After ensuring the wellbeing of the researchers, this band of four continued onward, leaving the Ruins of Alph behind them. Taking a break from their jaunt to Azalea Town, Arthur wanted to see Riolu for a bit. "Let's just call it training exercises."

"If you say so…"

Riolu was out now while Ayame was still helping Mizuki with finishing set up their campsite. Riolu looked rather excited to see what Arthur had in mind, as he called on one of his Pokémon. "Alright Lara, I've got a new pup that needs a few pointers." Lara turned out to be a Lucario, assumedly female based on the name Arthur gave this Lucario. Lara stretched her arms, greeting Riolu as her newest pupil. "Now of course Riolu is still too young to learn anything about manipulating aura, but we can still train the pup to becoming a better fighter."

As Riolu and Lara started to spar, Mizuki turned to Ayame, "Say, did you notice Arthur's fists glowing during the Unown incident?"

"Glowing?" Ayame was too focused on dodging the Unown that she really didn't pay too much attention on their side of things for long. "I don't recall it, although…"

"Right…" Mizuki still couldn't let this odd feeling go, especially after seeing that back in the Ruin of Alph. "Another thing I still have to wonder about, why Mawile was able to take the Dragon-type hit and not take any damage. She's blocked them before, but she never nullified it like that."

"Is it possible that with all of our Pokémon and how many attacks the Unown were firing, something in the air neutralized the attack for us?"

"But that's just it Ayame, there is nothing that is capable of negating a Dragon-type move like that. I know that Dragon is effective against Dragon, but the reaction just seems…unnatural."

"Perhaps it would be best to just continue onward for now. Maybe it was just a fluke." She continued to watch Lara guide Riolu in his strikes, easily blocking each one with her paws.

"That's it, don't back down and push forward. When your enemy pushes back, give yourself some room to maneuver," Lara pushed Riolu back from one of his punches as she moved in with Thunder Punch. Riolu used a Quick Attack back step and managed to avoid the strike. "Not bad. But remember," Riolu looked up and found Lara already behind him, "Sometimes your opponent will be faster than you."

Lara looked like she was going to strike, but stopped just inches from contact, patting Riolu on his head and offering a few pointers on how to be able to move faster and how to protect himself better. Mizuki joined them now, "So do you have any plans on helping get Scar overcome his anger issues?"

"The only thing that will sate him will be achieving more strength and returning to the Safari Zone to gain leadership over that particular Scyther swarm."

Arthur looked to Taiichi now, "So this Scar fellow can't exactly be easy to handle. If I remember correctly weren't you penalized because you were more concerned with keeping all of the Pokémon safe then letting your Scyther have an all-out against your opponent's Scyther."

"Yeah, but Servine and Kangaskhan were more than enough to help defeat my opponent's overconfidence. A really boon for us I suppose. Besides, there's been some progress. He listens to the strategies I plan out for him."

"But he's still headstrong isn't he?" Arthur could see that this problem wasn't going to simply fix itself anytime soon. Arthur smiled, slapping Taiichi on the back, "Well if it's any consolation I think you were robbed of a Pokémon for that match. But it also means we've got one more reason to get to Azalea Town. Though I suppose we'd have to get through this forest first."


At night, when everyone else was asleep, Ayame had changed into her kunoichi attire ventured out alone, leaving behind Joltik and her other Pokémon. She wasn't foolish however. Ayame had grabbed a number of concealable tools from her bag before wandering off to meet with Koga, the first of many encounters she was assuming based on what little they've done. A figure emerged from the thickest foliage as he knelt down to Ayame. This man was the other with Koga and Aya, who he was or how he might relate to Ayame was a mystery though he seemed to be respecting Koga's orders. As per Koga's training, this messenger allowed Ayame to see him first before the two met alone by shadow of night.

Koga's man tossed a kunai with a scroll tied to it, striking the tree next to her. Ayame took the scroll, reading it as she also kept an eye on the messenger. The scroll contained orders and a location, Koga wanted them to root out a Neo Rocket operation that has subtly hidden itself in Azalea Town's Slowpoke Well without drawing too much attention on who disband them. Ayame could only guess that Koga did not want to encounter Arthur for reasons unknown to her. With the message clear, the messenger vanished.

Ayame wasn't sure how to break this information to the others without telling Arthur, but with their next destination being Azalea Town, they were going to complete the task one way or another, even if Ayame had to do it alone to protect her friends from Koga's wrath. She pulled the kunai out of the tree, twirling it around before stashing it away.


The next morning Ayame was already up as she was gathering her things, "I'm going to go on ahead to check on something. Mizuki, could you watch over Joltik until I get back?"

"Uh…sure…but why all of a sudden?" Ayame didn't say a word, instead she looked to Taiichi and flashed one of her kunai without showing it to the others. Mizuki held her hand out for Joltik, whispering, "Alright but don't take too long. And if you need help…"

"I will. But I should be able to handle it only. Azalea's well is the destination, and the Neos are the objective."

