"Boss, I've gained a copy of the findings of the DNA testing Magma scientists have been working on. But I am unable to simply tell you them over this, I am working on sending you a copy of the results soon. You won't believe it when you see it." The undercover Aqua agent whispered into his communications device. He heard the line die as Archie hung up. Now all he had to do was find a way to send his boss these findings, the results went on for pages upon pages upon even more pages, he had skimmed through them himself and found the entire thing unbelievable to say the least.
But it was not his job to think, just to spy. So he rose from the corner of this unused, extraordinarily messy storage room and headed out. Another grunt ran up to him. "Leader Maxie is organising a new plan, he wants all grunts to attend."
With that, the Aqua grunt ran off beside the Magma grunt, wondering what new plan Maxie had in store for his team.
"The plan remains very much the same as our previous one; we shall awaken the mighty Groudon and have it expand the land so that people can live in greater comfort. However, I will assign a small group of you to a second mission of equal importance, to ensure our success and carve it in stone." Maxie stood in front of his team, on a raised platform to look down at all his subordinates. "Ranks 15 through to 21 please join me." With that he turned and marched off. The Aqua grunt was one of the six mentioned and so followed the red-clad leader.
They entered what seemed like a meeting room, with a long table in the centre lined with many chairs. Maxie took his place at the head of the table, watching as the grunts sat themselves around him, the Aqua grunt sitting the furthest away from the leader, just in case the intelligent man saw misgiving or traitorous thoughts in his eyes.
"The mission I will assign to you six is extremely important and I will not accept failure in this. For if some reason our plans to awaken Groudon should fail we need a solid backup, something that is just as powerful as Groudon and can do our bidding as effectively." Maxie began. "Now listen closely…"
Garnet heard a metallic whirring close behind her, once she wheeled around it had vanished into the maze beyond. She heard shuffling at her feet and wondered if the others were finally waking, as fragile as they were they had been knocked into the darkness of unconsciousness. Her amethyst eyes glanced downwards, immediately seeing something wrong.
Sapphire awoke first, standing to her feet quickly, brushing off her clothes. "Where are we?" She breathed as she tried to see through the shadowy veil upon the surrounding area.
"We fell into the trapdoor, but I can tell you no more than that because I have no more information than you do." Garnet looked around her, trying to locate the lost thing.
But at that moment both Donphan and Coil-Boy woke up, the startled Pokémon beginning to wrestle with the man wearing a great amount of metal, semi-concealed within this suit Garnet assumed he had made, the handiwork was patchy in places and she could not figure out what purpose most of the buttons and switches had, they seemed to be rather useless in her opinion. The male retaliated, trying to pin Donphan down to the ground.
Garnet moved to stop them, "You two, knock it off now before I force you to." She stared over her shoulder, seeing Sapphire storm forward, an angry look on her face. "Haven't you noticed we're missing someone?" This was directed at all of them, but Sapphire glared at Garnet, as if she had hidden Wattson away.
"I'm in the process of looking for the lost item yes." She huffed before moving to a wall where she had located a switch. "But since you are not used to searching in the dark, why did you not just switch the lights on?" Her fingers flicked the switch with ease; it gave no resistance even though it was clearly decades old. To the shock of everyone standing within the underground place, the majority of the lights flickered on, a few flashing but only one or two stayed darkened.
"The lost item? He's a person not a thing!" Sapphire scoffed and made to walk past Garnet, stopping dead in her tracks when she saw the play area clearly designed for children. "What is this?" She stared at the items which looked as if they belonged in a park, swing-sets and roundabouts littered this first floor.
A call sounded from further in the emptiness of this underground place. Running footsteps skittered across the metallic floor; a green blur shot towards them as Wattson's Electrike came hurtling towards them. Garnet greeted the creature, stroking its head to calm its fears. "What happened to him, where is he?" She asked the distressed Pokémon, who gave a barking cry once then turned around, shooting into the distance once again.
The group followed quickly, passing by the desolate area intended to keep children entertained. Sapphire felt a twinge of fear bubble within her stomach, the whole place just seemed so unnatural it resonated within her very soul, going against everything she knew and loved. But despite this she soldiered onward to locate Wattson and get them all out of here safely.
Garnet was having a similar mental struggle. The smells of metal and buzz in the air from all the electricity reminded her too forcefully of her time cooped up on that island, the humming of the bright lights added to the cacophony of painful images raging within her. Though, because the Electrike needed help finding his human, she would delve deeper into this hell. A cold hand grasped her shoulder; she glanced over to see the metal claws of Titan, the Metang giving her a comforting look out of the corner of his red eyes. Garnet sighed and sent him a psychic message; 'Thank you my friend.'
"Hey, you what's your name again? Anyway, do you know what this place is?" Sapphire turned to Coil-Boy as they followed the Electrike deeper into the cold place.
