Chapter Fourteen: Warehouse Race
Hilda raced into the Pokemon Center, stopping as soon as she got through the door. She panted heavily, and Oshawott and Lillipup did the same as soon as they reached her. Pikachu was disoriented from the sudden jostling of Hilda's run- she had refused to get down from her shoulder despite this. Hilda looked up, scanning the area for her friends. Bianca was spotted on the higher levels, though why, she wasn't sure. Cheren was nowhere to be seen. Right, so at least she made it here before him.
Cheren walked through the doors soaking wet, his shoulders dipped low in disappointment. He glanced at Hilda, but said nothing. He simply strode up to the front desk, handing the nurse his Poke Balls. Hilda walked up to him, her hands clasped in curiosity.
"Didn't go well, huh?" she asked.
Cheren shook his head. "Low Kick, High Kick, Karate Chop...throhs are too tough for me just yet," he sighed. "I used Snivy at first, but one Karate Chop lowered her strength halfway. I wasted most of my Potions trying to keep Purrloin in the fight, and that did no good. I tried using Pidove, but they knocked him out before he could get a single move in."
"Oh, that's rough."
Cheren dug through his bag, sighing as he pulled out his wallet. "And I'm out of money, so I can't restock," he concluded. "I don't suppose you have any cash to lend?"
Hilda shook her head. "I spent most of it on Potions. I think I have enough for dinner for one night."
"Can't waste that. Hey, your Pokemon seem unhurt. Did you find any fighting-types on your search?"
"Not yet. I was searching for Pokemon that might help me catch one, though"
"Which one?"
Hilda pulled the Poke Ball out from her bag, releasing Petilil from inside. She bounced onto her boot, gnawing on a shoelace. Cheren scanned her with his Poketch, fiddling with some of the instruments there.
"Oh, you got the app that Leroy suggested?" Hilda wondered.
"Yeah. I caved," Cheren admitted. He smiled, and continued, "You made a good catch. This petilil knows Sleep Powder. It can put any Pokemon to sleep. Assuming you can get the first move in, you should have no trouble catching a fighting-type Pokemon."
Hilda rubbed the back of her neck, accidentally nudging Pikachu. "I'll let you use my Pokemon for the Gym Battle, if you find that you have no luck," she decided.
"No, it's all about the bonds. We can't just trade Pokemon willy-nilly."
Bianca ran downstairs, greeting them with a smile. "Guess who just completed her first Pokemon trade!" she announced.
Hilda and Cheren gasped. Bianca seemed so close to her Pokemon, though. "Which one?" Hilda asked.
"Patrat. He didn't seem to like me very much, and I met an Ace Trainer that really wanted to put in the work training him. He told me that he had many fighting-type Pokemon that they wouldn't all get the same attention, so he was willing to give one to me so they might get attention."
"What did he give you?" Cheren wondered.
Bianca released the Pokemon from a Poke Ball. Out came a weasel-like Pokemon, one that had pink and yellow fur. She studied them calmly- or perhaps she was studying their weaknesses. This was a female mienfoo they beheld.
"She's a fighting-type- just what we need," Bianca explained. "I want to spend the time training her, but we could all use her for the Gym just this once."
"Mienfoo might not readily listen to you," Cheren warned her. "She's too comfortable with her old Trainer, still. And she already went through one trade- who knows how she'll react to three or four in such a short amount of time. No, you're better off training her on your own."
Bianca nodded, patting Mienfoo on the head.
"At least it seems like you put thought into it," Cheren decided. "You wouldn't happen to have any money, would you?"
Bianca pulled her wallet out, searching through it. She grimaced and looked back at the two of them. "Apparently not," she muttered.
Cheren leaned against the counter. "What are we going to do?" he sighed.
Bianca shrugged. "This is the City of Art," she suggested hopefully. "We can make something pretty that people will pay money for."
"Like what? We can't knit or paint or anything."
"We can perform. We could put on a play or something."
