Wow, been a while, hasn't it? I truly apologize, gentle readers, about the extreme lateness of my updating; I have no excuse besides I was busy! Too busy. But I'm back now. I will be sticking to the program I've already put forth concerning the updates...or I will do my extreme best. If I have to go to two days a week I might....not for this one though. But anywho.

One thing though, and this is very serious, and I need your opinion. I am concerned about the rating of this fanfiction...I'm thinking that I may have to bump it up to an 'M'. But I'm not sure if it entirely qualifies as an 'M' rated story, but I definately don't want to get kicked off the site. (Call me paranoid if you must). Anyway, I really am in need of a decision. Please PM me with your thoughts.

Thank you.

d4, THIS ONE'S FOR YOU! LOVE YA LOTS!

DISCLAIMER: I do not own the concept of Pokémon. I own only the specific characterizations of the canon characters as well as the assorted and individual background characters, along with the plot of this story itself. This work cannot be used, copied, reproduced or otherwise distributed. All rights reserved; Blake Wilson, The Pokémon Company, Satoshi Tajiri and Ken Sugimori, Nintendo, Gamefreak and Creatures Ltd.


December 17, 2000

Ruined Tunnel

Almost to Pastoria Great Marsh

2:37 PM

It had been one of the longest trips to Pastoria the tough had ever seen. With traffic backed up beyond the Plateau and the Tunnel, a trip that should only have taken a couple of hours had so far taken five.

The heater still wasn't working, a fact that had not gone unnoticed by the tough driving the Hippowdon. Despite the fact that Pastoria's climate was tempered by the Plateau, which kept the cooler air funneled to the north, this was not to say it was any warmer. The Marsh cooled the air considerably, and the trade winds from the sea forced the temperature lower this time of year.

"By Cressel, we're late." He growled, gunning the container truck through the last set of switchbacks until he could almost see the sunlight the led onto the Marsh. "Fucking traffic, fucking road, fucking heater, fucking truck…"

The woman shifted in the seat beside him and giggled slightly, and the tough grimaced. She hopefully wouldn't give him a bad report to his boss; whom he had been trying to gain favor with all this time. This was his last assignment; he'd be able to move up from a simple delivery man to other jobs within the mob.

And that was all too good. The pay would increase dramatically, and the tough would have enough to be able to spend a weekend at the clubs in Sunyshore, hopefully even enough for a couple of hookers as well. He grinned despite the cold and then cursed again as the gearshift stuck.

"Trouble, Padawan?" the woman asked, breaking the silence of the cab.

The tough shifted gears, downgrading as he took the final curve from the Tunnel and out onto the Marsh. He took a moment to make sure that he could think of the best answer; after all, this woman would report to the boss.

"Uh, no…I'm just a little tired." He replied uneasily, his hands automatically jerking forward and backwards on the clutch and the gearshift.

The woman laughed her creepy breathy laugh. "Good. Pull over at that rest stop, I need to pee."

The tough rolled his eyes as they exited the Tunnel for good, shivering despite the false warmth of the sunshine on the open Marsh plain, peeling off from the main road to glide smoothly to a stop at the rest area. With a mighty sigh, the Hippowdon's engine ground to a halt, and the woman exited the truck with a quick crash of the door against the side of the Hippowdon. She crossed the parking lot with a sort of feline grace, despite her rush, and it wasn't long before she disappeared into the restroom, not once looking back at the truck.

The tough stepped from the cab, relishing the opportunity to stretch his legs. Nonchalantly, he tossed open a cigarette pack and extracted one, relishing the feel of the tobacco in his fingers. Yes, today was his day. Nothing could go wrong.

December 17, 2000.

55 Pyrite Drive

Veilstone City

2:40 PM

"Okay, okay. Who was the actor who played Brett Rhutler in Gone with the Whirlwind?"

"Um…Gary Crant."

"Wrong! It was Lark Cable!"

Henry let out a noise of disbelief as he threw his hands into the air. "Aw, come on! I told you no musicals!"

Shiri grinned as she clutched the card containing the right answer in her hand. "You only say that because you're losing." She chuckled, leaning across the coffee table.

Henry smirked, a lewd grin playing across his face. "Oh, but you'll still get some."

Their kiss was hasty and sloppy, and Shiri pulled back out of it first with a wink. "Loser, loser…okay…ooh! Here's a romantic comedy question!"

The two were playing yet another board game, finding that neither one of them could go anywhere until the snowplow came around to their house. The snow had piled up to five feet, something the emergency weatherman on the radio was claiming was a new Veilstone record.

Henry didn't really care; he was enjoying the few hours he had off until Valerie was able to wrangle the snowplow to hit up Pyrite Drive and free up the Chief of Police. Once it did however, he would take the lone Pokémon he had in his Pokéball and travel again to the station; he would not be getting any vacation this weekend.

Valerie had hit a snag.

December 17, 2000.

4 Rockslide Avenue

Mayor's Residence

3:07 PM

"Mary-Jane, did you contact Pastoria? They said their trucks would be arriving to help snowplow. And provide emergency service."

Mayor Stockman paced back and forth in the Mayor's mansion, doing her best not to fidget. It had stopped snowing, but there was no sign of any snowplows and other heavy equipment that Pastoria promised to Veilstone. She struck up a quick rhythm; her heels clicking on the floor.

"Madam Mayor, the lines are down." Mary-Jane replied, adjusting her glasses. "There's nothing we can do to get in touch with them."

Jennifer rolled her eyes. "Of course…."

