[CONFIDENTIAL] From the files of Dr. Kaminko.
Item No. 002: EXO
Publicly Released Information:
[DATA UNAVAILABLE]
Confidential Information:
EXO, short for Extranormal Operations, is an initiative started by Dr. Kaminko and President Lusamine, funded in part by the Pokémon Association, the Aether Foundation and various companies and individuals. The aim of the organization was to assemble top researchers and Pokémon trainers to engage in battle against superpowered threats such as the Ultra Beasts and Giratina as well as continue clandestine Pokémon research.
Kaminko's Notes:
The secondary objective of EXO is the development of weapons based on cores extracted from unusually powerful Pokémon and obtaining combat data from Operatives to develop artificial humans capable of doing the same job.
[END OF FILE]
Chapter Four: "Village of Dragons"
Location: Northern Unova, northwest of Opelucid City
Iris stood before a horrid sight. Hands balled in fists and shaking, she stood on a hill, watching what used to be a village on a beautiful meadow, surrounded by lush forests. Now, there were metal fences everywhere as an enormous construction yard had taken most of the space. Only a small patch of green remained, surrounded by fences. On that patch was a sea of dozens of tents, hastily built shacks and even shipping containers - the refugees of the Village of the Dragons, the only ones who still lived on the land. Probably there weren't more than two hundred people still there.
Alder, the tall, aging Unova League Champion with long, blazing red hair, gripped Iris' shoulder firmly, preventing her from losing her composure.
"I know it must not be easy to see," he said softly.
"No, I appreciate you telling me about this," Iris said, suppressing a sniffle. "It makes complete sense now. Where else would they hide a base that size? Somewhere where the only inhabitants are people nobody cares about…"
"Iris," Alder said, taking his hand off the girl's shoulder, looking at her in concern.
"For almost two years, I've been going from this place to that place, hoping to save this village," Iris continued, an entranced look in her eyes. "Not to mention all those years in Opelucid City… and it didn't help a single thing."
"That's not true, Iris," Alder said more firmly. "If you hadn't left, you would still be none the wiser as to who did it and why. Now we know for sure! And the ones who did it will pay."
"Right," Iris said shakily. "Today's the day."
~o~O~o~
Location: Somewhere near Viridian City, Kanto
Kris stared at Yellow, who seemed to be increasingly struggling to keep up the psychic barrier that prevented Domino and the others from seeing them. The two just looked at each other in silence, Kris frowning slightly while Yellow smiled kindly as always, though shaking slightly.
"Talk?" Kris asked warily. "Talk about what?"
She had no reason to doubt Yellow had any bad intentions towards her - but their way of popping up out of nowhere still puzzled Kris.
"It's all over the news, really," Yellow said calmly. "The six outlaws fighting against the government, labeled terrorists and criminals for disagreeing with how things are. Reminds me of something…"
Suddenly, Yellow coughed violently and let their arms drop. Kris rushed over to Yellow, catching them before they hit the ground. But the glow in their hands disappeared as well, which meant Kris knew the psychic barrier Yellow had created was also gone. Shrew squeaked in concern, holding Yellow's head.
"Hold on, I'm getting you to safety!" Kris said. "Shrew, I know you're…"
Kris looked at the Pokémon who was roughly up to her knee.
"Well, physical stature aside, you're strong!" Kris insisted. "Help me carry Yellow back to the safe house!"
Shrew squeaked in affirmation, and together, human and Pokémon carried the semi-conscious psychic human back to the shack. Unfortunately for Kris, Blaine was waiting there, pacing back and forth in the kitchen area furiously. Based on the fact that his cane was on the floor, he couldn't have been back for more than a couple of minutes, but Kris still winced, ready to get yelled at.
"There you are!" Blaine snapped as Kris arrived.
However, he quickly fell silent, his expression fixated on the unconscious Yellow.
"Dialga's dongle!" Blaine exclaimed. "That's Yellow! You went out to help 'em?"
"Uh, yeah, that's why I was out," Kris said quickly. "Why else, you asked me to stay inside, right? Anyway, Yellow collapsed after using their powers, probably to slip past some HSF people."
"Psychic energy overuse," Blaine said, nodding. "Help me get 'em on the bed!"
Together, Kris and Blaine laid Yellow down. Once they were done, Blaine began talking excitedly.
"We just caught wind of something big!" he ranted. "I called everyone back here because I got a message from Iris! She knows exactly where EXO's headquarters is!"
Kris, energized by this new nugget of information, stepped in front of Blaine.
"Then I'm going as well!" she said. "I'm not staying here to rot a second longer!"
Blaine nodded. "We'll all go," he said. "We'll all be needed there. Just waiting for Hilda and Wes to come back."