"This is New Mauville. See Mauville City is heavily overpopulated, mainly with children, there are too many children so they don't all fit in the playgrounds made in Mauville for them, this place was made a long while ago to tackle the impending overpopulation. Though it was shut down due to funding issues some time ago, Wattson and I have been trying to find this place for a while now, so that we could get this place up and running so that families could move in here and Mauville wouldn't be so overpopulated," He explained to the girls.
"Great," Garnet scoffed, glancing over to him out of the corner of her amethyst eye, "Because every growing family wants to live in a subterranean artificial habitat." She rolled her eyes at the mere idea of choosing to live in such a cold environment. "I need to deal with a generator here for Rayna anyway, so let's get this over with quickly."
"You're certainly edgier than usual, what about this place has you spooked?" Sapphire smirked, wondering what had the standoffish girl so shaken. Sure this place was creepy, but it seemed so unusual to see such emotion from Garnet, who was always so guarded.
"Drop it! We're wasting time!" Garnet quickened her pace, sensing a great electrical surge nearby. "Come on!" Garnet led them around a corner of this seeming maze of metallic corridors. The four stopped, facing a giant robot. Garnet could sense an immense amount of electricity generating from this creature of walking steel. "The wayward generator…" She looked down to the Electrike and saw it glaring directly at the monstrosity, to the place where Wattson, Voltorb and Electrode were stuck to the front.
Garnet clutched on hand to her chest, she could feel the suffering of the two Electric-type Pokémon as their power was sapped from them. Sapphire looked up at the robot in front of them, trying to see a way to unplug it or turn it off, but there seemed to be any sort of indication as to how to turn it off.
They watched transfixed as the robot's hand began glowing with a ball of electricity. "What?!" The girls glanced at Coil-Boy as he frowned deeply at the robot. "That's nothing in comparison to my inventions!" He began frantically pushing buttons and flicking switches on his robotic-suit-legs. Everything shot from them, silly streamers of bright colours, shots of confetti, flags waving frantically and many other useless features. Garnet sighed as she realized her prior judgement of these things was correct, she had hoped the human would surprise her, but clearly not.
"Move out of the way buffoon!" Sapphire ran back around the corner as the robot unleashed a stream of electricity towards them. Garnet booted Coil-Boy, kicking him out of the way of the stream, when the two humans were turned away, Garnet caught the stream of electricity, she had had intentions of throwing it back at the robot, but the pleading glances from Wattson's three Pokémon changed her mind, she instead spread the power out between the two Electrike beside her, giving them a good boost of electricity.
Afterwards, the three set off hot on the heels of Sapphire and Coil-Boy. When they had fully caught up to the other two, Garnet noticed something wrong with Metang, he was dipping and swerving at odd intervals, his gliding was usually so smooth, what was wrong? She watched as both Sapphire and Coil-Boy began swaying as they ran, losing their equilibrium, almost staggering over. The Donphan was bouncing and trumpeting his call in an attempt to gain their attention. Its antics drew the gaze of both the girls, the truth clicking in both of their minds at the same time.
"This is why you've been stampeding?" Sapphire stated petting the Donphan gently; Garnet looked startled at the young girl. How did she have such a grasp on the understanding of Pokémon? She tilted her head, a half-smile on her face, this human was good.
"Of course! This robot has the ability to turn its surroundings into magnets, most likely due to the electronic power which flows through it. It has the ability to turn this whole place into a powerful electro-magnet, so strong that it even affects the balance of humans and Pokémon would be much more susceptible to the changes. Donphan has been circling the area for some time; perhaps it couldn't leave due to this magnetic pull."
"Well, now we know this, how do we beat it?" Sapphire crossed her arms and glared at the others.
"There's no way we can beat it, our Pokémon aren't strong enough and we can't even stand up straight without teetering." Coil-Boy huffed, crossing his arms, "We should just get out while we can."
"Pathetic!" Garnet spat, turning away from the male human and thinking deeply, what could the weakness of the robot be?
Sapphire whacked Garnet's arm, "Stop being so cold!" She ordered, seeing Garnet's shocked glance. "You can't give up on your friend…. um… guy! He wouldn't give up on you. You need to wrack your technological brain and find a weakness of that thing! Then we can take it down!" Sapphire's stare was sturdy and seemed to give Coil-Boy new hope.
"It's Coil-Boy," He muttered.
"Move," Garnet ordered, pushing the two out of the way of a bolt of electricity, which struck the floor where they had been standing, causing the metal flooring to burst upwards in a bright explosion.
"You could have mentioned it had caught up to us!" Sapphire challenged.
"If you had been listening you'd have noticed it, as it is you weren't paying attention and so now you're on the floor, your problem." Garnet waved her hand, smiling faintly at the irritable look on Sapphire's face, but the look died as she saw the robot and the smile she wore whenever she found a promising challenge crossed her face, a deep blue flare of determination burning bright in her eyes.
