Episode 16: The club


"We cut this way too close," I said as I glanced at the very late breakfast in the plate in front of me.

"You got that right," Laura added as she ate her own food.

Learning that the boat to Fallarbor proper was leaving early that day was rough. Having to rush out the door with no food for either of us or our pokémon was even rougher.

"I feel as though we should have looked this up beforehand," Brook added as she sat next to me and ate away. A part of me wanted to scold her for 'speaking' with her mouth full, even though she wasn't speaking at all. "But I guess we were pretty busy with everything else,"

I shrugged and decided to just enjoy myself for now.

Laura and I were both sitting at one of the small tables at the edge of the boat's deck. The pokémon were either sitting with us or on the floor next to us. Surrounding us were a bunch of people who I assumed took up the space that forced us into the bad motel.

I wanted to be mad at them, but then I thought about it for a bit. If we hadn't been forced to stay the night, just how much damage would Team Neo-Aqua have been able to wreck? At the very least they would have canceled the contest, which may have caused a minor riot.

The worst part was that I was only somewhat joking. It had only ever happened once, but one riot caused by angry contest fans was all they needed. Now even the smallest disturbance and everyone joked about starting a riot.

Contest delayed due to weather? Riot.

Venue has to be closed down due to damage? Riot.

Popcorn cost too much this year? Riot.

"So do you want to go see the contest?" I asked Laura as we finished eating. She glanced down at her fork a bit as it twirled around in her food as she hummed to herself.

"Maybe?" She stated with a wince. "I mean, it's pretty big in this region. But it's just that…"

"You don't really get it?" I guessed.

"I don't l know if I want to get it," She corrected as she set the fork down. "It's like… it looks so complicated, and the idea of figuring it all out freaks me out a little,"

"I mean, I guess that makes sense," I lied as I came up with a better idea. "How about this, go to the contest, and if you find yourself wanting to know what's going on, then dive in, and if you don't, then don't,"

"That's not such a bad plan," She admitted. "Maybe I'll go with that,"

"Yeah, now all I have to do is figure out how I'm going to explain a bunch of contest stuff to… do you hear that?" I asked her as I heard a small commotion start on the other side of the boat. We all stopped eating and glanced over at a small crowd.

In the center of the crowd were a pair of trainers standing off. They were both a few years older than me, and both wore clothes that were noticeable nicer hen mine. The blond boy wore a stylish blue suit with a brown belt, while the girl wore a lacy green and white dress with an umbrella at her side.

With the way they were facing off, and the fact that both of them had a pokéball in their hand, I could guess where this was going.

"A bit too crowded to have a battle," I mumbled to myself as I glanced at the large crowd surrounding the pair, the lack of proper match field and the little space between them. Maybe if they stuck to smaller pokémon it might work out, but if they picked anything that even approached the bigger end of the scale…

"Go Milotic!" They both yelled, proving me wrong as a pair of gigantic water snakes appeared, coiling around each of them.

"There is not enough space on this boat for those two to battle here," I said plainly as both Laura and Brook got up from their seats in case they needed to put some distance between us and the fight.

"Are you ready?" The kid in the suit announced as his Milotic got close enough for him to stroke its head. He smirked at the girl as he gently stroked Milotic, the pokémon letting closing its eyes as he did so.

"Of course," The girl replied as her own Milotic got close enough for her to do the same.

"Then, I'll make the first move," the suit kid said as he reached into his jacket and pulled out… a magnifying glass?

He held the magnifying glass towards the Milotic's skin and held it up for the girl to see as she closed the distance between them.

"As you can clearly see, my Milotic's scales are of the highest quality!" He loudly boasted as few of the people in the crowd looked at each other in confusion. Had I been a bit closer, I would have been one of them.

"Well, his body scales are pretty good," The girl said as she closed her eyes and pouted a bit. Her small frown suddenly turned into a smug grin as her eyes opened. "But those red antenna-hair scales look a bit dull to me,"

The boy flinched back like he had just been hit as the girl's Milotic moved in, shifting so that it's antenna-hair moved onto the girl's hand.

"Look at this vibrant color," She said as she stroked the antenna. "It's almost like they were made from the finest rubies, don't you think,"

The boy's Milotic rolled its eyes a bit as it moved its own antenna back to be a bit out of sight. The crowd was just as confused as when they had started, and a few of them were even walking away from the pair.

The two Milotic trainers kept going on like that for a while, ignoring the dwindling crowd as they compared their Milotic's on every possible factor, and even a few that I had thought impossible.

I never would have guessed that the interior curve of the red spots on a Milotic's tail fan were something worth comparing, but apparently I was wrong.

"Alright, I think that does it for all the standard categories," The girl said as she looked around, her smile fading as she did so. "Where did everybody go?

By the end of the whole thing, there were only a few scattered people left watching the thing.

"I have no clue," The boy told her as his eyebrows narrowed. "Something else must have caught their attention. Must have been quite the sight if it could have distracted from a match between our lovelies," He explained as he scratched his Milotic under its chin.

"Such a shame…" She said with a sigh. "Oh well, so, how much did I beat you by?"

"Excuse me?" The blond kid asked, clearly confused. "I thought, you were keeping track of the score,"

"No I thought… neither of us decided on a scorekeeper before we started," The girl realized before letting out another sigh.

"It's too bad," The boy said sounding bummed out about the whole thing. "Walking into the meeting with a win under my belt would have been nice,"

"Look on the bright side, think of it as a warm-up for the real trails to come," The girl said before she leaned forward and whispered something into his ear. The boy's eye immediately went wide, his mouth agape.