"Elm left-"
"Yeah, I got a message from him," Blaine grunted. "That scatterbrain just had to go back to get something at this moment. I told him it's safer for him to stay put in New Bark Town when he gets there until we deal with this. Anyways, we'll get a plane ride there. Apparently, Alder organized it. Not sure if I can trust the Unova League Champion right now-"
"You can!" Kris insisted. "He helped me escape from EXO before, and he helped us fight against Team Plasma as well!"
Blaine nodded. "Yeah, Iris said the same," he said begrudgingly. "I guess I don't have a choice. But we need someone to take care of Yellow here. Maybe Agatha-"
"No!"
Kris and Blaine both rushed into the bedroom, seeing Yellow sitting up suddenly, face sweaty and hair messed up but a firm look in their green eyes.
"I'm coming with you," Yellow said evenly. "They - EXO - they've got Red!" Yellow turned to look at Kris. "Your friend Lyra, too! I got some information from the inside that confirms this!"
Kris frowned at Blaine. "So Lyra is either dead or a traitor, huh?"
Blaine sighed. "It was a reasonable assumption at the time," he muttered and turned to Yellow. "If you feel up for it, I won't stop you. But from what Iris described, it's not as if we can just sneak in through the window. They have automated defenses, security guards, trap doors, sensors that can see us coming a mile away-"
"It doesn't matter," Yellow said simply. "Even if our chances are zero, I'm going. It's Red we're talking about."
~o~O~o~
Location: Northern Unova, northeast of Opelucid City
Several hours later
With Wes and Hilda having arrived soon and the situation explained to them, the whole group left first to a private airstrip in Pewter City, from where a plane piloted by one of Alder's most trusted subordinates came to pick them up. A few hours after that, the group had arrived in Opelucid City, where a car picked them up and drove them to the surrounding countryside.
Listening to Iris' stories over the time they had known each other, Kris had high expectations from the Village of Dragons, expecting it to be a bustling community of Dragon Tamers, all controlling fierce and powerful Pokémon, living in harmony with nature and proudly maintaining their heritage. And until recently, this had indeed been the case. But now, as Kris arrived there, what awaited her was a gray wasteland with much of the surrounding forests cut down, with construction equipment everywhere. Large areas had been fenced off for no apparent reason, and there were no houses to be seen - only a small patch of land filled with tents, caravans, shipping containers and hastily built shacks.
As Kris met Iris again, she expected the girl to be devastated. But while not the same ball of energy she was before, Iris nonetheless greeted Kris with a hug and the same cheerful smile as always. After the normal pleasantries - mainly from Iris' side - the two walked side by side around what had become the villagers' refugee camp.
"I'm so sorry you didn't get to see us in our glory days," Iris said, still smiling despite the air of melancholy in her voice.
Kris shook her head. "I'm the one who's sorry," she said. "I would have had time to do so if I hadn't gone and joined EXO…"
"You were trying to do the right thing," Iris said kindly. "Nobody is blaming you for this!"
"Who did this, then?" Kris wondered, looking around her, getting more depressed by the second at the sorry sight. "How did all this happen?"
"It's been happening since I was a little kid," Iris remembered. "Everybody from the government to different companies were muscling in on our land, trying to find excuses to get rid of us. Sometimes it was about the land, sometimes about the forests here, sometimes trying to force us to assimilate to 'civilized Unovan society'..."
Kris shook her head, shocked at what she was hearing - and ashamed that the two had never had a conversation about this before.
"Then there was this one company, Terra Construction," Iris said thoughtfully. "They made a better offer than most. At that point, we were really struggling. Farmland was getting reduced and businesses in Opelucid refused to hire from the village. They gave us good money for some of the surrounding land and even gave many people jobs, including my parents."
"But they were just like the rest. They didn't care about us, and because nobody else did either, they got away with some horrible working conditions, withholding pay for months, firing anybody who tried to organize any meaningful movements within the company, the list goes on. Many people from the village got sick because of the poor safety guidelines there - such as my parents. And they didn't get better."
"Arceus…" Kris sighed. "Iris, you… you haven't had it easy."
"Well, neither have you," Iris said with a smile. "Not recently, for sure."
"You heard about the news?" Kris asked Iris.
Iris nodded. "Never been a terrorist before, so this is kind of exciting!" she said cheerfully. "But don't worry, all the Gym Leaders have have my back, and Mr. Alder has been great!"
Together, Kris and Iris climbed up on a hill that allowed them to see the entirety of the refugee camp as well as the construction sites around them, followed by endless streams of forests. There was a lot of activity now as about twenty uniformed men ran around, gathering equipment and getting their Pokémon in line. They were Alder's men from the E4 Task Force he had set up with the Unova Pokémon League. While the organization had been cut down and most of its troops recruited to Holon Security, Alder still had a small group of loyal soldiers at his side.
Many of them were either extremely young or extremely old, Kris noted, a majority of them out of shape. Kris noticed a unit composed of what seemed to be biker gang members among them as well.
