Chapter 16

June 6th, 2006

Clemont was hunched over a desk, working with a yellow apricorn. He was told to make it into a moon capsule, or as he would rather call it, a moon ball. So far Clemont had successfully made two other pokéballs from a red apricorn and a blue one. He heard a knock on the door and Kurt Sr. stood up with a grunt, abandoning the black apricorn he was working on.

"Clemont!" Kurt Sr. called as Clemont was tinkering away on the moon ball, "There's a man here for you, says he's your friend." Much like Kurt had, Clemont stood up with a sigh, stretching briefly. He walked out of the room and into the living room which was also a foyer to the door. Kurt's house was very much an open concept home.

He saw Gary standing there with a smile, "Hey," He said with a wave, his eyes squinted slightly, "You don't think that they'll be selling glasses here do you?"

Clemont smiled back, "Maybe. How did you know I was here?" He questioned.

"Ran into Dawn on the way over, I'm resting for the remainder of the day, already done too much work for the past three days." His smile turned into a smirk, "Too many ladies wanting to get my help." By now Clemont was accustomed to Gary's antics. Gary was not a person that Clemont had ever expected to get along so well with, he greatly enjoyed being around the brown-haired researcher.

"Were they those cheerleaders you hired when you were ten?" Clemont asked. "You had a nice car too right?"

"What?" Gary asked his voice was almost shrill with embarrassment, "How do you know about that?"

"Ash told me. He enjoys talking about your past. He also said that you thought you were famous because you're Oak's grandson when in reality you weren't all that famous."

"When that guy returns he'll wish he hadn't." Gary muttered, "Anyway, what exactly are you doing here?" He looked around the house from where he was standing.

"Making pokéballs out of apricorns, but don't call them pokéballs, back then they were called pokémon capsules." Clemont explained, "The mechanics of them aren't all that hard," he looked behind him to see Kurt back working on his red apricorn. He leaned towards Gary and whispered, "I'm actually improving them a little, more up to date like they are in our time."

"Is it really that simple?" Gary asked.

Clemont nodded vigorously, and then adjusted his glassed which fell down his nose slightly, "It's just very basic mechanics in this era, it's much more advanced in our time."

There were a series of loud knocks on the door again. "Clemont, can you open that, it's most likely the girl wanting her love balls." Kurt had shouted to the blond man.

"Yes of course." Clemont answered and walked around Gary to pull open the dark wooden door.

"Hello!" She greeted cheerily with a wave.

"Leaf?" Gary's sudden shout made Clemont jump slightly, he was staring at her wide-eyed, a look of utter disbelief on his face. "Why are you here? Why haven't you been home in so long?"

The girl stared at Gary in confusion, her mouth slightly agape, "Um, no I'm not a leaf sorry. My name is Lyra and-"

"Lyra?" This time both Gary and Clemont had shouted the name. Clemont stared at her; she was pretty short with brown hair that flipped up at the ends and brown eyes that perfectly matched her hair. "Are you Lyra Noisi?" Clemont prodded. She was wearing clothing that was very similar to the kimono that Serena was wearing herself, except her's was red and blue rather than red and pink.

Lyra quickly shook her head, "No, I'm Lyra Stevens. You've said it wrong; it's Niosi, not Noisi. Anyway, that's my friend Khoury's last name." Her face fell for a moment, looking pained, then it left as fast as it came.

"Wait, you just said Khoury right?" Clemont repeated, "Do you know Ash Ketchum, Dawn Berlitz, and Brock Harrison?"

"Yes, I met them a long time ago but why does that even matter? It was like four years ago."

Gary grabbed a hold of Clemont's shoulder, his grip was very tight, it would most likely bruise Clemont's shoulder, but he was to baffled to care. "Ash left looking for her and she was here the whole time! They said that they wouldn't be back for about a week and a half! Holy shit..." A hand went up to his spiked brown hair, gripping it just as roughly as he had with Clemont's shoulder. "How the hell are we going to tell them? It's only been three days!" He turned his green eyes onto Clemont, alarm flashed through them. "We could be leaving the city by now! I knew that we all should've stayed here!" He looked at the still stunned Lyra, "I know this'll sound weird but you have got to stay with us, at least until Dawn comes back then we can figure out a way to contact Ash."