"You mean he's coming this year?" He tried to whisper. Tried being the keyword here, his excitement raising his volume enough that I could hear every word. "Why would he come see us, I thought he couldn't stand us,"

"Not too loud," the girl said as she looked over the few people that were still standing around this deck. "I'll tell you more about it when we reach shore,"

With that the pair both left, heading into the lower decks as a pair, any hostility they had been showing earlier nowhere to be seen.

"Wonder what that was all about?" I asked aloud as we all took our seats again.

"Maybe it has something to do with the contest?" Laura asked a question that would have made sense if you knew nothing about contests.

"No chance," I told her with a nod as I began to give her the explanation that I had been practicing or years in case I ever met someone from another region. "Personal appearance is a factor in contests, but despite what people in other regions, might say, it's not everything. Trainer-pokémon coordination and style are both weighed more in the first round, and personal appearance doesn't factor in at all in the rounds after that. Plus the judges make their observations from a desk, way too far away to notice anything that those two were comparing,"

"And so the mystery deepens," Laura said as she looked over the water and off into the distance.

"Knowing our luck, we'll end up finding out exactly what was up with those two by the time we leave Fallarbor," Brook both told me and chirped aloud as she sat the edge of the table, her legs dangling back and forth. "Probably before, during, or after events that could be called 'shenanigans'. And hey, if we get really lucky, I'll even be able to get a battle out of it,"

Brook smirked and punched her fist into her hand as both Vimilky and Khesen gave me matching stares. I looked at them

"You're still on probation," I added as Brook froze in place. Khesen and Vimilky both took a careful step back as Brook slowly turned her head towards me.

"What?"

"You're still on probation for a little while longer," I told her again. "Once we get out of Fallarbor, you're back on the frontline,"

"But you let me battle those Neo-Aqua kids. Why didn't that count?"

"Because that was an emergency were I needed to shut down two criminals as quickly as possible," I explained as Khesen and Vimilky both nodded along with me. "Not picking you would have been dumb and could have led to some very bad things. If we get into a normal battle, then the probation is still on,"

Brook glanced at Khesen, then at Vimilky, and then back at me. She blinked twice and smiled sweetly at me.

"So what you're saying is that all I need to get a battle is to run into a bunch of criminals,"

I let out a sigh as I grabbed Brook's pokéball and recalled the grinning Kirlia.


"I think I made a good point," I said to myself as I laid back on a hammock that I created inside my pokéball. "I mean, with our luck, is it really that crazy to think that we'll run into trouble?"

We had made it off the boat and were currently headed to the local pokécenter where Brenden was apparently waiting for us.

And by us, I meant Nikki, Khesen, milk and I. Laura and her pokémon had split off from us to go visit her mother. Nikki had offered to go visit as well, but Laura's mother 'didn't like strangers', whatever that meant. She was going to meet up with us for the contest which was later today, but until then we were on our own.

I glanced at the outside of the pokéball as Nikki walked through the town. It was pretty small, with wide streets and small buildings everywhere. There were a few taller buildings off in the distance in what I was pretty sure was the center of the town. But aside from everything else, the biggest thing I noticed was that almost everything was entirely covered in a small layer of volcanic ash.

I mean, it made sense, the town was downwind of a volcano. But you would think that they would at least try to clean it up a bit.

Or maybe this was what the town looked like cleaned up, in which case, yikes.

Glad my trainer's not native to this place. I'm having trouble breathing and I'm still in my pokéball.

We arrived at the pokécenter a little while later. It was in the town center with only tall buildings in town. Funnily enough, the ash-covered center was bigger then most of the buildings we had passed by on the way here, but still smaller than everything around it.

"Hello there, I'm here for a meeting in room 413," Nikki told the nurse at the front, following the instructions that Brendan had given him earlier.

"I.D please," The Nurse asked as Nikki handed it over without a word. She looked through it for a bit before handing it back to Nikki with a professional smile on her face. "Thank you. Room 413 will be on the right when you exit the elevator. Would you like to leave with your pokémon with us to recover?"

Nikki glanced down at me. Well, he was looking down at the pokéballs on his chest, but it felt like he was looking at me.

"Maybe in a bit," He finally said. "They're all in good shape, and I have a feeling that part of my meeting is going to involve them anyway,"

"I understand," The nurse said before Nikki bid her goodbye and walked into the elevator. There was a bit of an oddity to Nikki's walk, like his foot was aching. His face was wincing in pain and I could see a bit of sweat going down his brow. I waited a bit until we started moving up and then emerged from my pokéball.

"You alright?" I asked Nikki as I leaned my back on the elevator wall. "You look nervous,"

"I am nervous," He admitted as he let out a breath. "This is the first time I'm meeting Brendan since setting out as a trainer. And he was the one who wanted to talk to me. I'm trying to think of what he could possible want from me, but I can't think of anything,"

"I'm sure you'll do fine," I told him as the elevator came to a stop and the doors opened. Another thought struck me as we walked out onto the carpeted floor. "By the way, did you ever tell Brendan about what happened with Flannery?"

"No, I didn't tell him," Nikki said as I let out a sigh of relief. No worrying about getting scolded by warmth. "But if it comes up I will tell him that you're on probation until we get out of the city,"

So all I needed to do was to make sure that the topic of battling didn't come up. Should be easy…

"Here we are, room 413," Nikki said as he took a deep breath and knocked on the door.

I put my hands together and swayed back and forth as we waited for a response.

"Come in,"

And there it was.

Nikki gulped as he grabbed the door handle and pushed it open.

