A/N: In the German version, the leaders of Aqua and Magma are named Adrian and Marc, respectively. We agreed that we like Marc better than Maxie, so the Team Magma leader is known in this verse as Marc.
Saylee Pokémon: 10 Deaths: 2
Key Pokémon: 14 Deaths: 1
"Why is it you always catch the quiet ones and the ones I catch are always trouble?" Key complained, watching the Numel that she had just caught, Nathaniel, picking on Saylee's Nadalia by trying to spit tiny wads of mud into the crater on her back.
"I have Zac," Saylee pointed out.
"Fair enough," Key admitted, returning Nathaniel and pressing the button that sent the pokéball into storage. "I don't really need him on my team."
"And I've already got Teddy," Saylee said, returning Nadalia and sending her away likewise. "Well, if there are Numel around here, we must be at the base of the volcano. Now we just need to find a path up it."
Directions from a Ranger working in the area brought them to a signposted footpath up the mountain. If Saylee had found Hoenn hot before, the air around the volcano was sweltering. She untied her headscarf and started flapping at her face with it, hoping that Key would take the rivers that she was sweating for her difficulty in handling the hot climate rather than fear. Despite Key's repeated assurances that the volcano was dormant, it still frightened Saylee. Is all this heat just from the sun, or…? No, Key mentioned that scientist are monitoring this place. They'd know if it was going to go off, and it's not going to…
She was seriously considering getting out Molly and asking her to produce a fine mist to cool her down when Key suddenly ran forwards.
"There's the cable car!" she said, pointing to the station. "They're air-conditioned! Come on!"
As they got closer to the station, however, they noticed that the doors were being blocked by a couple of men in red hoodies and black leggings.
"How are they not dead, dressed like that out here?" Saylee asked Key, before turning to the men. "Excuse me, can we get on the cable car?"
"Cable car's closed, miss," one man said gruffly. "Crater's closed off. Go through the Fiery Path."
"The crater's closed?" Key complained. "Why?"
"Because it is," the other man snarled. "Now get out of here!"
"No need for that," Saylee huffed, turning and storming off. "What crawled up his arse and died?"
"Maybe the crater's unstable," Key worried, looking up at the mountain. "I'm sure we'd have heard if it was going to go off... let's get through this tunnel fast, okay?"
"Fine by me," Saylee agreed feverently. "I can't wait to get off of this overheated lump and into a nice, cool shower..."
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"SHOWER, SHOWER, SHOWER!"
The Fallarbor Pokémon Centre seemed used to this, as the showers were clearly signposted and very near the front door. Saylee half considered just getting in fully dressed, as the ash saturated her clothes as well as her hair. She settled for grabbing a complimentary dressing gown with an eye to spending the evening in it.
"Oh good grief, the water's running grey," Key complained from the next shower stall. "It comes down so softly, you don't realize how much you're getting on you!"
"It's the grass that's a problem," Saylee said, sluicing thick grey ash off of her legs. "Seriously, you can't go anywhere without kicking up a flurry. Eurgh, that was so manky!"
"I guess that's why the air over Verdanturf is so clean," Key opined. "It all ends up here. Blech..."
There was also a laundry service at a small fee, which Saylee figured was worth it because she had no idea how to get that much ash out of her clothes on her own. While the laundry was running and Key remained in the shower, fighting to get rid of every bit of ash that was caked into her long blonde hair, Saylee decided to look up a PC with an eye to withdrawing the Skarmory she'd caught while they were out among the ash. The only computer in the centre, however, was taken up by a young woman with messy brown hair, lopsided glasses and a haphazard stack of books and papers under one arm.
"Excuse me," Saylee said, after half an hour of watching the woman type one-handedly at the computer, "but are you going to be much longer?"
"Oh, I'm sorry!" The woman gasped, so flustered that she dropped all of her papers. "Oh, darn it..."
"Careful, butterfingers," Saylee said, helping her pick up all of her papers, making a face at the mathematical equations and computer code scrawled across most of them. "Are you a scientist?"
"Yes, sort of," the woman said, trying to straighten her glasses and only making them squint in the other direction. "My name is Lanette. I'm the system administrator for the Hoenn PC system. I designed and built it, too."
"You're the admin?" Saylee said in surprise. "My name's Saylee. I'm a friend of Bill and Celio. Do you know them?"
