Drums of War
Matthew Vixen blinked as the pink glow from Mew's teleport faded; he was in the bridge of the luxury liner S.S. Legendary, beside him are Ethan Vixen, an Umbreon Hybrid, dressed in a black robe with a gold yellow silk trim to it. On the other side of Matthew Vixen, was Becky Sparks. Now Matthew and Becky were or are Ninetales Morphs. They all looked over the lake that they had been teleported into.
"I would never think that I would be on Ninetales Reservoir like this in a million years." Becky said with a shake of her head, sending strands of her gold hair flying a little.
Matthew was holding the steering wheel as if he was the one controlling the movement, even though they were in the middle of the lake, which was surprisingly deep enough to hold an old Ocean liner. Of course the strangest sight must have been the boaters and fishers that were their in the early morning hours. The lake was shrouded in mist, but nothing could really hide first a blinking pink flash of light, and then the looming black shadow of an ocean liner in the middle of a mountain lake.
One of the Officers, not a Jenny, was making his rounds when he was stopped on the beach and boat launch, rooted to his spot as he saw the mammoth ship in the water. He slowly raised his radio and spoke into it. "Uh… dispatch… I don't think we have a code for this… but you got to send out someone…. Either someone has pulled the biggest hoax in all the history of our village… or we have an Ocean Liner in our lake."
"Come again Frank, what's in our lake?" the female voice called back, "You better not pull my leg, because if it isn't you, it is the other grave yard shift officer, between you, I would say that…."
"Renee I am not joking, you better get anyone you can… we have an honest to goodness Ocean Liner out here… Pronto, understand?" With that Frank cut off his communication and sat on a park bench and waited. Not five minutes later he heard the sirens of a Police Car coming up the road. He smiled and got up only to have his smile drop a little. Why are the Vixen's coming here? This doesn't concern the mail, or their property.
However by the time these thoughts crossed the officer's mind the car had stopped and the two adults. Timothy Vixen and Renard Vixen stepped out of the car they right away looked out to sea and only blinked.
"I'll be… you weren't joking… that is a ship… an old one if I remember all those books Matthew left around the house, I was always picking them up after him." Mrs. Vixen said with a blank look. She almost looked like she didn't believe what she was seeing.
"Now, now, I am sure he will be safe and sound… I mean, he has some good blood in his veins, along with some good and loyal Pokemon, I mean, did you see the way that Flareon attacked that tree when we came home?" Tim said this gently as he gently wrapped his arm around the shoulder of his wife.
However the officer a Sergeant by the rank on his shoulder patch only cleared his throat. "Fine, fine, but let's get to the dock… we should have some of the water patrol coming…." His words were interrupted as truck with a small black boat with the VVPD on the bow. The driver waved and everyone got onto the side of the road as the driver back up, turned the vehicle around, so that the boat was facing the water and then he set the brake before getting out.
She whistled as she looked at the shadow out in the early morning mist that was clinging to the lake's surface. "I'll be, when dispatched called me out here to bring you the boat, and mentioned something big out in the lake, I didn't think they meant big… big. But there it is the biggest big to ever come to our small reservoir."
Most everyone was use to her speaking that was on the force, but a few men who were pulling a boat out of the water laughed a little at the understatement she had just made…. Yet it described the situation perfectly.
The sergeant looked flustered. "Look we are wasting time… we cannot just gab all day when who knows what might be on that ship… we could be in a heap of trouble. For all we know… it could be crawling with Team Rocket spies ready to take us over."
Timothy only looked at the Sergeant. "Now Sam, I am sure that we would have been attacked already, but yes, we should move out."
During this argument, another officers, who was sitting in the passenger seat of the pick up was talking on a video phone that was mounted to a car computer used by the police force. "That's right Chuck… a ship… I'll send you the name if I can get it, so you better fire up that fancy database you have." He then blinked, "What were you doing up at this hour anyway? You were helping with the loss communication with Cinnabar last night… do you even sleep?"
"No Charles. I didn't sleep last night, in fact you called me when I was finished sending my report to the office. But now, you have me wide awake again… a mystery ship… I sure wish Matthew was here, from what I hear from his mother he is a ship expert."
