A Maiden's Voyage
Chapter 10: End of the World
Rotom and I traveled along on a bridge across to another small, rocky hill until three steps later where we had to cross another bridge. After we crossed the second bridge, I saw the ground below and Hearthome City was in the distance, far away. I looked back at Rotom and smiled, then we began trekking to Hearthome again. Rotom commented on the lovely sunset and I asked him what he thought about when we were in Geraldine's chamber. The conversation lit up our walk and we even hypothesized that Geraldine was doing something sneaky back in that chamber. I recalled her pressing a lot of buttons and switches. And I still wondered why there was a hole in the ground so deep that it reached her chamber. Rotom thought it could have been a silo of some sort and I rejected the idea.
"What's the next gym going to be, Aria?" Rotom said to me as we navigated around and down the final staircase leading us to ground level. Hearthome was just a ten minute walk now and I was relieved to be back in my home country. It's sad to think of half of Sinnoh being my country of origin but it's the truth when Society Sinnoh and Galactic Sinnoh are polar opposites.
"I think the Hearthome Gym Leader is a Ghost-type user. You should have the upper hand."
"Yes, but you should know Aria, Dusknoir and I are both weak to ghost attacks, too." Rotom said looking at me a little annoyed.
"Oh. I know. But you're faster and he can take lots of hits so it works out like that right?" I said as we walked along on a trail that seemed to be winding to the right. We kept walking and the trail winded again until we were walking next to trees. Then at the clearing, we came upon a small section right before the city itself. There was a huge expanse of land between us and the city, I hadn't seen from above. I did, however see some buildings further up ahead and was excited because I heard, despite Hearthome being extremely fortified, it was a beautiful city with its trademark Amity Square. I told Rotom I would take him to the beautiful gardens of the Square and visit the Contest Hall to watch some of the greatest pokemon coordinators guide their partners to victory in a series of tasks.
After a brief moment to see the city up ahead, we continued walking. In this land there was a park to my right with no people or pokemon playing in it. Instead it seemed like nobody had played in the park for a long time. In contrast, there was a house closer to me on the right of the path. It looked very rundown and I doubted any people lived in there. It didn't matter to me and so I just kept walking.
"Aria. Something's not right here." Rotom stopped where he was floating and I turned to face him.
"What's wrong?" I said, just before I could say anything else or move I heard a huge crash. Dust flew everywhere and I couldn't see. The impact had hurled me into the grassy area of the expanse and Rotom floated after me, calling my name. I yelled after him but the loudness of the scene around us was too great for him to hear me. My ears were ringing when I stood up and the scene before me was hazy, but I could see the house that was just on my right was engulfed in flames. I was frightened by this horrific scene and saw the house had collapsed in on itself, with a faint crying when my hearing was starting to come back. Rotom found me and appeared at my side when more of the smoke cleared, and we couldn't go inside the blazing house but that didn't stop me from trying. Rotom and I cautiously approached the house and the faint crying became sudden and a little choked. I placed my hand on a piece of fallen wood and it felt warm to the touch, so I wondered what could have caused such a tremendous explosion. I pushed more of the wood around, scorching my hands a little until I could see a small body wriggling in the discarded wood.
"There's someone there!" I screamed and ran to the small child.
"Mom?" The child looked up at me and appeared crestfallen when I did not match who it thought I was. I saw that the little child was a girl and I quickly picked her up in my arms. Dashing through flames I ran out of the house and stopped in the grassy field. I told Rotom to watch the little girl when I went to go back inside for her mother. At first Rotom pulled me back but I told him lives were at stake and I ran back to the house.
A shiny piece of silvery firm metal gleamed underneath the small floorboard of the house when I walked in. I got on one knee, amid the flames and picked up the warm metal in my hands, turning it over to inspect it. The smoke was too great and I couldn't see so I was forced to run back outside and met Rotom along with the child. I tucked the piece of metal in my backpack and searched for Rotom and the girl. Then, the house behind me collapsed completely and the fires spread to the nearby grass and trees causing the fire to spread exponentially.
It was at this juncture that I could see many white trucks approaching the scene from the direction of Hearthome City. Society operatives emerged from the trucks, releasing Water pokemon that began attacking the fire, trying to suppress it. One operative saw me and Rotom and ran up to us asking what had happened. After I told him I was just passing by he grabbed my arm forcibly and pulled me in the direction of the trucks. Rotom had zapped the man's arm and I ran away from him as he called to his friends. The smoke had cleared now and before I could even reach the trees a mass of vines had strangled me and I was suppressed on the dusty grass. To avoid being attacked, Rotom quickly infiltrated my poketch and I saw his face on my wristwatch where I was held on the ground by a pokemon's vines.
