Foundations of the World

by 50caliberchaos

Hoenn lays broken, reeling from civil war and suffocating beneath the tyrannical grip of warlords who rampage across the land. To this shattered country May, Wallace, and their allies bring a message of hope. But can May's idealism survive the realities of war? Can Wallace survive his disease? Fate has them set on a collision course with monsters, gods, and perhaps even each other.

2. May - Chapter 1 - The Ghost Ship

AN: Just let me say thanks to everyone reading this. It's nice to see a bunch of my old friends coming back to read this next installment.
The decision to include this chapter initially didn't come easily to me as I included part of it as a teaser at the end of The Sun Soul. That was however before I added a great deal towards the end of the chapter and made it more plot relevant than its teaser counterpart, so even if you read it at the end of the previous book, it would certainly behoove you to read this iteration as well.

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May – Chapter One – The Ghost Ship

Biting her lip and surveying the scene about her, May took a breath to steady herself. That poor man, the young trainer thought, sitting on the bench several yards down from her observee. As the soldier in Team Rocket's black and red uniform gripped with white knuckles the edges of the barrel and vomited forcefully into the already overfilled container, the ship beneath his feet hit the rising crest of a wave and threw him to the ground. The soldier failed to relinquish his grip on the barrel of regurgitated muck and pulled it over as he went down, splashing its contents over himself, the floor, and no less than a dozen nearby sailors as outside the wind howled so loud the scene in the ship's hold seemed to play out silently.

Her own white and gold regalia dotted with day-old putrescence, May gripped the bench's handholds by her thighs tighter, her stomach churning like a bag of angry snakes. "Ensign!" she snarled at the man on the floor. Struggling to be heard over a sudden thunderclap. "Get your sorry self back in your seat! Strap in, and do not get up until the storm is over! If you must puke you will do it in your lap!"

The sailor groaned a "yes ma'am," pushing himself from his hands and knees to his feet just long enough to fall back onto the bench. The Rocket sailors on either side quickly reached over and helped the stricken sailor work the straps over his chest and pelvis, securing him to the seat.

Looking to the sandy-haired youth to her left, May fought back seasickness and nudged him with her elbow. "Odin, are the storms always this rough?" she asked, barely loud enough to be heard over the gale outside.

The room sat so poorly lit May could barely make out the faces three seats down from her, but she easily saw the happy spark in his bright green eyes as Odin shook his head. "No ma'am," he said as the ship pitched sharply and a number of crewmen in the chamber gasped and growled in complaint. "They're rougher usually," he stopped as May felt her resolved expression break and she catapulted forward, heaving but not throwing up. "Permission to rub your back, ma'am," Odin asked.

After heaving again, May looked up at him. "Granted," she moaned.

Reaching over and pressing the butt of his hand firmly up and down his commander's back, Odin cleared his throat. "Respectfully ma'am," he said. "There's no need to worry. Seaspear is a good ship, as solid as any vessel thrice her weight. She'll bring us through just fine."

"How do you know?" May asked.

"Mom was a Cinnabarean," Odin answered. "Dad hailed from the Orange Island Navy. My blood is seawater ma'am."

A loud drone and a crash filled the chamber as the ship started to roll so hard that the men on the port side of the room found themselves looking almost straight down at the men on the starboard wall. As the Seaspear righted herself with a splash, a wave of water came rushing down stairs to the top deck and soaked everyone present.

May heaved a third time as Odin shook the saltwater out of his hair and looked around. "Okay," he smiled at her. "That was a big one." He looked over when his commander didn't respond. "Look on the bright side ma'am," he said. "You went toe to toe with a storm this big in a boat as small as this without puking your pretty pink guts out. That's impressive for a land lover."

May groaned again as her stomach churned and her face drained of color. "How much longer can this damn storm possibly last?" she moaned.

Fourteen hours later, the crashing waves and lashing rain began to abate. The men in the Seaspear's hold gradually filtered out of the secure room and returned to their duties about the vessel or left for their racks, leaving May and Odin alone in their seats. The savant in her white and gold armor leaned forward with her head in her hands and the stink of the chamber's spilled barrel of aging vomit filing her nose.

Taking a breath to steady herself, May looked up. "We've been at sea two weeks," she said, eyes sunken. "I've been in the wilds of Johto, Kanto, and the mountains in-between for months at a time and it never beat me to death like this."

"We survived," Odin said, getting up and stretching. "And unless the storm threw us completely off course we should reach Isla Comienzo within the next twelve hours. Restocking there shouldn't take more than a day or two, and from there," he motioned forward with an open hand, "We hop islands straight to Hoenn. Shouldn't take more than three or four months, tops."

The young woman's face fell. "So long?" May asked.

Odin shrugged. "We," he stomped the deck beneath his foot, "could make the trip in this ship in several weeks if we never had to resupply and the wind never slowed us down. But we do have to resupply, navigate to hop the islands from here to Hoenn to do so, and the wind will be against us most of the way. We're not a single ship either. Just because my Seaspear cruises at 29 knots doesn't mean the heavier ships in your fleet can."

Getting to her feet, May rolled her shoulders back, shaking out her long, chocolate colored hair. "This is the fastest ship in the fleet by a wide margin," she said. "Maybe I should just take it and go ahead."