"Not expert, historian" Reynard said with a smirk as she passed the window, "He wouldn't know the tonnage or weight of a vessel." She then moved to unclip another rope that was securing the boat.
"Well, I stand corrected." Chuck said with a laugh, he was thin and looked to be in every sense a book worm. Thin, always a book in his hands and owlish looking eyes. "Anyway, you better get to helping and stop chatting with me." The screen went black.
Charles only sighed and opened the side door with a little force, and jumped down. He was five foot even, so it was a little hard not to jump from a two foot high frame.
Within five more minutes the driver, dive expert Elizabeth, had the boat all ready and floating in the water. "Okay, shake a tail everyone, we got a ship to raid." She then went into the main cabin and sat down to pilot the ship.
The others only looked at each other with a strange look in their eyes. But they hurried when they heard the engine start up, and soon they had thrown their gear into the back of the ship.
At the last minute two other figures came running and jumping into the ship, they were wearing deputy uniforms.
"Thought you would go for an adventure without us?" The female asked with a false sound of being hurt. "Then you must ready yourselves…" She blinked at the groans that emitted from everyone. "What? I gave up the motto, I only use it for rule breakers now."
"We know Violet… but we could not help it. You said it when you got ready to garden, paint the new house on Tenth Street. But now… anyway welcome aboard… we are heading out to that… thing." Timothy said while pointing at the ship, the sun was now just beginning to burn the mist off the lake.
"Great Violet, this better not be a repeat of that Beedrill nest that was in the backwoods." A male said with a sigh, even though they had served a day in the city jail… they had reformed and were trying to work out their debt to the city.
"Don't get so worked up Garth… We are good guys now… and nothing bad should happen to us." Violet said with a laugh.
"But what if Team Rocket is on board? What then?" Garth said back, looking like he was trying to work out all things that could go wrong.
"Then we fight, we are with a police group are we not? Along with Reynard and Timothy Vixen, two retired Pokemon Trainers." She sounded confident but her eyes showed uncertainty. They had trained their own Pokemon on the Police grounds but it had only been two months at tops since they had come here seeking asylum from that insane black Ninetales.
During this small fight of words the ship continued onward. "Isn't it nice to see two people get along so nicely?" Elizabeth said with a grin, she sounded so sincere that everyone else including Violet and Garth fell over… but it could have been that she also plowed over a somewhat strong wave.
"What?" Charles muttered. "Was that?" He looked around almost fearful of them hitting a rock.
"Oh, just waves from the Propellers that were spinning but stopped…. They are creating a lot of waves." Elizabeth said again… "They also dropped both their anchors, I think that whoever they are, they plan on staying for a while.
Meanwhile on the ship, a small boy, who looked more like a Rattata was watching the incoming vessel and right away moved from the life boat he was hiding in and scampered off to the direction of the bridge, to tell the group what he had just seen. Within moments, anyone that might have been heading to the top deck were ordered back, and the bridge was evacuated, they too were unsure of what would happen next, so they decided to hide.
Due to wisps of fog still on the lake it was still difficult to discern anything of noteworthy facts… but Charles was once again in contact with Chuck.
"Well, from what you are telling me, that dates the ship back a few decades… back to when people crossed the sea for trips and moving, instead of just being on a ship for the heck of it." Chuck said from the Video Phone.
"Wait… you're telling me, that we have a ghost ship out… wait, yes I saw it, and I saw that blasted name you were telling me to look for." Charles snarled he wasn't that too in shape for the ocean, if anything he was getting seasick.
"Well, spill it, what name is it? I got six different ship manifests from the Major Shipping companies that were in Passenger service that could afford such size." Chuck called back, only he was yelling in eagerness. Not anger.
"L. E. G. E. N. D. A. R. Y. That's strange…. Legendary, what kind of name is that?" Charles commented as he put the letters together, he was not too big on history. "It's almost like a group not a name."
