A/N: I wanted this to be longer, but this is all that I could come up with. Sorry for the delay.
"So, do you think Professor Sycamore will be at his lab?" Ash asked. "He usually wanders around the place, as far as a I remember."
"Yeah, he tends to do that," Clemont said. "But yeah, even if he isn't there, there'll be a phone to the League and Professor Oak, and they'll probably know where he is at least."
Lumiose City came rapidly into view and the two of them disembarked near Professor Sycamore's lab. The street was filled with people- that went without saying at this time of day- and it was odd for two Trainers to just swoop into the city at random, but no one paid them much attention. Ash returned Fearow to its Poke Ball. He didn't have Charizard's Poke Ball at the moment so Charizard just stayed outside for now.
"Is Professor Sycamore here?" Clemont asked one of the aides present there.
"Oh yeah, just at the top of the…" the aide said before he noticed Ash. "Wait- aren't you that boy on the news? The one who went missing?"
"Yeah, I sort of found him," Clemont said. "Or technically speaking I didn't actually find him- but uh, well, you get the idea."
The aide didn't seem to understand much from that, but let them through. As Ash took a good look around the lab, he noticed that a lot of things were missing. It had been a long time since he had last stepped foot in the place, but he could tell that it was a lot dustier than before. And the number of workers there had decreased, there were only two aides there right now.
Professor Sycamore was at his desk on the top floor, and boy did he look worse for the wear.
Technically speaking he wasn't so much at his desk as slumped over it, a few empty glass bottles scattered around the place.
"I never knew Professor Sycamore could snore that loudly," Clemont said.
"I never knew that Professor Sycamore could snore," Ash said.
"Pika pi," Pikachu said and ran up to Professor Sycamore and shook him awake.
"Mama… don't make me go to school again… I don't want to go…" Professor Sycamore said.
"Uh, Professor?" Ash asked.
Professor Sycamore still wasn't responding much though.
"Think we should go for the old-fashioned route?" Clemont asked.
"What da ya mean…" Ash was about to say as Clemont grabbed a jug of water and dumped it on the Professor's head.
"Pah… pah! I'm drowning, I'm-" Professor Sycamore looked at Ash and Clemont with red eyes. "I'm dreaming again?"
"No Professor," Ash said. "It's me. Remember?"
"Remember?" Sycamore asked as he started laughing hysterically. "I've been looking for you all the time… and now I'm even hallucinating like this!"
"You do realize that you're awake, right?" Ash said. "This isn't a hallucination."
Professor Sycamore groaned. "Okay, look, dream-Ash, it's nice to meet you and all but considering the fact that you're a figment of my imagination and the fact that I have a splitting headache from this hangover, could you please shut up while I try to get my life back in order?"
Ash then walked over to Professor Sycamore and put his hand over the Professor's head.
"What're you doing?" Clemont asked.
Ash then stroked the Badges. He could feel their power even now, and he said, "Metabolize all the alcohol from his body and make him feel better again."
He wasn't sure if it would work, but he did feel his hand get very warm and some clarity seemed to return to Professor Sycamore's eyes.
Then, after this was over, he just fell asleep again.
Ash groaned.
"I think we should give him some time to recuperate," Clemont said. "What did you do? Was that something using the Badges? Well, maybe he just needs some time…"
Ash sighed. "Alright then. But as long as we're here we might as well do something productive."
"Oh, right!" Clemont said. "We should go and call Professor Oak."
"I was actually gonna say that we should order a pizza," Ash said sheepishly. "I haven't had one ever since I landed in Galea. I kind of coer- I mean, asked my chefs to try but they couldn't get it right. Are they still selling stuffed crust?"
"Yeah," Clemont said.
And so, once they were done ordering a pizza and had eaten said pizza, Ash then remembered that he should probably have called Professor Oak.
'Right, but do you know the password for the computer here?" Ash asked.
"I dunno, he might not have one," Clemont said.
Professor Sycamore was still snoring away like a Snorlax. He wasn't going to be of any help anytime soon.
Ash turned it on.
"Should we really do this without permission?" Clemont asked.
"Well, I mean, this is a matter of extreme importance to the world," Ash said. "So I don't see why not."
It turned out there was no password, and there was already a contact saved as 'Professor Oak.'
Ash tapped it and the phone rang for several seconds before someone picked it up.
It was Gary. "Okay, Professor Sycamore- I don't care what you've found, we're not interested in an-" Gary then paused as he saw Ash. "Ash? That really you?"
"The one an only," Ash said. After all this time, it was quite a relief to see a familiar face. And he hadn't seen Gary in… how long? He couldn't even remember. "How you doin'?"
"Fine, fine," Gary said. "Where've you been all this time."
"It's a bit of a long story," Ash said.
It was then that Ash realized that having to tell the whole thing over and over again was going to get really tedious. It had taken nearly three hours for him to relay most of what he had seen to Clemont.
It was as if Pikachu had read Ash's mind and pointed to small red camera icon. Ash tapped it and it began recording what he was saying. This was good- he would just have to explain what had happened once and he could then send it all over the world! It would be way easier than trying to visit every single one of them individually and repeating it over and over.
This time, Ash decided to cut out some of the fluff involved and winded up the story within an hour. Gary was mostly just staring at Ash with a look of total disbelief or otherwise interrupting him occasionally with a question or two.
It was then that Ash realized, after all that work was done and he stopped the recording, that he hadn't seen Professor Oak, the person that he really needed to see.
"Where's Professor Oak?" Ash asked.
"Over at Lavender Town for something," Gary said. "But I can mail this conversation to him. Say Ash…" Gary then stopped, his eyes widening. "Oh no! Wait- wait just a moment!"