Coil-Boy sat cross-legged on the floor, pulling out a mini abacus. "Due to the calculations of the kinetic energy levels o the blast we've just witnessed…" He muttered to himself, moving many of the beads from one side to another and flicking them from one side to the other.
Garnet noted how the lights were flickering now, she could determine without any calculative device that the robot was drawing in power.
"Hit it right after it releases the energy, when it goes to absorb more power it's vulnerable!" Coil-Boy called to them.
"Fine, Electrike Rayna, with me. Sapphire, you and Donphan attack the robot and get Wattson back." She waved to the two Pokémon, leading them away from the group. The metallic monster released a great stream of electricity, curving and darting towards the two Electrike, the energy being absorbed by their Lighting Rod Ability. Garnet held up her hands, using some spare electricity still stored within her to magnetically attract both Voltorb and Electrode, knowing that those would be more difficult to pull from the robot by hand.
As the energy struck the Electrike, Sapphire charged Donphan towards the robot, perched on his back perfectly balanced on the Pokémon; she heaved Wattson up onto the Donphan before the Pokémon smashed its head into the chest of the generator robot.
The metallic beast collapsed backward, a clear dent in its chest. Was it over? Coil-Boy moved over closer to the machine to get a closer look at it. "This is a stupid machine! It's not well made, it attacks people without warning, and it was so easily defeated by one simple attack. Whoever made it was a pompous inventor with little insight into the intricacies of machinery." He kicked the robot before turning around.
Behind him the robot raised itself onto its feet. Coil-Boy, upon glancing and seeing the thing tower over him, squeaked and bolted, hiding behind Sapphire, Garnet and Donphan, Garnet found herself giggling at the behaviour, Sapphire joined in, turning the giggled into hearty laughter, to the point wither both girls had a difficult time ceasing. Coil-Boy scowled at them, but his attention was drawn away by the sight of a hatch that had fallen open on the machine, a video recording was beginning to play on the little screen. A bright red button pulsated above the screen.
"I am the one who made this machine! Dear children and grandchildren of mine, if you manage to find this place, please push the red button above and enjoy yourselves! MWAHAHAHAHAHA!" A caption appeared after the film finished, below a picture of a man who looked almost exactly like Coil-Boy, ' -This message was brought to you by genius robot man, Konkonsai'
"Well, that seems kind of creepy…" Sapphire muttered Garnet smirked towards the girl.
"More creepy than a six-foot robotic monstrosity lurking in the depths of a deserted children's play-park just to pounce on the first people to find it and attack them?"
"Somehow, yes…"
Coil-Boy stepped forward and reached out for the button, pushing it carefully. The rest of the lights flicked on and revealed the rest of the hidden scenery. A gigantic theme-park-like array of different apparatus littered the gigantic room, all geared towards the entertainment of children while keeping them safe.
The group looked around in confusion. Well, everything seemed like it was working, that gang of children would have a field-day once they saw this waiting down here for them. "I think this place has been a secret for long enough." Wattson moved towards the exit. "Oh you two, for working together to save myself and my Pokémon, I wish to present you with these Gym Badges as your resourcefulness and teamwork clearly outlines your abilities as trainers."
They accepted the badges, rather shell-shocked, glancing at one another with sceptical looks gracing their faces.
Archie's fax machine was going haywire as it printed out each and every page of the results his subordinate was sending him. He threw each page at Shelly once it had been printed as he couldn't deal with the pace it was working at.
"There, that's it all!" He growled at her when he threw her the last of the pages. "Look through it would you? Let me know what it all means, ya're sciencier than me." He turned to walk out of the room, wanting to know all the secrets that Maxie had uncovered.
(Many Years Ago)
"This storm is unnatural; I can feel a great power at the eye of this storm. Why does it feel familiar to me?" She stood on the edge of a cliff, looking out towards that island. Her old friends had gathered around her, she glanced over to them all. "Are you sure you all want to follow me there? I won't force you to return…" They all shouted her down, wanting to support her in her endeavour. "Alright, well, um… Let's go!"
Her feet left the floor - her arms spread out wide - her partners were supported by her psychic power it looked as if all seven of them were flying along the cloud-ridden skies. Rain poured down, forks of lightening framed their profile through the sky.
Every inch of her screamed to turn back, but she simply carried on, swallowing her fears and pushing through the pain of the past. She needed to learn the answers she sought. Who exactly was she? Who was the one who had started this storm? Why had Mew flown off this way? And who was Mew exactly? What relationship did she have to him?
Hopefully, everything would be revealed once she reached that island…
PhantomGalaxy13: Thanks once again for your review! It's so intriguing to see your thoughts on the chapters as I post them! It just great seeing a second opinion on things as they stand. Even thought it's far away now, the ending is what is bothering me the most, how to write things and what to include as I have so many ideas but I'm unsure what will and will not work, I'll simply have to figure it out as i go! There's still much to go before then! :D Hope you enjoyed this chapter and thank you so much for all your expert help and information on the events in New Mauville! -Iris