Flocks of bird Pokémon were sent scattering into the air as the first groups of people began to file out in an orderly fashion from the main lobby of Stadium Thirty-One, still enraptured by the incredible battle that they'd just seen within the stadium walls. A few, though, were set upon by the reporting duo of Derek Cohen and Jeanne Girard, who were always eager to grab a few opinions on the events of the battle for their piece on the evening news. Most of the spectators were more than happy to give their thoughts to the pair, particularly since the news crew was on hand to give them fifteen seconds of fame on live television; within five minutes, they had all the footage they needed, much to the disappointment of the spotlight-hungry people waiting their turn.
"Oi, Derek," said Jeanne, microphone being casually spun around between her fingers as she turned to her co-anchor. "I think it's about time one of us sent this footage back to the station, don't you?"
Derek pondered her words for a moment, mouth curled into a frown, before he gave a stout nod. "You're right, Jeanne! I think it's about time one of us sent this footage back to the station!"
"Are you talking about me?" she snapped, swinging her foot forward and catching him in the shin with the sharp tip. "I was suggesting that you ought to do it!"
"Me?" howled Derek melodramatically, his arms flailing about as he hopped up and down on the spot. "That's ridiculous! My place is out here in the world, always looking for another scoop, not stuck doing errands for the man behind the teleprompter!" he countered, brandishing his fist.
"I guess there's no other way to settle this…" Jeanne sighed. "The usual, then?" she proposed, holding out her hand.
"I suppose so," Derek replied.
"Rock, paper, scissors!" they chanted, throwing down their fists, and both came up with flat palms. "Rock, paper, scissors—!" this time, the pair both landed scissors, "rock, paper, scissors—!" paper again, "rock, paper, scissors—!" believing the other to pick rock, the only one unchosen thus far, both went for paper a third time, and groaned in frustration as they saw the other's hand.
"You two are like a pair of six-year-olds!" shouted one of the members of the technician crew, a burly-looking man holding a stereoscopic camcorder on his shoulder. "I'll take the bloody footage to the executives, sheesh!" he grunted mutinously, pulling a pair of cassettes from inside the camcorder. Tossing the machine one of the other techies in the crew and keeping the cassettes for himself, he marched off, still muttering loudly as he disappeared amongst the departing crowd.
Derek and Jeanne watched the crewman until he was out of sight, and once he was gone, they exchanged white-toothed smiles and a boisterous high-five, much to the remaining crew's chagrin.
"Six-year-olds don't work together that well," Derek snickered, spinning his microphone and jamming it into his trouser pocket like a cowboy with his revolver. "Score one for the intrepid anchor-man! Oh, and his partner in crime," he added quickly, after a watchful glance from Jeanne.
Jeanne rolled her eyes. The cameraman was right; for all his passion and instinct when it came to journalism, Derek could be as childish as the best of them sometimes. "Well, come on. Let's head over to Stadium Sixteen; I don't want to miss the start of the Reiger-Robinson match—hang on," she said suddenly, pointing back towards the stadium entrance. "Isn't that Robinson coming out of the stadium?"
"Say what now?" exclaimed Derek, whirling around to face the stadium, and he saw a pair of young men running from the entrance at full tilt. He squinted in the midday sunlight to get a good look at their faces. "Robinson? Not even close," he scoffed, raising a hand over his face for a little more protection from the rays. "That's Ash Ketchum. Plus one, too… I think the other guy's name is—oh, what was it?—Barack or something."
"Oh, so that's Ketchum, huh?" Jeanne muttered. She rested a hand on her hip, tracking the boy as he ran down the boulevard towards them. "Well, he's a cute little kid, but I'm not exactly sure what all the fuss is about," she remarked, casting a cool glance at her partner.
"Appearances can be deceiving, my dear Jeanne," Derek retorted smugly. "I'll have you know that Ash hasn't had a single one of his Pokémon knocked out so far in the tournament."
