This chapter's a little short, but it's got a lot of stuff to think about. A lot of exposition, too, and maybe some secrets come out.

KedharS: Nope? Actually, it's more like "yes please, more of that." She's just not one for an actual relationship.

Aquahaze675: …Yeah, definitely not intentional at all…

Hellraisephoenix: We'll get to check up on a few characters, certainly.

Thunder Fire: Maybe one or two. Maybe the entire chapter focuses on one, who can say?

JoshGamerV: As usual, messing things up.

Pokemon Academy: Beginning of Beginnings

Chapter 373

"I'm gonna get something to eat," Sango said. Blake and Cynthia stared at her and shook their heads. "…What?"

"She didn't make it five minutes," Cynthia said, holding her hand out to Blake. Blake grumbled and took out his wallet, pulling out a few bills and handing them to the redhead, who gleefully snatched them away.

"You guys suck!" Sango scowled, storming off in a huff.

"Blake Harker."

Blake turned to see a girl come up to speak with him, one of the last girls he expected. Darla Drake wasn't in "work" mode but she still looked as much of a cool beauty as ever, wearing a dark blue dress with black ruffles on the sleeves and over her shoulder.

"You're…" Cynthia gasped.

"Darla Drake," Darla said, putting on a fake "professional" smile as she greeted the girl, but her attention was still on Blake.

"I was wondering if I could speak to you?" She asked, turning back to him. "In private?"

Blake glanced at the girl, then back to Cynthia, who was nodding her head eagerly.

"How often do you get to hang with an idol?" Cynthia asked, her eyes shining with excitement. She gave him a thumbs up.

"…Yeah, sure," Blake agreed. She said goodbye to Cynthia, but when he turned to Serefina to wish her his best, she just stared at him with glazed-over eyes and muttered something.

Darla led him through the crowd of people and out onto the balcony, where a few people were hanging out and chatting.

"Whoa, Darla."

"It's Darla."

"Hey there!" Darla grinned, giving them a cool smile. "How's your evening going?"

One of the girls blushed, clearly excited that her idol was talking to her. Apparently, not everyone was close enough to the inner circle to get face time with the idol.

"I need to have a chat with my buddy here," Darla said. "You don't mind giving us the balcony, do you?"

"S-sure!" A guy said, nodding eagerly. The balcony cleared out in record time.

"Okay, good," Darla said, clearing her throat. She walked away from Blake.

"You go over there," she said, pointing to a spot several feet away. Blake stared at her, confused. She scowled at him.

"We have to stay 10 feet apart at all times, and no facing each other. Just look out past the balcony, and I'll face this way."

"This is… what?"

"Oh, I'm sorry, did you WANT Dakota Evans to get a picture of the two of us sharing a private moment on the balcony at girlfriend's birthday party?" Darla snidely remarked. "'Sure Darla, who gives a fuck about your reputation I'll gladly create a huge scandal' the fuck with that shit."

She raised a good point. Blake obeyed.

"Anyway…"

"Listen, Darla, if this is, like, a love confession, I already have Aya," Blake cut her off, glancing back at her. "So if you're another girl trying to confess to me, let's just stop, okay?"

"…What kind of life do you lead?" Darla asked, raising her eyebrow incredulously.

"Never mind," Blake sighed in relief.

"I ain't interested," Darla replied. "For the record, I don't even get what Toujou sees in you, if I'm being honest."

"Rude."

"You're just some guy. Now, your brother? He's not bad, but you're just… some guy." She shrugged, staring out into the night, looking over the white campus.

"So what do you want, then?" Blake asked. "I don't think you and I have a lot in common to really talk about. Is it about Sarah? Because she's been-"

"Not about that," Darla said, waving her hand dismissively. Even staring at the back of her head, Blake could imagine her eyes rolling.

"Then what."

Darla let out a long sigh.

"If I asked you about 'Oracles', what do you think that would mean?" Darla quietly asked. She let that statement hang in the air.

Blake stared at her, stunned. Did she… did she mean what he thought she meant?