Now, this ragtag group was going to invade the base of EXO, one of the most technologically advanced sites in the world.
"So, how far are we from the target?" Kris asked Iris. "I don't see anything."
"It's hidden behind all the trees and the construction sites," Iris said, a slight bitter edge to her voice.
"What exactly are they building?"
"Nothing," Iris sighed. "Alder theorized that it's been a front the whole time. Just another way of hiding the base while giving an excuse to instead build defenses for it."
"They actually destroyed your village just for this," Kris said quietly. "They have a lot to answer for."
Iris, surprisingly enough, smiled as she turned to look at Kris.
"The others were a bit unsure about you," Iris said. "Said that maybe you don't have the drive to fight back anymore, that all the horrible things that happened had finally broken you."
"Who said that?!" Kris snapped.
"I won't name names," Iris said sheepishly.
Kris raised an eyebrow. "Wes?"
"Wes."
"Typical," Kris scoffed.
"But he or whoever else might have said it, they're wrong!" Iris proclaimed. "The same reason why you joined EXO - heck, the same reason you started your journey in the first place - is also what's going to make you keep coming back to this!"
Kris smiled at that. "When we first met, when Elm forced you to hold my hand to get me started… did you think it would lead to this?"
"What, to you being one arm short and the world sliding towards chaos?" Iris suggested. "Nah. I knew you had it in you, but I didn't think you would still be going at it after you reached your goal to compete in the Silver Conference. Remember that you had to borrow one of my Pokémon to get your first gym badge?"
"Don't remind me," Kris groaned.
"I should have asked for more compensation for that," Iris laughed.
"I got you that ice cream at the souvenir shop, at least!"
As Kris and Iris started to happily reminisce, Hilda and Wes were not too far from them. Wes was using his binoculars to try and see where EXO's headquarters was, but there was nothing unusual in sight. Whenever he had gone in and out of there before, it was always either through teleporters or blindfolded in a helicopter. It felt weird that he was standing within a kilometer or two of that place of mystery.
"Feelin' nervous?" he asked Hilda, who was sitting on the ground, picking up a bunch of small pebbles and letting them drop over and over again.
"Nope," Hilda said simply. "Unlike you."
Wes just rolled his eyes and continued looking through his binoculars. "What were we thinking, joining up with those people," he muttered. "Especially after the Pokémon Association stabbed you an' me in the back at Navel Rock…"
Wes glanced at Hilda, but she didn't react. Before she had joined EXO, Hilda had been a part of Alder's task force, who had been assigned to guard the Navel Rock Research Facility, a secretitive base run by the Pokémon Association that had been run by the same man who controlled EXO, Dr. Kaminko. Wes had been called to help them out, being a sort of a mercenary back then, before he had met Kris and the rest.
"I know what you were thinking," Wes said quietly. "After what happened to Hilbert at Navel Rock, they offered to rebuild him if you joined up with 'em, right?"
"Mm-hmm," Hilda said apathetically.
"But there had to be some other reason," Wes continued. "Just like you didn't just join up with Alder's little army for fun. Or why you fought Team Plasma when you were supposed to be competin' in the Pokémon League."
"I know my life Wes, I lived it."
"You act all cool," Wes smiled, "but I have a feeling you're more like Kris than you let on."
"Whatever you say," Hilda said, got up and dusted herself off. "What about you, then, good ol' boy? Why did you make the decision to join them? When I was recruiting you, you were complaining about working for the government or whatever. But then you went on with it anyway."
Wes sat down next to Hilda, seemingly contemplating the question. Unfortunately for him, Hilda saw right through him.
"It's because Kris joined," she said bluntly. "Kinda pathetic, but sweet in its own weird way."
"It's not what you think!" Wes insisted, but his face was getting redder. "I just… I got the feeling that if I follow her lead… maybe my life will lead to something interestin', is all…"
That got an honest laugh out of Hilda, who nudged Wes with her elbow.
"Dumbass," she chuckled. "Come on, we need to get ready for this."
Down at the foot of the hill, in the refugee camp, Blaine was walking around, taking in the devastation around him. Curiously, he spotted Yellow meditating in the middle of the place, just sitting there in a lotus position, eyes closed, unconcerned with anything. Not having had a chance to catch up in ages, Blaine made his way over to the youth.
"Am I interrupting?" Blaine asked Yellow carefully.
"Fortunately, no," Yellow said, serene and calm as usual. "I am just mentally preparing myself for the battles we will definitely be facing."
"You know for sure Red is in there?" Blaine asked. "Have you been in contact with him?"
"No, but the information is reliable, I'm sure of it," Yellow said simply.
"So, what have you been doing?" Blaine continued, finding it harder to get information out of Yellow. "It's been like two years since we last saw each other."
