~Chapter Twenty-five: Let's See what's Going On with the P.L.A.S.M.A Foundation. Also, What's Ghetsis Been Up To Lately?~
~Author's Note~
Today (on which this chapter is/was uploaded) marks the one year anniversary of A Thousand Shades of Grey. When I first started this story, precisely one year ago, I already knew it would be long and exciting, but most of my original ideas for the plot have rather gone by the wayside. Most of it I am happy with, apart from how I've been characterising N, which may or may not be addressed in the following chapter.
Originally, Cheren and Bianca were just going to be minor characters, and Whitney might well have been in a relationship with Blake. I also planned to have Blake catch a pidove and use Zephyr in battle more often. That was before I started developing an interest in pokémon rights. Also, I had the notion of Whitney being the "Hero of Girl Power" or something, thereby freeing up N to be the Hero of Ideals. Whitney would have ended up completely sidelined, though, so I kiboshed that particular idea.
Since this day last year, this story has been viewed more than a thousand times, as well as receiving not one, not two, not three, not even four, but FIVE REVIEWS! Five whole reviews, all for me! What a tremendous number!
...I'm not dropping hints or anything.
In any case, please enjoy this chapter, and hopefully another year's worth as soon as I get around to writing them. You all have brilliant taste in literature and I love you considerably because of it.
On with the story!
The nights were cold around the P.L.A.S.M.A Foundation's secret base, on an island a few miles southwest of Nuvema Town, and Melissa was beginning to regret shaving her head. N thought she looked good with a buzz-cut, but his hair was so long and shaggy he could never truly understand (until he cut it off). Of her sober green jumper and garish orange dungarees with glow-in-the-dark pink highlights, the least said the better.
"At least it's summer," the Grand Marshall muttered to herself, wandering along the battlements to N's tower. There was no moonlight to cast a shadow beside her, nor give the slightest shine to the base's armour plating, so Melissa was hardly surprised when she crashed into Debbie.
"Bloody distortion realm... we really need proper lights out here," said Debbie shakily, helping Melissa to her feet.
"It'd make us too easy to see from the air," Melissa pointed out. "At least we've got plenty of carrots... which I hate, actually, but..."
"You should try carrot and cheese baguettes," Debbie suggested. "With tartare sauce."
"I don't like tartare sauce," said Melissa, stony-faced.
"Oh." Debbie looked a little put-out at that, but rallied magnificently. "Mayonnaise, then. Or hoummous!"
"Now you're talking!" said Melissa, a mayonnaise lover since childhood. "Er, anyway, N has summoned me. He wants us to clarify some things." She started towards N's tower again, stepping carefully and holding tight to Debbie. You could never be too careful on dark nights.
"What things?" asked Debbie.
"Oh... stuff, you know. Our mission, our relationship with the pokémon league, how we plan to bludgeon Ghetsis repeatedly with pineapples and stuff bananas up his nose and cut off his feet and use them as paperweights and make him eat that stupid diadem-!" She broke off, looking slightly abashed. "Well, we'll discuss stuff."
"Right. Does it concern me?" asked Debbie earnestly.
This was enough to rouse Melissa's suspicion. "You? The helicopter pilot, messenger, swimmer, dentist, chef, mathematician, fashion designer and all-round mysterious person who seems to be one of our highest-ranking operatives and N's personal assistant now? I don't know... he didn't exactly say you could come."
"Ah, then he never said I couldn't, either!" said Debbie triumphantly.
Melissa sighed. "Look, Debbie... Deborah Cormorant-Gullywhumper, isn't it?"
"Deborah Cormorant-Gullywhumper the Third," Debbie corrected her.
"Oh. Well, in any case-"
"You don't need to say anything, Melissa," Debbie assured her. "I won't come if you don't want me. I mean, I know my place; just a plain, simple woman of many, many, many talents. Not a zoroark or anything!" She laughed a little.
"As if!" chortled Melissa. "Zoroarks need to eat sodium in order to keep up their illusions for long periods, don't they?"
"Yep," agreed Debbie.
