S.R: Well….. It's time.
M.R: Sadly.
PhoenixWyvern: Huh? What's it time for? sneakily unlocking the door
S.R: Oh thank god you didn't ask if it was time to duel. That joke is overused and should be dead.
PhoenixWyvern: I know it is. But seriously. What is it time for?
S.R: watched PhoenixWyvern unlock the door so he just gestures towards it.
Cazzidy: burst through the door Sup! It's time to party!
M.R: What have we done?
S.R: Short answer or long one?
PhoenixWyvern: realizes what's happening YES! OUR TIME HAS COME. NOW TO TAKE OVER!
S.R: Smacks him upside the head Calm down goofball. You ain't taking over that easily. It's just time to bring your OC's into this.
ASH'S POV
It had only been a couple hours since Brock suggested finding the owner of the ditto Mansion to commission a saddle for Gyarados. But we could already see the Mansion off in the distance. As we got closer though we were able to see to figures standing by the front door. Thanks to my dad's training before he vanished I could tell that they were fellow Aura users. Once we were close enough to see them clearly I was surprised to say the least.
One was a very tall and muscular guy. He was wearing a black sleeveless hoodie, with the hood up but a few deep blue tufts of hair were visible. The guy also wore a metal chest piece over top of his hoodie. I wasn't quite sure but it reminded me of some artwork of a legendary Pokemon from Sinnoh. There was a very cool sphere shaped gem that he had as a necklace. It was rainbow colored and held a weird leaf shaped symbol inside. He also had a pair leather gloves that had been dyed silver. Set into the gloves right below the knuckles was a bunch of crystals that were all different colors. For pants he was wearing a pair of jeans similar to me, but his were a much darker blue. What really caught me off guard was when I saw his eyes. They seemed to have a blue glow to them.
His companion was a tall girl. She had very long and dark hair that ran down her back to just above her waist. But it was a familiar if slightly messier look since she had it styled like Cynthia did. The girl had a deep red top that squeezed her figure tightly. She wore a layered red and black skirt that covered her legs down to just below her knees. Like her companion she also had the weird rainbow colored gem on a necklace. But her eyes were a calming gray. As I studied her I noticed that at times I could see her aura pouring out of her causing the girl to have a pink glow.
"Hey there. I suppose you two have come to the ditto Mansion to ask about getting a saddle commissioned to?"
She spoke when Brock and I finally got close enough to talk.
"That's the plan. We need a saddle for my Gyarados."
"Nice. We'll be getting one for my Dragonite."
the guy mentioned after my response.
"So any reason why you're just standing here?"
Brock asked, sliding up to the girl with heart shaped eyes. Pikachu and I rolled our eyes at his attempt to flirt. The guy with the hood on moved to get between Brock and the girl but I motioned for him to wait a moment.
Brock's Zubat left it's Pokeball and used Poison Sting on him, causing it's trainer to collapse to the ground temporarily stunned. The two strangers laughed at that, and I gave a little smile.
"I'm sorry about my friend Brock. Any time we meet a girl that he finds attractive he flirts. Thankfully his Pokemon reign him in before he goes overboard."
"It's fine. I thought it was kinda funny. Anyway I'm Raven and this is my boyfriend Phoenix."
The girl replied as she gestured to herself and the guy.
"I'm Ash. And this guy on my shoulder is Pikachu."
I introduced myself and Pikachu to the two. Raven smiled as she reached out and gave Pikachu a head pat. Phoenix chuckled as he warned Pikachu to beware Raven. According to him she likes to squeeze Pokemon in crushing hugs when she thinks they're cute.
Around this time Brock recovered from Zubat's Poison Sting and stood up. He brushed the dirt off of himself and shook hands with Phoenix.
"Could I get my question from before answered?"
"Oh, yeah. One of the butlers answered the door when we got here. He asked us to wait for a while as their was an incident and some of the more wily and mischievous dittos have gotten loose."
Phoenix answered Brock's question. Since I figured the same thing would happen to Brock and I, I gave a sigh.