It was a pretty standard pokécenter room, with brown walls and a green carpet covering the floor. Unlike the rooms we normally got, there was only one bed though. Made sense considering that Brenden traveled alone.

Brendan himself was sitting at the edge of said bed, smiling at us as he got to his feet.

"Nikki, it's good to see you," He said as he walked over and patted Nikki on the back. "I'm so glad you managed to get here before the contest. And Brook, look at you, you've already evolved,"

He put his hand down on my head and ruffled my hair a bit. A chirped in annoyance as I tried to keep him away from my head with my arms.

Anyone who would later say that I laughed while doing so was a filthy liar and that was the story I was sticking with.

"Good to see you too Brendan," Nikki greeted back. How are things going?"

Brendan deflated a bit as he retracted his hand away from my head. "Not too well, to be honest, but a maybe a little better now that you're here,"

"You know you can count on me," Nikki said with a weak chuckle. "But, um… what exactly did you need me to do?"

Brendan smile washed away as he let out a frustrated sigh. "Can't believe that I have to do this," He mumbled as he walked over to the desk that came with the room and grabbed what looked like a flyer. "Read this,"

Brendan handed the flyer over to Nikki as I jumped onto his shoulder to get a better look.

On the flyer was a bunch of text that I couldn't read, plus some artist drawings of a certain pokémon that I had just seen earlier today.

"The Milotic club?" Nikki asked aloud as he tilted his head to the side in confusion. "What is this?"

"It's what it sounds like, a 'club' made up of people who have Milotics. In order to get in, you need a Milotic in high condition, but the more famous you are, the more they're willing to skirt the rules," Brendan explained. "And if you get famous enough they just add you to the list without asking,"

Well now I guess I knew what was up with those two kids on the boat. Should have made a bet with one of the others, I would have gotten something out of it.

"You're a member?" Nikki asked as he glanced down at the paper again. I looked at Brendan and tried to imagine him next to those snooty kids from earlier today.

Out of place didn't even begin to describe it.

"Like I implied, I was added to the members list without being asked. Wallace has the same story actually," Brendan said as he crossed his arms. "Unlike me, he actually attends some of the meetings from time to time to make sure they stay a bunch of eccentric but harmless pokéfans and don't become something more dangerous,"

"What could they even do?" I asked which caught Nikki's eye.

"Brook just asked what they could do," Nikki told Brendan who raised his eyebrow.

"You can…? Oh right, Uncle mentioned something about you learning how to talk to Brook psychically," He said as he smiled and placed his hands on his hips. "Remind me to ask you about that later,"

"Sure thing, so you about the club?" Nikki said, keeping the conversation focused.

"Oh right, well the thing is that Feebas are rare, really rare and they're also kind of hard to raise into Milotics if you don't know what you're doing," Brendan explained as he took out a pokéball and placed it onto the desk. "So because of that, they're a pretty rare sight on an average trainer's team. So trainers with Milotics tend to come in two types. Experienced trainers like me or Wallace…"

"Or people with the money to acquire a Milotic as a pet pokémon," Nikki finished for him.

"How'd you guess?" Brendan said with a laugh as he scratched the back of his head.

"Had a bit of an encounter on the boat on the way here," Nikki explained. "Two rick kids that compared their Milotics,"

"Yeah, a sizable majority of Milotic club members could be described as 'rich'. With all that money comes power, and with power comes trouble," Brendan sighed as he scrunched up his eyes. "Power to do some pretty stupid things,"

"Like what?" Nikki asked as I tried to think of something stupid enough to warrant this conversation.

"Like trying to become an official group with the authority to decide who gets a Milotic and who doesn't," Brendan explained As Nikki's jaw dropped. The older trainer stepped back and gave Nikki a chance to recover.

I glanced over at Nikki's still open mouth and carefully reached over to his chin and gently pushed it up to close it.

"That's…" Nikki started, ruining my good work closing his mouth for him. "That's stupid, that's so stupid. How would they even get away with that?"

"They won't," Brendan put in plainly. "And hopefully they won't try. Which brings us to why I contacted you,"

Brendan walked over to his bag and emerged a little while later with a blue and beige egg inside of an incubator.

It was so weird to look at. I'd never seen a pokémon egg before, and I sure wasn't expecting to see one today.

"Is that?" Nikki asked as Brendan set the egg down on the table and we all huddled around it.

"It is," Brendan confirmed despite not actually knowing what Nikki was about to say. "It's a Feebas egg, specifically one from my own Milotic,"

"Let me guess," Nikki said as he kept his eyes on the egg. "The Milotic club has opinions on what to do with the super rare Feebas egg that came from a champion pokémon?"

"Yeah 'opinions' is right. Apparently some of the crazies in the club have been talking about convincing me to auction off the egg to one of the other members,"

"Is that even legal? As someone new to human society that feels very not legal," I asked as I tried to imagine my mother auctioning me off and bad example never mind.

"It's just barely legal, and only if both me and the purchaser hop through a thousand hoops to make it legal," Brendan explained after Nikki translated my question for him. "Not that it matters, because they'd never get my permission in the first place,"

"So what do you need me to do?" Nikki asked as he glanced back at the egg.

"Someone's who's not a licensed breeder selling an egg to someone who you have no connection to is skirting the edge of illegal. A trainer giving a pokémon egg to a family member is a time-honored tradition that can be done in five minutes,"

Nikki and I both turned towards the egg and processed what Brendan was saying.

"I can't keep the egg, if I did then the Milotic Club would just keep pressuring me to put it up for auction. Giving you the egg would be the strongest way to tell the crazies in the Milotic club that they don't hold any authority over me,"

"Why me? You said that you only needed a family member to take the egg. Why does it have to be me?" Nikki asked softly as he touched the egg's case.