"Continuing to find information," Yellow replied. "Finding any information I can to get the whole world out of this mess."
Blaine chuckled. Yellow hadn't changed a bit in his eyes.
In one of the tents, Alder was knelt opposite to a very old, short woman - the matriarch of the Village of the Dragons.
"I appreciate you letting us use your humble home as a staging ground for our operation, Matriarch," Alder said, bowing respectfully. "I just wish we would have discovered this all sooner."
"There is little use in regretting these things," the matriarch pondered as she stirred a cup of tea. "You are a good man, Mr. Champion, so I don't have a problem helping you with this. But I wonder if a violent raid against these people will help us…"
Alder closed his eyes in shame. "No, it most likely won't," he admitted. "But they… the people responsible for doing this to your village must still be punished. I couldn't call myself the Champion if I didn't do something about them."
The matriarch just nodded as she took a sip of tea.
"Well, Iris will give you all the support you need," she said after a long pause. "She will guide you to the springs. That's where she discovered the tunnels."
Alder nodded and got up to leave.
"Iris…" he said slowly. "Who is she exactly? Is she some sort of special prodigy? Could I have a word with her parents?"
The matriarch shook her head sadly. "They have passed, I'm afraid," she said slowly. "A few months before that, they sent Iris to Opelucid Academy to learn. Truth is, she is no more special than anyone else here. But nonetheless, we all wanted her to succeed and carry on the spirit of our village, regardless of what happened to us."
"And Drayden chose her to be a Gym Leader," Alder pondered. "Uh, sorry, I've taken enough of your time. Thank you again!"
Alder left the matriarch's tent and rounded up all of his troops, along with Kris and her friends. With everybody in one place in the middle of the camp, Kris could see just what a ragtag group Alder had assembled. One unit was full of people roughly around Alder's age, another composed of kids led by a boy a few years younger than Kris with long red hair similar to Alder. Kris also saw the biker unit that seemed to be consisting of out-of-shape middle-aged men. The exception was their leader, who had more muscle on him. He was a very tall man who had a mullet and wore a biker outfit instead of a uniform.
"When are we getting out there to fight!" he complained. "Charles the Heartbreaker needs to make nog out of someone's noggin!"
"That guy seems familiar," Kris muttered to Iris, who giggled.
When Alder arrived to meet the troops, however, they all fell silent and stopped their chatter, all laying respectful looks at Alder.
"Attention!" he bellowed. "Squad leaders, step forward!"
The kid who resembled Alder stepped forward, as did Charles the Heartbreaker, an aging veteran soldier and a very nervous-looking young man close to Kris' age.
"We will now begin the operation to infiltrate EXO!" Alder informed. "Our aerial scouts have informed us of the rough layout of the target - a large, three-story building on a clearing less than two kilometers to the north of here! Benga squad!"
"What up, gramps!" said the red-haired kid. "What kind of job you sending me on? Something cool?!"
"You got it, champ," Alder said unprofessionally, making finger guns at his grandson. "You will be outdoors, using your Pokémon and your wits to create a heck of a ruckus outside their main building. This should draw their attention. Make a lot of flash so they think there's more of you out there!"
"...you're sidelining us for a distraction job, gramps," Benga moaned.
"Exactly! Clyde squad," he told the nervous-looking young man. "You support him, keep your distance! Charles and Nishino squads, go with me and my men. With the help of… what do you wanna be called?" he asked, with everyone turning to look at Kris, Iris, Wes, Hilda, Blaine and Yellow.
"Iris squad," Kris said, smiling as she put her arms around the girl.
"No protests from me!" Wes added, stepping closer to Iris. "We should have a certified Gym Leader leadin' the charge!"
"Hey!" Blaine protested.
"I thought you retired?" Kris asked him.
"Seeing as I got us all the way out here, I would like to be acknowledged is all," Blaine grumbled.
Alder's men were shaking their heads and laughing, probably wondering if this bunch of youngsters and an old, one-armed man were good for anything.
"Anyways," Alder said, "Iris Squad will lead the way. Iris here knows how to get into the tunnels that they're using to avoid traveling on the surface!"
"Nicely done, kid," Blaine said proudly.
Iris was getting flustered under all the praise, which amused Kris. It was a relief that the attention was on someone else for now.
"Together, we will infiltrate the EXO base of operations," Alder continued. "We will disarm anyone who opposes us and liberate their prisoners, of which there are confirmed to be at least two. Besides the prisoners, our primary target is Dr. Kaminko. Once we capture him, the rest should surrender."
"Let me make this clear," Alder said. "I don't want anyone taking any unnecessary risks. This place has automated defenses, traps and presumably a lot of guards. It may seem small, but keep on your guard. Let's move out!"