"And something's been at our sodium, come to think of it," Melissa continued. "Strange, seeing as how no-one except me has the key to the sodium cupboard. I'll have to up the security. Maybe Trillie'd look after it..."
Debbie looked momentarily worried. "Trillie? The tropius, right?"
"Uh-huh. She's always good at guard duty. I've played Chess with her, too; she's great with her defences."
"Well... fine. Good. Brilliant! I mean, I'm totally not a zoroark, so it won't bother me at all, right?" laughed Debbie.
"Of course not!" agreed Melissa.
"Great! Well, this is N's door. See ya later!" declared Debbie, and, still laughing, she practically sprinted off. A distant scream and thump indicated that she had gone over the wall.
Sighing resignedly yet fondly at the scream and thump, Melissa entered N's tower, let the retinal scanners scan her eyes, left her massive sword, two smaller (but still pretty big) swords, two daggers, a longbow, some arrows, a plasma rifle, another spare sword, extra bottles of plasma, countless throwing stars and a few magical amulets in the hatstand, and made her way up the stairs.
(Meanwhile, in a distant city, Bianca realised she would need to up her game as the queen of run-on sentences.)
Melissa gave N's door a few loud knocks.
"Yes?" N called.
"It's me," replied Melissa. "May I enter?"
"Sure," replied N. Melissa entered, moved a few blankets out of the way and on the bed beside N. Purrloin was sitting in the young Harmonia's lap, and N himself was examining a poké-ball.
"Tell me, Melissa... what thoughts and emotions do this poké-ball call up in your soul?" asked N.
"Well... oppression. Bullying and abuse. Utterly inhuman cruelties against fine, upstanding creatures! Pokémon being stuffed in plastic thingies is an unthinkable act of callous, heartless viciousness totally unwelcome in the modern age, and I'll kill anyone who uses poké-balls for whatever reason!" declared Melissa.
"Of course, as I once thought," said N, his voice betraying little emotion.
"Er... what?" said Melissa.
"Melissa, old chum... what if I were to tell you that Purrloin... this young man here... actually prefers sleeping in this very poké-ball?"
"True story," Purrloin agreed.
Melissa's heart skipped a beat, and for a moment, she felt as if she might faint. Then she felt as if she might kill N. Then she felt as if she might give Purrloin a thorough psychological examination. Then she felt she needed to study poké-balls in greater depth. Then she felt ashamed of thinking such thoughts, and finally felt only confusion.
"...Are you the zoroark who's been at our sodium?" asked Melissa suspiciously.
"No," N assured her. "Purrloin just said it was true, didn't he?"
The world was dropping out from under Melissa's feet. "...Are you sure, Purrloin?"
"Of course! It's warm, comfy and quiet, and there's a great wi-fi signal. And whenever N carries the poké-ball with me in it... I feel like I can touch his heart, and he can touch mine. And I remember my sister... I'm still not entirely happy about her dying, to be honest, but her life was her own to nobly sacrifice. I guess that's why I like N so much. Because she did," replied Purrloin.
"That makes no sense at all!" wailed Melissa. "I think I need to sit down..."
"You are sitting down, Melissa," N pointed out.
"Oh," said Melissa. "Evidently, it's not working." Then she fainted.
When Melissa came to, she was in her own room. Judging by the clear blue light shining through the window, it was morning.
"Uggghhhhh... poké-balls and purrloins and Natural Gropius Harmonia, oh my..." groaned Melissa. "Oh, well. Time for breakfast, I suppose."
As Melissa changed into her usual clothes, not thinking too hard about how she'd got into her pyjamas without being conscious, she noticed a piece of paper pinned to the wardrobe. Closer inspection revealed some of N's unnaturally precise handwriting.
"Gone to seek truth and discover self and stuff. Might meet Magnificent Many, also. Please hold down fort while I am gone. -N," read Melissa. "He's... gone? Gone?!" She tore the note to pieces, crushed them into a little ball, stomped on it a few times, retrieved her plasma rifle (which someone had left by her bed) and shot the mutilated piece of paper, then pulled her bedside rug over the charred hole in the floor. "How could he just go?! Now, of all times, and after coming out with something so stupid! I mean, poké-balls?!" screamed Melissa. "POKÉMON DO NOT LIKE POKÉ-BALLS!"