"Wouldn't recommend it ma'am," Odin followed as May crossed the room for the stairs leading up to the main deck. "Seaspear cuts through the waves quick enough and her marines are some of the hardest troops in Team Rocket's employ, but there are pirate fleets between here and Hoenn, big ones: Gyarados, Wailord, Sharpedo, and Tentacruel too. Any one of those catches us unawares and we're done."

May grumbled. "I know, I know," she went on, climbing out into the blinding sunlight on deck, her hair instantly caught in the fierce breeze and thrown all about her face as Odin walked behind her towards the bow of the ship. "I just want to be there. I want my family's name, our lands back." The young savant gripped the rail at the forward-most extreme of the ship, looking towards the horizon, breathing in the fresh salt air. "Tomorrow wouldn't be soon enough, let alone several months."

"Ma'am," Odin stepped up behind May and stood to her left, "might I offer an alternate perspective?"

Turning back to the youth, May nodded. It occurred to her that she almost didn't recognize Odin as the stammering, awkward soul she'd met on the docks of Pallet town two weeks ago. "Of course," she said. "Offer away."

Leaning against the railing, Odin looked towards the rear of the vessel and at the twelve other ships trailing the Seaspear, each one a minimum of twice the size of the lead vessel. "Think of the coming months as a gift. Once we get to Hoenn the real work starts: politicking, peacekeeping, and probably more than a little warring. Use the time afforded by the trip to strategize, put together a solid plan for how you're going to accomplish what needs doing. We need more than twelve ships and a few hundred men to take and hold an entire continent. You're going to need the goodwill of the people of Hoenn and, respectfully ma'am, your family name alone probably isn't going to be enough… outside Petalburg at least."

Expression unchanged, May kept looking forward, staring intently at the horizon. "You're right," she looked back at Odin. "Is there a gym on Isla Comienzo?"

The sandy haired youth shrugged and smiled. "Was the last time I was there," the young trainer answered, taking a pokeball from his belt and rolling it around between his fingers. "Some young guy with a few moderately skilled Pokémon from what I hear. Never met him."

"Fine," May lifted her hands over her head and stretched. "Once we land I'll leave restocking the flotilla to you and the other captains. Spare the purses as much as possible."

"Of course," Odin inclined his head to her. "Where should I look for you when we finish?"

"Wherever I can train," May answered, blinking against the wind.

The young savant paused and looked to Odin as he glanced again back at the ships trailing his own. Odin folded his arms in front of his chest. "It might do the men some good to see their commander directing them personally," he said, "if you can find the time."

May shook her head. "I need to spend every spare minute I find between here and Littleroot building and training my team. I want them as strong as possible."

"Respectfully ma'am," Odin offered, "Strong Pokémon are all well and fine, but it would be good for morale if the rest of your men saw you taking an interest in them."

Folding her arms, May turned directly towards her second-in-command. "Morale needs me less than I need my Pokémon," she said curtly. "I'd poured years into training my last team and Mewtwo slaughtered them before I realized the fight started. I'm a trainer at heart Odin. That's where I need to focus my energy."

"Trainers fight wars ma'am," Odin said. "Leaders win them. Men can't follow someone who doesn't lead," he went on, adding very quickly "with all respect."

Closing her eyes against the breeze, May smirked. "How ever did you did you reach Captain with those manners, or rather, complete lack thereof?"

Odin cleared his throat, his face noticeably redder. "Took over when mom and dad passed," he said quietly and matter-of-factly.

May flinched. "I'm sorry," she stated quickly.

Features softening, the captain leaned his weight against the railing. "Hemorrhagic Pox," Odin shrugged. "It's the bane of armies, navies, and cities alike in Orange and, from what I hear, Hoenn; spreads like hayfever on a windy day and kills like nothing I've ever seen."

The woman in white and gold turned from the young captain and looked over the sea, marvelling a moment at how staggeringly blue it shone in the daylight. "Do I even want to know?" May asked.

"No," Odin answered. "You probably should though. If we find an infected village in Hoenn, well, in your position I'd want to know why everyone's skin was turning shiny black and sloughing off their bones like sheets of rice paper. If ten men catch it, nine men die and the tenth languishes blind for the rest of his life."

May swallowed the lump in her throat. "No cure?" asked the young woman, her face as white as her white armor.

"No ma'am," Odin answered. "You can vaccinate against it, and not everyone exposed will catch it, but actually come down with the stuff and you're gone. That's the problem... out in the more remote islands in the Orange chain, anywhere doctors don't usually go, the 'Bloody Pox' just waits to wipe out whole villages and catch a ride on an unsuspecting slouch back to civilization. It's been known to leave whole islands of thousands of people completely depopulated."

Taking a deep breath of the salty air, May resisted a shiver. "That's horrible. Have you ever seen it up close?"

Odin nodded. "I had the good fortune of being vaccinated young, so when the Pox hit my father's ship... I got to clean up the remains, sanitize the ship, and bring it into port."

Jaw slack, May stared at him. "Odin I'm so sorry, that must have been," she trailed off, a soreness stabbing into her chest as her companion watched the horizon without emotion. "I'm so sorry," she repeated. "That was this ship?"

Odin pointed across the deck of the ship towards the captain's quarters. "My father passed in that room there." He stopped as a look of horror spread across May's face. "Don't give it a second thought," he said. "I don't. Death's just as much a part of life as being born, no use worrying or dwelling."