With Ayame off, Taiichi asked Mizuki, "What's she up to?"

"She's…she's just checking in on a few things before we get to Azalea Town." She then nudged against his side six times.

Arthur walked over, "So what's the hold up?"

"Nothing. So next stop, Azalea Town." Taiichi stopped, "But before that I've got a question for you. You have an Absol and an Espeon. You also pointed us toward New Bark Town and you were at the edge of Violet City with us instead of approaching from the city itself. So I was wondering if you happen to help us out during a little incident involving some hunters a little while back."

"Hunters, huh. Nah, can't say I've done anything recently to mess with those kinds of idiots."


Ayame was traveling through the trees once again, something she hasn't done for a while. It felt liberating for some reason, the wind blowing through her hair. A sensation that she had never really noticed before now, or paid heed to given her situation. It was almost like she was flying, as if she was truly free of the ground below her. That was when she was hit with another memory of her past. This one was of her mother leaping from tree branch to tree branch with her cradled in her mother's arms.

They were out together just for the fun of it, no lessons to teach, just being a family and picking out her favorite flowers just outside of the village and playing in the fields together. However it was Ayame who wanted some pointers, "Mommy, how do you get your kunai to strike where you want?"

"It takes a lot of practice to do, my little Swablu, sharp eyes and the ability to read your environment. Sometimes you can even manipulate a few things to play them out in our favor." They stopped so she could demonstrate. She put Ayame down, sitting her on the branch they were standing on, "See that cut branch over there?" pointing to a freshly cut limb, but from where they were there was no straight path to it. "I'm going to hit it."

"But how?"

"A lot of concentration and gaging one's own abilities." She pulled out seven kunai, "Watch only the first kunai I throw only." She tossed the dagger away from her intended target, but after it flew past the first tree, a second kunai was tossed and hit the first so that it changed trajectory. It still wasn't enough to hit the tree she pointed, but she wasn't done yet. The other kunai were thrown and shifted the first kunai more until finally it struck the intended target.

"You're the best mommy!"

"I'm far from the best, my little Swablu." She pulled out another kunai, "There are those who could throw just one and manipulate it in the air with very thin, very strong, string like this," she pulled the string so it shimmered just a bit in the light. "And others have Pokémon help them do this. It's also not good to leave so many things as evidence of your activity." Small gusts of wind blew through as it sucked all of the kunai up and back to her hand.

"Can you teach me to do that mommy?"

"One day, I promise. But for now let's hurry on back home. Your father might be getting a bit worried about us being out so late again. How about this time we race against mommy's Shiftry and see who gets home fastest?" Ayame happily nodded as Shiftry jumped onto a nearby branch. Her mother picked her up onto her back as she and Shiftry got ready to race back to the village.

Focused back on the now, it didn't take longer for Ayame to reach Azalea Town, far faster than by foot. Upon arriving to the outskirts of the small town was a stone well that was being guarded by a pair of men in black. Both men also had white masks covering half of their faces. They didn't have the distinct red R on their shirts, but the rest of the uniform matched up.

Ayame could take them out, or she could just skip the formalities of engaging them and just get in to learn more about what she was dealing with. Koga simply wanted Neo Team Rocket's operation to cease, nothing about how to handle it.

Ayame kept to the shadows of the trees tossing a rock to draw their attention away from the well. Only one of them moved to investigate the disturbance, not something that happened often when it came to guards. But that was all Ayame needed, slipping closer to the well and crawling down the stone walls to find what was happening.

The water level seemed unusually low for a well, but then again the ladder lining the wall seemed to suggest this well wasn't just used to access the underground aquifer. Even so there seemed to be a rather unusual lack of water based upon the water line that she was seeing. Deeper into the tunnel she found an inhabitant of the well, a Slowpoke, however this Slowpoke's tail was cut off. Soon other Slowpoke staggered around, also with their tails lopped off. They didn't seem to care, or they were just too oblivious to notice someone had done so.

It didn't take long before Ayame found several members of Team Rocket, this group had the red R on their black shirts but they also had the half mask like the two on guard duty. They weren't in any rush and they seemed to be going at their leisure, or they were waiting for orders for more. Either one this was the perfect time to strike and disrupt their operation.

However before she could actually get started one of the guards from above grabbed her arms from behind. "Looks like we've got ourselves a little pest problem." Ayame could free herself from the situation, but if she did it could lead to rather unfortunate consequences, or a prolonged battle. Ayame managed to get Ekans and Pawniard's Poké Balls off her and into the shadows of the cavern as she was escorted to the others.

Pawniard managed to get herself out and aided in getting Ekans out of his. They carefully followed Ayame, keeping their distance away from the Slowpoke. Ayame was still in the cloths that Mizuki gave her so she was going to act it up as if she was one of the townspeople who managed to sneak past. She wanted to find the leader and why they were doing this. "What do we have here? A little girl who got herself lost? Or maybe a little hero trying to save her town's precious Slowpoke?"