"Milotic has… opinions on what exactly would be best for her son," Brendan explained as he glanced at the pokéball on the desk. "She wants to see him become a strong battler like her, and that won't happen if I hand him over to Ali or your parents,"

"I still only have two badges," Nikki said with a gulp. "Are you really sure that giving such a rare egg to such an inexperienced trainer is the best idea?"

"Giving an unexperienced trainer a rare pokémon like this does sound like a bad idea," He said as he put his hand on top of the egg's case. "But I'm not doing that. I'm entrusting the child of one of my precious pokémon to one of the people who I trust more than anyone else in the world, my cousin Nicholas Maple,"

Nikki glanced back at the egg and then back at Brendan.

"Is it alright if I thought it over a bit?" He asked as he glanced back at the door. "I have to go sign in and get my own room so…"

"Don't worry about it, think it over if you have too. I know that I'm asking you to do something big for me," Brendan said as he nervously looked off to the side. "But… just try to make up your mind soon. The Milotic club meeting is right after the contest and I need to show up to that with the egg already given away for the plan to work,"


I sat down on my own bed as Brook stood on the desk. I had called Laura on the way back down to see if I needed to get a room for both of us. Apparently she was going to be staying with her Mom while she was in Fallarbor. So for the first time in my trip, I was staying in a single room.

It pretty much looked like Brendan's room.

"So what are you going to do?" Brook asked me she placed her hands on her hips and looked at me. "About the egg I mean. We only have a little while until the contest,"

"I think we should talk it over for a bit first," I told her as I glanced around the room.

It was pretty big for a room meant for one person, in fact it was big enough for me to take out all three of my pokémon and still have a bit of room left over. A fact that was about to become relevant.

I unclipped both of my remaining pokéballs

"Vimilky, Khesen, Come on out," I said as I released both of them into the room. Vimilky appeared on the desk next to Brook while Khesen stood on the floor next to me. Vimilky sat herself down so that her legs dangled over the side of the desk while Khesen crossed his arms and leaned with his back to the wall. "So I assume that the two of you overheard what Brendan and I were talking about. Any thoughts?"

Vimilky went first, saying something pretty short to Brook who then turns towards me.

"Milk says that she doesn't like this whole thing, but that we should still take the egg," Brook explained.

"She doesn't like the plan but still thinks we should do it?" I asked, trying to make sense of that. Vimilky talked to Brook for some more before they both turned to me.

"This whole thing with the club feels like bad news that we should stay away from, but that's also why she would feel bad leaving the egg behind,"

Then Khesen started saying something from his spot on the wall. Brook frowned a bit and tilted her head before saying something back.

They had a quick back and forth, with Vimilky chiming in from time to time. It didn't sound heated, but it sound serious. Khesen glared a bit at Brook and said one last thing before Brook turned to me.

"What was that all about?" I asked as Brook swayed from side to side.

"Well Khesen's kind of neutral on the whole thing. He'll go with whatever the rest of us decide to do. Other than that, he's mostly just worried about how exactly we'll take care of a newborn pokémon,"

"Yeah, but newborn pokémon, especially fish-like water types are pretty independent from when they hatch," I said as I glanced over at Khesen who shuffled his feet a bit and turned his eyes away from mine.

"Yeah, we told him that, but he's still not sure,"

Brook explained. "As for me… Well I think we should take the egg,"

I turned back to Brook who took a deep breath.

"Here's the thing, if this Egg has to go somewhere, then we are far from the worst kind of people he can end up with," She explained as she started speaking aloud and psychically at the same time. "But if those crazy people that Brendan told us about get their way, who knows where that Egg will end up,"

"You have a point there Brook," I told her as I looked at all three of my pokémon. I had two yes's and a neutral. No one really opposed me taking the Egg.

"Of course I have a point," She said as she closed her eyes and gave a proud huff. The smile on her face got a bit gentler before she opened her eyes. "But we still haven't heard from the most important person in this room yet,"

"And who would that be?' I asked despite knowing full well that the answer was going to be.

"Well you of course. Do you want to take the Egg in the first place?" She asked as both Brook and Khesen turned towards me and watched me carefully.

"I… I don't know," I admitted as I sat laid down on the bed and looked at the ceiling. "Whenever I try to think about taking the Egg, it feels like my brain starts arguing with itself. All the reasons for and against just start going at it,"

"Well, maybe saying the reasons aloud will help you out?" Brook suggested. I blinked a bit as my fingers tapped on the bed.

"Well let's get the easy practical stuff out of the way first, the stuff unrelated to the Egg" I said as I organized my thoughts. "Milotics are strong pokémon, and even I have to admit that I dreamed about having one on my team since I was a kid. Hat aside, I can't think of anything that could fit on the team better than a water type. But at the same time, I've heard that Feebas are tricky to raise," I finished as my hands twitched. I had gotten the easy part out of the way, now all that was left was the personal stuff.

"Brendan asked me to this for him. He's counting on me to this," I said as I felt like garbage for saying this next part. "But one of the reasons I set out on this journey in the first place was to make my own way. To get out of Brendan's and Uncle Norman's shadow. Getting a rare pokémon from Brendan that he's famous for using feels like the exact opposite of both of those things,"

No one said anything as I got off from the bed.

"Wow, that sounds even worse when I said it aloud," I told Brook. "Maybe I should take the Egg,"

"As much as I want you to take the egg, maybe you should think about it a little while longer. We still have a bit of time before we have to choose anyway," Brook said as she pointed toward the door. "Why don't you take a walk before you make your choice… maybe grab an early lunch while you're at it?"