"Hi, Melissa," Samuel the samurott greeted Melissa, as she stomped past in a terrible fury. "I notice you're stomping past in a terrible fury. You do realise excessive stomping can damage your feet, right?"
Melissa came to an exasperated halt. "You're an idiot, Samuel, and a lunkhead, a poltroon, an iconoclast, a fathead, a reprobate, a blackguard and a doofus, and I won't hesitate to stomp on any of your limbs if you push me to it. Any questions?"
"None whatsoever, save this," replied Samuel blithely. Melissa's terrible bad moods were nothing new to him, Heidi and Trillie. "Do you like my new poké-ball? I made it myself. It's got an en-suite bathroom and everything!"
He proffered a large green poké-ball with yellow stripes. Melissa contemplated the ball. Technically Samuel had the right to choose his own dwellings, but... WHY?!
"...It's round," she finally commented. "Sort of... spherical."
"I know, hence the "ball" part," said Samuel.
"Yeah... and green," said Melissa. "With yellow bits. Er... very nice. I'll be off now, shall I?"
"Nice seeing you," said Samuel, waving a paw as Melissa resumed her terribly furious stomping past. She spent a great deal of money on heavy boots and floor reinforcements- just one of the Grand Marshall's many duties- and she was determined to get her money's worth.
However, as Melissa made her way to Bronius's room (he probably knew where N had gone), she found she couldn't help but put some serious thought into the question of poké-balls. If a sensible samurott and a prestigious purrloin claimed to like being inside them... could they just be going against the grain for the sake of it? Some sort of counterculture? Or could she actually, all things considered, have, in fact, been wrong? Ideologically?!
Get a grip, Melissa, Melissa inwardly chided herself. There's no way you could be wrong about this. Every pokémon in the world except Samuel and Purrloin hates poké-balls. They've got to! I can't be wrong!
...But then N would be wrong. Which is better than me being wrong, but...
Heidi's belly brushed against the clouds as she floated gently across the sky, barely needing to use her wings. This was the life: cool, crisp air all around her, perfect aerodynamics, surprisingly low density... who wouldn't want to be a hydreigon? Purrloin had an even easier time of it, even though he had nothing but a pair of flippers and several helium balloons, and N was exhausted.
"I've... made a... poor... decision!" panted N, barely making himself heard over the noise of his pedal-powered gyrocopter. "Totally... blooming... exhausted!"
"I'll be glad to carry you if need be," Heidi offered.
"No, no! I'm fine!" N assured her, lying through his teeth. "Good exercise!"
"If you're sure..." said Heidi.
"He isn't," Purrloin pointed out.
"Shut up," said N.
The group had been flying together for some time now, and N knew they'd have to land soon or else his legs would give out completely. It had seemed like such a fine idea at first: just the three of them soaring through the skies together, seeking the truth about ideals, the ideal truth or whatever... In reality, though, N wasn't built to fly. If his Aura grew strong enough, he could fly without the gyrocopter, but that kind of power was a long way off.
"Touch down... that tower!" huffed N, pointing as best he could to a tower, standing proud many miles below. He immediately eased off on the pedals, gasping with relief as his gyrocopter started to glide towerwards. He had a very good feeling about that tower.
The following day dawned bright and cheerful, not that much light could enter the Dark Tower of Doom, positioned as it was in the middle of the Acid Lake of Doom, surrounded by the twelve Volcanoes of Doom and kept dark by the Thick, Persistent Clouds of Doom.
"So," said Ghetsis doomily, getting into the spirit of things, "it would appear that my idiot son has crashed into Celestial Tower. This is more fortuitous than it may seem: there is an item there of which we have great need-"
"We know, Ghetsis," said Shadow Charizard archly.
Ghetsis stiffened. "I am a lord!"
"We know, your lordship," Shadow Charizard corrected himself, giving his forelock an extremely sarcastic tug.