Hilda went up to the desk, putting her attention on the nurse. "Do you know where we could set up any performance thing in this city?" she asked.
"Anyone can use the warehouses if they wish," the nurse explained. "I believe warehouse number 26 is available for use. If you get there in time, you can claim it."
Hilda pulled away. "I'll go do that," she told her friends. "I'll come back here once I do and bring you there."
"Good luck," Cheren shrugged.
Hilda and her Pokemon raced down the street, making their way to the warehouses. They swerved past crowds of people and Pokemon making their way to their apartments, barely dodging performers standing by the statues. They passed a large statue depicting some kind of Pokemon, but they couldn't stop to clearly observe it. Time was of the essence, it seemed. She had no reason to believe that Warehouse 26 would be taken so soon, but anthing was possible, so they had to hurry. Hilda was just thankful that the rain had slowed down to a drizzle.
With her legs and throat burning from exertion, Hilda took a look back at her Pokemon. Petilil rode on Lillipup's back like a magnificent rapidash rider, though she looked quite frantic. Oshawott trailed behind them, stumbling occasionally. She then looked up next to them, finding a girl in a flowing green dress running alongside them. Her red hair was tied up in a bandanna, flowing freely in the breeze. She was flocked by a swadloon and a tympole, and a cottonee flew just above her head. A camera swung at her side, and her bag fought to slide down her shoulder.
This girl gave Hilda a glance, and it was all it took for her to narrow her eyes. She then quickened her pace, running ahead of her.
If Hilda wasn't panting, she would've gasped. They were racing to the same warehouse!
"Pikachu! Race ahead to Warehouse 26!" Hilda commanded.
Pikachu leapt off her shoulder, running ahead of them. Her pace was much quicker than that of the rest of her team, and this was with no effort. She was the fastest Pokemon that Hilda had. If she could get to the warehouse first, it was as good as theirs!
The girl's eyes frantically widened at this rule change. "Cottonee, race after her!" she shouted.
Cottonee hummed in agreement, racing ahead of them.
Soon the competitors of the race weren't Hilda and the strange girl, but Pikachu and Cottonee. The flying cotton puff used height to her advantage, getting ahead of Pikachu on several occasions. Pikachu used her surroundings to her advantage, climbing up onto rooftops and maneurvering around Cottonee to get ahead of her. They were really close the entire way there.
Eventually they reached the warehouses. Hilda counted the numbers on the front, trying to determine how close they were. 22, 23, 24, oh it was too much. She and the girl halted as they reached close to Warehouse 26, watching their Pokemon reach it. Pikachu hopped along the rooftops, climbing into the top window of Warehouse 26. She just barely made it ahead of Cottonee, winning them the rights to the warehouse.
Hilda cheered at the top of her lungs- between bouts of panting at least. She scooped her Pokemon into her arms, giving them big hugs. "We did it! We won!"
The girl slumped her shoulders, staring in disbelief as Cottonee floated somberly back.
They both stood around for a minute, catching their breaths. Hilda set her Pokemon on the ground, holding out her hand.
"What's that for?" the girl asked.
"I commend you on a job well done," Hilda explained. "Your cottonee did pretty well."
The girl patted Cottonee on the head. "She's pretty fast, huh?" she mused. "No one can beat a pikachu with smarts like that, though. Where do you even find one?"
Hilda shrugged somberly. That was the question, wasn't it?"
"Hey, what are you planning to do with this warehouse, anyway?" the girl asked.
"Oh, my friends and I wanted to do some sort of performance thing to get a little more money," Hilda explained. "We're not sure what we're doing quite yet, but we wanted to have the warehouse for it."
"I wanted to use it for a painting and photography studio. If you and your friends used the bottom level, would it be okay if I used the top?"
"I don't see why not. And we're probably not going to be here long anyway, so you can continue using it after we're done."