Chuck was only waiting for Charles to finish; his face was not looking at the screen. "The Ship was built at the Hoenn Mightyena Shipyard… for the Pokemon Master Ship Line. She was to be their appeasement and nod to tradition towards the legendaries to allow the company to flourish. The ship was tested, and sent on her Maiden Voyage, it was success and she sailed for a totally of fifty seasons between Jhoto, Kano, and her home port of Hoenn. But times grew tough and they tried to sell her to museums, but in a twist of fate, a scraping company bought her and planed to tear her apart, you see she was the last of the legendary ships to…" Chuck was interrupted by Charles.
"Enough with the history lesson… is it dangerous? Will it kill us if we go aboard?" Strange questions from someone who was rediscovering such a rich ship, but he most likely didn't care about what was the past, just the present.
"Well," Chuck started clearly disappointed at not being able to speak all he wanted to. "It seems that the ship would be safe, in fact, it may be the home to some of the Pokemon it honors."
"Oh please," Charles said with a groan. "No more of your hobby on business hours… you are being paid for this." But he was interrupted, not by Chuck, but by Timothy.
"You better wrap it up in here, we found a good place to board… now, just don't get trigger happy, I don't want you to scare anyone up their like you did last Halloween." Timothy left without an answer.
"One simple misfire, it didn't hurt anyone." Charles said shutting off the computer before Chuck could make a response to the comment. Chuck only laughed and went back to reading about the Legendary. A fascinating article, the same one he was reading off of when Charles interrupted him.
Charles was scowling at the situation that he was now in. "Why do I have to stay on board? I am trained in this kind of work."
"You were trained in military tactics, not civil investigations, remember that, now stay here and make sure no one steals this boat or lowers a Life Boat… and do try to talk to them first." Timothy said this before yanking on a rope and then began to climb it to the top, or boat deck in this instance, for that was where the grappling hook had attached itself, the metal railing that was about waste high bordering the entire deck to assure no one falls off.
In five or six minutes the group was standing around in front of a series of doors. A small sign denoting the different Life Boat station numbers one way, and then the other way. The Police Sergeant looked over the four other people with him. "Okay, we will split up into one group of two and one group of three. Tim and Reynard, you will go off and check around the bridge and outer decks. The two of you, you're with me, and no motto, we are to check the inside of the ship. Okay, let's move out."
Hype, that was what this was all about, Hype. These are the thoughts of Charles as they circled the ship slowly for the second time in just two hours. They could see Timothy and Reynard as they moved sometimes near the railing of the ship; they were in the bow of the ship and looking around, under pipes and behind chairs, looking for something at all to denote what or where this came from. Come on you five… we don't have all day, besides, I want to go back to my book you interrupted. But he was so wrapped up in his own thoughts that he failed to notice a purple face in the window above him as they idled for a minute before continuing the search, making sure that nothing would try to escape into the ocean.
Inside the ship, Violet and Garth both stared wide eyed at the interior of what seemed to be some type of Dinning room. "Wow… this is… now wait a minute." Garth was the one speaking, "The boss is gone. I guess he isn't looking around at the beauty of all this. This is a ship for the rich."
Violet only smirked. "Come on, let us get going further… maybe we'll learn something in the kitchen." Her words were met with a small giggle as both their stomachs growling in unison.
"You're right, we might meet a chef too, and in exchange for saying nothing, we can get a meal." Garth responded and both of them began their search again, this time to the kitchen.
Meanwhile in the shadows, the Sergeant only smirked, "Fools… don't think that Giovanni has forgotten you cowardice… I am sure he'll give you a new job when I turn you back in." He then moved in the opposite direction, he was searching for a Radio Room. Of course since neither of them knew which way was what and it can be so confusing to travel around a ship. Both of them were soon lost.
Violet and Garth blinked… "I thought we were going to the kitchen, not dial for Pizza." Some how, the two had gone up, instead of down, and after pulling on doors along the outside, finally entered the only room that seemed to be opened, the Radio Room. Only problem was that instead of anything to speak into, a wooden rectangle with a metal arm and two circles, separated by only air.
"What is that?" A Pidgey asked the two from his perch on Garth Shoulder. "It looks like no radio I have ever seen."