She was worried about how this would affect her career yet again. Her campaign was declining steadily downhill, especially after how she had lost the Technology Building on Granite Street to the Galaxy Corporation. Her opponent had noticed this. Every attack that he'd leveled at the Mayor was about this building. About how her interests were much more aligned with the big corporations of the city instead of the people (everyone, however, neglected to mention the massive cleanup operation she'd instigated to lower crime and redesign the Gaming District). Without this noted fact, her ratings were dropping faster than a stone off the Veilstone Bluffs.

Councilman Tory Barker was no fool. And Mayor Jennifer Stockman's ratings were plummeting at the polls.

"Ma'am, if I may…?" Mary-Jane's coolly polite voice interrupted Jennifer's troubled musings about her poll ratings. "I think something has happened." She proffered the radio that was sitting on the desk in front of her, tapping against it with a pen. Her face contorted from confusion to a worried frown.

"What..?"

The Mayor leaned on one of the corners of her desk, folding her arms about her suit. The tiny radio broadcasting on the emergency channels began talking loudly that something had happened on Route 214, something catastrophic.

Intently, Jennifer listened to the tinny voice crying out on the radio. She locked a horrified gaze with her blonde assistant, both sets of eyes widening in fear and confusion.

"Oh, no.…!"

December 17, 2000.

Route 214 Rest Stop 2

Outside Great Pastoria Marsh

2:49 PM.

The tough checked his watch for the third time in twenty minutes, flicking his fourth cigarette out the window of the truck cab. Above him, the sun belied more of its false warmth to the Earth's surface below; taunting its subjects.

"45 degrees Moltregrade…" the tough noted, reading the truck's internal thermometer. "Fucking heater…Darkrai's scrawny legs…HEY! We're gonna be late!" He added to the world-at-large, vaguely shouting in the general direction of the brick restrooms.

Inside the restroom, his female companion was hunched in one of the stalls, the hood of her parka thrown behind her. She was sweating profusely; each drop that threatened to spill from her forehead she quickly brushed away in a jerky action.

"Late, late, for a very important date." She whispered to herself. Another drop of sweat, this one on the tip of her slender nose, another swipe that detracted from what she was doing. Her hands shook. Her legs bounced hurriedly up and down. "Cressel help me from Darkrai, I'm gonna be late."

She was listening, not to a mundane song, but to a recording on her music player. The frenetic pace of her arms and legs were trying to keep pace with the man's droning voice on the recording. She needed a lot of help for her current project: the little thing she was building in her lap.

Hurriedly, she was instructed to open the left pocket of her pastel blue jacket. She extracted the necessary components and rapidly began attaching them to the half-built apparatus she had in her lap. The wires weren't supposed to stick out like that, but she'd have to make do. She was trying to break land/speed records, not obtain ultimate precision or aesthetics. She opened the right upper pocket and began attaching the wires from the bottom right pocket to a tiny sprocket. Then she pulled from the bottom right and stuck the doo-jiggy to the sprocket in between the wires. The voice in her ears told her she was almost done; a whatsit from the outermost left pocket and the thing was finished. She hurried to unclip the music player from her ears, shoving the headphones into the toilet underneath her and flushing it. With a final snap, the music player disappeared in the mass of wires underneath the whatsit, plugged by the wires into the sprocket. The voice on the recording had told her she now had two minutes after she plugged the music player into the device, which was accomplished by a small headphone jack stuffed under the sprocket, whatsit and doo-jiggy.

Stuffing the apparatus under her coat, she unlocked the door to the stall and brushed her hair back, making sure the hood was completely covering her face. In doing so, she caught sight of the mirror across from her; luckily enough, her shockingly red hair and dull red eyes were completely hidden by a white wig and gold-colored contacts. Tucking the apparatus closer to her body, she stomped out of the room, feeling a bit of bile rise into her throat; something her male companion couldn't see.

"By Cressel, took ya long enough!" the thug grimaced as she got back in the cab of the truck. With a grimace and a grunt, he shifted the truck into gear and merged back onto the road.

"Padawan."

The thug responded to the odd moniker the woman had given him, leaning heavily on the window he flicked a gloved finger at her in acknowledgment.

"Turn around, now." She stated tonelessly.

He scoffed, shifting the truck into a higher gear as the truck turned back onto the freeway. "What the fuck is your problem? Why the hell would we turn around?"

He had grown suffieciently comfortable with her to be able to use such colloquial language; after all, he did have a schedule to keep. And his odd companion was not going to keep him from such a task that would improve his standings with his boss.

For the first time, the woman shifted, unzipping her coat. She turned to the thug, locking her strangely golden eyes on him. He followed the curve of her arm, trying not to leer too much at her chest, and saw the apparatus in her coat. His breath hitched in his throat, and he gagged a little, trying to regain a mouthful of air. Bile threatened to spill from his lips and he choked it back, eyes wide in surprise. Instinctively, he braked, but not too much to overextend the uneasy rapport they'd established.

"A…bomb…" He stated. A cold feeling of dread settled in the pit of his stomach. He had no idea what she was planning to do, but he decided to go along with her and stay alive. Downshifting, the tough exiting the road at the nearest exit, intent on turning around and heading back to Veilstone. "But…why?"

His voice was neither cold nor full of its usual bravado. Of course he hadn't been stupid enough to completely trust her, but he didn't plan on the bitch bringing a bomb.

She zipped up her coat again, pulling the hood back over her face. The tough didn't notice the leery, feral smile on the woman's lips as she clutched the apparatus under her coat. "What did you expect? Flowers?"

The tough shook his head nervously, turning around the truck and pointing it back in the direction of Veilstone. Maybe, if he was lucky enough, and Cresselia was smiling upon him, he would survive.

"Good choice, Padawan." The woman said, fingers happily playing with the zip on her coat to cover her internal nervousness. "We'll go down in history!" She added in a sing-song voice.