"You're not far enough away to have missed what I just said," Darla continued. "Oracle. You know what Oracles are, don't you?"

"…Why?" Blake asked.

"Because this is something important, that's why," Darla replied. "Blake, I don't think you understand what we're dealing with here."

"…Can you tell me what you know?" Blake asked. "Sorry if I'm a little worried and suspicious about what's going on here, but this is something important and I'm not sure if I can trust you."

"Same to you," Darla said. "But I'm reaching out to you, so I suppose I trust you a little more than you trust me. Fine."

She let out another long sigh, reaching back and running her hand through her hair.

"According to my people, the Oracles are fragments of energy," Darla said. "They are the compressed power shards of power of a certain pokemon that fell from the heavens. That's probably just a legend, though. Who knows where they come from, or what they really are. Just like people imagining that the sun was a god, humans like us love to make stories about things we don't understand."

Blake understood that line of thought all too well.

"I'm from the Hoenn Region originally," Darla said. "My people are the Draconid people. We worship a great dragon of the sky, and we keep track of ancient legends. That's how I know for sure what I'm talking about."

She turned to Blake.

"In my village… we have an Oracle that we worship as a sacred deity," Darla revealed to him. "We're secluded and well-defended, and we've protected it since it fell from the sky into our village."

"There was another Oracle in Hoenn," Blake revealed. "A crimson crystal in Mt. Chimney."

"I know," Darla said. "I've heard the stories. One in a volcano, one in the depths of the ocean, and the one in my village. Those are the ones we've heard of in my village. My grandfather… he believes that they exist all over the world."

"I've seen others," Blake admitted.

"Then do you know of their powers?" Darla asked.

"Powers? No, I mean… I know people think they have powers, but…"

"The one in my village is a powerful sphere. It grants power to dragon pokemon that are near it."

"Seriously?" Blake asked, surprised.

"Just dragons. No other type of pokemon," Darla explained. "So tell me, what do you think that means? Knowing what you know about the Oracles?"

"Do you think…" Blake gasped, understanding what she was implying. "There's an Oracle for each type of pokemon?"

"An Oracle for Dragons," Darla said. "One for Fire. One for Water. Those are what the legends from my village say. These Oracles heighten the power of certain types of pokemon. Which means we can then assume that for each type of pokemon… there is an Oracle that exists for that type. At least, that's what the elders of my village believe."

"…So why are you telling me this?" Blake asked. "How did you hear about this? Why do you even care, anyway? What's your stake in this, Darla?"

"I've known about the Oracles for a while. I just didn't give much care about them until recently. Until I heard… that you were involved with them."

"Heard? Heard from who?" Blake demanded.

"The boss, Olivia," Darla said. "She mentioned it a while back. That there were these things called 'Oracles' and that you were involved with them somehow. When I heard that, I began to get suspicious that you were really involved after all."

Did Blake mention the Oracles to Olivia? He might have, he didn't remember. Or maybe someone else did, either way, the important thing was that Darla was talking to him about it right now, and she clearly knew stuff that he didn't.

"So why did you talk to me then?" Blake asked.

"…My grandfather contacted me," Darla said. "It was surprising, because technically, I'm an outcast from my village. So why would he be speaking to me? I abandoned my duties as a priestess, after all. He told me that the Oracles in both Mt. Chimney and the Undersea Cave had been taken, and he was worried that the Oracle in my village was going to be taken. It was a last-ditch desperate plea for me to return home, but… absolutely not."

"You're… you're an outcast from your village?" Blake asked. Darla nodded.

"My duty to the Draconid people was to become their high priestess. People don't tend to look kindly on their high priestess becoming a pop idol," She ruefully laughed. "So when I told him I was leaving, I severed my ties completely. And now, here I am."

"So you wanted to warn me?"

"I heard that people were trying to collect them," Darla said. "All I know about it is you. So if you know anyone that could make use of this…"

She sighed.

"But not your brother."

"Huh?" Blake asked, surprised.