Going quiet and letting her gaze trail down to the waves breaking against the Seaspear's bow, May took a breath. Her thoughts turned over and over in her head for a moment without really going anywhere before she shook herself from the stillness and turned to the young captain. "Why don't you show me around more of the ship," May said, making herself grin. "Maybe you're right about the men needing to see their commander up and about."

May spent the rest of that first afternoon since the storm touring the Seaspear with Odin, assessing damage and gathering reports from the crewmen on their statuses. May left most of the talking to the young captain, perfectly content to allow the seaman to run the affairs aboard his own ship, though she made every effort to note the policies and procedures that came up during the tour.

Stopping in the engine room, a cramped and dim chamber crowded by cables running across the floor and filled with the smell of hot copper and iron, May watched as Odin addressed two of the frigate's engineers. He knows this ship like the back of his hand, May thought as Odin and the engineers exchanged a great deal of numbers and pointed to the cables running here and there before chattering on about power generation and thermal to electric efficiency.

Odin nodded, his face bearing a satisfied expression. "Excellent work keeping the salts from freezing during the storm," said the captain as the pair of crewmen saluted him. "I knew you boys were good but that's impressive. Let's focus on keeping the metal buildup in the pipes to an absolute minimum until we reach our next stop, cleaning that out in the middle of the ocean would be dangerous and we don't need to shut down for as long as it would take. Understood?"

Both engineers dropped their salutes enthusiastically. "Yes sir," they acknowledged in perfect unison.

May paused in her inspection of the engines and turned to the crewman, both of whom she noticed were watching her look around the room.

"Question ma'am?" the taller of the engineers probed, returning his hand to his chest to salute the young savant.

Her earlier conversation with Odin sticking in the front of her mind, May pointed to the massive engine cases that consumed most of the lower deck's floor space. "Ensign Keller, wasn't it? Tell me about the engine," she said calmly, a subdued smile on her lips. "I'd like to know a little more about the Seaspear and how you keep it running."

The taller engineer, a burly character with wide cheeks and a complexion like raw dough cleared his throat and glanced between the captain and the flotilla commander. "Yes ma'am," he said, visibly pulling himself together and beginning to motion to the massive engine cases. "Well basically Seaspear runs off an experimental Thorium reactor. It's specially designed for naval applications and calling it merely top of the line would be an insult. The reactor itself started out as a proof-of-concept that the boss in Viridian back in the day thought had enough potential to stick it on a boat and see how things went. As I understood it, the original design was Professor Oak's himself."

May flinched at the name but followed along as Keller walked her to a display panel showing several numbers and red and green bar graphs that monitored the heat, pressure, and other variables within the engine. "Essentially," the engineer continued, "Seaspear was a great ship when Rocket co-developed it with the Orange Island Navy back in the day, but it was the modularity with which the ship was designed which made outfitting it with the L-F-T-R power plant possible, and it's the power plant that makes her absolutely amazing. Seaspear generates as much power as a small city, won't need to refuel for the next fifty years, and has the capacity to serve as an emergency power supply for other vessels that lose power."

May nodded along. "Very impressive," she said, reaching out and shaking the engineer's hand after he very briefly paused as if to make sure his commander had actually extended the gesture. "I'll be joining the crew for meals this evening and I'd like very much to discuss Seaspear's potential to serve as a mobile base of operations then, assuming you'd eat with me," she added.

Keller nodded, a smile creeping across his features. "Yes ma'am," he said. "I'll save you a spot. Looking forward to it ma'am."

Both engineers saluted. May, as she and Odin turned to leave, heard them chattering amongst themselves with pleasant surprise that the flotilla's commander would bother to stop by and personally talk to them. The young savant looked to her companion as they ascended the ladder that carried them up to one of the upper decks. "How was that?" she called up to him as Odin lead on.

The sandy-haired youth nodded and gave her a quick thumb's up as they reached the top of the ladder, finding themselves in a steel hall full of tight clusters of doors. "A little awkward," he smiled at her, "but not bad. Keep it up and you'll win some friends yet."

May grinned and started to respond, but stopped short and froze as the sound of a horn blaring high overhead stopped her in her tracks. "One long blast," she muttered. "One short. A distressed ship in the vicinity?"

Odin turned and May walked quickly beside him towards the light at the end of the hall. "Odin," she said, wincing as she stepped back into the sunlight, "assemble the trainers and be ready for anything."

Again the horn sounded overhead, blown by a trainer soaring in circles over the Seaspear atop a Pidgeot. Some dozen people hustled about the deck of the ship as May split off from the captain, bound for the bow of the ship as Odin walked for the bridge. The young savant waited, her single pokeball in her hand as the Rocket trainer on the Pidgeot aimed his mount for the ship and descended towards her. Talons clattering, the massive bird landed on the Seaspear and its trainer, a young man in black and red, hopped down, still brandishing a bronze horn in one hand and wiping condensation away from his helmet's visor with the other.

May walked forward as the trainer saluted. "Any particular reason you're using a horn like that over the perfectly good radio we issued you?" May looked the trainer over.

Straightening up as he fastened the archaic instrument to his belt, the trainer removed his helmet and shook out his long, red hair. "Yes ma'am," he said abruptly, tapping the little earpiece clipped to the side of his head with one thumb. "I radioed several times but no one responded and all I got was high-pitched static. It's some kind of interference; I couldn't get in contact with any of the ships on any channel."