"Dawn and Ash?" She looked between the two men. "They're here in Johto? Why?"

"It's a long and difficult story. I just want you to know ahead of time that everything we will tell you is the complete and utter truth."

Clemont, Gary, Iris, Serena, and Dawn had all set up a camp in the Ilex forest, close by to the city so they had easy access to any resources that they would need inside. The owner of the town's only inn had not believed their claim that they had better money. This wasn't a problem for Iris because she preferred the outdoors over inside, but she was yearning for a warm, relaxing bath, even she felt dirty at times when she was outside too much.

Iris was in a tall tree near their camp, leaning against the trunk while sitting on a thick branch to hold her weight safely. Her hands clamped down onto her yukata, turning her knuckles a lighter shade. She still felt the anger and pain that began such a long time ago. Four months before Ash's call, coming close to five now. She didn't understand how a nice and kind person like Cilan could inflict so many emotions that were far from positive. But really, what did she know? It was proven that she didn't know his life and she clearly barely knew who he was, she knew hardly anything about him even though they traveled together for so long. With and without Ash.

"Axew?" Her trusted dragon-type partner popped out of her tangles of curly hair. Iris smiled at the little pokémon who wasn't much of a baby anymore. Axew would always be her baby though, no matter how big he got. Axew was holding off on his evolution, not wanting to leave Iris' hair, or for some other reason that wasn't told to her. She could tell that her little partner wanted to evolve very badly.

"You haven't been out much." She said, "Being anti-social?" She teased, Axew flashed her a look. Iris laughed lightly, "Quiet people are good people. You're a very good partner, that I know." She rubbed the top of his head. "I swear you're really the only person, or I guess pokémon, alive who actually knows every little detail of me, right?"

Axew nodded his head vigorously. "Ax axew! Axew axew!"

Iris threw her head back in a laugh, her dark purple curls cascading down her back. "Iris!"Axew jumped slightly at the voice, glaring down at Gary who was the one who called to her. "Iris, we have a huge problem!" He shouted. Iris swung down from the tree and landed in front of the researcher.

"What's the problem?" She asked, catching Axew as he jumped down from the tree himself. "How big of a pro-"

"Lyra was in the town the whole time."

"What?" Iris demanded, staring at the man. "Are you kidding me?"

Gary shook his head solemnly, pointing to the brown haired girl behind him who was talking to Dawn rapidly, from what she could hear; it was about the prophecy from Carrie. "I wish I was kidding." He admitted, "It would be so much easier of I was."

Iris slapped her forehead, "Everybody who went looking for her are all people who are angry, moody, and like to complain a lot. Imagine their reaction when they return! We have to send a message to them somehow..." An idea popped into her head. "Dawn!" Dawn almost immediately stopped talking to Lyra upon hearing her name. "Do you have Togekiss with you?"

Dawn nodded, "I do."

"Good thinking Iris!" Gary praised. "Togekiss is part flying and is indigenous to Johto so nobody will find it strange to see it. It's also a pokémon that everybody in that group will recognise too." He turned to Dawn, "Will Togekiss be able to make the delivery fast enough?"

Dawn nodded, "Of course! We've actually been working on our speed recently; Togekiss can make that delivery in no time!"

Iris felt very pleased with this outcome. "Okay, lets hurry up and send this as soon as possible." Axew stared up at Iris, a dark smirk played across his scaled lips.

After an extremely tiring weekend which involved a long drive and two day dance competition, this is what I have written! Shorter than I wanted it to be, I'm also shprter than I wanted to be too...

I'm praying for a snow day, an extra day of sleeping sounds so nice...

I hope you liked this chapter and that you have a lovely week!