Jeanne laughed, loudly and haughtily. "That doesn't really mean much at this stage. Come back tomorrow and tell me that, after he's gone through the Bellringer, and then I'll be impressed. Heck, if his record is flawless by tomorrow night, I'll suck your d—"
"Watch out, coming through!" Brock called out, still lagging a few paces behind Ash, the latter already level with the reporters and barging his way through them with almost careless abandon. "Ash, wait up! Slow down and tell me what that phone call was about!" he roared. Seeing no sign of hearing from his friend, Brock put on a huge burst of speed and closed him down, and a low sweeping arc of his foot brought the Trainer and his Pokémon falling onto the solid ground with all the grace of a wet noodle.
Ash clutched at his face, feeling a sharp pain in his nose from where it had smacked against the pavement. Alongside him, he could hear Pikachu groaning, but he bounced back to his feet and turned to face Brock instead. "What the heck was that for?" he yelled thickly, gently tipping his head backwards as he felt a few drops of blood smack on his upper lip.
"Come on, Ash," said Brock, his voice somewhere between a sigh and a bark. "What was the deal with the phone that woman gave you? And who was the person on the line?"
Reluctantly, Ash recounted the conversation he'd had with the mysterious man on the phone. As he went on, Brock became increasingly worried, and his mouth crashed open when he heard about the man's cruel ultimatum. By the time Ash finished his story, both were standing stock-still as they faced each other, fists shaking at their sides. Even Pikachu was visibly affected by the revelation, his tiny red cheeks throwing great bolts of lightning onto the ground in all directions.
"That's—that's unbelievable!" Brock stammered. "Do you have any idea why anyone would want to do something like that?"
"Not a clue…!" Ash sighed, voice rising as he clutched at his hair, threatening to rip it out by the handful. He screwed his eyes shut, hoping that somehow, somewhere in the recesses of his mind, some sort of answer would come magically speeding towards him.
The sound of somebody nearby clearing their throat, loudly and deliberately, broke Ash's concentration, and his eyes snapped wide open. In a flash, he whirled around towards the sound, only to find himself greeted by the same two people that he had nearly mown down a minute or so before; a middle-aged man with flawlessly-styled, jet-black hair combed backwards; and a beautiful woman, her red curls matched by the suited dress she wore.
"Sorry to bother you, Ash," said the man, beaming brightly, "but I was wondering if we could have a word."
Ash instantly recognised the voice. "Derek Cohen?" he asked, receiving a polite nod in reply. "Look—I already gave you that interview, and my friend and I really have to get going to—"
"The interview?" Derek repeated, looking blankly at the boy. "Oh no, that was fine—you did a good job of keeping up—" He waved a hand about dismissively, drawing another roll of the eyes from Jeanne, who then stepped between Ash and he.
"What my co-anchor was trying to say—" she interjected, shooting a quick glare Derek's way, "was that were—well, as unprofessional as it might seem—eavesdropping on your conversation with Barack—" Brock opened his mouth to correct her, but was quickly spoken over as Jeanne rose her voice, "and we know about that unfortunate business with your poor friend Misty."
"Exactly! And, we think that we could provide some assistance!" Derek shouted from over her shoulder, giving the two youngsters an enthusiastic wave of the hand that wasn't returned.
The slight discrepancy over his name suddenly gone from Brock's mind, he cast Ash a doubtful look before turning his gaze back to the journalists. "You could help us? How?" he inquired, folding his arms.
Derek heard the slight bite in Brock's words and ducked out from behind Jeanne's back, holding up his arms defensively. "Hey, no need to be all capricious, my good man!" he said with false cheer. "We're offering you a service here—" his next few words were silenced by a sharp upwards jab from Jeanne's right fist, knocking his teeth together and his body comically onto the pavement in a heap. "Owwie…!"
"Like I was saying," said Jeanne, calm as could be, "we heard about your troubles, and we want to offer our services to help track down the horrible people behind your friend's kidnapping as quickly as possible. We'd be glad to broadcast your story live and run a helpline through our switchboard if you think it might speed things along."
"You'd do all that for us?" gasped Ash, eyes lighting up. "Thank you, so much!"