"We've been here a while now and I'm starting to think we should go in anyway. Wanna join?"
Phoenix commented.
I held up a finger as I responded.
"Yeah, just give me a moment to contact Professor Oak. I want to switch my team around a bit."
"That's fine."
Moving into the shade from a nearby tree I used my Pokedex to call the Professor and restructure my team.
The six that I've chosen to use as my team for Pokemon battles are Pikachu, Conan, Charmeleon, Gyarados, Ivysaur, and Wartortle. In the three extra slots I have due to being a trainee field researcher I have Scyther and Gengar. Since Artemis and Apollo haven't yet gotten to relax I decided they could take a break and meet my other Pokemon back at Professor Oak's ranch. I sent Golbat back because he wanted to take it easy for a bit as well.
Returning to the others I mentioned I was ready, and we entered the mansion. It was dead silent, which was worrisome so I called out.
"Hello? Anybody there?"
My response was the echo as my voice bounced off the walls. We all shared a look at that. Pikachu hopped down off of my shoulder and started to sniff at the air, before signally to us to follow.
'You find something buddy?'
'Yeah. I can faintly smell something. I'm not sure what though.'
Pikachu and I talked as he lead us towards a hallway.
"Hey, you wouldn't happen to have been using aura to talk with Pikachu right then would you Ash?"
Phoenix asked, a grin on his face. I just nodded more intent on paying attention to my surroundings since I had a weird feeling.
"Raven and I also have aura capabilities. She's more of a healer though. I tend to have an easier time using my aura to mimic Pokemon attacks."
I went to hold my hand up to quiet him, but Phoenix went silent before I could move my hand. I knew this because he shifted to be in front of the group as he let out one of his Pokemon.
"Come on Rey, let's deal with these pests."
With a curious expression on my face I watched the light fade as his Pokemon was revealed. Standing in front of him ready to battle a large group of Ditto melted back into their normal form instead of the decorations they were mimicking. Thanks to having Conan, and studying his evolution line I knew Rey was a Lucario.
"Since we don't want to destroy the place I need you to hold back, but let's use Close Combat."
As he spoke, Phoenix let his aura flow around his hands causing a bright blue glow. With a nod of it's head Rey and Phoenix both dashed into the mob of Ditto. Watching with wide eyes I saw the two take each Ditto out with a simple punch before moving on to the next, mowing through them with minimal effort.
Raven after seeing my look of awe turned to me and started to speak.
"Phoenix is pretty talented thanks to training with Rey all the time."
"Good job girl. Why don't you stay out for a while and stretch. I know you didn't like being in your ball."
Phoenix commented to his Lucario as they joined back up with Raven, Pikachu, Brock and I. Rey just nodded at his words before crouching to say hi to Pikachu.
"That was awesome! I hope I can teach Conan that after he evolves."
I spoke with an excited tone.
"You've got a Riolu?"
Phoenix questioned with an interested look on his face.
Instead of answering him, I grabbed a Pokeball off my belt and let Conan out. The first thing he did after being released was hug my leg happily as he cried out his greeting. But then he looked around, a questioning expression on his face until he saw Rey.
Rey, the moment she saw that Conan was looking at her picked him up and held him close. It was very sweet and caring embrace, that made me think of a mother holding a child.
"I apologize for this but Rey probably isn't going to let the little one go for a while…"
Phoenix said in slightly sad tone. But since I was curious I had to ask why. He explained that Rey had to give away her egg once. Back before she officially joined his team there was an incident and Rey was in bad shape, so to make sure that it survived and didn't get abandoned she gave her egg away.
"If she wants to hold him and play with Conan I don't mind. It probably makes her feel better getting to be the mother she was denied a chance to be."
I told them, a small smile on my face as I watched the two. Luckily in the time that this talk had been going on nothing happened.
"Anyway, I noticed you were kinda tense earlier Ash. I know this is a situation where we need to pay attention, but you can loosen up a bit. With our aura's the three of us can expand our senses out enough to balance it out."
"I never learned that…. My dad only taught me about Aura Bonds, Aura Linking, and Aura Scanning. I was just picking up on how to make Aura Bonds when he left for a mission from the Order of Aura and never came back."