May nodded. "Acknowledged," she said as a number of other crewman arrived. "What did you see?"

The trainer, armored from his neck to his boots, walked to the ship's railing and pointed at a spot on the horizon. "We've got one ship dead in the water, about thirteen clicks out. From bow to stern she's about three-hundred fifty meters long. I didn't see any structural damage but she's not moving."

May raised an eyebrow. "That's the biggest-ass ship I've ever heard of," she said. "Anyone onboard?"

The trainer shook his head. "Not that I saw on four flybys ma'am," he said. "Just a very big, very dead ship."

Both the scout and the savant turned as Odin and another officer arrived, though the captain spoke first. "Radios are down," he said, out of breath. "There's some kind of interference," he looked around at the other officers and trainers around him. "Nobody stopped to think that, maybe, I would have liked to know that something as important as my radios being down."

The officer walking beside the captain cleared his throat, stone-faced. "Sorry sir, they went down less than fifteen minutes ago."

Odin glared at the young officer. "No excuse," he said. "Keep me in the loop."

Everyone present at the bow of the ship flinched and several cursed loudly as sharp screeches shrieked over their radio earpieces. Most of those around, including May, tore the tools from their ears and held them aside. Before anyone could speak, a loud thumping shook the ship. May turned and looked at the vessels surrounding the Seaspear as their bridge lights dimmed and flickered out. From the ships all around her the shouting voices of crewman rose and fell, declaring that they were losing power. Odin immediately began barking orders and his subordinates responded with disciplined and quick action, hustling about readying to disseminate as much as information to the other ships as possible.

Watching the bridge lights onboard the Seaspear, May remained fixed on the deck, unmoving and breathing only a little as the incandescent bulbs inside the ship's command center continued glowing. Several minutes passed and a number of messengers arrived onboard the Seaspear from the other ships in the flotilla as each captain sought to figure out the situation, May kept watching, waiting to see if the bridge lights would go out. "Why aren't we losing power?" she asked at length.

Odin stopped in the middle of relaying an order, looking between May and the bridge. "I don't know," he said, voice shot through with worry. "I've never seen anything like this before. Everyone's telling me the other ships, all of them, have completely lost power. The flotilla's dead in the water right now."

May shook her head. "We're not," she said. "Odin," she went on, "what do you want to bet that the radios going dead and the flotilla going cold are related to that other ship out there?"

The young captain paused and looked between the horizon and the lazily descending sun. "What makes you say that?" he asked.

May looked to the speck sitting on ocean's horizon some miles ahead and stared at it for a long moment, her mind turning over. "Something's out there," she muttered, glancing to the scout trainer. "Did you see the colours the ship flew?" she asked.

Clasping his hands behind his back, the scout nodded his head. "Yes ma'am: two white bones splintered and crossed to form a capitol 'A' on a blue field."

Swallowing the lump in her throat, May stepped back. "I don't recognize the symbol."

Odin spoke up. "I do. That's Team Aqua's sigil," he said, now quite calm, "which makes sense because they're the only ones who could possibly build a ship that large. What they're doing this far from home is beyond me though."

Waiting a minute and folding her arms across her chest, May stared at the sky in thought as the clouds began to take on a distinctly orange hue. "Odin," she said at last, turning to the young captain of the Seaspear. "Send messengers to the other ships and have each captain send over two of their best trainers. While we've still got power you're going to take us to that Aqua ship and we're going to have a look around." She stopped and looked to the east. "I suspect that whatever's interfering with our flotilla's on that ship."

Saluting and bowing, Odin acknowledged the order and turned to relay it to his subordinates, barking at the top of his lungs before turning and making for the bridge of the Seaspear.

Moments later May stood at the bow of the ship, flanked and followed by no fewer than two dozen trainers in Team Rocket's red and black armor as the Seaspear sliced through the waves, carrying its passengers east. Watching intently as the speck on the horizon grew and expanded into what looked like a small metal island jutting out of the sea, May tapped her foot on the deck. "Soldier," she turned to a trainer who wore armor completely obscuring his features and half a dozen pokeballs at his belt as the Seaspear sailed within a hundred meters of the dead Aqua ship. "Go to Odin. Tell him to bring us up alongside the ship and then have him meet us down here."

The trainer bowed and turned away, disappearing up the stairs to the ship' bridge. A few seconds later the Seaspear jerked and began to turn ninety degrees in the water as her engines idled and then kicked into reverse. Odin appeared on the bridge's balcony, shouting orders for the tug teams to bring them up alongside the ship. Immediately four trainers on the deck loosed their Pokémon, each summoning an aquatic creature in a blinding flash of white light. The four trainers, one working with his Starmie, two with their Seakings, and one with his Feraligatr affixed themselves with heavy ropes to their Pokémon and then tied the ropes off around great steel beams fixed to the deck of the Seaspear. Diving overboard, the trainers and their Pokémon splashed into the ocean and tugged the ropes taut.