~o~O~o~
Location: EXO HQ, northeast Unova
A while later
The command room of EXO was seemingly a small space, with a few terminals and a large screen displaying a ton of information to the people there. But the main command center was actually on a balcony overseeing dozens of other workstations, with a technician manning every one.
And now, everything was on red alert. Klaxons blared, several terminals flashed red and technicians were running around from one terminal to the next, yelling out information to each other.
"RED ALERT! RED ALERT!"
"Enemy attacking the headquarters from the eastern side! Deploying the Voltorb!"
"Release the Houndour!"
Marshal, the head of Operations, a large, intimidating-looking dark-skinned man with short, orange hair, was trying to make sense of it all, standing in the command center behind the skinny, bespectacled lead technician Celio. So far, he had been used to guiding operatives from afar, using the data gathered to their command center to give orders and instructions. Never before had an enemy breached headquarters yet, and while they had made action plans for this kind of contingency, they had never expected it to happen in person. Nobody knew their location, after all. Even Marshal himself couldn't point the base on the map.
"What's going on?!" he barked at Celio. "Do we have a visual?"
"Not yet, the eastern side cameras are being disrupted," Celio said quickly while furiously typing. "Get the Fearow in the air!" he ordered the other technicians.
"I need information on how many there are, and how many Pokémon!" Marshal ordered.
"Thermal scans showing five people, sir," a technician replied from down below. "And about eight Pokémon! They seem to be attacking the eastern-side wall randomly!"
"Five more approaching from the southeast!" another technician yelled. "Should I deploy the suppression troops?"
"Kaminko has the final say on their use," Marshal said. "Send a third of our own security, but tell them to keep their distance. Don't let anyone enter the facility! Keep the rest on standby!"
"Yes, sir!"
The electronic doors of the main command room slid open as the old scientist in question arrived.
"Status report!" Kaminko said firmly. "Who is it, Marshal?"
"No identification yet," Marshal replied. "But there's at least ten people. Sir, we're requesting permission to deploy Unit Surge."
"Not yet," Kaminko said, rubbing his chin in thought. "To tell you the truth, I suspected this. This must be a diversion tactic."
Suddenly, Kaminko turned around and began walking out of the room. At the door, he looked at Marshal over his shoulder.
"You and Celio are in command here now, take care of this one!" he said. "I will be in my office."
"Um… right, sir!" Marshal said hesitantly. "Couldn't we get help from Dr. Faba on this one?"
"He is busy with our latest project," Kaminko said simply as he left.
Ignoring the hustle around him, Kaminko walked to the elevators, past the security guards preparing their weapons and the civilians running for safety. As he arrived on the second floor, he walked past the empty receptionist table and into the security of his office.
There, however, someone awaited him - a very large man with blonde hair, in his late 50's but not looking like it.
"Surge," Kaminko greeted him casually. "Are you and your men ready?"
"I got a dozen of them inside, five more in the place you asked," Surge informed.
Kaminko nodded. "No more than that?"
"Not too many were willing to risk getting demoted, fired or worse for betraying President Lusamine," Surge said evenly as he glared at Kaminko.
The older scientist just smiled. "I'm glad I can still count on you," he said. "Trust me, if our rebellion goes as planned, it will be a victory for all of us."
"I hope so," Surge grunted. "I'm just here to fight. And let me be clear on this one - I'm doing this because I owe you. Without you, I wouldn't be standing here. Once this is done, I'm going back to the HSF and I don't want to hear from you again."
"It's a deal," Kaminko said. "Assemble the men. And fortify the office. I won't be leaving here until we are done."
Satisfied, Surge left the office. As soon as he was gone, Kaminko grabbed his phone from his pocket and made another call he was reluctant to make, but felt it necessary.
"Yo, Cheren Black's office," came the reply on the other end.
Kaminko rolled his eyes. This young punk may have been acting powerful in the Pokémon Association's hierarchy, yet he didn't know better than to not use his real name on the phone.
"It's me," Kaminko said. "I want a status update."
"Righto," Cheren said casually. "Well, the Gym's renovations have been going nicely-"
"You know what I mean," Kaminko hissed.
"...sure," Cheren replied. "The girl and Lusamine's secretary are on New Island. They ain't moving from there in a while. The warden there owes me a favor."
"And the illustrious president herself?"
"I just contacted those two knuckleheads you sent to keep her under guard. They're sipping tea and watching TV as we speak. And I'm guessing tonight they will see all about how the tyranny of the Pokémon Association has finally ended."
"That's the plan," Kaminko said simply. "Keep monitoring the situation and let know if anything changes. Don't call me for any other reason."
"Sure thing, boss man."
