An Altered Journey Chapter 6:

Mercury woke in his quarters at 0400 hours sharp. He woke up slowly, taking his time. The admin walked over to his desk, seeing a folder on it. He opened it, reading the mission debriefing. Mercury, along with Venus, were to go to the Old Chateau and find some ghost types. Seemed something a lowly grunt would be assigned, but he went with it. He read thoroughly about the section of the Plasma Pokemon, Rotom. Charon had supposedly seen one there a few years ago, but it wasn't captured and there had only been one other sighting, that being in the Unova region. His further studies showed evidence of multiple of these Pokemon existing. As he was preparing to leave, Venus opened the door.

"Heya. You gonna be moving? We need to get there while there is as little light as possible, so we're not spotted getting there. It'll cause less hassle" She said, arrogantly and nicely both at the same time.

"I'm ready" Mercury replied. He seemed well prepared. They began to walk into the main corridor. They headed out by several buildings, into the lush forest of Eterna. They were completely unnoticed by the public, as there were public members awake at this time.

"What Pokemon do you have?" Venus asked Mercury.

"Just the Larvitar" He responded. Venus giggled.

"You'd be such an easy opponent, but we're working together so no need to weaken it" She teased.

"He's got me this far, hasn't he!" Mercury declared. Venus thought about this for a second. Mercury had only thought it had got that far though, but she didn't now that. They then approached the mouldy doors of the abandoned estate.

"Anyway, here we are. Let's get in". He then pushed open the pair of doors with a sharp kick. Venus called out her Emboar to provide light by using Ember on a Chandelier. The now-illuminated lobby of the mansion was almost empty, containing a few cobwebs and Rattatas roaming around.

"Let's split up. Then we comb the place for good pokemon quicker" Mercury suggested.

"Sure, whatever gets you out of my hair the fastest" Venus commented sarcastically. She then burst into laughter. They both appreciated each other's company, although neither would want to be the first to admit it. They walked into rooms on the opposite side of the Mansion. The search for pokemon the duo could use began, and it would not end for hours.

Eclipse paced himself back and forth across the room. He was extremely worried for Colin, but knew he couldn't barge in stupidly like he and Barry did. The group felt worried, but none was so suffering so severely was Barry. He had blamed the entire ordeal on himself, and he was going through a lot of mental stress, thinking he had possibly caused his friend's capture and possible torture. Barry's hair had undergone a slight change. His blond locks of hair remained normal, except for a few, which had turned white because of the stress. Lucas had been trying to comfort him all day, but to no avail. Dawn was upset, but also motivated to train on, as she knew it would be what Colin would want them to do. She and Eclipse, as well as their pokemon, went to train in the forest, the very same one the Team Galactic Administrators had passed through a few hours previously. As her Prinplup and Eclispe's Scarecrow battled, an Absol had crept up and watched, laying down. It seemed lonely and bored. The Slurpuff Dawn was caring for waddled over to it; Absol tried to turn away at first, but then realised it was was holding out a Sitrus Berry to her. The Absol munched down on the berry, as though it was starving and hadn't eaten in weeks. Eclipse noticed it, stopped the battling and came over to it. He sat next to the Disaster Pokemon. He noticed something to differentiate this Absol to others he had seen. This one had red skin underneath it's fur, instead of the more common black, and it's eyes were a pale aqua. Dawn then asked Eclipse if he wanted her to call Professor Rowan about it. Eclipse then spotted about eight different pairs of red eyes, hidden within the lush bush of the forest.

"Maybe later, because look" He called. The owners of the eyes stepped forward, revealing themselves to be other Absols. An intense argument broke out:

(I'll make it translated so it's easy to follow and not just a bunch of growls and barks)

"Hey look! It's the redhead!" One of the Absols barked. The others chuckled.

"My whole body's red, so that doesn't work!" The red one growled back. The one who teased the red one didn't look as clever, and was beginning to be a bit ticked off. Then Prinplup, Scarecrow and Slurpuff stood by Absol, taking her side, much to her surprise.

"Go away!" yelled Slurpuff. Then suddenly, all of the two trainer's Pokemon non-presented jumped out of their pokeballs.

"Leave her alone!" Leafeon backed up. He stood and stared opposite to the one on the very left.

"You're just jealous of her elegance!" Noctowl hooted. The horde of Absol crept backwards, slowly.

"Let's get out of here!" one yelled. The pack of disaster Pokemon fled, not liking their chances of winning a fight. The red Absol sighed with relief.

"Thanks!" She exclaimed, extremely bewildered by the fact that they helped her.

(Translation off)

To the two trainers, it looked like a fight was about to break out, but didn't.

The Absol came over to Eclipse, and nudged his bag. He pulled out a pokeball, and she taped the button the middle with her foremost right leg. The ball then shot out a beam of red light, containing Absol. It shook once, then twice, and then a third time. A little 'ding' noise was echoed from the back of the rounded capsule. Eclipse smiled.

"Karma" He muttered.

"Pardon?" Dawn questioned. She hadn't heard him clearly.

"Karma. That's what I'm calling her" He said, clearer and louder than before.

"Oh. Cool" She replied. She then pulled out her phone and texted a message. Almost within an instant she had a response.

"Apparently, red skin and aqua eyes are the signs of a shiny Absol" Dawn read aloud from her phone.

"Shiny?" Eclipse asked, partially confused.