Gary then ran out of the screen's view.
"What was that about?" Clemont asked.
"Do you think he believe me?" Ash asked. It was something that he was beginning to worry about a bit more now. Sure, it was pretty obvious with his disappearance and al that Galea existed… but it was about the other things that he was far more concerned about. There was little proof about anything else other than the fact that Galea existed. And if no one believe him, they were going to be a long way away from trying to go back to Galea with him.
Gary returned ten minutes later with a sullen look on his face. "I had put a few cells were culture and they needed to be changed at just the exact right time and with his going on I forgot. And I was writing a paper on that too."
"Uh, sorry," Ash said.
"Oh, no, don't worry about that, we've got bigger problems on our hands," Gary said. "I sent the file to Grandpa and gave him a rough explanation on what it was and I think he should get back to me soon."
"Right," Ash said, glad that it seemed that Gary was believing what he was saying.
"So what're you going to do now?" Gary asked.
"Like I said, organize a force to go back to Galea," Ash said. "But for that first, I'll need a way to get back to Galea."
"I can do that," Clemont said. "Or, I mean, it might take some work and help from Professor Sycamore… maybe I can get Bill or Lanette to pitch in too. After all, this is important."
"Right… but if you don't mind me being rude, who are you?" Gary asked.
"Uh, I'm Clemotn, and I am- was the Lumiose City gym leader until a while back," Clemont said. He didn't know who Gary was, but from the conversation it was pretty apparent to him that Gary was two things: a) Professor Oak's Grandson and b) someone who Ash knew pretty well given how the two were talking.
"So, you're building an army?" Gary asked.
"That sound a bit dramatic… but yeah, I guess so," Ash said. It was then that he remembered something that he had seen back in Galea and wondered if he should mention it.
"What's wrong?" Gary asked, noticing the tension on Ash's face.
"Nothing…" Ash said.
"Oh spit it out, it clearly isn't nothing," Gary said.
"Huh, well, see the thing is that in Galea there were some ancient ruins," Ash said.
"Yeah, those are really hard to find," Gary said sarcastically.
"I'm not done yet," Ash snapped back. "Only thing is that they had been vandalized by whoever visited the place, and most of it was just plain garbage, but there was one that read, 'Ash and Gary- Best Friends Forever.' I just thought it was… odd."
Gary rubbed his chin. "Huh, now that is something you don't hear about all the time."
"Yeah, just that it was weird and all," Ash said. "That was it."
"Okay, look, Ash, this is all news and all, but I was supposed to feed the Pokemon over half an hour ago," Gary said. "I need to get on that."
"Alright," Ash said.
The call disconnected.
"Hey Ash," Clemont said. "You still have the recording of your file in the computer, right?"
"Yeah," Ash said.
"Okay," Clemont said then pushed Ash aside from the computer.
Briefly this irritated Ash- no one would have done something like this back to him in Galea. They would have definitely asked for permission first… and it was then that he grinned. It wasn't a happy one- he was actually quite saddened at how life in Galea had changed him and just how used to attention he had become.
"So here's the recording," Clemont said and pointed to a small bubble with a red video camera icon under it. He then typed in an email address. "That's the Pokemon League's- at least the one for Kalos. I think if I send them your conversation and explain what you're trying to do, they just might reply."
Once Clemont was done with that, Ash dialed someone he should have the moment he had gotten there: his mother.
"Hey, Ash," Clemont asked. "One thing I've been wondering… just how good are you with time here? I mean, how quickly do you need to get an army into Galea?"
"I'm kind of not sure," Ash said. "And I'm not sure how time works like if one day here is the same as a day back there in Galea. But yeah, we've gotta work at this fast."
Ash stopped as his mother had picked up his phone.
"ASH! IS THAT YOU!" she shouted.
"Yeah mom I just wanted to say that-" Ash began.
"Where have you been all this time?" Delia Ketchum asked. Ash had a feeling that if it was somehow possible to reach through a computer screen and pluck them out, she would've done so. "I've had no note and I wasn't so worried at first but then there was nothing, none of your friends knew and I…"
She sobbed. It was a weird experience for Ash to see his mother crying.
And so then Ash told her everything- there was no video and he went into detail, pouring out a lot more than he had for Clemont so that it was far into the night by the time he had finished and Professor Sycamore had just woken up.
"I just realized something," Clemont said suddenly. "What if we just used all of Professor Sycamore's talk time? I mean, both of those calls were to Kanto!"
"Wha-" Professor Sycamore said unceremoniously as he got up.
Several Days Earlier, In Galea
"What's happening?" Jenkins shouted out to someone- anyone- who would potentially be listening.
There was no reply for a while before some said, "Sir, it appears that we ran into a Wailord and it has grazed our ship. We can still continue on, but the ship will eventually need repairs in a few days."
"We'll repair it when we land in His Majesty's domain," Jenkins said. "He can't keep our ships out for very long. And we'll stay way from the combat until then."
"Alright sir."
The fleet that they were leaving behind to attack Ponyta City and other places was now far away form where they were. It was difficult to communicate with them even with their state-of-the-art systems given that something about the Barrier breaking down was messing with all sorts of electromagnetic waves. Not to mention that for some reason, all of them would stop working once they landed on His Majesty's domain. For some reason nothing worked on there.
At least, nothing had worked on there since that day long ago when the Elite Four had been overthrown.
Jenkins looked around. He couldn't help, but at this time, to wonder about what he had felt had been watching him. He couldn't help but feel that there was something really wrong with all of this- that they were headed towards a huge trap.
Not that there was much that he could do about that. He could only hope that they would survive the battle with His Majesty's forces, which would probably begin in another two days.
A/N: Thanks for reading.