Kaminko hung up and slowly walked over to the window of his office. From there, you couldn't see the battle, but Kaminko could see the flashes of light from the energy weapons of the security guards and the fire- and electric-type attacks of the Pokémon. He wasn't afraid, as it didn't matter if they lost the battle or not. At that very moment, a satellite was orbiting the planet, carrying the Heat Razor, a weapon fashioned out of the body of Heatran, the legendary Pokémon EXO had captured months ago. All he needed to do was buy enough time for the computers in the server room to finish their calculations, and then press a single button on his phone. After the first shot, nobody would doubt EXO's power ever again.
~o~O~o~
About one kilometer away, Squad Iris and the remaining half of Alder's forces were making their way through the forest surrounding the EXO headquarters. Two of Alder's men were walking in front of the rest, using machetes to clear the path. Even in the middle of the woods, they could see construction equipment, bricks, helmets and other waste scattered around haphazardly. They really wanted to sell the image that something real was being built.
"Interesting," Yellow remarked as they stopped to look at a helmet hanging from a tree. "Iris, you said Terra Construction is the company responsible for this?"
"Yeah," Iris said, walking next to Kris, behind the much larger Alder who could stomp a path for them. "Don't even get me started on them."
"Oh, I won't," Yellow said calmly. "But it is an amazing coincidence. The same company has been behind cutting large swaths of Viridian Forest in Kanto."
"Really?" Kris said, glancing at Yellow. "Multiregional, huh? Do you know who runs it?"
"I have a guess," Yellow said quietly, "but I don't wish to voice it out just yet. There's a lot of uncertainty."
"We're here!" Iris exclaimed suddenly.
Everyone stopped, hearing the flowing of a nearby stream. Iris walked by the stream until she came across a tree - nothing spectacular or standing out from any other. But as Iris swept aside some grass and stray leaves, she revealed a metal pipe sticking out of the ground.
"Ventilation," Iris said proudly. "Blaine told me about the tunnels going from the EXO base to various locations. That's how they get around without teleporting. As I was searching around after Alder told me about the base being somewhere here, I found this."
Blaine chuckled appreciatively. "Nice one," he said.
"Where did you get your information, then?" Kris asked Alder.
"An inside source, but an anonymous one," Alder said contemplatively. "Of course we double-checked it, and sent aerial scouts over the area. They have some sort of electronic jamming equipment that prevents any serious scans, but we at least confirmed there is a building here that cannot be found from any maps or official listings."
"Look!" Iris said, pointing at something further down the stream
The stream originated from a small waterfall, and as the group approached it, they saw the opening to a tunnel behind it. Slowly, Alder's men went in first, checking around the waterfall and by the mouth of the tunnel for traps. When everything seemed clear, the group entered the cave.
Inside, though, there wasn't much space and the tunnel didn't seem to lead anywhere. Everyone was looking around them for a secret switch, a door, a button behind a poster or anything that could lead to a secret tunnel, but there was nothing but damp, solid rock wherever they looked.
"There is a tunnel under us, there has to be!" Iris insisted as she looked around frantically.
"I don't doubt you, it makes sense to me," Hilda remarked quietly as she also looked around the cave. "EXO wouldn't just make it obvious…"
Yellow, on the other hand, had already closed their eyes and was scanning the area with their extended hands. After a minute of doing it, Yellow's eyes opened.
"There," Yellow said, pointing at a seemingly random spot on the cave's wall.
"What about it?" Wes asked as he walked up to Yellow.
"Just give it a try, please," Yellow said, smiling at Wes.
Shrugging, Wes pushed the wall in the place Yellow had pointed to. To his surprise, a small part of the wall was giving in, and with some struggling, Wes managed to push a piece of the wall the size of his palm into the wall. At the same time, a part of the cave's stone floor nearby slided open, with one of Alder's soldiers almost falling in before Alder and Charles pulled her back up. The exposed hole in the floor had stairs that led right into the underground tunnel.
"I'm so happy you came along," Kris grinned, slapping Yellow on the shoulder.
But before anyone could take a step, several Koffing and Magnemite suddenly floated out of the exposed tunnel and towards the group, glowing maliciously. Everyone knew exactly what was going to happen next.
"TAKE COVER!" Alder shouted.
~o~O~o~
Location: EXO HQ, northeast Unova
Professor Juniper tried to do her best to contain the panic at the headquarters. She wasn't even supposed to be there. She would have much rather been spending time at her lab in Nuvema Town. But when so many people had quit the organization and Kaminko had come back to her with a tempting pay raise, Juniper didn't have much other choice. Her father Cedric being part of the Pokémon Association's Committee didn't exactly help matters either.
Right now, scientists, technicians and other civilians were grabbing their personal items and getting ready to evacuate, some frantically also trying to grab whatever they could of their work. The sense of panic was clearly getting to them, as their shouting had become more and more frantic. Juniper had tried to no avail to calm them down, but had now given up.
Fortunately, her friend, the long-haired Dr. Fennel, who always looked like she was dozing off, was calm as always, walking over to her with her Musharna floating behind her slowly.