Garth answered the talking bird as if nothing out of the ordinary was happening. "I think it was called a code sender, you tap that circle of metal down and I think electricity connects creating a click, the longer you hold down, the longer the click. Or at least that is what it looks like."
The Pidgey nodded his head, only it was difficult because of a metal black box over his neck, the machine that allowed him to speak. Another reason why they didn't want to meat up with Team Rocket, they had the only prototype that works.
The Sergeant blinked in surprise. "How did I get here?" He asked allowed. "I am in the blinking Kitchen, not the radio room… just how confusing can this ship be? How am I to contact Giovanni now?"
"You won't." Came the growl of a voice, too inhuman to be good, but before he could turn around, a frying pan was struck on his head so hard that he fell to the ground out like a light. A second later a frying pan feel on the stomach of the Sergeant.
A Skitty Morph was sitting on the counter, legs folded, so she was sitting Indian style, in her paws a small Styrofoam cup of something, she only smiled and returned to eating. "My, my, always something to interrupt my ramen noodles it seems." She had a hand held radio that was used by crewmembers of ships next to her, but it was turned to the off position at the moment. She continued eating the noodles.
(Cinnabar Island)
Blaine looked back over his shoulder, the double metal door were sealed shut against the strange army that was outside. Around him were mainly tourists and sightseers, something that he didn't care for at all. They had chased away all the Pokemon Trainers long ago and he felt that they didn't give the same kind of challenge that dedicated Pokemon Trainers were. However, even he had the sense not to turn away those that needed help.
Suddenly a bang sounded on the metal doors and everyone jumped. Most everyone was still dressed in travel clothing and half of them were a collection of escaped passengers from one of the last cruise ships to pull in earlier this evening. But each one had the same look, fear.
"Look alive everyone." Blaine shouted as he moved from person to person. "I want you to start bringing items to barricade the doors… look lively, we are what could the last hold out on this island."
However he was and been silently contacting some friends in other cities and had procured some Physic Pokemon that knew Teleport. He had slowly released them around the Gym floor, which was hovering over a pit of lava… but he had erected a barrier so no one might fall over the edge of the Gym floor.
The bang came again, and this time with more force. This got a few people to cry out in horror. Making more people look agitated. Suddenly Blaine knew it was time, with hast he released the last five Psychic Pokemon and with a single and simple nod, they all teleported. Into the cities of Viridian, Celadon, Vermillion, and finally of all places Lavender Town. But Blaine wasn't too concerned about where they went… just as long as he could pull off something before he too was brainwashed. He released his two Magmar and then ordered them to begin to open up some lava flows inside the Volcano that housed the gym.
He stared at the Door which had bowed slightly from the barrage of attacks which were coming none stop now… suddenly everything stopped, but before he could contemplate what was going on, a figure appeared from the shadow. He looked human almost, yet… dark fur, glossy and silky was covering his body. He turned around only to see more figures coming out of the shadow.
The man looked around and shook his head. "Well, well, Mr. Blaine of Cinnabar. I must say I am impressed at all the subjects you have denied me… but a gym leader will more then make up…." Suddenly a rumble was felt and the Gym floor, which was attached with metal chains so it could be over the lava pool at the bottom of the volcano twisted a little. With a snarl the Dark Ninetales, for Blain could make out that much detail from the glow of the Volcano about the figure in front of him, Blaine was careful not to look into the eyes of the Ninetales due to the fact that a Ninetales could control one's opponent's mind easily.
"SO, you thought you could trap me with a controlled eruption? Then how foolish for if you think you… This base will become dead because of you… but no matter, I have a port city now under my battle control… I will just use some of the Psychic Pokemon under my control to teleport all my troops off this Island, and force this nature to erupt and destroy your one beautiful island. You will die for opposing me." He then twisted his tails and head and the ground buckled even harder. Blaine looked down for a second and when he looked around he was all alone. Suddenly a wall of flames and Lava shot into the air melting an edge of the Gym floor, and before Blaine fainted from the heat, he thought he saw a flame in the shape of a bird. But it could have been his own mind playing tricks on him before his death.