"Imbecile..." muttered Ghetsis. "Anyway. There is an item in Celestial Tower of which we have great need, and with my idiot son back in the picture, it is more imperative than ever that we act swiftly and decisively!" He thumped the table hard enough to send shockwaves through everyone (except Shadow Heatran). "As you all know-"
"You love the sound of your voice," said Shadow Charizard, attracting a few chuckles from around the table.
"SHUT UP!" snapped Ghetsis. He took a few deep breaths and cleared his throat. "Now. As you all know, N actually is my son, although he thinks he's been adopted or something. It's been a while since I really thought about it. In any case, N is a direct descendant of the Harmonia bloodline, sired many millennia ago by Jenny Harmonia herself, and so he is guaranteed to be able to unlock the Light and Dark Stones. He is best suited to Reshiram, so I will force him to awaken her, then I shall turn her into a thousand shadow clones! And I, Lord Ghetsis, WILL RULE THE WORLD!"
Ghetsis waited for rapturous applause. There was none.
"You'll all have a share, of course," Ghetsis sighed.
The deafening cheers lasted for several minutes. Ghetsis smiled. These shadow clones were so-
"Just a minute!" Shadow Charizard interjected. "We're still badly outnumbered by the P.L.A.S.M.A Foundation, and we know N won't go down without a fight. There are people guarding Celestial Tower, too. We simply don't have enough-"
Ghetsis barely glanced his way as he raised a hand, sending a blast of purple lightning through Shadow Charizard. The shadow clone fell to the ground in agony, smouldering and sparking like an overheating battery, and in the poor light of the tower all anyone could see of him was the pitiful, dwindling glow in his eyes. What they could not see was his tail-flame.
"Any other objections?" asked Ghetsis, not bothering to disguise his triumphant smugness. "None? Jolly good. Shadow Lugia, I want you and your brother to fly to Celestial Tower and bring me N. You will carry four lightweight agents apiece for supplementary purposes. Understood?"
"Understood, O Dread Master of Assorted Horrible Things," said Shadow Lugia meekly.
"What she said," agreed Shadow Ho-oh.
"Then get going!"
"N, what were you thinking?!" demanded Melissa, standing over a bandage-encased Natural Gropius Harmonia in the small hospital outside Celestial Tower.
Although his lungs could barely work his vocal chords, N forced himself to reply. "My legs were tired and the tower looked safe. I guess I misjudged the trajectory a little..."
"No, what I mean is, what were you thinking vis a vis leaving without telling me?"
"I did tell you."
"With a scrap of paper, yeah, but was you telling me in person really too much to ask?"
"Well, you were sleeping like a log. It's not healthy to wake someone up after they pass out like you did."
"That reminds me, are you serious about poké-balls not being evil?" asked Melissa. "Because if you are-"
"You'll grow up and just accept it?"
"No."
"I thought not..." N gave a deep, heartfelt sigh. "Look. I've been talking to the pokémon of the skies lately, and none of them have any problems with poké-balls. I got into a few discussions about air travel routes, actually, but poké-balls were never a problem. There was also a fearow on an errand for his trainer."
"And you convinced him to abandon human rule and live his life as free as a literal bird, right?"
"Actually, no. He and his trainer adore each other."
"How do you know?"
"She was riding on his back."
"And you didn't push her off?!"
"No! Melissa, we've seriously misjudged pokémon trainers in general," said N severely. "Sooner or later, you'll need to rethink things."
"It simply can't be true-"
"Exactly! I don't know what's true or not!" snapped N. "We need to listen, Melissa, and see, smell, taste, feel... do psychic stuff, maybe. We can't just stick blindly to the same beliefs we've held since Ghetsis was with us. We can and have been wrong!"
"I-!" was all Melissa could think to say, although a fair few things she hadn't thought to say were fighting to come out, preferably at great volume in N's direction. This was beyond belief. N had betrayed her, Heidi and Purrloin were happy to go along for the ride... "You're nuts! I'm taking command of the P.L.A.S.M.A Foundation. Don't try and stop me!"
"Melissa, listen to yourself! You want to do what's right, don't you? Well, how do you know what's right?!"
"Easy! Ghetsis told me everything I... er... oh." Well, that put a crimp in things. There was no way Melissa was flying into a zealous rage and doing something highly unreasonable just to defend Ghetsis's beliefs, even if they were also her own. "You've got a point there."