Slowly then, the Seaspear inched through the water towards the silent ship as the trainers on deck watched and waited. Minutes later, just as the sun touched down on the horizon, the Seaspear ground to a halt against the Aqua vessel. The tug team trainers riding the Seakings handed their ropes off to the trainer with the Feraligatr and the soldier with the Starmie before returning their seafaring Pokémon to their pokeballs and grabbing hold of ropes lowered down for them from the deck of the Seaspear. The two remaining trainers then exploded from the water with their ropes, the Starmie floating gracefully up to the deck of the other ship while the Feraligatr stretched out its claws and latched onto the side of the steel ship, climbing upwards and joining his teammate on the deck of the ostensibly abandoned ship where they tied off their ropes and fixed the Seaspear alongside the other ship.

May craned to look upwards, estimating the top deck of the other ship to be no less than thirty feet higher than the top deck of the Seaspear. "Big-ass ship indeed," she muttered, scanning the side of the ship for its name. "Trident of Vengeance?" she read aloud, seeing the collection of faded and chipping letters painted on the side of the ship near its bow. "No taste in naming I suppose." She turned to the trainers gathered behind her as the two soldiers on the Trident of Vengeance's deck took several rope ladders from their packs and threw them down to the deck of the Seaspear. "Alright," the savant in her white and gold armor called out. "Split into teams of six and search the ship from bow to stern for anything that could be jamming our radios or interfering with the flotilla's engines. No hero business, you're each too valuable to lose so if you run into trouble you're to fall back to the nearest other group and retreat to the Seaspear. Am I clear?"

The gathered trainers saluted and answered in unison. "Yes ma'am," they shouted.

Odin likewise saluted as he stepped up beside May. "Yes ma'am," he answered, his voice far more subdued than the others as the rest of the trainers rushed to the rope ladders and began climbing towards the deck of the Trident of Vengeance. "What do you expect to find onboard?" he asked quietly as he and May waited their turn at the ladders.

Shrugging, the savant looked upward. "I'm not sure," she said. "I'd be willing to bet whatever it is, is some kind of electronic weapon. Of all the ships in the fleet, only Seaspear's engines are completely analogue, all the other ships rely on digital mechanisms to function. And, of all the ships in the fleet, only Seaspear is unaffected by whatever this electronic weapon might be." She walked forward and grabbed ahold of the ladder, beginning her assent as Odin climbed behind her.

Climbing the creaking ropes Odin glanced over his shoulder at his pack. "Well, whatever we're dealing with," he grunted, "I just hope we can find a way to shut it down."

Reaching the deck and joining up with their four escorts as the rest of the teams spread out across the deck of the derelict ship, May and Odin each took their pokeballs from their belts. Dozens of flashes of white light about the deck signaled the arrival of as many Pokémon, with Odin calling on his growling Houndoom and silently observing Honchkrow. May likewise dropped her pokeball, kneeling down as a chittering Torchic emerged from the light and looked up at her. She picked up the little Pokémon and let it sit on her outstretched arm as she and Odin and the four other trainers walked to one of the many hatches fixed in the deck.

Kneeling by the hatch and straining with effort, Odin heaved up on the metal slab without so much as budging it. May cleared her throat and one of the Rocket trainers, a burly man accompanied by an equally burly Machoke in turn cleared his throat. The Machoke clapped its hands together and leaned down, gripping the hatch's handles as Odin stepped back. Pulling up with seemingly little effort, the musclebound Pokémon pried the hatch completely free of its hinges, stepped aside, and dropped the heavy steel door clear of the new hole in the deck.

Odin grimaced, muttering something about loosening it up for the purple Pokemon, and May moved forward, holding the Torchic out. "Mind giving us a little light," said the savant. The feathered Pokémon gave itself a quick shake and, cooing quietly, began glowing like a torch, casting enough light down the hole for the gathered trainers to plainly see that it did not end at the next deck down, but in fact continued farther down than the twenty or so feet of light provided by May's Torchic could illuminate. "Maybe a little more light?" May prompted. Her Torchic cooed again and, chattering with effort, began glowing with a more intense light that, reaching the bottom of the shaft before them, clearly illuminated a partially flooded hallway several decks down.

Shifting her Pokémon to her shoulder, May turned around and put her foot on the ladder. "Ladies first," she smirked, loosening her grip on the bars enough to slide down into the darkness before Odin or the other trainers could protest. The young savant splashed down in the hall some forty feet down, finding herself up to her waist in the freezing saltwater and looking around.

Odin leaned over the edge of the hatch. "See anything?" he called out to her, trying to keep his voice quiet enough to avoid disturbing any unaware enemy but loud enough that she could actually hear him.

Waiting to answer, May pivoted around as her Torchic threw off its light and glared into the darkness alongside its trainer. "Actually yeah," May called back, her voice uneasy. "Odin, get down here."

Instantly the sandy-haired youth returned his Pokémon to their pokeballs and turned around. He dropped down the shaft, gripping the ladder only tight enough to avoid complete freefall. "What's down there?" Odin called down to May without stopping or turning around to look until he splashed down beside her, the four other trainers in hot pursuit.

May gestured down the hall, her face as white as her armor. "Lots of bodies," she muttered, "that's what."

Following May's direction, Odin gasped when he spotted the dozen or so dead humans, each floating face down in the frigid water. Nevertheless, he walked forward as the other Rocket trainers arrived and flanked their commander, taking hold of one of the corpses and rolling it over for a better look. Recoiling from the body, Odin raised a hand in front of his face and sucked in a breath before turning away and dropping his hands on to his knees as though the sight made him ill.