"I don't trust him," she replied. "I don't like him, I don't trust him. Maybe you do, and that's fine. But I won't. Trust. Him."

She turned back to Blake.

"I shouldn't even be telling you, to be honest," she admitted. "But… the Empress trusts you. And clearly, Ayame Toujou trusts you. So maybe you aren't such a bad guy. So I'm going to trust you, too. And hope that you'll keep the secret of my village a secret. The Draconid are rumor and legend, technically we don't exist. You won't find our village on any map, but I can take you there. But I won't. Because I don't trust even you that much. Just know that the Dragon Oracle… it's safe. Or at least it should be safe. But you better not tell anyone I told you this, understand?"

"You… don't trust my brother?" Blake asked, a little surprised. "Because the way that you were acting around him, I thought-"

"That's a performance," Darla scoffed, turning and looking out over the railing. "The cool idol fawning over the pokemon master. Nothing about me is real, it's all just theater. The only thing that's real… is Lila. I want to keep her safe. She's the only reason."

"Lila? What does Lila have to do with this?" Blake asked.

"When we joined the Empress, we did so for our success as idols. Ever since we were children, it's been our dream to perform onstage for adoring fans. But that required the Empress's connections. So we joined with her. But the thing is…"

Darla sighed again. She'd been doing that a lot.

"You can't tell the Empress that I told you this. And you can't tell Ayame, either."

"Tell me what?" Blake asked. "What can't I tell her?"

"The Phantom is searching for the Oracles," Darla replied.

Blake gasped. For a brief moment, he considered the notion that the Phantom was associated with the Children of the Oracles. It was… it was possible.

"The Empress learned about this a few weeks ago," Darla said. "But she didn't want to tell you. Not even Ayame knows. That's why I'm telling you."

"But if Olivia said not to-"

"If Olivia didn't tell Ayame, then that means she was afraid that Ayame would tell you. If she's that concerned, then that means it's because she doesn't trust you to do something crazy and stupid. And if you do end up doing something crazy and stupid, I want to hear it from you, first. I don't want you to learn about this… another way."

Darla turned back to Blake.

"I heard this from Sylvia Driscoll, after all."

Blake scowled.

"She pulled me aside and 'just so happened' to mention it. Told me I should bring it up with the Empress. Since the Empress doesn't want to let you know that the Phantom is searching for the Oracles, I suspect that Driscoll might tell you herself to try and goad you into doing something stupid. And if you do, with your association to our group, you could start a war. And that could end up getting Lila hurt. Understand?"

Blake was putting the pieces together. Sylvia told Darla. Darla told Olivia. Olivia didn't want to tell him or Ayame, out of fear that Blake would jump to exactly the conclusion he just had: the Phantom, Richard Valon, was connected to the Children of the Oracles, and thus to Blake's little sister. She was one of the few people who knew about his sister's circumstances thanks to Ayame. So she was probably concerned he'd go in guns blazing and demand to know where his sister was, and that recklessness could really start something he wasn't prepared for.

It was a reasonable fear, he had to admit. Even now, Blake was considering doing exactly that. But he wasn't going to do something so stupid.

Darla had come to him, told him all this, because she was afraid she'd get dragged into the mess. She was probably sharing this information with him because she was worried, herself, about her village and whatever it was the Phantom was planning. Blake wondered if she knew about the Children of the Oracles.

"Don't worry. I won't do anything reckless," Blake assured her. "It's just… there's some important stuff for me tied up with the Oracles. Olivia was keeping it from me for a good reason, but I appreciate you for telling me the truth."

"As long as everything is fine with Lila, I don't care," Darla informed him. "Lila, and I guess my village. So if you're panicked, or worried, well… my village is a closely-guarded secret."

Blake didn't have the heart to tell her that the Children of the Oracles had been able to find the locations of multiple other Oracles through means he didn't know.

"Are… are you sure?" Blake asked. "If you're that concerned, then maybe you should get in contact with your village, or contact the pokemon rangers-"

"No," Darla said, shaking her head. "Never going to happen. Exposure is the absolute worst thing for my people. I only told you because I thought I could trust you to keep your mouth shut. Please don't break that trust I placed in you."