"Celio? Oh, he's the man I've been exchanging emails with in Kanto!" Lanette said, setting her papers aside. "He's helping me fix some system bugs. Are you from Kanto too, Saylee?"
"Yep," Saylee said. "By system bugs, you mean the one preventing people from sending their Pokémon abroad, right?"
"Yeah… I'm afraid that one's been awfully difficult to pin down," Lanette sighed, pushing her glasses up her nose. "I only just heard about it from Celio myself. I can't say that any progress has been made. All I can say is that if your details have been affected, don't try to send anything. If the system glitches mid-transport, your Pokémon could die, you know?"
Saylee shivered. "Okay… listen, can I give you my number?" she asked. "I'd just like to know as soon as humanly possible when the bug is fixed."
"Sure thing," Lanette said, offering Saylee a pen and the edge of one of her sheets of paper. Saylee wrote her name next to it, hoping that the somewhat scatterbrained-looking woman would remember that it was a phone number. "I'd better dash. Lots of work to do. Nice to meet you!"With that, she scooped up her work again and scurried off.
Saylee watched her go until she was sure that the woman would at least make it out of the Centre without dropping her things again. Then she logged onto the computer, which was running noticeably faster than most of the other Centre computers that she'd used, and withdrew her new Skarmory, Steele, whom she'd sent straight to the Centre due to the injuries that he'd sustained in their fight.
"We'll take you out for a flight in the morning," she promised Steele's pokéball.
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"Awww, that feels nice," Steele sighed as Saylee oiled his wings after breakfast.
"Try now, you should be able to get a lot more lift," she said. He flapped his wings and flew in a wide circle around the town, landing only when he noticed that people were staring at him.
"You know a lot about Skarmory," Key said, watching Saylee train her new acquisition.
"I caught a female named Sheska back in Kanto," she said, tossing up rocks for Steele to Peck at. "She's much livelier than this guy, though." Steele ducked his head shyly and pecked another couple of stones into dust.
"It would be nice if you could bring your other Pokémon here," Key opined. "I'd like to meet them. They must be really tough."
"They're survivors, all of them," Saylee said, petting Steele. "Hmm… is something going on?" A number of worried-looking people had gathered, whispering, in front of the Pokémon Centre.
"They were talking about Professor Cozmo," Steele said tentatively. "I heard them. They said that Team Magma took him away."
"Team Magma?" Saylee asked, looking questioningly at Key, who shrugged. "There's two of them? Oh, this just gets better and better."
"I've heard of Professor Cozmo," Key said. "He's famous for space research. He was involved with the Space Centre in Mossdeep at one time. They're building a new space rocket at the moment, I hear."
"So one criminal gang went after a guy building a submarine, and another went after a guy building a rocket..." Saylee muttered, before smacking herself on the forehead. "Bugger it. I'm going to have a look."
"Hold on," Key protested, "I thought you were trying to avoid getting into danger?"
"Yeah, but this is how my life works, see," Saylee sighed, returning Steele. "I'll ask where they've gone, deliberately not go down that route, go somewhere else, and probably stumble into their Boss' hideout and have to fight my way out, anyway. So I might as well just go deal with them now." She went over to ask where Professor Cozmo had last been seen.
"Well, you're sure as hell not going on your own!" Key called, grabbing her bag and following. "Two's better than one, after all!"
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"So these are Meteor Falls?" Saylee whispered as they crept through the shining caves. "Wow... there's moon dust everywhere. Just like Mt Moon back in Kanto, at least before it caved in."
"It's gorgeous," Key breathed. "Weird place to bring a kidnapping victim, though..."
"That meteorite has immense scientific value! Give it back!"
"Sounds like our man," Saylee said, running towards the sound of the yelling. She nearly tripped over a sudden precipice, saved only by Key grabbing her outflung arm and digging her heels in to pull her back. "Thanks!"
"Don't worry about it," Key said, releasing Manami. The men fighting below had noticed them. There was a middle-aged man in a labcoat, clearly Professor Cozmo, surrounded by several men in the same thick red hoodies as the "guards" preventing anyone from entering the Mt Chimney crater. Saylee suspected that the crater was just fine, but that the men below were aiming to change that.
"Who's there?" One of the men yelled, releasing a Poochyena. Saylee let out Molly, who always made a good team with Manami. "What do you think you're doing?"