"I know I have," said N. "Now, I've got a feeling the visiting hours end in a few minutes, so you'd better go. I recommend you visit the tower. The local ghost-types use it as a sort of clubhouse."
"I'll bear that in mind," said Melissa, rising to her feet. "Goodbye N. Good luck recovering from... that. 'Bye!"
And she was off, stomping again, as she did when she was having ideological issues. Melissa would've stomped even if she were a ballet dancer.
Heavy-footed ballet... yeah, I can just see myself, Melissa thought, chuckling a little as she made her way to the tower. It was a disappointing sight, actually, for something called Celestial Tower: just a yellowish-brown brick structure, tapering towards the top. A few small, dark windows were visible around the outside, and some thin ledges spiralled up the outer walls. There was a small bashed-in patch on the second floor, shaped suspiciously like N.
It was cold inside the tower, as Melissa realised the moment she stepped over the threshold. She shiveved slightly. Ghost-type pokémon would love it here. The countless rows of tall blue tombstones would make them feel quite at home. Clubhouse indeed...
"Is anybody here?!" called Melissa, coming at last to the stairs. "Any pokémon fancy a chat about civil rights and interspecies relations?!"
There was no reply. It was as if the darkness was swallowing Melissa's voice. Maybe the next floor up...
"Anyone home?!" called Melissa, for once walking quietly as she made her way up the steps, a wide stone staircase spiralling up the inside of the tower.
"For pity's sake, have some respect for the dead!" snapped a passing chandelure. "Some of the pokémon here have been dead for thousands of years, and you know how they hate people being loud in the vicinity of their bodies!"
"Oh. Sorry," said Melissa. "Uh, what's your view on pokémon liberation?"
"...Liberation from what?"
"From being captured, being used in battles... that kind of thing."
"Oh. Well, I don't really think pokémon can be controlled by force," said the chandelure. "I mean, if you tried to enslave me, you'd suffer terribly. Some of the litwicks around here might not be so resilient, though, so..."
"They'd need people to look after them," Melissa suggested. "Such as you, or a benevolent human organisation dedicated to protecting innocent pokémon."
"Well, yes. That would do it."
This conversation was going well; time to get down to brass tacks. "What about poké-balls, then?"
"Poké-balls? They're completely unfair!" replied the chandelure, with a newfound vehement edge to his voice.
Melissa felt a great weight leave her heart.
"It allows pokémon to exploit humans and get carried everywhere like pampered pets instead of walking, galloping, crawling, floating, swimming, flying, oozing, teleporting, rolling, slithering, sidewinding, bouncing or burrowing like honest people!" the chandelure continued.
The great weight was back with reinforcements.
"Rest assured, woman whose name I know not, I would never ask you to carry me, and any pokémon who would does not deserve our time. Humans have rights, and I won't hear a word to the contrary!" ranted the chandelure.
"Uh... I never actually thought about it like that," mumbled Melissa.
"I fear you would not have. The whole of society is geared towards oppressing you," said the chandelure sagely.
"Well... fine. I'll take my leave now," said Melissa, rushing off down the stairs before the chandelure could realise what was happening. Her head was spinning. Humans were being oppressed by pokémon all of a sudden? That made no sense. Nothing made sense! There was only one thing for it: she'd have to make her own sense.
But I don't know how... I've never not known what to do...
Melissa forced the thoughts out of her head. Self-doubt never did her any good. As of now, all she could do was find out what was actually happening with pokémon liberation, then work out who she needed to beat up to make things right. That always worked.
"Just you sit tight, N. I intend to seek the truth while you're bedridden, and if it has the nerve to hide from me, I'll punch it into next week!" declared Melissa. She saw a boulder by the road, approved of it and struck a dramatic pose on top, raising her sword like a flagpole. "Truth, I'm coming for you! Prepare to die!"
Silhouetted by a perfectly timed bolt of lightning, Melissa leapt from her boulder, tripped over, got up again, kicked the boulder, screamed in agony and hopped off to see to her ruined foot.