"It's our pleasure," she smiled, giving Derek a playful nudge with the heel of her shoe. "After all, that mystery caller didn't leave you with a whole lot to go on, by the sound of it… 'a yellow box that traps light' isn't exactly specific."
"Yeah, I know…" muttered Brock, hanging his head. Just like Ash, he was desperately trying to think of a way to solve their predicament, but he was a little apprehensive about the idea of using the media to help their search. One the one hand, the attention it would bring could really help them narrow down a list of possible places where Misty might be being held; but, on the other, what if the kidnapper got word that the whole island was potentially looking for him?
"Well, what are we waiting for? We haven't got any better ideas!" Ash cheered, but Brock could tell that he was sharing the same sense of reluctance, his eyes still showing alarm from behind the confident grin now spreading across his face.
Derek took Ash's words at face value, though, and clapped his hands together with jubilation. "Fantastic!" he cried. He beckoned towards the news crew, who quickly shuffled over to join he and Jeanne. "Quit dawdling about and twiddling your thumbs, people—start setting up your equipment! We've got a story to run!"
"But—sir!" piped up one of the crewmen, a stout elderly man in a tattered blue jacket. "We need approval from the executive board to live-cast a story!"
Derek raised a finger to silence the man, already halfway through raising a cell phone to his ear. Two rings later, the line went through, but he didn't even wait for whoever was receiving the call to answer, instead raising his voice over any potential replies. "This is Derek. I'm about to live-cast a breaker about a high-profile kidnapping, and I want runtime in five minutes! Our video serial is Tangela, Vibrava, seven-one-nine. If you've got any questions, ask them to the man upstairs after you put us through to the broadcast!"
"Hang on—!"
Derek snapped the phone shut before the hapless receptionist could get another word in, slipping back into his jacket pocket. "Now then… shall we?"
Jeanne stood watchfully behind the shoulders of her crew as they kept their vigil; a tall man held the boom microphone steady over Derek, Ash and Brock as the former conducted the interview, and the entire exchange was expertly captured on a wireless recorder-transmitter clasped to another lackey's shoulder. Her grey eyes sent scathing looks to her technicians whenever they gave an inward hiss at some of the more disturbing details of Ash's story; even though they hadn't been within earshot of Ash and Brock at the time, it was still unprofessional of them to give such a reaction from behind the camera on hearing such a tale.
Eventually, the interview itself came to a close, and Derek shook both boys' hands as a formality before turning to face the camera. "And there you have it. For anybody with information that could lead to the poor girl's whereabouts or rescue, please, call the number at the bottom of your screens now—" he signalled inconspicuously to the third crewmember, who typed a command on the laptop resting on her legs, connected to the camera by thick black wires.
Jeanne leant forwards to peer over the cameraman's shoulder, and saw the number for their station's hotline appear in stylised numbers at the bottom of the display. She clenched her tongue between her teeth; it was a bad habit she had whenever she was stressed. She wondered how long it would be before the first call, and whether it would be a credible call, or just another prank by hacks looking for their fifteen seconds of fame on live television.
"At least this place is empty enough," she thought aloud, with a quick glance around. Nearly all of the spectators for Ash's battle with Lester had left the stadium to go elsewhere, and the next battle wasn't until well into the afternoon. The only people within eyesight, let alone earshot, didn't even look remotely interested in their journalistic presence; a blonde girl was looking over occasionally as she chatted away on her phone down the road, but that was it.
"—bring you more on this breaking story as it unfolds," Derek was saying, his eyes fixed on the camera. "This is Derek Cohen, reporting live in front of Stadium Thirty-One."
"Aaand cut," said the woman at the computer, cutting the feed with another flurry of fingers on keys and nodding to Derek.
Noting the gesture, Derek lowered the microphone from in front of his mouth and relaxed his shoulders, giving them a little shake to get rid of some built-up tension. "Well, I guess that's a wrap for now," he sighed. He gave his watch a quick check, and then turned to Ash and Brock, who were still both standing nervously next to each other, with Pikachu clinging onto his Trainer's jacket like he was in danger of falling off. "By my count, you've got two-and-a-half hours before—well, that unfortunate deadline," he informed them, choosing his words carefully as he saw their expressions.