All three of us turned towards Brook and gave her the same look as she looked off to the side and whistled for a bit.

"I mean… You're not wrong," I told her as I grabbed the pokéballs and recalled everyone.

I took the elevator down to the cafeteria and found some food that looked pretty good to me, as well as some food for my pokémon. I bought what I needed and sat down at a table as I handed the food out to my team who sat next to me.

As I ate into the bread roll in front of me, I thought back to what I had said in the room. It was a little weird now that I thought about it. Taking the rare pokémon egg that fitted perfectly into my team was somehow the selfish option.

Not the ordeal I would have expected to deal with when I woke up this morning.

"So what do you have in mind for the club meeting?" I raised my eyebrow as I heard someone say from the table behind me. I grabbed my pokénav and fired up the front-facing camera and angled it so that it saw past me.

At the table was a blond kid around my age wearing some fancy red clothing. He was leaning back on his chair and had both of his arms crossed. Surrounding him were a small group of kids that had similarly nice looking clothes. Not as nice as the blond kid though.

"My Father says he's been wearing Brendan down. He's sure that the offer he'll make today will be enough to convince him to give the egg up for auction. Once that happens, that Feebas is all mine,"

So this is the kid who would get the Egg if I didn't. Based on the way that all three of my pokémon had stopped eating, they were listening in too.

"So what are you going to do with the thing?" One of the kids asked. "I mean, Milotics are pretty cool but you can't do much with just a Feebas,"

"My father reassures me that he has ways to evolve a Feebas nice and early," The kid said smugly. "I won't have to deal with the ugly little fish for too long,"

I rolled my eyes as I took a deep breath. I hadn't even talked directly yet but I already couldn't stand him. Just listening to him talk made the decision with the egg so much easier to make.

"How does Feebas evolve anyway?" One of the other kids asked. "I heard that it was pretty tricky,"

"Well there are two ways," The kid in red explained. "Either it 'comes into its true beauty', whatever that means, or you can just do the sensible thing and use a prism scale,"

And just like that I was opening up the chat function on my pokénav and sending a message to Brendan. I told him my room number and to meet me there in five minutes with the Egg.

Using an item like a prism scale to evolve a pokémon was always a little hard on the pokémon since it wasn't a fully natural evolution. To use one on a newly hatched pokémon was unthinkable… unless you were this kid in red anyway.

My pokémon and I finished up our food and headed back up soon after that. We didn't have to wait for too long until Brendan walked in with the Egg.

"So you made your choice then?" Brendan asked as he walked in with a bag in his arms.

"I overheard the son of one of your potential buyers while I was getting lunch," I explained. "After hearing him talk, I knew that I couldn't let him get his hands on the Egg,"

"Yeah, that would do it," He said as he set the bag down and removed the Egg's incubator from it. "Okay, so now you get a crash course on taking care of a pokémon Egg,"


Both Milk and I listened in on the explanation on Egg care from the comfort of our pokéballs. It was pretty interesting to hear, and I figured that Nikki would appreciate having two more pairs of hands helping with the Egg.

"Are you sure that this was the right choice?" Milk asked as Brendan finished his explanation. We were in the common room, sitting around the center. She was slumped forward, her elbows on her knees and her chin settled on her hands.

"A little too late for that don't you think?" I told her. "All we can do now is roll with the punches and make the best of it. We have one more pokémon on the team to watch out for now,"

"I guess," She said as she leaned back and caught herself with her other jaw. She let out a sigh and closed her eyes. "Chancing the subject… what exactly are the humans going to?"

"I think it's called a 'contest'. From the little I understand, it's like a competition where human trainers show off their pokémon," I told her as she opened her eyes and turned her head towards me.

"Isn't that just a battle?" She asked as I tried to figure out why she was wrong.

I couldn't think of anything.

"Maybe it'll make more sense when we go and see it?" I offered as I settled in for the trip to the contest hall. I noticed that we were walking towards the less developed part of the town. The buildings around us were slowly getting smaller until everything around us was a single floored building.

So with everything around us so low, the large almost stadium-like building was pretty easy to spot.

"I guess that's the contest hall," I said as Nikki and Brendan approached the hall, Nikki wearing a modified backpack meant to keep the Egg safe.

I didn't like it. I mean I got the idea behind it, transporting the egg safely was important. But did it have to be in such a noticeable way? If the crazies of the Milotic club were as crazy as the name implied, then I could imagine them taking offense to us having the egg. Offence that might lead to a fight.

And there was no way Nikki was getting himself into a fight while I was still on probation. They might be my friends, but there was no way I was letting Milk and Khesen have all the fun.

"So anyone big entering the contest?" Nikki asked Brendan.

"Oh there's a few big names attending this one," The older human responded "James the Crimson, Alice the Lost, 77-bolt Zeni, and those are just the really big ones,"

"Wow those are some big names," Nikki said as his eyes winded. "What about Serpent King Juzi? Is he in?"

"Right I forgot you were a big Juzi fan. I only skimmed the listing for the names I knew. He might be in, but I'm not sure,"

I leaned forward inside the common room and warped my arms around my knees.

"Hey Milk," I said.

"Yeah Brook?" She responded back as she dangled her legs back and forth.

"Do you have any idea about what they're talking about?" I asked the Mawile.

"Not a clue," She answered back as the humans kept talking without really saying anything.

I shook my head at the bizarre ways of humans when I noticed that they had both stopped walking. I glanced over and saw a well-dressed human standing in front of them.