"Sauuuur." I heard a Venusaur say to its trainer as the Society operative pet it on the head for restraining me. I was loaded onto a truck without any approval from me and I didn't know what happened to the little girl I rescued. I struggled in the truck when they placed handcuffs around my wrists. I was all alone in the back of one of the trucks when they started moving again.
"Let me out of here!" I screamed when I could feel movement from the truck. There was no answer and I was just lying on the metal ground of the truck, not moving and scared. It had to have been about ten minutes before the truck stopped moving and I heard the door shut behind from the front door. Two men retrieved me from their truck and dragged me inside the back of a building. The sun was beginning to set now and it was the last thing I saw before the door behind me was sealed. I kept struggling, trying to wriggle free from the grips of the men restraining me but without any success.
I was taken into a solid white room. There was only 1 desk in the entire room and two chairs. I was seated in the chair and was left alone by the two men in a windowless study room. I whimpered when I tried moving my arms and my entire body was sore from being shoved around. A pain shot up my right arm when I tried moving it and discovered it was sprained. After waiting what seemed like an eternity, a man dressed in official looking Society clothes, didn't say a word to me as he walked calmly over to his desk and began writing things down on a clipboard he carried in with him. He had carried in my backpack and just before I could say anything else he propped my bag onto his desk. He was most likely the one in charge of the place I was in, judging by the pins he wore on his jacket.
"What's your name." The man stated in a gruff, sounding voice. It startled me into silence except for his breathing and my own.
"Why am I here!" I screamed at him. I so scared I had done something wrong when in actuality a house had caught on fire and I had rescued a child inside. So why was I in here?
"What is your name." The man stated again, ignoring my question and he didn't even look up at me.
"Aria." I said looking at the floor. Out of the corner of my eye I saw him look up at me and he blinked when I said my name, like he knew me. I, of course, had no idea who he was but I guess it's a small world.
"You are Aria?" He said looking at me. I nodded in my chair, still looking at the floor, sullenly.
"The one from Team Galactic." He said writing something on his clipboard. I was appalled when he said this and looked up.
"What? I'm not from Team Galactic!" He looked at me, almost angry that I was lying to him when it was the honest truth.
"I'm from Twinleaf Town. I was just walking by when the house caught on fire and-"
"You mean when the house exploded due to a Galactic missile?" His and my eyes were locked now. There was something going on that I wasn't aware of and this wasn't good because I'm not a terrorist.
"I was just walking by and it happened so I did what any normal person would do and went to see if anyone was in there and saved the little girl."
"What little girl?" He said, alerted now. I noticed now that he had shortly cut brown hair and wore a face with scars and some wrinkles on it. He wrote himself a note on his clipboard before putting it down and saying the word: yes.
"What do you mean 'yes' why am I still here?!" I said incredulously.
"You mean you were there to make sure the job was done, am I right Team Galactic?"
"I'm not from Team Galactic! I live in Twinleaf Town and-"
"Here's what I know, Galactic," He said shushing me into silence. I was so angry these people had restrained me and I was just doing my own business when these people came into my life.
"I was notified a week ago that Team Galactic had a spy located here in Hearthome. I began a heavy, secret assessment of the people in this city trying to smoke out the rat. Then one day later, Oreburgh City radioed me and said they intercepted a Galactic radio signal that was intended for Sunyshore. The message said they were going to shoot a missile at the spies residence in hopes that the spy wouldn't reveal any information regarding Team Galactic." He stopped talking and just stared at me. I looked at my poketch and could see the fading face of my pokemon who looked so sad staring up at me from my watch.
"What does that have to do with me?" I screamed, looking at him angrily.
"The message said the missile would be shot when the girl was nearby. That girl is you, Aria." I was nervous when he said this. Nothing was ever said to me about a missile or the house in Hearthome exploding.
"My field marshal spotted a Skarmory fleeing the scene after the bomb went off and my troops poured into the land. I personally know that Skarmory myself. It belongs to Commander Mars of Team Galactic and the transmission didn't stop there, kid. It said the girl, you, had a floating pokemon and carried a backpack. In that backpack I would find all sorts of Team Galactic equipment so let's see." The man began pouring the contents of my bag on the table and I didn't even protest because nothing in there would allude that I was ever apart of Team Galactic.