Brock clenched his jaw. Despite Derek's diplomatic wording, he still felt a little pang in his gut at the mention. "What do we do now?" he asked, looking between the journalists.
"Since that interview was broadcasted live around the island, the local police department will already be conducting an investigation. Within an hour, they should start a limited search of the island, looking through all the usual places to keep a hostage," Jeanne explained, opting for a more honest and direct approach than her partner. "Low-key hotels, one or two of the edgier neighbourhoods and so on—"
"What about us?" barked Ash. "I can't just stand here and do nothing while we wait for someone else to look for Misty! She's my friend!"
Derek moved to stand a few feet in front of Ash, just in case the boy tried to run down the street past them. "Now, just calm down a moment, Ash," he said. The sound of a phone ringing caught his attention, but Jeanne quickly answered her cell phone and wandered away from the group to listen more clearly. "Look, you—"
"Don't you get it?" Ash howled, throwing his arm out to the side. "Somebody's got Misty held hostage and if we don't find her then—then—we have to find her!"
Before anybody had time to react, he tore at one of the Poké Balls on his belt, with such ferocity that the latches on his jeans were pulled apart by the seams and the whole belt came away with his hand. A stream of unintelligible curses streamed from Ash's mouth as he scrabbled at the ball, clumsy hands fumbling over the strip of leather it was attached to; the others watched the spectacle unfold with a mixture of empathy and pity, hearing the anguish and infuriation in his voice as it cracked with emotion.
Eventually, the Poké Ball came free, and Ash lobbed it into the sky as hard as he could, feeling a little jolt of pain in his shoulder as he launched the ball upwards. With a flash of bright white framed against the clear skies, his Noctowl burst out into the open, accompanied by a dazzling spray of glittering, golden sparkles of light that drifted lazily over the heads of the people standing below. As the Flying-type swooped down towards its Trainer, Derek and the others were momentarily awestruck by the shiny gloss of its feathers as they twinkled in the light of the golden dust.
"Hurrruuuu!" hooted Noctowl, perching itself on Ash's shoulder and giving Pikachu a friendly wave of its wing.
"Jay, quick!" Derek called out, snapping his fingers at the cameraman to get the latter's attention. "Get a good shot of this Noctowl! Be sure to capture everything, yeah?"
"Yeah, yeah… whatever," he muttered, tweaking the camera's zoom and focusing on the Pokémon as it ran its beak through its wing feathers, cleaning away. "I'd better be getting overtime for this… s'posed to be my lunch break…"
The disgruntled cameraman's words went mercifully unnoticed, as all eyes were trained with curiosity on Ash and his Noctowl, the young Trainer muttering in a low voice to the bird Pokémon. Every now and then, his eyes would dart back to the rest of the group, and then to Jeanne as she continued her conversation on the phone, to make sure that their eavesdropping wasn't bearing any fruit of gossip.
"Okay, now get going!" he ordered, with a roll of the shoulder that dislodged Noctowl with a loud squawk. Wildly beating its wings, Noctowl steadied itself and soared up towards the clouds before levelling out and heading west, plumage bright against the blue backdrop. "Meet us at the Pokémon Center at sunset!" he called after the Flying-type, and he heard a faint coo in reply before Noctowl disappeared over the rim of Stadium Thirty-One's roof.
As the last sight of Noctowl's tail-feathers vanished from view, Jeanne strolled back to the others, waving the cell phone in her hand. Ash and Brock looked to Derek, wondering what she meant, but the latter marched over to his partner and took the phone from her, raising it to his ear.
"Yes?—Uh-huh—right—okay," he muttered, in between bursts of speech from the other end of the line. "Understood. Alright, give us thirty to get ready and then put him through."
"What's going on?" Brock asked.