Walking forward, May examined the corpse and likewise had to turn away, mirroring her second-in-command and putting a hand before her mouth. "Well that's," she fought back her gag reflex, "pretty awful."

"No shit," Odin turned back to examine the eyeless corpse. "What could have done this?" he asked.

Wading through the water, glad her hardsuit was watertight but still shivering against the cold, May rolled another of the corpses over, then walked forward to a third and repeated her cursory examination. "No idea," she answered. "This wasn't predation or the work of scavengers though. These men's' eyes literally exploded in their skulls and from the looks of things," she glanced carefully down the gory ear canal of one of the bodies, "so did their eardrums."

Odin thought a moment. "Some kind of sonic weapon maybe," he said. "It would explain the burst eyes and eardrums."

Turning to her agent, May folded her arms before her chest and tapped her fingers on her elbows. "That would have to be one hell of a sonic weapon."

"An especially powerful Tentacruel maybe," Odin offered. "I've seen smaller ones use supersonic attacks to stun prey with burst eardrums before."

One of the guards stepped forward, accompanied by his Machoke. "Ma'am, I'm no coroner," he said, "but shouldn't there be some decomposition? This water's cold but unless these men died within the past few hours there should be at least some sign of decomposition. These men, aside from the obvious, look pretty much intact."

May and Odin glanced at each other but the latter spoke first. "He's right," said the youth. "We should proceed with extreme caution."

Wading their way down the pitch-dark hallway, the trainers eventually made upon a fork in their path. Each studying the sign at the end of the hall, Odin spoke up. "This isn't any language I know," he looked at the letters painted on the wall. "Can anyone read it?"

The rocket escorts shook their heads but May stepped forward. "It's a dialect from Orre," she muttered, as much to herself as to anyone present, "their royal language. I recognize it from my time with Professor Elm… but why," she turned to the men around her, "why would a ship from Hoenn, with its external markings written in Common Kantonese use an Orrean dialect for its internal signs?"

One of the Rocket trainers, a lithe woman with silver hair that clashed with her youthful appearance cocked her head to one side. "A joint engineering venture?" she offered.

May shook her head. "No," she said under her breath. "Orre does not play well with others. This," she paused, realization dawning on her face, "this ship is part of a false-flag operation. Its heading suggests a course aimed away from Hoenn, not towards it. I think the Orreans were trying to smuggle something back to Orre."

"On a ship this big?" Odin asked. "Hardly subtle."

May shrugged. "Maybe they were trying to smuggle something big, or a lot of littler somethings? Anyway," she pointed down the hallway to their left. "The sign says a laboratory is this way, and I imagine that's as good a place as any to start looking."

Following the hall until it ended at an especially heavy looking bulkhead May assured her compatriots was labelled "Laboratory" in Orrean, the trainers paused as Odin walked forward and tried the door. When he discovered the bulkhead was locked, he stepped aside and motioned for the Machoke to move in. Grinning and clapping its hands together, the muscled Pokémon stepped up and gripped the large wheel set in the center of the bulkhead. Grunting with effort, veins bulging on its lavender arms, the Pokémon screwed its eyes shut and put all its weight into turning the wheel. As the sound of metal grinding on metal filled the hall, the Pokémon's hands budged as the red wheel began to rotate and the bars holding the bulkhead in place began to shift out of their slots.

Stepping back, its task complete, the Machoke sighed and dropped its arms. Patting his Pokémon on the back as he passed, the trainer walked forward and pushed the bulkhead open. Pressing his body against the door as it rotated inward he stepped into the room beyond, the trainer lifted a hand to shield his eyes against the intense blue light flooding out of the room and into the hall beyond. "Found something," called the Rocket.

May and Odin made their way forward and into the laboratory as the other trainers remained in the hall outside. Both commanders could only stare in wonder when they spotted the source of the blue light: a brilliantly glowing sapphire sphere resting on the laboratory's floor beneath a few feet of water but shining so bright as to light up the water around it like a florescent bulb. Making her way over to it, May handed her Torchic off to Odin, took a deep breath, and knelt beneath the frigid water, reaching for the orb. Eyes locked on the glowing object, May extended her hand for the sphere, itself only a few inches across but glowing brightly enough to clearly illuminate the large room even from beneath the water. As soon as her fingers touched its glassy surface, the light dimmed so quickly May almost lost sight of the little ball while her eyes adjusted.

Closing her fingers around the orb, May stood up and broke the surface of the water, gasping in a deep breath of air. She held the still dimly glowing orb up for everyone else to see before reaching up with her free hand to wipe her soaked hair out of her face. "I think," she said, eyes locked on the orb as it flickered and filled the room around them with a sound not unlike the singing of a wind chime, "we might have found something. Odin," she called, snapping the captain's attention away from the hypnotizing ball of light, "What do you make of it?"

Hesitantly pulling his attention away from the orb, Odin intently scanned the room all around them. "Looks dangerous to me," he said, his eyes flitting over the broken gadgets and scattered debris throughout the laboratory as his commander's eyes seemed to glaze. "Whatever it is, you'd think something like that," he allowed himself a quick and cautious glance at the orb before intentionally pulling his gaze from the artifact, "would need some kind of containment-" he stopped, spotting a roughly cylindrical case set on the shelf of an open locker across the room. "Containment unit," Odin finished his thought and walked to the locker, swinging its door all the way open and reaching for the case.