This fellow was in a grey suit over a black turtleneck. The suit had the Rocket logo over his right breast as he kept the suit out of his pants. "She thought she was clever and managed to get past us."

"Well now that you've seen our little operation, we can't let you leave."

"They'll get suspicious if I don't return home soon!" Ayame's acting of a slightly scared girl was rather impressive, on par to some of Mizuki's best from her movie career.

"The town's people have been getting a bit nose about this place. So gentlemen, let us continue this operation elsewhere. Take all of the Slowpoke with us. We'll harvest the rest later and will use them to breed more."

Ayame 'struggled', "Why are you doing this to our Slowpoke? What do you want?"

"What we want?" the leader of the Rocket group leaned closer, "We want money so we can achieve our main goal."

"World domination?"

The Rockets all started to laugh, "Nothing so petty as that. Our leader has even greater ambitions in mind."

Ayame doubted she'd get much else from them like this, so it was time for her to turn the tide. Ayame slammed her head against the Rocket leader, forcing him back so she could throw the guard holding her off, slamming him against the ground. Pawniard rushed from the shadows, tripping two of the Rockets onto the ground and keeping them down with her blade arms to their necks while Ekans wrapped himself around another.

Ayame quickly got Beedrill and Shedinja out, Shedinja holding down the guard who was rushing toward them from the surface as Beedrill's stingers were placed next to the Team Rocket group leader's neck. "You aren't one of the townspeople. Who are you really?"

"Someone with questions that need answering." Ayame tightened her grip on the Rocket she was pinning down. "Now who are you working for and tell me what your plans are really."

The Rocket with Beedrill to his neck smiled, "Well now you are persistent." He released a group of pellets from his hand before being blanketed in smoke. The smoke was choking Beedrill, forcing her back. Ayame knocked out the guy she was holding to try and give chase. But as she started to follow he had led her to a fork in the tunnel diverting to several different paths. The Rocket had slipped away from her and there was nothing she could do about it. She did have the others Rockets to contend with, and meeting up with the others before this ruckus got out of hand.

Ayame proceeded with knocking out the Team Rocket members and tying them down. "Let's see if we can't alert the authorities before rejoining the others."

Ayame gave Pawniard a note to deliver to the Azalea Town's law enforcements to clean up the mess down here. Pawniard rushed off to complete the task, as Ayame recalled the others to return to Taiichi and Mizuki. She knew at least one of them was going to be taken by Koga or Aya, so when she tied the Rockets down she did so individually.


"…Now if you want a really exciting time then there was this one adventure where we…" Ayame walked over through a bush, "And there's our missing companion," Arthur welcoming her back. "So, find what you were looking for?"

"In a manner of speaking," turning to Taiichi and Mizuki, "There seems to be some kind of trouble with their well, but nothing we should be too worried about." Joltik jumped back to Ayame, crawling back onto her head.

"Looks like somebody missed you." Ayame was getting used to having Joltik around, but she still had much to protect her from, like her past that now haunts them.

"Find anything about the Gym Leader?"

Ayame welcomed Joltik back with a scratch on the back, "Well I wasn't able to ask many questions thanks to that scene with the well."

"So we'll just have to find out when we get there."

"Oh, and while we're there I'd like to stop by this one crusty old fellow," Arthur looked ahead, "I think you guys might like him."

"And who might that be?"

"You just have to wait and see. But for now let's keep going."


Before they could get beyond the forest Mizuki's Xtransceiver started to ring. "Mi…I—as I—can you—"

"Karla? Karla I can barely hear you. Look, I'm almost out of a forest so I'll call you back in a bit or just leave me a message." Mizuki hung up and her Xtransceiver started to ring again, "These dense forested areas can be such a drag for these long distance calls."

Taiichi looked worried, "Do you think it was important?"

Mizuki looked worried as well, though she couldn't do much about it, "Maybe, but I won't know until I hear her message."

Not long after that they found Officer Jenny busy at work as she was transferring four people into police cars and a Nurse Joy accompanied by quite a few Chansey as they entered the well. "Wonder what that was all about."

Ayame looked away, keeping herself out of view of the Rockets being taken away. "I couldn't say really, though if I had to guess it can't be anything good." Pawniard was waiting near one of the bushes now, giving Ayame the chance to get her back into her Poké Ball. Ayame 'stretched' her arms out, one of them going into the bush with said Poké Ball in hand and quickly getting it back onto her belt without anyone noticing. "So are we to visit this 'friend' of your first or stop at the Gym and get that over with?"

"Either one is fine with me. The Gym isn't going anywhere and the old guy doesn't usually leave his house often. So more or less it's up to him," Arthur nudging Taiichi's shoulder.

"I am curious what this fella you were talking about has to show. And you said he's usually at him home. So if you're willing to introduce us, we should visit this friend of yours first."

Arthur took lead, "Alright, but just so you know, he can get a bit grouchy at times, especially when you talk about some of the newer Poké Ball models coming from Silph Co. or the Devon Corporation."


A/N: Even more of Ayame's past has resurfaced, at least this one was of a happier memory.