Derek snapped the phone shut and tossed it back to Jeanne, signalling for the tech crew to begin setting up their equipment again. "Good news," he replied, flashing a dazzlingly white smile. "Our little gambit with the hotline paid off!"
"Say what?" exclaimed Ash, starting forwards and pressing toward Derek for answers.
"It's true!" he nodded. He jerked a thumb towards Jeanne. "The head of the network just told Jeanne and I the news over the phone; apparently, one of our viewers figured out what that cryptic little crossword clue that your kidnapper gave you actually means."
"Alright!" Ash cheered, pumping his fist and throwing a grin at Pikachu on his shoulder. "That sure was quick!"
"You can say that again," added Brock, folding his arms with a smile of his own. 'A little too quickly, though…' a voice said, deep in the back of his mind, but he wasn't willing to throw away such a brilliant piece of luck, not while their situation was this bad.
Meanwhile, Derek was busily bumping Ash to and fro, positioning the pair of them so that they were centred on the screen. Once again behind the cameraman's shoulder, Jeanne signalled to her crew and pointed at her partner. On cue, Derek raised his microphone and looked straight through the lens of the camera, waiting patiently as the voice of the studio's anchor came through the computer setup a few feet from him.
"—Cohen on the ground, with that breaking development. Derek, what can you tell us about it?"
"Well," replied Derek, his voice now sounding more professional as he slipped back into his journalistic habits, "we've just received, on good authority I might add, a phone call from a concerned viewer who claims to have deciphered the riddle that the kidnappers left. Let's hear what he has to say," he offered, clapping a hand against his ear and tilting his head away. "Sir, you say you understand what the kidnapper's phrase means?"
A new voice echoed through the computer's speakers, reaching Brock with crystal clarity despite being the furthest from the former. "Yes, that is correct," said the voice; by its tone and pitch, Brock reasoned that it belonged to a young teenage boy, probably only a year or two below Ash.
"For those of you at home who have forgotten, the words were, and I quote, 'a yellow box where no light can escape'," Derek said to the viewers, before focusing back on the anonymous caller. "Okay, could you tell us what you believe to be the significance of this cryptic term?"
Ash felt himself leaning forward expectantly, his impatience bubbling just below the surface as the caller remained silent for a few seconds, only the scritch-scratch of static sounding through.
"Of course," the boy said, pausing again before giving his answer in a slow, deliberate voice. "It's a reference to a supernatural manga series by the name of Fatal Inscription."
"Excuse me?" exclaimed Derek, tapping the earpiece lodged in the side of his head as though sure that he'd misheard. "Could you repeat that? You're saying that the kidnapper left a hint in a comic book?"
More silence.
"That is correct," the boy replied at last. "The climax of the story takes place in a location called the Yellow Box Warehouse, next to some docks; the villain, who is portrayed to represent light, suffers a heart attack while trying to escape the authorities and dies. Hence, a yellow box where no light can escape."
"The Yellow Box Warehouse?" Jeanne repeated, professionalism forgotten as her voice came through on the live broadcast, and she received a reproachful glare from the woman manning the computer linkup. "What?—It used to be a mass-storage unit about five years ago, but it got bought out and left to fall into disrepair," she explained.
"That is correct," interjected the boy; he was still on the line, much to Derek's initial surprise. "If memory serves me correctly, the Yellow Box Warehouse can be found at the very end of Lawliet Avenue, alongside the tertiary merchant trading harbour on the island's western coast."
With some off-screen encouragement from Jeanne, Derek pressed forward. "Sir, is there anything you could possibly add to shed some more li—?" he asked, but a loud click sounded through the speakers, and a repetitive, dull tone told him that the anonymous tipster had hung up the phone.
"Hello? Hello?"
"He hung up…" Jeanne muttered. She stroked a finger against her mouth, eyebrows furrowed in thought, but she was snapped out of her reverie by the sound of Derek wrapping up his report, the clatter of the crew packing up their equipment accompanying the trademark delivery of his sign-off.
