Gloria's astute black suit harshly cut through the cone of light surrounding her. A flood of flashes and clicks bombarded her senses. Gloria closed her eyes and slowed her short quick breaths. She slapped her cheeks until they were rosy. Her eyes opened, staring at the sea of faces with burning conviction. You got this. She thought with a wicked grin.
"Citizens of Galar!" she screamed, raising a clenched fist into the air. "As the champion, I've been invited to represent all of you in a champion brawl! Eight champions of different regions have been invited to the Aloha region." A projector behind her flickered alive. Eight faces appeared on the screen, each filled with conviction and determination. "In exactly one month, I'll prove to the world just how strong we are, and in exactly one month, we will be known as the strongest region."
A chorus of screams erupted. Shirts, bottles, papers, anything was thrown in the air. Galar really is the best.
Hop's hazel eyes darted around, scanning the area. He slipped into the tall alleyway as silently as he came. He slowly walked down the graffiti-filled alleyway, with light steps. Shielbert sat on a worn-down wooden crate propped against the back of the alleyway. They made eye contact, Shielbert's silvery-blue eyes glassy with dark circles underneath them. His normally posh hair was wiry and full of grease.
"Were you followed?" Shielbert's voice was low and hush.
"No, what happened?"
"Have you ever heard of an organization called," Shielbert paused, hesitantly. "The darkest thorn."
"Rumors?" Hop scanned Shielbert, trying to read his emotions. "Or something more?"
"People in dark clothing approached Sordward and I." Sheilbert's eyes darted around as if at any moment he would be pounced on. "They wanted to learn more about Galar Particles, but worse, they knew about everything."
Hop raised his hands, motioning in a calming gesture. "Calm down… what do you mean by everything?"
"One week ago, they knew about the champion tournament, they even knew the area would be in an ultra wormhole."
"That's an issu-" Hop began.
"You don't understand!" His voice quieted to a whisper that could die out on even the smallest breeze. "The only ones that know about that are Gloria, Leon, and a couple of the higher ups that Leon works with… If someone that high up is involved in this Darkest Thorn, I can't even begin to imagine what it's capable of."
"That's why you had me come out to a desolate part of Wynton," Hop murmured. "Who knows how many of them could be crawling around us."
"They told me that they were going to do something with Galar Particles when the champions enter the wormhole." Shielbert looked down guiltily. "I've been too afraid to say anything. If I just start trying to cancel the tournament, they'll know it's me, and who knows what they might do to me?"
Hop was silent. Depending on how large their network was they would be able to learn a lot about their potential enemies. They might even know about the details of a case that hasn't been reported yet. No. Leon would never do anything like that. Right? All Lee cares about is his stupid Pokémon battles. Leon was a man who became chairman just to make a tower for Pokémon battles. There was no reason why he would involve himself with this.
"I understand, I won't tell anyone." Suddenly his eyes lit up, "Wait, Galar Particles. Would something like a shard of Eternatus' egg have leftover Galar Particles?"
"Most definitely, Eternatus was the one that first brought Galar particles to the region thousands of years ago." The muscles in his face relaxed, and his word choice had returned to his normal pompous way of speaking. "I'm glad to have such a reliable friend like you. I hope your arm recovers quickly."
Hop forced a smile, then waved goodbye to Shielbert. As he trudged to the nearest train station, the events of the previous week swirled through his mind. The thief had stolen a shard of the egg instead of buying it. They're monitored, so they wouldn't be able to do something like extracting the Galar Particles without raising suspicion. Furthermore, the public robbery might have been a signal of some sort to other members of the organization.
Hop entered the train to Hammerlock. He sat down, barely registering his surroundings. Darkest Thorn Hop thought. An organization that messed with Galar Particles. The Darkest in its name no doubt referencing the Darkest Day. Meaning, the "Thorn" part was somehow related to Chairman Rose. At the former chairman's own request, he was still doing community service under constant surveillance for starting the Darkest Day in the middle of a packed arena. There was no way he was directly involved with the group. Unless everyone there was working with Darkest Thorn.
Hop shook his head. He wasn't getting anywhere just thinking about it. He'd have to do independent research later.
Once the train skidded into Hammerlock station, Hop bolted towards the police station.
The sliding door slammed open, "Sorry I'm 6 minutes late."
"You don't have to apologize to me." Officer Jenny said dryly while shuffling through the mountain of papers scattered around her desk.
Hop sighed while plopping down into his desk next to Officer Jenny. "Rotom, bring up the list of potential factories." The Lavender Rotom phone zipped out of his pocket. Light flowed out from the camera, forming a tangible panel of light in the air in front of Hop
"We've been looking at these factories for the past three days and we've only eliminated one." Hop let out an exasperated sigh. "I wish they would approve our search warrants so we could just bust in and see if there's any signs of Rotom Guns."
"I've asked Nurse Joy to send me a list of all suspected criminals with Rotoms."
"She's definitely going to kill you."
"I know."
As if on cue, Officer Jenny's Rotom Phone burst out from underneath a pile of papers and started shaking violently. "Riiiiiiing, zzzziiiiiing, riiiiiiiing!"
Officer Jenny pressed the accept button and scrunched up her face preparing for an outraged mouthful from the other end.
"I've sent you the list." Nurse Jenny said calmly. "By the way, congratulations on becoming a Detective I." Click.