"Brendan," The man greeted cheerfully. "How wonderful to see you before the meeting later today,"

"Mr. Irving," Brendan forced a smile as he walked over and shook the man's hand. "What can I do for you?"

"Well, I wanted to speak to you about a certain matter before the…" Mr. Irving trailed off as he noticed Nikki and the big notable egg carrier on his back. "And who is this,"

Brendan took a step behind Nikki and held him by the shoulders.

"Oh this is my cousin, Nicholas Maple," He said, a genuine smile coming to his face as he said the word 'cousin'.

"I see," Mr. Irving growled as he closed his eyes and took a breath. "I must apologize, I just remembered that I have a bit of business to take care of before the club meeting. I guess I'll be missing the first round of the contest,"

The man walked away while grumbling something under his breath.

"Was he one of the…" Nikki said before trailing off.

"The crazies that want to turn the Milotic club into some sort of pseudo-political organization that gets to decide who 'deserves' a Milotic?" Brendan finished for him. "Well he's not just one of them, he's pretty much the ring leader,"

"He's somehow both exactly and nothing like what I was expecting," Nikki said before refusing to elaborate. "You think I should duck out of the contest and head out of town now?"

"Well…" Brendan said as he rubbed his chin. "I don't think Irving will do anything too crazy, so you should be good,"

"Okay then, let's get to our seats," Nikki said as they headed into the contest hall.


I walked out of the contest hall with a chip on my shoulder.

"I can't believe Juzi failed to rank," I moaned as Brendan tried to pat my shoulder. I glanced down at the resting arm and batted it away. "Don't you dare pity me when you're favorite took the top spot,"

"What can I say," Brendan said with a smirk. "Always bet on Alice,"

"Yeah, yeah, now go head to your club," I told him as I shooed him away with my hand. He just laughed and started walking away.

"This is not how I expected today to go," I muttered to myself as I shifted my shoulder, feeling the weight of the egg on my back. "Now to find Laura,"

"No need, I'm already here,"

I almost jumped as Laura suddenly jumped out from behind me.

"Nikki, good to see you," She said as she tilted her head to the side.

"What is that," She asked as she pointed at the large, noticeable, egg carrier on my bag. I glanced back and shifted my eyes from side to side as I weighed my options.

Most of the Milotic club was probably already heading to the club, but I didn't know who was in it. For all I knew, a member of the crazies was standing right behind me. Dealing with one of them while Brendan was right next to me, easy.

Dealing with another member now that I was on my own? Didn't sound like the best idea to me.

"I'll tell you about it later," I told Laura as I started walking towards the exit. "In the meantime, how's your mom?"

"Oh she's good, really looking forward to seeing me again. Still won't leave the house a lot, but that's pretty normal for her," She explained as we walked out into the streets of Fallarbor town. "She was also a little mad that I went to Lavaridge and I didn't get her any sort of souvenir,"

"Good thing we're passing through there again," I said as I glanced down at my pokéballs. I had a rough working strategy for my rematch with Flannery, but nothing that I would be willing to bet on.

"Speaking of, how much longer are we staying in Fallarbor?" She asked as I stopped in place. Part of me wanted to get out of town as quickly as possible to avoid dealing with the Milotic club. But it was already pretty late, and after everything that happened with the motel, I was looking forward to spending the night in a proper room.

"I'm not sure," I finally admitted as I looked around and noticed that the streets had gotten a bit less crowded. "I want to stay the night…"

"Great, my Mom wanted me to stay the night," She cut me off before I could say 'but'. I opened my mouth to correct her when I noticed her beaming smile. I closed my mouth and let out a sigh.

"Yeah, I guess we'll meet up tomorrow morning in the pokécenter's lobby?" I offered as I remembered that I had just met up with my own family a little while ago.

"Sound's great," She said as she lightly punched my shoulder and started walking away with a skip in her step.

As soon as Laura was out of sight, one of the pokéballs opened by itself as Brook stood next to me. She pouted at me with her arms crossed.

"Don't you think that maybe not telling Laura about everything with the Milotic club might be a bad idea?" She argued. "I mean, we're calling the group we're up against 'the crazies'. Wouldn't it be better if she knew what was going on in case they come after her?"

"They're 'the crazies' because they want an insane amount of power, not because they're violent," I explained. "Plus did you see how happy she was to spend some more time with her mom? Laura will be just fine,"

Brook shrugged at me. "If you say so, but I still want to be on the record as thinking that this was the wrong call," She messaged me as she started walking away.

"Hey, where are you going?" I asked as I started following after her.

"I'm heading back to the pokécenter before we run into any trouble that I'm not allowed to fight," She explained as she glared at the two other pokéballs on my chest. "If I don't get to fight, then no one does,"

"I think you may have your priorities mixed up a bit," I told her as I noticed that we were no longer taking the route Brendan and I had taken to get to the contest hall. We had made it there by taking a single large, albeit winding road that led out from the crowded downtown into the more open are in the north.

Brook was instead walking straight south right into the most crowded section of downtown.

"Are you sure you know the way?" I asked as the leading Kirlia giggled before turning back at me and giving me a smug grin.

"I figured that I would save us some time and take the shortest route to the pokécenter," She explained as she kept walking forward towards a narrow alley. "Still don't know why you and Brendan too such a long way around,"

"Because taking the long way around put us in the safest part of the town?" I explained as I glanced around at the quickly growing buildings that were starting to tower around us. "And taking a straight line takes us through a part of town that Brendan wanted to avoid for some reason," I pointed out as we both emerged from the alley and into a pretty nice looking part of the town.