The young captain glanced between the cylindrical box and the orb, judging the former to be perhaps just large enough to fit the latter and still close, but when Odin tried to lift the box he faltered. "Whoa," the youth stammered, giving the thick leather strap on the box another experimental tug and watching as the container barely budged. "Fucking heavy, this thing," he grunted as May failed to react at all. Odin foisted the case into his arms and peered inside. "Gods above and below," he muttered under his breath, glancing back to his commander but not really paying her much heed. "Look at the seams on this thing," he said, wonder plain in his voice. "I think it's lined in lead and gold," he turned the ponderously heavy container over in his hands, stopping when he spotted a mark on the bottom and going just a little pale. "Uh, commander. I don't know much about anything, but I recognize the trefoil when I see it. Ma'am, I'm guessing that thing you've got there is dangerously radioactive and this box was meant to contain it." Odin paused a moment and turned when May failed to respond.

Spotting his commander standing erect and silently staring at the glowing orb in her hands, Odin turned on his heel and walked to the girl. "May!" the captain shouted as the sentrys outside nervously turned and looked into the laboratory.

Shaking as though waking from a dream and looking around in surprise, May's gaze settled on her second-in-command. "What?" she stammered. "What's wrong?"

Again Odin held the box out to her. "You spaced out there for a minute," he answered. "I'm going to recommend we put that orb away and get the hell on with our investigation."

May nodded. "Right," she said, popping open the pouch at her belt and dropping the glowing blue orb inside. "Let's get out of here."

Eyes fixed on his commander's belt pouch, Odin stepped in May's way, still holding the lead-lined steel box out to her. "Ma'am," he said, "until we can have someone take a look at it I'm going to recommend holding the artifact in a more secure container."

May paused a moment, glaring at the young captain as an air of tension filled the room. May's eyes narrowed as they stared at one another as though a cloud had passed between them through which either had to struggle to see. May caught her lip curling up almost in a snarl to bear her teeth, but quickly shook her head and retrieved the orb from her pouch. "Of course," she said, dropping the orb in the box and jerking her hand away as Odin snapped it shut and closed the latch. "You're right. Let's get a move on." Her demeanor immediately softened.

The six trainers gave the lab another brief once-over, with Odin locating and cleaning out a glass cabinet full of expensive medical supplies. Upon the completion of their ransacking the room, May lead the trainers under her command back into the flooded hallway, but stopped as the radio earpiece in her pocket chirped to life. Quickly fitting the device to the side of her head, May pressed two fingers to the transmitter in her ear.

For a moment only static buzzed over the airwaves until a voice reached the young savant. "Commander," called the man on the other end of the line. "Commander May, this is lieutenant Rickby in command of the Seaspear."

Motioning for everyone to wait, May fiddled with her earpiece for a second. "This is May," she said. "What's going on Rickby?"

"I'm not sure ma'am," the voice buzzed. "I've just started receiving radio reports that the rest of the flotilla is back up and running. Everyone's engines seem to have just come back online like nothing was ever wrong."

May paused and looked at the box poking out of Odin's pack. "Really," she said. "Well that's good news. Rickby, tell the rest of the flotilla to meet the Seaspear at the Trident of Vengeance. Tell everyone to be ready to render aide or strip the ship bare depending on whether or not we find survivors."

"Understood," answered the man on the other end. "If there's nothing else, Rickby out."

Odin looked to his commander. "What's going on?" he asked.

"Communications and engines are back up with the rest of the flotilla," May answered. "Let's get topside and-" May stopped short as the radio in her ear buzzed again. "One second," she said, turning away to answer the call. "This is May," she said.

The radio hissed in her ear for a second, the voice coming through suffering a great deal of distortion. "This is Captain Jorgenson, my squad and I were exploring a starboard hall on sublevel nine," said the voice on the other end. "Commander, I think we found what wasted the Aquan sailors."

May turned to Odin, ordering him to grab the map of the ship they'd retrieved from the laboratory. "Give me your location," she called over the radio. "We'll be there momentarily."

Rushing as quickly as they could through the waist deep freezing water, May and her team followed the map and made good on the Jorgenson's directions, coming moments later across the other team of Rocket trainers where they waited outside a secure door that looked like it had been ripped from its hinges. As May and Odin arrived, one of the men in black and red armor moved forward to meet them.

Saluting, the Rocket inclined his head. "Commander," he said, motioning towards the door as the rest of his squad backed away from the entrance. "Glad you could make it, have a look at this." He lead May through the door and into what looked like a security room, with a pair of chairs in the center of the room surrounded by television monitors that were all either switched off or buzzing with static. "We happened across this room within minutes of breaching the entrance," said Captain Jorgenson, sitting in one of the chairs and typing at the keyboard beneath one of the monitors that responded by turning black and displaying the commands typed by the captain. "Most of the security footage looks to have been destroyed, but I did manage to piece together a few things, including the ship's manifest and," he paused and stopped typing, "this."

Jorgenson clicked a final button and sat back in the chair as a number of the monitors flashed to life. On one of the monitors May recognized the laboratory in which she had stood only minutes before, in which two men were standing around an apparatus of wires and metal rods. Suspended inside the apparatus by some invisible force, May saw the blue orb glowing and shining just as it had done when she found it. One of the men pressed a button on the device on the apparatus and a bolt of electricity leapt between one of the exposed wires and the blue orb.

