Team Skull along with Lillie arrived at the Aether Foundation and Lusamine led them up to a secret area for them to continue on with their plans. Lusamine took the bag and instantly took Nebby and shove him into a small cage. She then gave the bag back to the grunt. "I have no use for the piplup, so go place it…"
Piplup jumped out of the bag, which made the grunts all around send out their pokemon to protect their president.
Piplup stared at them with a worried look, unsure how to get them all out of this predicament.
"Piplup? Could that mean…?" Lillie wondered.
Lusamine got everything set up. Then the cage went and shocked Nebby.
Lille watched in horror as she heard Nebby scream out in pain. "Stop it! Please, stop!"
Lusamine ignored her, and the machine stopped on its own out of power. "That was close. I'm sure we'll be able to open the wormhole with a little more push."
"Just what are you doing? You are supposed to be helping pokemon! Not harming them!" Lillie shouted.
"I am. I'm going to find the Ultra Beasts and give them my love and attention."
"And what about Nebby? This isn't helping him!"
Lusamine shrugged. "Sometimes sacrifices need to be made for the greater good."
Lillie and Piplup gasped.
"But… Nebby could die!" Lillie shouted.
"Did you really come here to lecture me?" Lusamine glared at her. "I could care less what a traitor of a daughter has to say about me!"
"You… You never cared for what I had to say!" Lillie shouted with tears in her eyes. "But this time, I am not going to let you walk all over me! Can you not see what you're doing is wrong?"
Lusamine sighed. "You just don't understand. Why can't you children just understand…"
"Stop! Stop treating me like a child!"
"You should understand your place!"
Lillie crossed her arms with a frown.
Piplup frowned as he looked over to Nebby.
"P-pew…" Nebby weakly cried out.
Lillie looked over to Nebby with a frown and wondered, "what can I do? I have to save Nebby, but mother just won't listen…" She looked over at Piplup. "And… I'm no trainer. Even if Dawn did send over her pokemon to help… it won't listen to me."
Ash slowly opened his eyes and looked around. "…Where am I?" he asked. Ash could hear a pokemon scream out in pain as a machine shocked it. "W-what was that?" Ash scrummaged around to get his pokeballs, but he couldn't find them. He didn't even have his bag or rotom dex. So he tried to break the cage he was trapped.
An Aether foundation worker turned around and laughed. "What, you think we buy cheap garbage? You ain't ever going to break that cage!"
"Just what is the big idea? Why am I here? Are you working for Guzma too?"
The guy laughed. "No way! Our president is in command, Guzma is part of our cause."
Ash glared at him as he clenched the cage. "That makes no sense! Guzma, he's… just some jerk who let's his gang of thugs do what they want!"
"None of my concern. If the president trusts him and he doesn't get in the way of helping pokemon, then I don't care."
"And what about me? Why am I locked up here?"
The guy shrugged. "Something about keeping you out of the way. We need Cosmog for our mission, and you got in the way of that."
"…For your mission?"
"Yes. And once we complete our mission and if you behave yourself, we shall let you go."
"Just what is your mission, and what does it have to do with Nebby?"
"Nebby? You mean Cosmog? I believe Lusamine plans to bring the Ultra Beast here and have them live a happy life."
Ash then remembered when he first came here with Dawn and Hau and what Lusamine said when they saw the jellyfish creature.
"It… looked like it was suffering. Like, it pained it to be in this strange place. I can't bare that! I will save it and love it!" As they were leaving, she said, "I'll have to start on the newest but most important duty yet: the protection of the Ultra Beast!"
"So Nebby, err Cosmog… can go to the Ultra Beast's dimension?"
"Of course. Cosmog come from another dimension itself, you know."
Ash gave a surprised look, but then realized something. "So… what's with the method of trying to steal Cosmog from Lillie? Why not just ask her to have it help you guys?"
The grunt laughed. "Did she not tell you anything?"
"What do you mean?"
"Cosmog is OURS. Lillie was the one who stole it from the Aether Foundation."
Ash gave a surprised look. "But, Lillie is so modest, sweet, and caring…"
"Guess she can be quite deceiving."