The streets were clean and on either side of the road were two-story townhouses that were freshly painted and looked to be in good condition, a far cry from the taller buildings that surrounded this little neighborhood on all sides. To my left was a small park that had an even small arena and a tennis court.

The only thing off about this whole place was the ever falling ash that was still falling all around us. Then again we had been dealing with that ever since we arrived to the town in the first place.

"Ash aside, this place looks pretty nice," Brook said as we both looked around. "I wonder why Brendan wanted to avoid it."

"Let's try not to worry about it and just keep going," I said as I kept walking with the full intent of making it to the pokécenter before nightfall.

"Hello there, excuse me,"

I let out a pained sigh as I heard a voice that I had only heard once before. It was earlier today, while we were eating at the pokécenter.

I slowly turned around and saw the boy in red standing down the street from me. He was under an umbrella that was being held up by an older man in a suit. Now that I could get a good look at him, the familial resemblance to Mister Irving was uncanny. He looked just like the man but younger and a little thinner.

"Hello there, your name wouldn't happen to be Nicholas Maple, would it?" He asked with a flourish even though I had a feeling he already knew the answer.

"Yes, yes it would. And you are…?" I said, trying to stay polite despite knowing what kind of person this guy was.

"I apologize for my rudeness," He said as he placed his hand on his chest. "My name is Lawrence Irving. I've been looking for you for some time now,"

"I see," I told him as I choose my words carefully. "So, what do you want with me?"

"Come now, let's not play games, we both know why I'm standing here before you," He said before pointing right at me. "I'm here to make my offer for that egg,"

I was about to ask him 'what egg' but figured that it would be a waste of time. This called for a more direct approach.

"The Egg's staying with me," I told him as I spread my legs out a bit ad Brook rushed out in front of me and spread her arms out.

"Come now, are you really going to stand there and claim that you have no price?" He argued as a woman in a suit appeared carrying a briefcase. With a single snap of his fingers, the woman opened the case and showed me what was inside.

That was… a lot of money. Almost what I would call an obscene amount of money.

I mean there was no amount of cash that Lawrence could show me that would make me give up the egg, but I was a little impressed with how much he was willing to put on the table.

"As much cash as that is, I'm not giving up this Egg," I told him as I stood my ground.

"I see, based on your reaction I'm guessing that there is no offer that I can make that you'll take?" I shook my head at Lawrence's' question. "No rare pokémon, no impressive items, not priceless relics? Fine then. I'll give you one last chance. Give me the Egg or you might find yourself dealing with some… unpleasantness,"

"Are you threatening me?" I growled, absolutely done with this guy. "Sorry, but that's not going to work either,"

"Fine then," He said as he pretended to wipe a tear off his face. It might have worked if he didn't have the ugliest grin on his face. "I wanted to do this the clean way… but you leave me no choice,"

He lifted his arm up into the air as I tensed up.

He snapped his finger again and I tensed up as I watched both of the suited flunkies. I felt a little confused when neither of them moved a muscle, only for me to hear a slight buzzing sound from my right.

I turned towards the alley, eyes wide, as a Beedrill launched itself from the shadows. It came right at me, its stinger raised and ready to stab me.

I gulped, trying to jump out of the way as a bright flash of light emerged from one of the pokéballs on my chest.

The Bedrill stopped in midflight as Khesen emerged right in front of me and grabbed its stinger that was inches away from my neck.

The insect pokémon buzzed in annoyance as it raised its other stinger, ready to attack Khesen. The Breloom just scowled before quickly punching the bee in the face before it could react.

"Did you just order your pokémon to attack me?" I demanded as I walked past forward Brook and Khesen threw the Beedrill back at Lawrence. The rich boy glanced down at the fallen pokémon with an ugly sneer.

"Useless little bug," He scoffed before looking back up at me. "If you must know, Bedrill was merely going to prick you with some mild paralytics,"

"How is that any better?" I demanded as I reached for Vimilky's pokéball in case I needed all three of my pokémon.

"I hoped that paralyzing you would allow me to take the egg without a fight," He explained like he didn't see anything wrong with that he was saying. "By the time you would have recovered I would have been long gone from here,"

"And you think the rest of my pokémon would be okay with you just taking the newest member of the team?" I asked as Khesen growled at Lawrence.

"What would they have done? With you paralyzed, you wouldn't have been able to issue any commands to them. And without you around to command them, what would you're pokémon do?"

"When exactly did I command Khesen to block Beedrill's attack?" I demanded as Lawrence blinked and looked down at the downed pokémon at his feet and then at Khesen who was in a boxing pose.

"Yes, how did you do that exactly? My pokémon would never come to my defense like that if I didn't order them to do so," He scoffed. "You must have given them special training right?"

"Have you ever considered that you're just a horrible trainer?" I pointed out as Khesen nodded. "Right Brook?" I asked before turning to the Kirlia who had been eerily silent until now.

A single glance would be all I needed to know why she hadn't said anything.

"Brook?" I asked as the Kirlia in question stood dead still, her eyes glowing red and crackling with lightning. The ash around her was no longer falling down, but moving around her in a swirling vortex. Her hands were tightened into fists that were also covered in swirling red psychic energy.

"You hurt my trainer…" I heard in my mind. Based on the way that Lawrence gasped and the way the two suits were baking away, I guessed that they had heard it too.

"Brook, are you okay?" I asked as I held my arms forward in a claiming motion.

"You tried to hurt my trainer!" She yelled as she pointed her arms downwards and launched herself right at Lawrence in an explosion of psychic force.


I growled as the two other humans got in my way. I raised my arms up and opened fire on both of them, blasting them out of the way. The path to my target was wide open.