"I'm from Twinleaf Town, t-tell Barrington. He saw me at the Twinleaf Festival!" As I finished saying this my heart dropped when the man rummaged through my things and picked up a silver piece of metal. He held it up to me and I stopped before I could say anything else. Things were turning a dark terrible corner when I realized this had sealed my fate. I was Team Galactic. But I wasn't.
"So what's this? I can clearly make out the "G" that's painted onto the metal." He looked at me and laughed a little.
"Well, Aria, it's been nice meeting you, I'd tell you my name but you'd just forget it anyway, hm." He laughed to himself, fiddling around with the piece of metal.
"What do you mean I'd forget." I looked at him tensely, while he played with the metal. He stopped, then clinked onto his metal desk the small piece of Galactic metal and looked me right in the eye.
"When we decommission you, you worthless piece of shit. There's a machine in this building." He said pointing with his finger onto his desk. "And this machine is tuned to a very particular frequency of high electrical voltage. I'm gonna hook it up to your brain and zap!" He slapped the desk, startling me.
"Your brain is fried and you become a lump of pokeblock for the rest of your life." He cackled.
"Wouldn't it be easier to just shoot me?" I looked at him, cunningly.
"Shoot you." He chuckled. "What would I want with a teenage girl's corpse staining my building? I've got enough problems with fugitives running around and Team Galactic. That would cause way too many fractures in our cracked world."
"You're cracked. You won't get away with this." I stood up from the chair, my hands still restrained behind me. He laughed even harder now and told me I was in no position to bark orders at anyone. He told me General Barrington would be really upset to hear his favorite Galactic Grunt had fallen down a hill and lost all her memories.
"You can't do this. My father won't rest until you're all punished for doing this to me!" I said running up to his desk. He called in the guards who grabbed me while I was trying desperately to wriggle free. I was pulled through a hallway containing cells. In these cells I saw Galactic Operatives who were all behaving like newborn babies. I would become one of them except they would throw my body down a hill so I'd get physically injured before all my friends and family discovered poor Aria Verne fell down a hill and forgot everything. I'd be bedridden forever while these fiends who were supposed to be protecting me, rummaged through the world and I'd be dead. I would be. I'd rather be shot than cause everlasting pain to everyone around me.
The guards took me into a huge room containing nothing but a control booth and to my right was a large machine that I was hooked into. The two guards strapped me into a chair that had wires coming out of it in all directions into something I would've seen on an alien cartoon, but this was the real thing. I struggled, trying to undo the tight iron clasps that bound me to the chair and I couldn't do anything but rest here until my brain was literally fried. There was nobody who could possibly save me. Dusknoir's pokeball was still in that vile mans office in a pile of my belongings. This made me feel uneasy because it meant my pokemon would continue to suffer after I was gone. I then realized Rotom was still in my wristwatch. The two guards were positioning themselves in the control room of the machine.
"Rotom. Get out while you can. It's hopeless for me. Please. Find Dusknoir and Run. Run away." I cried. Tears streamed down my cheeks as my life was slowly about to end. My poketch began buzzing and I heard a faint "no" coming from Rotom, still inside the mechanism.
"What are you going to do?" I sniffled. Then I saw one of the Society men walk down, avoiding my tear stricken eyes and exited the room.
"Trust me." I heard a faint buzz. Then my poketch powered off. I cried a little thinking about my Dad and my friends at home who would have to care for my body once they found it. If they found it. My Dad would be heartbroken. He would quit his job to take care of me. I don't even know what we'd do. And I wouldn't even be conscious to any of this. It would be a painless oblivion to be a vegetable in the care of my friends and family and I couldn't do that to them. I couldn't be selfish and give up everything I had already accomplished.
The man from before, whose name I didn't even know, walked into the room with the accompany of the grunt from before. The grunt walked upstairs into the control booth and the man walked up to me, smiling at my teary face. I don't think I've ever hated a person as much as I hated him and then I remembered Geraldine Swan. These two people were no different in the way they generated destruction. If it wasn't on the battlefield then these destructive forces ruined the lives of the people around them. These are the villains that I was born to stop.