"I see. Well you mentioned that you were planning to get a saddle for your Gyarados earlier right. I guess the reason for that is so you can ride it to Cinnabar Island right?"
"Yeah. Though we're planning to take a detour to the Sea Foam Islands and do some exploring as a way for Ash to train his Pokemon."
Brock spoke up.
"We've been asked to investigate something going on in the Sea Foam Islands. Why don't we travel together for a bit. Phoenix and I can teach you a few more things you can do with aura."
Raven commented, offering to teach me a few more things I could do with aura. Since I knew it was something that could help me immensely, I turned to Brock with a look. He just nodded at me, so I told Raven that sounded like a good idea.
With that we started walking again as we searched the mansion. There was no other encounter like the previous one. In fact we managed to wonder out into the back yard before anything else happened. We could see a person standing in front of a storage shed.
"Hey, is everything alright out here? We're trying to find everyone so we can figure out how best to deal with these Ditto."
Brock called out, as he did the figure turned. It was the body of a butler but the face was wrong. In place of a regular human looking face was the bland and blank stare that I remembered seeing on Professor Oak's Ditto.
"Pikachu use Iron Tail on that Ditto!" I commented, since I was the closet one to the Ditto.
Pikachu hopped off my shoulder his tail glowing as he flipped and slammed it into the Ditto's head. It shuddered from the attack before melting down to its normal form eyes closed as it was knocked out by that one hit.
The moment Pikachu landed back on his feet he turned to the door to the shed and rushed into it with a Quick Attack forcing it open. The moment the dust kicked up from the action settled we were treated to the sight of several people tied up and gagged.
Rushing forward Brock, Raven, Phoenix, and I began untying them.
"My, my I must thank you all for the help. I apologize for any problems my Ditto may have caused."
An older man spoke as we freed him. He stood up and brushed some dirt off of his suit as he turned to our group with a smile.
"Hello there. I'm Mr. Double, the owner of Ditto Mansion. Once again I say thank you for helping us."
"It was no trouble sir. We just happened to be here, while this incident happened so think nothing of it."
Phoenix stated as he brushed the mans thanks off.
"Oh-ho? The only reasons people visit this area is to commission a saddle from me."
"That's right. My girlfriend and I were hoping to have a saddle made for my Dragonite. These two back here, Ash and Brock came by to have one made for a Gyarados."
"Well then, as thanks for helping us out why don't I make those for you free of charge?"
At that I spoke up unsure of if it was a good idea.
"Are you sure? I mean I don't know how much a saddle costs but wouldn't you be loosing out to do that for us?"
"I'm fairly wealthy so I don't mind the loss of profit. Besides I feel like I owe you all for helping out, so please let me do this for you."
He answered, a smile gracing his face as he spoke. Strangely I could sense that he was being completely truthful with us so I nodded my head in acceptance.
"Thankfully the Ditto that assist me while I work never leave my workshop, and the rest of my Ditto avoid that room. If you would follow me I can get right on it."
M.R: Yes, we know this chapter is short. We had planned for this chapter to be a bit more... well we had planned for the chapter to have more, but in the end we decided to just use it as a short introduction for the two OCs, and let the Sea Foam Islands be separated from their intro.
S.R: Okay so I only just now realized that the Pokemon with names do not have their names associated with them in the little notes at the end of every chapter about what Pokemon are where. From this point on that is being corrected.
ON HAND:
1. Pikachu (m) 2. Conan: Riolu (m) 3. Charmeleon (m) 4. Gyarados (f) 5. Ivysaur (f) 6. Wartortle (f)
TRAINEE FIELD RESEARCHER SLOT ADDITIONS:
7. Scyther (m) 8. Gengar (f)
AT THE RANCH:
1. Pidgeot (f) 2. Beedrill (m) 3. Nidorino (m) 4. Muk (m) 5. Growlithe (f) 6. Golbat (m) 7. Apollo: Espeon (m) 8. Artemis: Umbreon (f)