"Aurea, I've gathered my team and they're on their way to the shelter," Fennel said calmly.
"More like the only lab big enough for all of us that also has locks in the door," Juniper sighed. "I swear, we're totally unprepared for this. But thanks, I'm hoping my department will calm down soon enough. What about the bio team?"
"I haven't seen Leaf anywhere," Fennel said.
Juniper sucked her teeth, annoyed at the circumstances. The evacuation order had been given twenty minutes ago already, what could Leaf be doing?
"Faba is in charge of the Special Projects department," she muttered, "but I haven't seen them around either. Listen," she told Fennel, "please round up these fools here and try to get them to the shelter in an orderly fashion. I'll pay Leaf a visit."
With Fennel confirming this, Juniper ran past the panicking staff and to the biology department, which took more than ten minutes to reach past the winding, maze-like corridors of laboratories and offices to get to. In the corner of the area, there was indeed Leaf's office. Like the other departments, the biology department was in chaos mode, and the team leader didn't seem to be trying to dissuade it at all. Juniper rushed to Leaf's open door and knocked hastily, seeing Leaf looking down a microscope as if nothing was happening.
"Hello, professor," Leaf said casually, giving Juniper a quick glance. "If you don't mind, my work is at a crucial-"
"Screw your work!" Juniper snapped. "The alarms have been going on for twenty minutes!"
"I know, it's very annoying," Leaf remarked, not taking her eyes off the microscope. "I'm trying to concentrate here."
"The HQ is under attack!" Juniper yelled. "Every non-combatant needs to evacuate now!"
Leaf just shrugged. "If they get in, they get in, but this work is extremely important, Kaminko is expecting results on this soon," she said. "You get my department to safety, okay?"
Juniper was flabbergasted, but the young researcher didn't budge. Shaking her head, Juniper walked out of the office and began rounding up the panicking employees.
~o~O~o~
Back at the command center, Marshal was trying to process the flood of information on the various screens and shouted at him by all the technicians working on their monitors.
"Releasing the Electrode bomb in quadrant B!"
"The automatic turrets are unresponsive! Someone has crashed the system!"
"No response from Dr. Faba or his team, sir!"
Marshal didn't even bother to respond to these anymore as he was sitting by his own monitor, shifting through footage of the hundreds of security cameras in the base. Several had already been knocked offline, and so far, he still didn't have a clear view of who was attacking.
Finally, his stress was relieved by Celio's sudden shout.
"The drones are in the air!" he shouted. "We have footage of the intruders in the yard! They're pressing hard, but the Holon Security boys are standing tall!"
"Show me!" Marshal shouted.
Celio brought up the camera footage to the big screen, showing a young boy with bright red hair commanding a Volcarona, who was easily defeating a Magnezone commanded by a Holon Security grunt. Marshal frowned as he looked at the footage, recognizing the hair quite well… as well as the emblem on their uniforms.
"No way…" he said. "These are… these are Alder's troops."
"The Unova Champion?" Celio wondered. "Why are they attacking us? They trying to bury the evidence of what we've done?"
Marshal shook his head. "This is because of Kaminko's feud," he grumbled. "He's pissed someone off real good."
"Didn't you work under this guy before EXO?" Celio asked.
"For a solid thirty years…" Marshal sighed.
"Commander!" a technician shouted. "We have footage of intruders coming in from tunnel C-5! They got past the trap Pokémon!"
"Send in the Conkeldurr!" Marshal snapped. "Can somebody get me footage of what's happening in there?"
"On it, sir!"
Another technician switched the big screen to show surveillance camera footage from the underground tunnels. Marshal knew that this particular tunnel was very well-sealed, with no one having ever used it thus far.
And when the cameras turned on, the results removed all doubt. A group of twenty or so people were making their way through the tunnel. A fierce-looking, roaring Feraligatr was wrestling with one of the Conkeldurr sent as security, while a Haxorus used its sharp, scythe-like tusks to block the swing of a concrete pillar of another Conkeldurr.
"Sir?" Celio said, turning to Marshal, who was standing behind him and squeezing the back of his chair so hard that it looked like it was going to snap in half.
"I'm fine!" Marshal snapped. "The tunnel is going to branch into different directions. Get two guards to every door and seal them up! They cannot get into the base!"
"After all that effort to get out of here, huh," Celio remarked as he resumed working on his terminal.
~o~O~o~
Kris' Feraligatr, Iris' Haxorus, Hilda's Emboar and Alder's Bouffalant had single-handedly taken care of the four Conkeldurr that had appeared in the group's way. Everyone knew EXO had a large supply of Pokémon standing guard, so this was probably just the beginning. Alder's troops were just hanging in the background, unable to do anything in the narrow tunnel anyways, forced to just hang back and watch the action.
With the Conkeldurr trap surpassed, the group arrived at a junction, where the tunnel split into three paths.
