.
"C-"
"Run ahead now," Ceres said, glancing at the girl, "I'll catch up in a moment, okay?"
The girl nodded, her eyes wide and frightened at the thought of being attacked by more Wurmple, and she ran ahead and around the corner.
"I-I didn't-"
The guard did not finish his sentence.
The little girl stopped to catch her breath, and her Drifloon looked worriedly at her.
"I'm okay Floony, I'm just glad that icky worm didn't hurt you!" the girl said, meeting her Pokemon's worried glance. Then she noticed that the trainer who was helping them get though the building wasn't behind them anymore, and they're come quite a long way.
"She said she'd catch up but…should we go back and look for her?" The little girl was indecisive.
Her Drifloon hadn't heard her question, as he was too focused on the two Pokemon who seemed to have spotted them while they were wondering about their escort.
One of the two, a Zubat, who looked stronger than the one he had briefly faced earlier, smirked at him.
The other stepped back, and muttered for her companion to make the first move.
The Zubat nodded and flew towards the girl's Drifloon, ready to attack with a super-effective Bite.
"Floony!" the little girl cried, finally noticing their predicament.
Once more, an attack hit Soot rather than the Pokemon hit was meant for. As her teeth met Soot's arm, the Zubat screeched in pain, and flew back, regretting attacking in the first place.
Soot began to prepare a Rock Throw attack.
"Yeah, get the bad Pokemon that tried to hurt Floony!" the little girl cheered.
Soot was about to attack when she was stopped by a curt, "don't," from her trainer. The rocks that she held fell harmlessly to the ground.
"What about the mean Pokemon?" the little girl whined, still watching the Zubat carefully out of the corner of her eye.
"Why hurt them needlessly? They know better to attack us now, don't they?" Ceres asked, also watching the Zubat.
The bat Pokemon looked confused, and gave no sort of reply. Her companion scoffed at Ceres. She wouldn't take orders from anyone but her trainer, especially vague, indirect ones from complete strangers.
"See?" Ceres said, when the second Pokemon, which she knew to be a Purugly, did little more than glare rather nastily at her.
"I-I guess…are we going to save daddy now?" she little girl asked.
Ceres glanced at her, and then at the Pokemon blocking their way, and then at their trainer, who had seemingly just arrived.
Despite the fact that Ceres was sure that she had never met the trainer before, the woman looked familiar, although she was unsure as to where she would have ever met someone with hair so vibrantly red, or with an outfit as unique as the one the woman happened to be wearing.
It occurred to her that the colors and design of the outfit were similar to those of the guards, and to the one she had first answered to, as well as to her own. Perhaps that was why she seemed so familiar. Still…
"What are you doing here?" the Pokemon's trainer asked, sounding vaguely annoyed.
Ceres couldn't tell if the question was directed at her, or the little girl who accompanied her.
The little girl hid behind Ceres for a moment before getting up the courage to say what she had come to say. She stepped out from behind the trainer who had helped her, and bravely announced, "I wanna see my daddy. I want you mean space-people to let him go!"
"And why should I?" the strangely familiar woman asked, giving the little girl a disdainful look.
"Because if you don't…" the girl paused, thinking. "If you don't…my nice trainer friend will make you!" She put on an angry, determined face, and shot a rather adorable, not-at-all threatening glare in the woman's direction.
"She will, will she?" Ceres was spared a single glance. The woman smirked. "Are you entirely sure about that, little girl?"
"Of- Of course! Of course she will!" The girl responded, blindly trusting. The Drifloon beside her looked entirely doubtful however. He didn't trust the girl as far as he could through her, and considering he was weak enough to be blown away by a strong wind, that was saying a lot!
A name came to Ceres' mind suddenly.
"Mars," she said, and then fell silent, unsure of where she had heard the name before, or to whom it referred.
The red-haired woman turned to look at her once more, looking quite surprised for some reason. Perhaps they hadn't ever met.
"Yes?" she inquired after a few moments of silence.
Ceres remained silent for another few seconds, and then said, "Perhaps you could let the little girl see her father…and then we can speak…elsewhere."
Mars still seemed a bit unsure of what exactly she was trying to say for a second, but an instant later it was apparent that she understood
"Well…come on then little girl. Let's go see your daddy, m'kay?" Mars said, faking a hospitable smile.
"'Kay!" the girl said obliviously.
"Floon!" her Drifloon cried, immediately suspicious of the red-haired woman.
"It's okay Floony, she's gonna take us to see daddy," the girl assured the Pokemon.
"That's right, right this way," Mars said, beginning to walk away. The little girl followed her, and was closely trailed by Mars' Zubat and Purugly.
The girl's Drifloon hung back for a moment, before deciding to follow. It never got the chance to do so, however.
"Do we have what we need?" Mars asked immediately as she walked into the room.
"We've collected all the energy we need," a balding, pale lavender-haired man responded, "We've no more use for him." He pointed vaguely at an exhausted-looking man in a lab coat.
"What are you going to do with the energy…?" the man asked tiredly.
"None of your business!" the balding man replied, "Mars, be a dear and deal with him, will you?"
"Don't tell me what to do Charon! For the last time, I've been a commander longer than you, so you don't order me around, got it?" Mars paused for a moment, and then added, "You watch them, will you? I've got someone to speak to. Purugly, Zubat, let's go."
"What's going on? Aren't you gonna let us go?" asked the little girl that Ceres had escorted through the building.
"Not a chance, brat," Mars replied, rolling her eyes at the girl's naivety. She walked out of the room, her Pokemon closely behind, and slammed the door as they left.
She had not walked far before she met up with Ceres.
"What was it that you wanted to talk about?" she asked.
Ceres minimized the pokeball she was holding, the one containing the Drifloon that had formerly belonged to the little girl, putting it away with the others, and said, "Let's talk outside."
They walked through the building's hallways, passing several guards, one of which was still nursing a bruise on his head.
"S-Sorry about the earlier confusion S-Sir, I-I mean Ma'am, I mean Commander…Um-"
Ceres ignored him entirely, and Mars simply didn't bother to ask.
Ceres remained entirely silent, even as they stepped outside. She looked up at the sky, as if waiting for something.
"You wanted to talk about something?" Mars prompted again, getting slightly impatient.
Suddenly, a Staravia fell clumsily out of the sky, a briefcase landing beside him.
Ceres ignored the newly evolved Tabitha entirely and picked up the case beside him.
"The local Professor's research notes on evolution," she stated drearily, "I trust Master Cyrus can make good use of them."
She did not miss the shock Mars failed to suppress at something that she had said. She simply ignored what she has seen. Surprise was useless, was it not? Everything was to be expected. Nothing was a shock.
She dismissed Mars' apparent alarm, and began to walk away.
"Ceres?" Mars called after her.
She glanced back over her shoulder at the red-haired woman, her expression void of either curiosity, or caring.
"…Never mind."
She turned away once more and walked off, Tabitha following huffily behind, annoyed at being entirely ignored.
She had recalled Soot earlier, and had nothing to hold her to the windmill place any more. She didn't know, nor did she care, as she walked away, that she would never see the Valley Windworks again.