My poketch containing Rotom was now violently switching on and off, even sparking twice. The man's smile changed to a frown as he saw my misbehaving wristwatch. He ripped it off my arm painfully, threw it on the ground breaking it, and if that wasn't enough, stomped on it multiple times.
"They should make better technologies for you Galactic pieces of shit." He sneered, then bent closer to me and spat on my face.
"This won't matter to you, but my name is Major Daryl Atkinson. It's funny. I say my name to all the Galactic Grunts I use this zapping machine on. Don't quote me on this, but I'm not even sure the Galactics know I exist." He laughed.
"Daryl. Old name to match an old and worn out man." I said, and those were my last words, too. Atkinson looked up at the two grunts in the control booth and nodded to them without looking at me as he walked all the way to the door. He left without saying anything else as the grunts were still preparing their machine. I wasn't even told if it would be painful or not. I had expected the worst and lost my last glimmer of hope when I couldn't find or hear Rotom. I prayed that when Atkinson stepped on my poketch, Rotom had escaped and went to find Dusknoir's ball.
Maybe he could figure a way to open it and the two Ghosts could find their way back to Twinleaf Town. They would tell my Dad the truth of what happened so my Dad knew my body would be in the news. I hoped my pokemon would be okay and I hoped my Dad would be safe, too. I knew my Ghost pokemon would do everything they could to protect my father if they even made it to Twinleaf Town, a long ways from here.
I heard the faint sound of a grunt saying "ready" to his cohort and heard the clicking sound like the switch to the big red button was underneath a seal to prevent the machine from randomly going off. I wasn't prepped for anything I just heard them press buttons and the machine roared to life, buzzing and clicking and making horrifying sounds. I shook in my seat preparing for oblivion and saw the grunts who were still pressing buttons in their control deck. I shook and shook trying so hard to escape but couldn't and the machine just shook more violently with every passing second. I looked up and there were long blue wires connecting the huge power, emanating from the machine to my chair which was connected all to my brain and in a matter of seconds I would forget everything. I would forget ever going to school. I would forget my home life, my friends, my Dad, Rotom, Dusknoir. I would forget winning the first two gym badges of the Sinnoh Region on my first try and forgetting my budding friendship with Medgar, the Grass Leader. I would forget all the time I spent walking with Rotom as we talked about virtually everything. My life would be completely erased in less than ten seconds.
The machine buzzed so violently I wish I could've covered my ears because it was so loud. It winded to a high frequency buzz that was milliseconds away from taking my entire life from me and then it just shut off. The entire machine powered down and the operatives were pressing buttons, pulling levers, backup generators, emergency hatches. Anything to get the machine to power up. I was looking around everywhere trying to find the cause of the mishap and couldn't find anything that could've caused this.
One of the operatives walked down the steps from his control booth and walked up to me in the machine. Before he could touch me, the machine regained life, but didn't zap me. Instead, from one of the beacons pointed downward, a huge bolt of electricity crackled from the machine and severely electrocuted the operative. He was pushed backwards and hit the wall before collapsing on the ground and never getting up. The second grunt ran down the stairs and was shocked with a similar bolt of electricity before falling down the stairs to meet his unconscious friend.
The latches on my arms and legs clicked open and I slid my hands out and carefully maneuvered away from the machine. I walked into the center of the room, just before the control booth and looked up at the machine which was buzzing frantically. Suddenly, the machine stopped working again and my favorite Ghost pokemon emerged from its backside, huffing.
"Rotom!" I said running up to him and hugging him in my arms, weeping. I held him for a good moment until I realized more operatives would soon find us in here.
"That thing sucks up a lot of energy outta you." Rotom said referring to the oversized machine that was just about to erase my existence from this world.
Rotom and I ran out of the room without a seconds notice, running through the hallway with the vegetable Galactic operatives and were now in another hallway. I told Rotom we needed to find Dusknoir's ball in Atkinson's room. We ran so fast through the Society hallway looking for the room I was just in, when out of the corner of my eye I saw a room with the door wide open. It was the furnace room and something terrible was beckoning me into the room. I peered inside of the room with Rotom just as a Society Grunt tossed my backpack into the wild flames. I held my mouth closed with my hand and tears streamed down my face. My pokemon was thrown into that furnace. Rotom tried its best to pull me away from the room, when the central alarm went off.
