Sorry for not keeping up with the one-a-day chapter updates, guys. My summer's gotten really busy, and it's going to stay hectic until late July, so I'll update when I can.

Unfortunately, I won't be able to update at all for the rest of the week...and this chapter's also pretty short, but also significant.

Chapter 25 - More Plotting

Joshua watched from his bunk as the steel door opened. With nothing to do other than sleep and eat, it was normal for him to take a nap at about noon, then go out for a quick run in the fitness center, where Charon made sure he never went anywhere close to any Pokemon whatsoever.

Not until Butch had given him that PokeBall, at least.

Joshua caught sight of Charon's head as the old man peered into the cell. Quickly, he leapt to the floor with about as little noise as he could. "Looking for me?"

Charon jumped a little at this, but recovered quickly. "You're coming with me." He opened the door a little wider, revealing the black box they forced him to travel around in.

Joshua shrugged. "You know that I can walk around without needing that thing," he remarked. "You really don't need to cart it around."

Charon frowned, then pointed at the black box as Butch opened a hidden door on one of the sides. Joshua rolled his eyes in return, but complied, squeezing himself into the small space. Butch shut the door behind him, leaving the hazel-eyed teen in a tangible darkness.

As the box began to move on well-oiled wheels, Joshua started to think. If Charon had been able to sense this, he would have reversed the cart's direction and sent him back to his cell. This had occurred other times, when a Grumpig or a Hypno had been brought along by the old scientist. However, Cyrus had sent all the Psychic-Types to some sort of secret storeroom, and they hadn't been heard from since.

Joshua's thoughts drifted to that of Khrista's location. He had been aware of Gangrene and Alak's original choice to stay, before Alak left with Khrista, at least. The idea of staying in a storeroom wasn't unheard of - a few Pokemon, both wild and tamed, had been found in various empty storerooms already. At least, from what Joshua gathered from Charon's boasting.

However, none the only ones who had managed to escape were Khrista and the Psychic-Type.

The teen mentally paged through the list of kidnappees trapped within the skyscraper. There was a total of at least seven other kids that he knew from his world - eight, if Silver was counted - but only one of them was actually aware of what was going on, as Mist was free of any sort of control. The rest of them were all kids who lived on streets near Khrista's most likely, but that would mean that Charon and Cyrus had already narrowed down their search to a small area in town.

Plus some of the outskirts, if he had been pulled in, as well, but Joshua wasn't about to put that off as random luck on his or their part.

Joshua put a hand on the wall of the Box, fingering the fabric-like material. There was a lot of time for him to go over his plan, and a lot of time to think over loopholes or anything else that might cause something to go wrong.

The hazel-eyed teenager was confident, however, that there wasn't anything that was going to cause too much of a shift in his plans.

Yes, indeed: everything was following according to what he knew to take place, and it was only a matter of time before the remaining pieces fell into their proper positions.

Joshua closed his eyes, going over events in his head, considering what might happen if this or that took place. When the black box stopped moving, his plan had already become much more solid - in more ways than one.

Spacial Break - change in POV (Charon; 3rd)

Charon eyed the brown-haired boy as he got out of the black box, which had been made specifically for that child, just so that he couldn't see what they did within those halls and get any ideas. The teenager was too smart for his own good, and the scientist was doing everything he could to keep the boy from getting any smarter.

"Today, against my better judgement, we are going to forgo the fitness tests," Charon stated.

The hazel-eyed boy frowned slightly, but didn't respond verbally, as the Galactic scientists had suspected he would do.

"We are going to partner you up with someone today," Charon continued with a wry smile.

"A Pokemon?" the boy guessed, raising an eyebrow.

"No. I'm setting you up with a tutor."

The brown-haired teen became bored. "Yeah, sure. Like I need that." He placed his hands in his pockets, a sign Charon had associated with meaning that the kid had other ideas for what he could have been doing right then and there.

"He's got a point, Boss," Butch remarked. "All his record state that he knows everything there is to know."

Charon sent Butch a glare, and the ex-Rocket member kept anything else that would come out of his mouth with his left hand.

"I was referring to teaching you our ways," Charon continued. "You could become one of us. A Galactic."

"Does it look like I want to be?" The boy looked annoyed. "If I'd wanted to, I'd have kissed your boots the moment I had woken up." He spoke through clenched teeth, like he hated the words that were coming out of his mouth.

Butch looked like he wanted to gag at the mental picture, but he resisted the urge by tightening his grip in the black box's handlebar, gritting his teeth and shutting his eyes tightly.

Charon glared at the boy. "Run."

"Until when?" the hazel-eyed boy asked calmly in return.

"Until your feet fall off."

The boy shrugged, took his hands out of his pockets, and walked over to the track, picking his speed up until he was running.

Charon watched the boy, his anger still churning at dangerous levels. Ever since the boy had arrived, certain, normal events had begun to become imbalanced. Entire squadrons were becoming emotional, which was not supposed to be a part of Cyrus' perfect world.

Cyrus had removed emotions, willpower, and knowledge from most of the human hearts under his command, but now they were coming back, and everything was going out of whack. Charon, who had heard of the Lake Spirits' absence, considered blaming them.

However, there could have been other causes, the scientist considered now. Especially considering the forces that had been brought through when White had been within that part of the world...

So, our friend Joshua is certainly cooking up a storm over there. It'll only be a matter of time before it explodes into action and throws Cyrus' world even more into chaos!