Ash just can't accept that. As much as Lillie cared about pokemon's well-being, there's no way she'd just steal a pokemon that'll help other pokemon without a good reason. "Let me out of here! You people have no right keeping me here!"
"No."
"I just want to see Lillie & Cosmog, and let my friends know I'm okay!"
"You can do all that once Present Lusamine's work is complete."
"Let! Me! Out!" Ash pounded on the bars again with his foot.
The grunt sighed. "You are just wasting your energy."
"Ash refused to stop. He started pounding the cage with his legs.
Pikachu slowly woke up and saw a female Aether worker.
"Oh good! You are going to be okay!"
Pikachu gave her a confused look. It was sure that he and Ash where going to recue some pokemon from Po town, but he was in the Aether Foundation preserve area.
"When you arrived here, you were in pretty bad shape. But you should be fine, as long as you get a long rest."
Pikachu's ears dropped and it made a sad sound. It figures it failed to save the pokemon.
The woman rubbed its cheeks. "Don't worry, after you recover you'll be good as new!"
Pikachu smiled and happily cheered as it was petted.
"Ah, you must be hungry!" The woman grabbed an apple and gave it to Pikachu.
Pikachu took it and happily ate it.
"Good. Now, you stay here and get your rest." She then left.
Buneary shouted at Pikachu.
Pikachu looked at her with a confused look. Then he asked her how did she ended up here.
Buneary got teary eyed, as it seemed Pikachu didn't think it anything that she risked her life for him.
Pikachu ran up to her, and tried to cheer her up. After she calmed down a bit, he asked her if she knew where Ash is, and she shook her head. Pikachu's ears drooped and it gave a worried look.
Buneary felt its strong desire to help Pikachu, so it hoped the fence and motioned Pikachu to follow.
Pikachu asked what she was doing.
But Buneary told him to never mind that and took Pikachu's hand to go and find Ash.
Dawn, Hau, and Gladion ran into the Aether foundation and took care of their grunts. Hau agreed to go along with them. He wasn't able to save Lillie alone, but he thought he could stop them with some help.
Hau turned to Gladion. "So… what's the plan?"
Gladion crossed his arms. "How should I know?"
Both Hau and Dawn sighed.
"You've got to be kidding!" Dawn shouted.
"Look, let's just head downstairs and see if we can find some clues."
They went down the elevator and took care of some more grunts. They then heard some banging going on in one of the rooms and went to check it out. Once there, they found Ash.
The guy jolted up. "What are you doing here?"
"What are you doing with Ash? Let him out!" Dawn snapped.
The grunt went to grab his pokeball.
"There's no way you're going to be able to take us on all at once," Gladion said as he, Dawn, and Hau got a pokeball ready. "Best to just get out of the way!"
The grunt went to grab his walkie talkie, but Silvally bashed it out of the grunts hands before he could call for backup and smashed went it hit the wall.
The grunt gave a panicked look. "You'll pay for this!" He then ran off to inform the others.
They looked around for a key but didn't find anything.
"That guy must have had it and we let him get away!" Hau shouted.
"Or it could be with my mother or someone else, and he was just a guard," Gladion said.
"So now how are we gonna get Ash out?"
"Easy. Just brake open the cage." Gladion had Silvally bust the gate on the cage open.
Ash slowly climbed out of the cage. "Thanks everyone."
Dawn ran into his arms. "Ash! You're okay!" He cried in his chest.
Ash closed his eyes with a frown as he embraced her. "Dawn… I'm sorry to put you through all this."
"Don't be. Ash… I'm just glad you're okay."
He held onto her tightly.
"In case you haven't noticed, we aren't done here," Gladion said.
"Come on, don't be rude man! A lot of things have happened…" Hau said.
"No, Gladion is right. We need to get to Lillie and Nebby and see what exactly is going on here!" Ash said.
Gladion crossed his arms with an annoyed look. "And we need to stop my mom from endangering a lot of lives for her own selfishness!"
They all looked at him with a surprised look.
Dawn let go of Ash and looked at Gladion. "Mother...?"
Gladion sighed. "There is no time to explain. We need to find Lillie and Cosmog quickly!" He dashed out left the room.
"I guess we should get going as well…" Hau said.
Ash and Dawn agreed. They left the room and searched the other rooms downstairs.