Clearing his throat, Jorgenson spoke up. "Nothing happens for a few minutes," he said, pressing a key that fast-forwarded all of the video feeds, "until this." He lifted his finger and allowed the displays to resume playing at normal speeds. At that point the two men experimenting with the orb removed it from the apparatus as warning sirens and emergency lights began blaring and flashing. The ship pitched hard to one side, throwing both men on the display hard to the ground. One looked to hit his head on a cabinet and dropped, unmoving.

Pointing to another screen, Jorgenson drew May's attention away. "And here," he said, motioning to a screen displaying an enormous loading bay at the forward end of the ship, "is where things get really interesting."

At the extreme end of the loading bay, which must have run two thirds the length of the ship and stood more than sixty feet from floor to ceiling, May saw two heavy steel doors at which's purpose she could only guess. The doors buckled beneath some great impact and began to slide open, allowing ocean water to flood into the bay at an astonishing rate. Tentacles, each one no less than two feet in diameter and perhaps a hundred times that long slid through the bay doors and forced them wide open, flooding the bay with water as a pair titanic Tentacruel, either one larger than any May had ever seen, crawled into the bay with the enormous doors slamming shut behind them. The two Pokémon instantly began thrashing about, slamming their tentacles into the walkways which remained above the waterline lining the bay and crushing the trainers and Pokémon running out to meet them in combat.

"Meanwhile," Jorgenson drew May's attention to a third monitor, this one showing the perspective of a camera watching the main deck of the ship from the bridge tower. As the ship pitched hard beneath the weight of the Tentacruel and the water flooding in, several crewmen loosed Pokémon to fight as a Gyarados, this one also larger than any of its species May had ever seen, rose out of the ocean and sprayed the deck with a blast of water under such pressure men and beasts exploded into clouds of gore when it struck them. The battle raged for only a few seconds before the top deck had been scoured clean of life and the Gyarados, seemingly in a rage, slithered up onto the deck to look for prey.

May's eyes grew wide and she stammered in disbelief as the water around the ship seemed to boil for a second before countless Staryus exploded from the water and latched first onto the side of the ship and then each other when no room against the steel hull remained. Such was the weight of the Pokémon that the ship actually began to sink beneath their collective bulk. She glanced from the corner of her eye at Odin as the boy stepped up beside her. Suddenly, the thought he carried the blue orb on his person made her stomach dance uneasily beneath her ribs.

"And the grand finale," Jorgenson nodded to the monitor where the two Tentacruel still in the ship had cleared the bay of stragglers. Both Pokémon reared up on their tentacles and opened their beaks wide. Instantly all sound coming from the monitor ceased and the glass lenses of all the cameras still functioning at this point cracked from one end to the other.

May leaned to Odin. "Looks like you were right about a sonic weapon," she said, not peeling her eyes away from the screen where she saw the remaining scientist in the laboratory threw his hands up on either side of his head. He ran into the hall outside his lab and jerked once as though struck by something heavy. As he spun away from the camera, May could see blood and bits of flesh spraying from the eye sockets and ears of the victim of the Tentacruels' attacks. "Yikes," she muttered under her breath as the feed ended and the monitors all went dead. "That's awful."

Jorgenson turned to his commander. "Ma'am," he said. "I went over the manifest to see what the men in the lab were experimenting with since the attack seemed to stem from them messing with that weird orb, but I didn't see anything matching that description…" he trailed off.

May thought a moment, staring at the dead monitors. "What about the Tentacruel?" she asked. "Are they still in the bay?"

"No," Jorgenson said. "Well yes," he corrected himself. "They're dead though. I sent one man to investigate and he came back reporting that it looked like their sonic attacks actually killed each other."

Turning to look at one another, May and Odin went silent for a minute, though when one broke the silence, May spoke first. "Get everyone off this ship," she said curtly, looking between Odin and Jorgenson. "Get everyone back on the Seaspear and let's get the hell out of here. I don't care what kind of treasure these people might have been transporting, but I'm not going to stick around to find out. We need to get out of here before anymore Tentacruel show up or that Gyarados comes back."

Jorgenson saluted. "Very good ma'am," he said, turning to his men and ordering them to split up to deliver the message to the other teams that they were to evacuate to the Seaspear as quickly as possible.

Meanwhile, Odin stepped forward and put his hand on May's shoulder. "What about the orb May," he said in barely more than a whisper. "You're not planning on bringing it with us?" asked the sandy-haired sailor.

"We can't leave it here," May answered, her brow quickly furrowing before returning to normal. "If it has the power to call down all this trouble there's no way I'm letting Orre, or anyone else for that matter, get their hands on it." She stepped back and spoke normally. "Now let's get back to the Seaspear. I want to be back on our way to Hoenn ten minutes ago."

Odin turned to follow her. "I've got a bad feeling about this," he muttered. "Are you sure you don't want me to dump the orb overboard? I say we'd all be safer with it at the bottom of the ocean."

A smirk flitting across her lips, May shook her head. "Not a chance," she said, a flicker of sapphire light sparking in her eyes for only the briefest second. When she went on it was in a voice too quiet for even Odin's keen ears to hear. "It's mine," she whispered to herself. "Mine."