The grunt inside the room began running to me and I gripped the handle of the door, sealing it shut. Rotom zapped the door and locked it from the outside so the grunt couldn't open it and was banging on the door, amid this alarm. I continued running through the Society building and was met with a Grunt and his Venusaur, who had detained me previously. It used a Vine Whip and wrapped around my arm, pulling me to him as the Grunt ran at me.
"Discharge!" I screamed and Rotom let out a powerful blue beam of electricity first at the grunt, and then down the fleshy vine zapping the Venusaur away. Then I ordered Rotom to use a Confuse Ray on the pokemon so it couldn't attack us any further and ran when I heard soldiers shuffling their boots in my direction. I picked the closest door in the four-way intersection I was in. When I saw a door I told Rotom to quickly unlock it with his Discharge. Then I closed the door and backed away from it.
I hid in this room as I heard a mass of Society officials run past us and my heart was racing like a horse at this point. I realized going through the front door was impossible and the room I was in had windows. They weren't the kind that opened so I had Rotom use another Discharge to crack open the window. I punched out the rest of the glass with my hands and crawled out of the building, sustaining only minor cuts on my body.
I looked to see where we were and learned we were somewhere in Hearthome City. It was dark now and I looked up and saw the Contest Hall. Then I looked over and saw the large Society sign on the building I was just in and people were running around.
I saw the entrance to the city, being patrolled by three Society grunts and ran. I ran after the entrance, trying to escape this town. When they were alerted of my presence, I had Rotom use an Ominous Wind to stun them momentarily while I just kept running. I heard a gunshot behind me as I turned behind a tree, then kept running until I was in the same patch of land before I was first captured. I turned around and the city behind me was in pandemonium with people screaming and I even heard pokemon moving around, roaring.
I still had Rotom's pokeball in my pocket and I took it out and ordered him inside. He protested at first but I shouted at him, ordering him inside. I wanted to protect him more than I wanted to protect myself. I gripped the ball as tightly as humanly possible and looked once more at the entrance to the city. I kept looking as I ran into the thick Hearthome Forest making sure nobody was behind me. I ran deeper into the forest when I heard several operatives running behind me, back at the large expanse of land with the charred house.
I ran for a good two minutes in this forest, until I could hear no more voice, no more pokemon and no more shuffling boots. I just stood behind a tree, raised my arms above my head and let out a wail. I reclined into my body behind this tree and cried, cried my eyes out for a good minute. I realized I was a fugitive now, that the Society would be looking for me since I had escaped my punishment. They would search every city until I was found and detained, again. I remembered what Atkinson had said about Team Galactic using my name for the missile launch and thought if it was even safe to roam back into Galactic Sinnoh.
My heartbeat increased to double its speed when I heard a bush near me shuffle. Without even looking to see if it was a pokemon or a person I ran, just sprinted forward looking behind me when I had a clear running shot through some trees. I couldn't see much because it was pitch dark, but I thought I saw somebody chasing after me. My beat quickened faster and faster as I was running. While running I checked behind again to see if the figure was still running after me, when I tripped on a loose root, banging both my knees on the ground really hard. I tried moving them but out of pain I couldn't and upon further realization, as well as my supremely fast heartbeat, that both knees were broken from impact. I crawled, desperately trying to avoid the person running after me and hid behind a tree, breathing rather vigorously. I tried suppressing my breath with my hand and the adrenaline started wearing off to which I started to feel the stinging pain in both my knees.
I didn't hear any rustling this time and sighed tremendously. I closed my eyes briefly and cried again, amid everything. Everything had spiraled out of control and my whole world was destroyed. I couldn't go anywhere now because the Society would have my face on a paper with some amount of money for my apprehension.
When I opened my eyes, I was face to face with a monster. It must have been the same person that was chasing me from before and I let out a bloodcurdling scream. I tried crawling away but the only thing I could see were the glowing eyes of the creature and the faint outline of a spoon. The spoon was raised at me and my screams softened, until I was slowly dozing off to sleep. I knew this was the end. I was being lulled to sleep by a pokemon belonging to the Society and my body would be brought back to that horrible machine. I would be zapped of my entire life and then be tossed down a hill where my body would be next found in my new vegetable form. I had failed my father in going on a pokemon adventure when I knew it was dangerous. I got myself into this mess and now I was facing the consequences for my actions. I had failed Veronica and Daniel back in Twinleaf Town. I had failed my deceased Dusknoir and Medgar. The last thing I thought about before leaving this world was that I had failed my best friend and partner for life, Rotom, before falling completely into a deep silent sleep.