Chapter 12: Underground Sewers.
"We've arrived in Castelia City!" Petra said cheerfully, stretching her arms out as the two of them stepped out of the port harbor. "The largest city in Unova, and a busy place at that."
Erick looked up. Granted, he had grown up in Veilstone City, but even then, there were never buildings THIS tall in that city. There had just been the giant galactic HQ and the Gym, with a few apartments here and there. But that was it.
"What's the matter? Meowth got your tongue?" Petra teased, making him scowl with a furrowed brow as Sunny and Ares snickered.
Erick shook his head as he looked up at a building as he and Petra walked past it, taking one of the many streets north.
Game Freak HQ; Planning has begun on Pokemon Diamond and Pearl Remakes, Featuring everything you loved about Sinnoh, such as;
No fire types
Slow battle speed
Lots of necessary HMs
Contests
Honey Trees for that B.S. Munchlax!
And Mindi!
Warning: National Dex will not be making a return. And there definitely won't be more Charizard bias this time...trust us!
"People beg and beg and beg." Erick said. "And then, when they get what they want, they complain, complain, complain."
"That's the fanbase in a nutshell, they don't realize how good something is until it's too late…" Petra replied.
Sunny and Ares walked after their trainers, in discussion with one another.
"I've...I've never been in a place so crowded before." Sunny said. "Whenever Erick went out, I usually stayed at home with his mother."
"Well, he was concerned about losing you I'd imagine." Ares replied, shaking the rims of his mushrooms. "I mean, did you really want to go out with him if his mother sent him to the market or something?"
"No...but then again...I don't think I would've been in any danger. What about you? How was Petra in this similar situation?"
"Oh? She took me just about everywhere she went!" Ares replied. "I've been all around Unova, and even a couple of other regions."
"Ah...I guess that makes sense…she didn't have much else to keep her company did she?"
"No…but that's all good. I kept her company, and she even learned how to battle in case she was ever in danger. Imagine that."
Petra inwardly smiled, it was nice to hear that Sunny was getting used to her. It meant that she was doing a good job getting closer to Erick as well.
"After all." she told herself. "The first step to befriending a hard-to-work-with trainer, is befriending his Pokemon."
"Well, this is the place…" Erick said, coming to a stop in front of a tall building. "Castelia City's Gym, the Leader is Burgh, who specializes in Bug types huh?"
The two walked up to the gym door, only to notice a letter pinned to the front of the building.
To whom it may concern.
If you have arrived for a Gym Battle, I'm sorry, but I can't do that as of now. I have received reports of suspicious activity being done in the back alleys and sewers of Castelia City. I will be taking some time to investigate, trainers help is wanted.
Thank you in advance,
Burgh.
"Well then…" Erick said. "I suppose we can't do this quite yet. Perhaps we should go rest up at the Pokemon Center and do some shopping in that case?"
Petra gave him a look of shock. "You don't want to...I don't know...help?!" she asked.
Erick shrugged. "It's just suspicious activity...and...also...I don't know how happy anyone back at that palace would be if I took you into back alley drug deals or the sewers of a city?!"
Petra raised an eyebrow at him, making the young knight silently groan to himself as his pendant started flashing. Victini's voice started to speak to him.
"I don't think you're necessarily wrong with your ideas." The victory Pokemon squeaked. "It probably is just a troll or nothing too serious. However, there may be Pokemon in danger."
Erick flinched at first, earning a small little snicker from the Pokemon.
"I suppose I never did explain to you that I could talk to you at any time from any place did I?" it asked. "You must still be weak of heart, not that I blame you, of course."
Erick shook his head, "Alright fine," he sighed to Petra. "Let's go investigate in the sewers."
As it turned out, it was much more difficult to locate the sewers entrance than they thought. However, they eventually found an entrance down by the last harbor in the east side of the city.