"Should we separate?" Blaine asked. "I think I know exactly where they lead."
"No," Alder said firmly. "I know how they operate, and I know how… how he will think. They're going to assume we want to do just that. Instead, let's pick what we think is a vulnerable spot and rush in at full force!"
"Well, you're the expert," Blaine said, clearly not completely convinced. "It would be the one on the right, then. That leads to a hallway that has just a utility room and some storage space."
"Then that's where we'll go!" Alder proclaimed and raised his hand. "Forward!"
This mixed group proceeded to storm through the tunnel on the right, running along the winding, twisting path. Kris wondered if the tunnel was made cumbersomely long on purpose to exhaust any possible intruders, making them easy pickings for the security. Occasionally, a Voltorb would pop out of a hatch out of nowhere, but Iris and Haxorus were on point. Iris reacted immediately, and Haxorus only had to make a swipe with its tail, sending the Voltorb flying away before it self-destructed. The hallway was then littered with unconscious, smoking Voltorb.
Finally, the group made it to the end of the tunnel. A heavy reinforced door stood in the way, but Alder's Bouffalant only had to ram it at full force to slam it open.
As Alder had expected, only two guards had been posted, one of them being knocked to the ground as the door blew off its hinges by Bouffalant's attacks. The other whipped around and pointed his gun at the group, only to instantly lower it and surrender when ten of Alder's troops did the same to him. Soon enough, the guards were hogtied and left in a utility closet, while the surveillance cameras nearby were quickly disabled by Alder's men. Once that was done, everyone gathered around.
"Now that we're in, we can divide up to search!" Alder told his men. "Charles, you and your squad head into the basement! Nishino squad, take that hallway to the right! My own squad and Squad Iris will head upstairs. Your priorities: rescue the captives and any other civilian personnel, and disarm the opposition! Holon Security forces and Aether Foundation personnel will probably be attacking you - don't hold back when it comes to them!"
"What about Kaminko?" Hilda asked pointedly.
Alder glanced at her. "Obviously, one of our objectives is to capture him as well," he said patiently, "he is responsible for what's been going on here, after all. But our first priority is to ensure the safety of any innocents caught up in the middle."
"Sure," Hilda said nonchalantly, "but not all of us are needed for that. Emboar, go find Kaminko! You can find me later!"
"What are you planning to do?" Wes asked her.
Hilda responded by suddenly taking off her shoe and throwing it at the ceiling. A hatch leading into a ventilation shaft was detached, dangling limply from the ceiling. With one boost, Hilda hoisted herself up to the ceiling and into the ventilation shaft, slinking away.
"You think she will come back to answer me?" Wes asked Iris, who laughed.
"Let's keep moving!" Alder shouted, and everyone obeyed.
~o~O~o~
Elsewhere, in a lab deep under the facility, Lyra was pacing back and forth, wearing the Expansion Suit with the visor up, glancing up at Faba, who was standing in an observation room, talking on his phone. Faba had called Lyra to do more tests with the suit, but Lyra could not focus right now, not with everything that was going on.
"Hey!" she shouted at Faba. "Give me an update already!"
Looking like Lyra was interrupting something, Faba made a big show of rolling his eyes and putting his phone away before pushing a button to talk to Lyra.
"The facility has indeed been breached," he said, sounding annoyed. "And the best thing is, it's those former operatives. Your friend Kris is leading the charge."
Stunned, Lyra stumbled backwards a bit, staring at Faba.
"You have to open the door, then!" she shouted. "Let me talk to her!"
"What you need to do is keep running more tests! We need to see how well your Typhlosion will be synced with the power cranked up higher."
"That can wait!" Lyra argued. "I need to get up there and see what's going on!"
"Listen to me, Lyra!" Faba said. "Kris is your enemy now. Don't you see what's happening here? She stormed the place in with the Unova Champion and his goons. That means she's sold her soul to the Pokémon League. She would rather ruin your hopes of freeing Lillie from her mother's grasp than see you succeed at something. But you cannot let that happen, Lyra! You have to fight her, and win!"
Lyra stared back at Faba for a solid half a minute in silence. Then…
"Nah, nice try, doc, but I don't go for that," she said casually. "You don't know anything about me and Kris, so just open the door and let me go see her."
Faba narrowed his eyes at Lyra, but eventually shrugged and pulled out a remote from his pocket.
"Well, I tried," he said and pressed a button.
Suddenly, Lyra's body seized up as the visor slammed down. Not that it mattered anyway, as Lyra's senses were quickly overwhelmed as hundreds of small cables appeared from the suit, embedding themselves into her body, sending electric shocks all around her. The suit quickly began to take over, and in the end, Lyra's body went limp for a sec before she slowly got up and looked at Faba.
"What is my command?" she asked, and Faba grinned.
"That's more like it," Faba told himself.