The moment the newscast stopped, Ash stamped a foot against the ground, fists clenched and pointed at the footpath in front of him, drawing out looks of bewilderment from the others as they saw the resolve in his glimmering eyes. "Let's go to that warehouse!" he shouted impatiently, and Pikachu waved a defiant little paw next to his Trainer's head in agreement.
"Wherever a story is waiting to be told, so shall we go onwards!" declared Derek, with many a flourish of his hands as he twirled the microphone like a cheerleader's baton.
Brock held back a titter and shake of the head, instead unfolding his arms and placing a hand on Ash's shoulder. "Alright then," he said with a nod, mouth creased in a firm line. "Let's go rescue our friend, Ash!"
Far away from the small group of rescuers as they set off for the western coastline, a ghostly smile flickered onto Iato's face as he stood near the window an electronics store. The breaking news broadcast update had just finished flashing out from over fifteen plasma television screens of all shapes and sizes in the shop's display, and a small crowd of people, some recognising Ash and others simply jockeying for a good spot from which to watch, had gathered around the store's front.
Seamlessly, Iato wound his way out of the curious gathering. With the telecast over, most of the people he was trying to weave between were already headed off in other directions, interest in the store gone as they chatted amongst themselves with the events they had just witnessed.
"That's the guy who beat Lester Garre, wasn't it?"
"It's got to be some kind of publicity stunt, I reckon—"
"—two interviews with the kid in the space of fifteen minutes?"
"They should lock that bastard up for kidnapping a girl—!"
"—Pah, forget jail! When they find the guy responsible, they should just drop him in the ocean!"
The little snippets of conversation that found their way to Iato only made his grin grow wider. Tucking the brim of his fedora a little lower over his face, he ducked away behind a large convenience store next to an intersection. Scanning the stubby alley, he immediately found who he was looking for.
"There, I did what you asked," said a teenage boy with grubby-looking pants and equally filthy hair; a street-urchin, to be sure. He fanned out a sheet of paper in his hand and waved it towards Iato. "I told that reporter guy everything you wrote down on this piece o' paper… now where's my money, huh?"
Iato pursed his lips, eyes narrowing at the boy's lack of manners, but a moment later he reached hand into his overcoat and pulled out a small brown package, bundled together with twine. "Here you are," he said, tossing the package to the urchin. "One thousand dollars."
The boy held it up to his face, tilting it this way and that in what little sunlight shone between the rooftops, and he swiftly pocketed it with glee. "Thanks, mister!" he exclaimed; he'd never even heard of so much money before meeting this strange Samaritan.
"Now, be a good lad and run along," Iato added with a smile, and the boy darted past him in delight, whooping and skipping all the way out onto the street. Turning around to watch the youngster leave the same way from which he'd come, Iato gave a quick check to make sure nobody was peering into the gaunt little passageway. Seeing nothing, he reached his other hand into the opposite pocket of his overcoat, closing his hand around the small, metallic device stowed safely inside.
Pressing his tongue between his lips, Iato softly pressed his thumb against the button in the centre of the device, and casually strolled towards the footpath adjoining the street. As the explosion tore through the air, he whistled a merry tune, relishing the contrast with the screams of terror at the crossing behind him.
Boom... shaka-laka. Looks like somebody's in red-hot form! Iato's really having a blast out there, don't you agree?
Those horrific puns, and many more, brought to you by Billy's Homemade Human Jerky Strips! Land a one-hit KO on hunger with some jerked jerk jerky!
In all (brief) seriousness, though, hopefully it was an interesting chapter. A bit of a bait and switch on the title, yeah, but if I spoiled things then there would be no fun. Plus, y'know, if I can manage to surprise you with what happens, then that's a good thing... hopefully.
Courtesy of the holidays, I'm going to be quite busy, what with the family and the celebrating and the hoyvin-glavin. So, as a result, Chapter 14, "Alone Wolves", will be released at the beginning of 2012. January 3rd, to be precise! That should give everybody enough time to sleep off their New Year's hangover - or red cordial sugar high, depending on how old you are.
So, until next time... Be sure to review and, since it only comes around once a year,
Happy Hanukkah, Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year!