Pikachu called out from inside the warehouse. Hilda and the girl walked inside, discovering that the warehouse wasn't too empty. They saw Pikachu sitting on the railing on the top level, warily observing two strangers inside. The taller of the figures was a brown-haired man, wearing a green shirt and strange red-and-black striped pants. The other was a leavanny, thin and lanky, with leaves making up the crest on its head. The leavanny walked up the stairs to the top level, trying to contact an agitated Pikachu.
"Not too forward, my friend," the man laughed. "You can't startle this newcomer. I'm surprised to find her here as well, but we need to take caution."
"Pikachu, come here!" Hilda commanded.
Pikachu looked up, spotting Hilda and the rest of her Pokemon. She jumped off the railing, skirting around the leavanny and running down the stairs, coming to Hilda's side. Hilda picked her up and set her on her shoulder, staring at the man in confusion.
"You...you're not claiming this warehouse, are you sir?" the girl muttered.
"Oh no, I have another one just up ahead. I bought that one out," the man explained. "It has my name on it where the letters usually are. Does the name 'Burgh' sound familiar to you?"
Hilda thought of home, her mind coming up with a painting that hung just above her mother's bed. It depicted a group of sewaddles leaping from the trees, weaving silk ropes to slow their descent. It used a fine array of light colors, from the light blues to the leaf greens. Of course, her mother had always liked it for the personality given to each of the sewaddles. A signature had been written in the corner of the painting by the base of a leaf, though the painting itself was a clear copy meant for sale. The signature said "Burgh" as the name of the artist.
"You're Castelia City's painter, right?" Hilda asked. "'Sewaddles ad Dawn'?"
"So you've seen that one, huh?" Burgh replied. "I've been told by many that it's one of their favorites. It was one of my earlier ones, though, so I can't see why. I see too many places on the sewaddle's snouts where the paint smudged."
"It's fine, trust me. But what are you doing here?"
"I can't resist the lure of Pinwheel Forest. All the Pokemon in there have such great personalities. I enjoy meeting them, even if I never catch them. But a lot of my muse lately has been coming from Nacrene City itself, and I'm amazed by how much the city has changed since I was a kid."
"So you used to live here?"
"Precisely. And my warehouse is the same one I've had since I was a young man. Only the interior has changed since previous visits here, to accomodate what I'm trying to work on at the moment. However, Leavanny and I were attracted here by what we thought was a wild pikachu roaming the city."
Hilda scratched Pikachu on the head. "Her appearance is strange, I'll give you that."
Burgh pulled a map out of his pocket. She only caught a glimse of the region depicted on it, but could tell that it clearly wasn't Unova. He scanned the map for a moment, frowning in thought.
"So, would you be from...Hearthome City?" Burgh wondered. "I've been told that families of pikachus gather around there."
"No, I'm from Nuvema Town," Hilda replied.
Burgh dramatically slammed the map shut. "Right here in Unova, huh? But that pikachu looks a lot like a Sinnoh pikachu."
The girl looked at Pikachu, scratching her head. "She looks just like any other pikachu," she shrugged.
"I've read many books on the biology of strange Pokemon such as pikachu. Their dimensions vary slightly depending on which region they're found in, or drastically if you're comparing Hoenn pikachus to Kanto pikachus. This one seems slim enough to be from Sinnoh."
So Pikachu could be from Sinnoh? Those bird Pokemon in her dream could've been starlies after all? The idea was still hard to fathom. What would Team Plasma want to go all the way to Sinnoh just to steal a pikachu there? While pikachus are popular, they had more presence in Kanto and Johto than in Sinnoh.
"Do you think Lenora could say for certain?" Hilda wondered. "I wanted to be sure for a while now."
"She can definitely say for certain," Burgh promised her. "Lenora has the books, doesn't she?"
"Fair point."
Burgh made his way out, Leavanny following just behind him. "I hope we see each other around," he decided. "I'd like to see what kind of art you make in the following days."
Hilda and Pikachu tentatively waved goodbye to him, wondering what to make of the encounter. Nothing to do about it right now, Hilda decided. They needed to figure out what they were going to do with this warehouse.