The second Erick entered, to literally no surprise, Petra let out a groan. The smell was...honestly not as bad as he expected, certainly not nearly as bad as the Virbank Complex's smokehaus power plant that he was concerned about getting second degree smoke cancer from. But Petra wasn't used to some awful smells like he was.
Another thing that he noted was that the princess's hand had clung to his arm, but for good reason, the place was incredibly dark, and the only thing they could really hear was the rushing rapids of the sewage.
Quickly thinking, he took out Terra's Pokeball and released the Espurr. The purple cat landed on the ground, and it let out a small hiss at first.
"Terra, I need you to use your eyes to flash this area for us." Erick said.
"Purr!" Terra's eyes glowed a light blue color as a flash of bright light illuminated around her, giving them a vision, instantly, Erick could see a lot of vandalism and spray paint all over the walls, giving gang signs, profanity and…
"Let's...ignore that one." Petra said, blushing slightly.
The two of them wandered around, passing by Grimers and Zubats that would either flap around them, or trudged past them. Occasionally, a Raticate or two would run by. However, none seemed interested in battling.
However, Terra eventually paused, her eyes glowed, but she tilted her head to the side, confused about something.
"Purr?" she asked.
"What's up?" Erick asked, looking down at her.
"Es Es!" Terra waved her paw around. "Purr Es pu!"
"She says that she senses something coming from behind this wall?" Petra said, looking just about as confused as the Espurr was.
"Hmm…This seems to be a dead end though." Erick said, observing the wall's structure. "I wonder if…" he tapped his fist against it, a loud echo alerted him that the wall was hollow. Quickly, he pushed down the door, and they found themselves in a laboratory.
Inside, there was a man with blonde hair. He had a blue piece of extravagant headwear that wrapped around his head, and his lab coat covered most of his body, however, you could see a cyan blue tie and black pants.
He had a piece of some sort of test tubes and machines that emitted a ping or ding every now and again.
"Let's see…" the man said, observing the results on the machine's screen. "Using a bit of the leftover energy given to me by him, I should be able to power this machine which in turn should…" he spied the two of them in the reflection of the glass.
"Oh, dear me!" the man, clearly taken aback. "How did you?"
"My Espurr sensed you down here." Erick said. "What are you doing here?"
"Ah, well, I was given funding by a confidential name." the man said. "My name is Colress, and I'm helping study perfection. So I've been investigating ancient legends and Pokemon in order to succeed in that goal." his eyes fell on the White Eevee.
"Hmm...a white Eevee huh?" the man said. "Well...anyway, I suppose the Gym leader sent you? I guess working in secret down here must've been causing problems for the workers. Oh well, that's the result of secret agreements."
The machine's ding alerted the man back, Erick watched as a luxury ball popped out, which the man took from the machine, then looked back at the results.
"OH! The operation was a success!" he said, his eyes widened. "First try too…well...I was not expecting that." The man folded up the document and packed up a few of the machines and tubes. He turned to leave and, after a moment, he paused, looking over Petra a bit more carefully. Then he simply shook his head.
"I'm sorry...but I'm terribly busy." the man said. "And...just between us, this never happened."
The two of them watched the scientists go, after he was out of earshot, Petra turned to Erick.
"He seemed...interesting?" she said. "Well...that wraps up that. Let's go to the Pokemon Center so I can take a shower." Erick nodded and the two made their way out of the Sewers.
Colress smirked as he came out from behind a corner. "So...it seems as though I'll be following them for a bit."
Yay! Chapter's done. I don't really have much else to say. I guess writing the Pokemon interactions is always very cute. Although, I would like to deviate away from having them sound very humane...but...oh well.
If you enjoyed this chapter, you can let me know, any thoughts you have is always appreciated.
PKMN Teams:
Erick Heart:
Sunny - Eevee
Nagini - Servine
Slippy - Poliwhirl
Terra - Espurr
Trinity - Toxel
Argon - Aron
Damage - Darumaka
Petra Gropius:
Ares - Shroomish
See you all, next time.