"You didn't have to tell me about your village, you know," Blake said. "You could have just told me what Sylvia told you, you know."

"I know," Darla said. "But… it's important that you knew everything. Everything about the Oracles. I don't know why you're looking for them, or what you hope to use them for-"

"I don't," Blake interrupted. "I don't have any use for them, not… not really."

That was true at least. He'd given the Oracle he'd found in Galar to that archaeologist, Kate. At the very least, she was Sango's soon-to-be step-mom, and that made her someone he could trust.

"Then why?" Darla asked, confused. "I thought you were collecting them, that's why-"

"I just want to keep them safe," Blake asserted. "Dangerous people are looking for them. I don't know why, maybe for the same reason as the Phantom is. Assuming he really is."

"You think Sylvia is lying?"

"It's what she does."

"…Makes sense," Darla agreed after a pause to consider it. "The Empress certainly believes it, at any rate. And your brother, well… in my opinion, he's one of the 'dangerous people' looking for those Oracles. So I wouldn't trust him either, if I were you."

"…Why not?" Blake asked. "You said you don't trust him, but-"

"Harmonia and the Oracles," Darla said. "Our people fear those two things. The union of people and pokemon, the Oracle that strengthens it… think of it like the equivalent of our Mayan Calendar."

"What?"

"When all the Oracles are gathered together, bad things will happen," Darla said. "That's all I know. That, and those with harmonia are able to see Oracles, hear them… I can't really explain it. All I know is that there's certainly a connection between the two of them."

Blake nodded. He had picked up on that, too.

"That's all I had to say. If I get more news on the Oracles, then I'll share it with you. And… if you get more news, please, can you share it with me? Anything will help. I know you aren't… technically allied with us, and the Empress has taken a lot of care to make sure that you can enjoy your school life without having to be draw into our politics, but…" Darla looked into the ballroom at the bustle of the party. "I just want to keep my friend safe. This whole Oracle mess, I'm the one who dragged her into it. I'm the one who wanted us to join the Empress, and it's my people who are getting involved. So I know you don't have a responsibility or obligation, but… I would appreciate if you let me know anything, okay?"

She reached into her purse and took out a pad of paper, writing something down on it. She walked over and handed it to him.

"That's my number," she said, giving him a wink. "An idol's private phone number, Blake, what a rarity. Treasure it well~"

She walked back towards the party, before stopping and looking over her shoulder.

"Oh, and enjoy the party, Blake."

Blake nodded and followed her inside.

"Daaarlaa!"

Darla was immediately caught in a big hug by Lila, who wrapped her arms tightly around her, practically in tears. Her white dress was surprisingly unstained, though her face was not.

"Are you drunk?" Darla scowled, keeping a vigilant eye out for Dakota.

"…Li'l bit," Lila hiccupped, standing up straight. Darla rolled her eyes.

"I was lonely!" She whined, leaning over and glomping her again. "You were gone!"

"Yeah, yeah, don't worry," Darla laughed, patting Lila on the back of the head, helping her find a chair to sit down in. "I'm always gonna be looking out for you."

"You're the besht," Lila slurred, maybe due to the alcohol and maybe due to her "cutesy" affect. As she walked Lila over to sit down, the wheels were already turning in Darla's head to figure out how she would spin this. Couldn't have Lila look like she was drunk. Better to just play it off as Lila being her enthusiastic and bubbly self. Yeah, that could work.

Darla glanced over her shoulder at Blake, who gave her a nod in return. He understood what it meant to have someone important to look after and want to keep safe. He'd gotten to know Darla a little better, and hopefully she'd be a good ally for him.

"Everyone!" Olivia's voice called out from the center of the ballroom, drawing all eyes onto her. "Now presenting, the star of the evening, Ayame Toujou!"

Speaking of important people to look after, there she was right now.

So Blake gets a new ally from an unexpected place! Darla lets a little bit of the mask slip, and we get to learn a bit more about her, and the Oracles!