A seismic lab somewhere near Indigo Plateau noticed a large action and within moments the lab assistant in charge for this shift looked over the data and noticed that it wasn't like an Earthquake at all… rather… His eyes went wide and picked up a Red telephone. "Get me the Pokemon Council, I think Mt. Cinder on Cinnabar just erupted… without warning."
Matthew Vixen was in the quarters reserved for the Captain of the ship, he had watched the search party go over the ship, check into windows and what-not… he wasn't ready to show his parents, he was… well, worried. He knew they worked for the G-Force. But he wasn't too worried. Suddenly he keen hearing pick up a small faint vibrating noise. He realized that it was a cell phone. Suddenly the door knob rattled and Matthew dove under the bed only to startle two Vulpix who were hiding away from the water and someplace that reminded them of a den, a happy place for them. He had done most likely the fastest shift to a Ninetales possible.
The sounds of two people, a male and a female, that Matthew, Matt, and Firestorm all recognized as Mr. and Mrs. Vixen was heard as they talked on their cell phone.
"This is Timothy Vixen speaking?" Mr. Vixen answered the phone as Mrs. Vixen looked out the window that moments ago Matthew was looking out.
"Tim… Lance here… we just got some disturbing news… Cinnabar's volcano just erupted, no prior warning or anything… we believe that something must have happened to cause Blain to try and destroy the Island… we feel that it could a pathogen from Team Rocket…." The voice would have gone on only Matthew's own voice broke into the conversation.
"That is not the truth… we have a problem worse then anyone can even imagine." Matthew had crawled out from under the bed and stood up in his human form… which was feeling as more time went on, a little more foreign to him…. Like a custom… because even now he had acute hearing and smell, items that he could not diminish if he wanted to.
"Who is that? Who is with you? I thought…" The voice, Lance, sounded angry and upset.
"Now, now… that was my son just speaking…" His own voice was showing some disbelief. "He was presumed dead in the retaking of the ship from the faction that went a different way from us. I think he should know what is going on better then anyone else."
"Then let me speak to him now… Don't say my name… we can't let anyone else know who your boss really is."
"Sorry, but with my hearing… I heard your name." Matthew said the moment he was passed the cell phone. "But no matter, I assume from your spying of Team Rocket that you know who and what I am… but this isn't the matter at hand… it is that we have…." With those words, Matthew spent the next ten minutes saying what had transpired, excluding the mentions of the Legendary Pokemon. Telling about Dark Moon, and Dark Tail… their alliance and what the destruction of Cinnabar Island might mean.
"Look," Matthew continued. "I know this may sound strange… but we must pull back from the outer rings of our lands… we cannot be cut off, pull all our supporters together into some of the area around us, and we can be better able to fight… even now, we face not only one front… but two."
(Viridian City)
Even as Matthew spoke those words, another city was experiencing disasters. This time, not from the shadows of a Pokemon… but from an organization that most people feared, the police were already taken care up, a supposedly huge accident had called a lot of police out to one spot and Team Rocket elite had easily took out the gathered force with a sleep powder. Of course, no one would know this until they woke up… most people were still sleeping or just getting up. A perfect time for Team Rocket's move, for no one would expect a thing to happen right at dawn.
All roads had been blocked as well from impersonators of Officers of the Law, and within five minutes the entire City was under Rocket Control. But on the outside, nothing looked out of place, a few windows were smashed but then, some of the more clueless if they passed through, would have only thought about vandals. Another city, another base of operations, for a different group has been founded, but this wasn't the only Rocket City.
Saffron City, was indeed another of the towns to fall to Team Rocket, overnight Physic Pokemon finished the brick and stone wall, making a perfect trap. Even the air was blocked with a Physic Barrier. Inside, Sliph Co. was being retrofitted for a military command post, all while the citizens of Saffron City sleep. The bases of command were being set up.
All these cities, amazingly, in days of old were cities of strongholds and military bases. Vermillion was once a Navy Port with its own city guard. Viridian was a city full of battle hardened soldiers, and finally, Saffron was the City of inventions for War of days gone by… and once again… each of those cities were given old roles once again to play in the coming war. Drums were beginning to sound, the air changing and people looking more nervous, all could feel the change, but most didn't know what it was going to be.