"No need to fight, gents," Saylee called down. "What seems to be the problem?"
"Stupid girls like you interfering with Team Magma—that's our problem!" The other man yelled, releasing his own Poochyena and ordering it to attack. Molly and Manami leapt forwards to fight, but before they could start the battle, the attacking Poochyena was taken down by a large, vicious Mightyena, who grabbed it by the tail and flung it into its compatriot to knock both of them out.
"Hold it right there, Team Magma! We, Team Aqua, won't allow you to get away with your misdeeds!"
"Team Aqua?" Saylee said incredulously, as three more men followed the Mightyena into the hollow with Professor Cozmo and Team Magma.
"Archie?" Key said in surprise, noting the burly Aqua leader when his Mightyena returned to his side. The Team Magma goons returned their Poochyena, stepping back from the attacking force.
"What the hell is going on?" Molly said in confusion. Manami just shrugged.
"You're too late, Aqua scum!" one of the Magma thugs crowed. "Soon, our great plan will come to fruition! You cannot stop Marc!"
"C'mon," the other muttered. "We need to get to Mt Chimney now!" He released a Numel.
"Get it now!" Saylee ordered. Molly fired a Water Gun on the Numel, but one of the Magma thugs moved to block it while Numel began blowing out thick smoke. It filled the cave in seconds.
"Wanda, we need Gust!" Key choked, releasing her Beautifly. Saylee followed suit with William, and the two of them blew away the black smoke clogging the air. By the time the cave was clear, however, the Magma men were gone.
"Dammit! Get after them, now!" Archie ordered his men. They saluted and ran past Saylee and Key, the direction that the Magma goons had apparently gone in. Archie strode after them, stopping when he reached Saylee and Key.
"It's you, isn't it?" he said, stroking his beard thoughtfully. "From the Oceanic Museum."
"Key and Saylee," Key said, indicating herself and Saylee in turn. "And you're Archie, leader of Team Aqua. You were showing off about that last time."
"Indeed," Archie said, looking a touch disgruntled at the "showing off" comment. "As the head of Team Aqua, I have dedicated myself to thwarting the dangerous plans of Team Magma."
"Why?" Saylee demanded. "Who are Team Magma?"
"Team Magma is a grave threat to us all," Archie said. "They have committed many destructive acts in their bid to expand the land. We, Team Aqua, love the sea above all! Team Magma is our sworn enemy!"
"By 'destructive acts', you don't include theft, assault and attempted kidnapping?" Key said acidly, stepping into his path and glowering directly at him. "Not to mention murder." Archie frowned.
"Soon you will understand why our actions are necessary evils," he insisted. "I must go after Team Magma. Key, you ought to keep an eye out for Team Magma, too. Farewell!"
He ran off, with his Mightyena leading the way out of the cave. Key stared after him while Saylee returned her Pokémon.
"I'm here too," she called after Archie. "Rude guy."
"I have no idea what's going on with that guy," Key grumbled. "I mean, there's no denying that he's hot, but he's clearly nuts."
"So," Saylee said nonchalantly. "Mt Chimney?"
"Yeah," Key agreed. "Mt Chimney."
"Excuse me," Professor Cozmo called plaintively, climbing the slope towards them, "but what just happened? Where are those men going with my meteorite?"
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Shorter chapter, just because the next section is so damn long XD
Saylee
Name: Nadalia. Species: Numel. Nature: Serious. Ability: Oblivious.
Name: Steve. Species: Slugma. Nature: Modest. Ability: Magma Armour.
Name: Steele. Species: Skarmory. Nature: Timid. Ability: Keen Eye.
Name: Skye. Species: Swablu. Nature: Brave. Ability: Natural Cure.
Name: Sunny. Species: Solrock. Nature: Sassy. Ability: Levitate.
Key
Name: Nathaniel. Species: Numel. Nature: Naughty. Ability: Magma Armour.
Name: Tyson. Species: Torkoal. Nature: Naughty. Ability: White Smoke.
Name: Stanley. Species: Spinda. Nature: Sassy. Ability: Own Tempo.
Name: Shawn. Species: Swablu. Nature: Hasty. Ability: Natural Cure.
Name: Zephyr. Species: Zubat. Nature: Brave. Ability: Inner Focus.