"Sorry, a shiny Pokemon, by definition, is a pokemon that is born with a colour/color deficiency, often severely changing the colour/color palet of one's appearance" She read aloud again.

"Interesting. Now let's keep on training our Pokemon" He replied. The two smiled at each other, and began to instruct their pokemon on what to do.

Meanwhile, the galactic duo had regrouped in the lobby. The time was 5:00pm and they began a mission recap.

"What did you find?" Mercury asked.

"Oh, just a Crobat and Zoroark for myself, as well as four Zubats for some grunts" She responded.

"How 'bout you?"

"A Reuniclus, a Lampent, as well a special… something for Charon" He answered.

"No way?"

"Yup, I found that Rotom the old geezer found years back" He confirmed. Venus laughed.

"He's an old geezer, but don't ever address him that way. He's rather shady and I don't wanna find out why. Also, you gotta gimme some credit when we report in; we weren't supposed to split up, it was in the mission briefing and people have gone missing when they did: we were lucky" She said. Mecury rolled his eyes. He sighed before saying:

"Fine". Venus smirked.

"Let's head back to base; I wanna see if they have any dusk stones or tm's in stock" Mercury said. He began to walk out, tossing a dusk ball up, before catching it again, over and over. Venus followed behind, and discussed their findings. They began to talk about Mercury's Lampent before they were spotted by Dawn and Eclipse:

"Hey you!" Eclipse barked, ramming Mercury into a tree. Mercury threw the dusk ball he was holding onto the ground, releasing the newly caught Lampent.

"Let me go or you'll feel the pain of Lampent's wisps" Mercury gritted through his teeth. Eclipse let go of his grasp on Mercury, Grabbing his own pokeball, sending out Karma.

"Karma, engage battle with Lampent, Play Rough!" Eclipse called out. His opponent smirked.

"Not very effective, is it? Lampent, return the favour with a Heat Wave" Mercury responded, overconfidentIy. The Disaster Pokemon charged at Lampent, whilst the Lamp Pokemon (another underwhelming Dex entry) sent a barrier of flames towards the opponent. The heat drove Karma back, completely unburnt. Mercury yawned.

"I don't really have patience for this" He said, completely bored somehow.

"Venus, why don't we teleport back to base?"

"Sounds good enough for me" She said.

"Oh, hell no, you aren't leaving" Eclipse muttered. But it was too late. Mercury had recalled Lampent, and used Reuniclus to teleport them away.

"Sh*t. That could have been a chance to get information about Colin's … wellbeing" Eclipse groaned, slumping down.

"Yeah. Coincidentally, he kinda looked like Colin, but he had a different eye and hair colour/color" Dawn said, tired by the events of that day of training.

"Not helping. Let's head back" He sighed, also tired.

The two returned to Barry and Colin, in the apartment they had stayed at before. Barry was feeling slightly better, but still was in a bit of shock. Dawn told them what happened in the forest, and they were alarmed about the entire Galactic run-in. She tried to reassure Barry that it was brief, and non-important, but Barry was still anxious, and this made him feel more uncomfortable. The group calmed him, by reminding him that the meeting of the league was tomorrow and they could help them rescue Colin.

Mercury and Venus reported in on their mission to Cyrus later that evening. When Venus described the trainer that attacked Merucry, his eyes widened. He didn't need Mercury remembering who he was by the other teens intervening. Cyrus then gave the duo a new assignment for the next day. They were to check a shipment of items and Pokemon, so there were no possible dangers (e.g explosives or intruders). They were then to distribute the Pokemon to the grunts that ordered them. They were to later escort a briefcase of rarer items to the vaults underneath the base. The items were: The three creational orbs, a Lunar Wing and a Magma stone. These had to be kept under lock and key, as they would be useful in Cyrus' plan.

The two admins then went their own ways. Before heading back to his quarters, Mercury decided to stop by Charon's lab. As he knocked on the door, he called out:

"It's Mercury!"

"Come in," Charon responded with a tone of boredom in his voice. The orange haired admin walked in, closing the door behind him.

"What do you want?"

"Nothing, I've picked up something from the Old Chateau and thought you might want it" He continued. Charon eyed him, as if he were staring at a piece of art. Mercury handed him the pokeball.

"What is it?"

"Something you lost" He replied. Charon threw the pokeball on the ground, sending out the Rotom. It looked around the room, reacting to the change of scenery. Charon's face lit up like he had witnessed fireworks at Parfum Palace.

"Thank you, Col—I mean Mercury" He stammered.

"Anything you need?" Charon added.

"Not at the moment, but do you know if I could get a Noivern shipped in at some point? I could use one" Mercury replied.

"Ok, I'll let our field grunts know to keep an eye out for one"

"Thanks, goodnight". Mercury walked out of the room with no further continuation of the discussion. He had a small smile on his face, as he walked into his quarters.


Heya! Sorry for not uploading sooner! Hope you're enjoying the story, and are having a good day. I'm gonna make the next chapter more interesting than it sounds, so keep an eye out for that. I want you guys (and gals) to send me some story ideas so I can work on another than this. I tried to start writing another, but it was too bad and caused me to cringe, hence it was discontinued before I wrote two pages of the stuff. Have a good one, the Weavilist is out.

Extra:

How many of you actually checked out TheRoyalSerperior? I wanna know, even if you didn't! He made Eclipse's OC; if I didn't menition it before, I have now!