Officer Jenny hurled a pencil across the room while cursing loudly. She blew up every time someone mentioned her recent demotion from Detective II to Detective I.
"Uhh, why don't we look at the list that Nurse Joy prepared for us."
"Fine. Rotom, open the list."
Hundreds of names flooded the screen, and the list zipped down, barely keeping up. Hop and Officer Jenny spent the next hour, painstakingly sorting the data into various different graphs.
"Ahhhh," Hop said while frantically scratching his head. "All of the graphs look the same."
"Welcome to being a detective. For the record I'm not finding anything either, wait," a graph lit up on the Rotom's screen. "Look at this, around 2 months ago there was a small spike of Rotoms in Circhester."
"Circhester? Rooms aren't native to Circhester or any of the surrounding areas, this could be something."
"Hey, don't get too excited now. I said small spike, it's probably nothing. But,"
"But?" Hop mimicked.
"It's the only lead we've got so we might as well check it out.
The train ride to Circhester was a silent one. Hop rolled his Poké Balls in his hand. He brought a battle oriented team.
He wasn't going let a repeat of last time happen.
As they stepped off the train, a rush of cold air hit them. Snow flickered unnaturally in the sky, forming small piles of snow, whitening the already monotonous reddish-brown bricks.
Hop called out three of his Pokémon. Corviknight and Cinderace shivered on the ground in front of Hop, despite their fur and feathers. On the other hand, Pincurchin sat on his shoulder, letting a small layer of greyish snow cover her. After all, she first met Hop in the waters of Circhester bay, which sent burning jolts of icy cold pain through the bodies of anyone unlucky enough to touch it.
They trudged slowly through the never-ending carpet of thick snow towards a rusty abandoned factory off of Route 9.
"Wait," Officer Jenny said while grabbing the back of Hop's Jacket. "There's no snow on the top of the roof."
"Then we have to go, and put an end to this."
"Don't be rash, you're only going to get yourself hurt… again."
"Rotom, call the Circhester police station for backup, quietly."
"Yezzip ma'am." Officer Jenny's Rotom Phone beeped softly.
"I'll take a look ahead," Hop said.
"Only look, don't you dare do anything beyond that." Officer Jenny stared at Hop with a dark complexion.
Hop and Cinderace trailed closely behind Coviknight's flying metallic body as they slowly neared the rusty building. Pincurchin had now swapped shoulders to Cinderace's.
What's that putrid acidic smell? A small fizzing noise echoed quietly off of the hollow metallic walls of the building.
Hop's hand shot towards his Poké Balls, his eyes wide and face contorted. For a moment everything was deathly silent. Hop's mouth opened, but his scream was never heard.
A giant explosion burst out of the building. Snow swirled violently around the spinning black and red mushroom of fire. The ground wailed, large chunks of shrapnel launched in every which direction, clanging against the ground.
Zamazenta's shield overflowed with reddish energy as he hurled himself into the sky, bashing into debris. Snorlax let out a deafening cry as a thin layer of metallic plating formed around his body. He thrust his fist forward, violently twisting the piece of debris flying at him, and sent it back flying in the direction it came from. From the back, Corviknight furiously beat his wings, creating a stream of air, guiding and enhancing the movements of the others.
Hop's body shuddered with the ground, sweat beaded down his forehead and a crashing feeling rattled his head. If he had called out his Pokémon a moment slower, he would've been reduced to a blotchy red corpse underneath a dark chunk of metallic shrapnel.
"Hop!" Officer Jenny screamed as loud as her lungs would permit.
Tiny ribbons of metal and swirling clouds of ash blotted out the sky. Black hot rain hammered down into the wreckage, bouncing unorderly off of metal pieces pointing in every direction.
Hop tore down the field, and jumped into the smoking debris. There had to be something left. There would be a clue somewhere. He reached down trying to move a cube of metal.
"Shit." Searing white pain burned through his now smoking flesh. Ash filled his lungs and charred the edges of the hair.
He slammed his foot against the metal over and over again until it bruised. He didn't care. With a resounding crack, the scrap flipped over, revealing heavily modified guns.
Doubling over in pain, Hop choked, trying to breathe. The edges of his clothing lit ablaze. Suddenly a large gust of wind hit him, knocking him over. Gasping, clear air filled his lungs. Corviknight squawked furiously at his reckless trainer.
"Are you trying to get yourself killed?" Officer Jenny yelled over the ruined walls.
"I found Guns Customized for Rotoms."
"What the hell are you talking about? Get back here now."
Hop reached towards the guns, but Corviknight batted his hand away with his wing. After picking up the gun with his talons, Corviknight flapped his wings, leading Hop out of the smoky mess.
"You could have died. Why do you keep doing this? If we just waited for the smoke to clear, you wouldn't have to almost die."
"Let's analyze this gun so we can get more clues," Hop said apathetically.
Wack. Officer Jenny held her outstretched palm in the air. "You can't help anyone if you're dead."
"Stop telling me what to do. You're not my superior anymore."
"It doesn't matter if I'm your superior or not, you can't just run in and kill yourself every time something happens."
"Is everything alright?" A few voices called out behind them. A patrol unit of cops rushed towards them crunching through snow.
"I'm fine," Hop called out.
"I'm taking you to the hospital whether you want me or not." Said Officer Jenny.
"What about the case?"
"Your hand is smoking. What the hell wrong with you?"