I landed on the human's chest, knocking him to the ground. I grabbed the collar of his shirt and pulled it up towards me, my other hand bursting with enough power to blast his head clean off.

"Brook!" I heard Nikki call, probably encouraging me to finish the job. I smiled at the soon to be dead Human and pulled my free hand back. I think I heard Nikki say something else after that, but I wasn't really paying attention.

I let loose a blast of psychic energy… only for something to grab my arm and point it skywards. I looked up and watched as my blast of red psychic energy flew off into the distance.

I glanced back and saw Khesen holding my arm back, a frown on his face.

"Brook calm down," He said as I glanced down at the terrified human in front of me, and then at my hand.

I blinked as the red psychic energy dissipated and I thought about what had just happened.

I was going to… I was about to… I had wanted to…

"I think I'm going to be sick," I mumbled as I let go of the human's shirt and slowly backed away from him. I quickly glanced around and spotted a useful bush.

I rushed over to it and I would rather not think about what happened next.

"Brook, are you okay?" Nikki said as he walked over to me and placed his hand on my head.

I glanced up at him before trying to wipe away… that… from my chin.

"I think," I chirped before remembering. "I think I want to go back inside my pokéball,"

"Okay," He said softly before taking my ball and recalling me.

I glanced around the ball before willing a warm bath to appear.


"Okay so just to make this clear," I said as I put Brook's ball away. "Over the course of the last few minutes, you've tried to illegally bribe me, threaten me, have you're pokémon attack me, and traumatized my starter by doing so," I explained carefully as Lawrence got to his feet. His immaculate clothing was roughed up, and he was covered in soot. He opened his mouth like he was about to say something but fell silent as soon as we locked eyes. "Anything else you would like to add to the list while you're at it?"

He gaped for a bit before turning away from me. As he did, both of his suited thugs got to their feet.

"How dare you threaten the son of Mr. Irving," The suited guy said as he took out a pokéball.

"You'll pay for this," The suited girl said as she did the same. They both tossed out pokéballs, a pair of Machop's coming out of them.

"You really still want to do this?" I said as I sent Vimilky out next to Khesen.

The Mawile glared at both pokémon as Khesen flexed and got ready for a fight.

"Enough," We all stopped as Lawrence walked up to his two suited goons. And placed a hand on each of their shoulders. He still looked a little worse for wear, but had apparently recovered from Brook's rough treatment. "I think this is enough for today,"

"But Master Lawrence," The girl said only for Lawrence to hold his palm up. The girl immediately stopped.

"You have been foolish to challenge me Nicholas Maple," He said with a flourish like he hadn't just tried to assault me with his pokémon. "But I think we should stop today's… excitement now before things get worse,"

"What world do you live in?" I asked as I tried to understand what my ears were saying.

"Understand this, that future Milotic will be mine," He said as he raised his fist into the sky. "One way or another, it will come to me, as all things that I want in this world do,"

He turned around, the suited goon picking up his dropped umbrella while the other suited goon picked up the briefcase she had dropped when Brook had blasted her.

Without a word, all three of them ran off, the first suited goon trying to keep the umbrella under Lawrence.

"Well," I said as I recalled both Khesen and Vimilky into their pokéballs. "That was a thing,"

I groaned as I looked around and noticed that despite the literal street fight, no one had reacted one bit. Strange… but not strange enough to distract me from something that was way more important.

"Brook," I said as I grabbed her pokéball. I needed to get to the pokémon center to see if she was okay.


I felt the sensation of the healing machine passing over me. Thanks to the healing mod, we didn't get the chance to feel it too often, but I liked it. It was warm, and comforting, and let me relax and not think about… stuff.

After that, I reconfigured the ball to take the form of two trees with a hammock between them. I climbed up and laid down with my arms clasped together over my chest.

I tried to sleep, forcing my eyes closed as whimpering as I shuffled around trying to get comfortable.

It didn't work. I couldn't stop thinking about everything that had happened. My eyes flew open as I let out a sigh. If avoiding it wasn't going to work…

"Might as well think about it," I groaned as I looked straight up at the fake stars overhead and thought about what I had almost done.

Why… why had I done that?

No that was stupid. I knew why. Because Nikki almost got hurt and I hadn't been able to do a thing to stop it. Because after spending all day hoping for a fight, I got one and it almost ended in disaster.

That power…

I unclasped my hands and held them up in front of my face, shivering as I remembered how it felt. The raw power coursing through me, the feeling like I was an unstoppable force of destruction. The sensation of holding someone's life in my hands, their existence being at my mercy. I had liked it.

I didn't like that I liked it.

"Am I a monster?" I wondered aloud as I felt myself getting called out from the pokéball.

Something that I don't think most humans knew was that you could resist the call to exit the pokéball. I had to admit, a part of me wanted to do just that. Stay in this nice little ball and deal with this on my own.

The rest of me thought that part was an idiot and let myself get pulled out of the ball.

"Hey Brook," Nikki said as I materialized on the bed in the same pose I had been on the hammock. "Are… are you okay?"

Was I? Honestly?

"No, I'm not okay," I told him as he sat down next to me. He patted my head as I closed my eyes and tried to relax. "I just felt so… angry, angrier then I've ever felt before,"

"It's not your fault," He lied as he kept his hand on my head. I clutched my hands together again and took a deep breath.

I told him everything, about how good it had felt and how I had lost myself to my rage. How if Khesen hadn't stopped me, I would have done it without any hesitation.

The whole time, Nikki just kept stroking my head. By the time I was done, I was a crying mess.

I couldn't wait until we got out of this town.