Authorial Nerd: After nine years in development, hopefully, it will have been worth the wait. Thanks, and have fun.

BornToDream03: Did somebody say moar?

Popstar had been a bust. Nothing but dead ends for the mysterious 'R' case. Anyone could see that from the way Pikachu seethed as he crawled down the sidewalk. At least, if they bothered to take a look at the ground.

He sulked as he made his way over to a nearby bench, Jigglypuff not far behind. The only threads he gained here, as minuscule as they might have been, pointed him to the capital, which was locked down.

The recent breakout had put his investigation on hold, barring any sort of public transport from getting to the capital. While stowing away on a private transport was an option, there was no guarantee he'd get where he wanted to go, so he was out of options.

Well, aside from staying underneath a bench and angrily tapping his paws against the ground.

As Pikachu mumbled to himself, Jigglypuff made herself comfortable beside him and patted his back. People crossed through his vision, too busy to pay any attention to the lonely bench as they went about their lives.

Not that he minded. A bit of peace of mind was what he needed as he considered his next step.

A creaking snapped him out of his thoughts. Pikachu blinked and found a pair of boots blocking his sight. Considering most of the people here didn't have legs, this looked out of place.

The bench creaked again under this new weight, and Pikachu hastily pushed Jigglypuff to the other side. He considered leaving it entirely, but he was curious to see where this went.

A groan came from above, and Pikachu felt he could empathize with whoever was there, a little frustrated himself.

"I should have known Rupees wouldn't get me anything here," Link muttered to himself, unaware of the two eavesdroppers hiding under the bench. "Now I'm stuck here, and I don't know how to get back. Just my luck."

He sighed, and his boots clicked against the pavement. A sword touched down onto the street with a clang, and the bench protested as he shifted his weight on it. As splinters rained down on him, Pikachu closed his eyes to keep them out.

"So much for seeing the capital," Link said, lifting his gaze to the clear sky. "I guess I'll have to keep my master waiting for a bit while I try to get enough money to get back home."

Pikachu's lips turned downward, and he let out a disappointed sigh. This strange person didn't have anything interesting to offer, it seemed.

"What's this?"

Something crinkled. Pikachu's ears perked up, and he glanced at the man sitting above him. Even Jigglypuff leaned forward, eager to catch whatever had caught his interest.

"A bounty list? And for escaped prisoners on Popstar, too?"

There was a pause.

Finally, he said, "He's not on here. That's a relief."

Another brief hesitation. And then: "Wait. What if this is my ticket out of here? I could get money to buy a ship to the capital."

Meanwhile, Pikachu was coming to a different realization. Just like this man, he wanted to get to the capital, so if he tagged along, he could hitch a ride to the capital. Even then, if he stuck with a bounty hunter, there was always the chance they could meet another bounty hunter who could take him to the capital before the travel ban was lifted.

Then the bench shuddered. Jigglypuff shrunk back, Pikachu flicked his gaze up, and Link glanced around wildly. No one moved, completely confused.

When the bench collapsed into a pile of twisted wooden planks, Link yelped as he tumbled to the ground. Dust poured out from beneath him, and somewhere in the scuffle, he lost the sheet he was holding on to.

Link waved an arm to clear the air and found Pikachu sitting on the bounty sheet not far from him, Jigglypuff leaning over his shoulder.

"Hey there little guy," he said.

Pikachu narrowed his eyes, but forced down his irritation. It wouldn't help to cause a scene here. He rapped a paw against the sheet, like he was trying to smooth out a wrinkle.

Link raised an eyebrow. "Are you interested in helping me hunt down the bad guys?"

The electric mouse nodded, and Link grinned. "Cool," he said, slowly pushing himself off the ground, taking the sheet with him. "Now, how about we-"

Without prompting, Pikachu leapt onto his right shoulder and nestled himself over his neck, letting out a comfortable sigh. Link gave him a look, but a tug on his boots grabbed his attention.

He turned down. Jigglypuff met him with pleading eyes. A smile slipped onto his face, and he picked her up, letting her down on his other shoulder.

With the two Pokemon settled down over his shoulders, Link took a minute to go over the sheet in his hands.

"That's a lot of bad guys," he said under his breath, letting his eyes roam over the various profiles on the sheet.

Hearing his comment, Pikachu gave his ear an amused flick. His cheeks sputtered as he sent an electric spark to Link's hands, causing his fingers to twitch. The sheet folded out, spilling onto the street and revealing even more profiles.

Link groaned. "Okay," he said, turning to his right, "who do you think we should go after? We can't go after them all, and we probably shouldn't waste time going after small fry."

With a sigh, Pikachu slid down Link's arm, careful not to put too much weight on him. Leaning over the sheet, he scanned it, before putting his paw over the picture of a plump man with a jagged mustache, a yellow cap over his head and an ugly sneer on his mouth. He held a bag of gold coins close to him, turned away from the camera.

Link gave a huff and exchanged a glance with Pikachu. "This guy?" He took a closer look at the picture, but his frown showed that he was unimpressed. "He doesn't look all that strong. But I won't argue with the reward posted for him."

Pikachu nodded at him again, giving him a pleased smirk.

"But where do we find this guy?" he asked. "I mean, we're just three people. I don't want to have to look all over the planet."

Pikachu rolled his eyes as if he was talking to a child. He moved his paw over to the bag of gold in the corner of the picture, circling around it to draw Link's attention to it. Then he tilted his head over to a nearby poster on the wall.

At first, he wasn't sure what it said. He moved closer for a better look. At the center of the poster, there was a bird face surrounded by big bold text saying: "Triple-D Bank".

The realization hit him, and he grinned at Pikachu. "Hey! Not bad, little guy."

If the yellow sparks shooting off Pikachu's cheeks didn't raise a flag with Link, Jigglypuff jumping off his shoulder certainly did.

So somewhere back in the Junior High (Middle School to those cool kids out there), my class did an activity where we were supposed to go into groups based on which parts of writing were the hardest. At that time, I thought it was the first draft. If I could go back, I'd probably say the hardest part is the rewrite.

I had this written up. Then took some time to think about it, and I thought it slowed the pacing too much, so I rewrote it. Then I took some time to think about it and you get the gist of it. Originally this chapter was supposed to have Mario, Yoshi, and Donkey Kong get sent to Popstar by Magolor (in case you didn't figure out who the egg-thing was from Part I). As you probably noticed, this isn't how this turned out. I wanted to keep the scope of the story manageable. Jumping from Pikachu and Link to Wolf and Samus then to Mario really stretches the story thin, so I decided to expand it at a slower pace.

But anyway, I just wanted to explain why I went so long in radio silence. Hopefully, I'll be able to put out more now.