AN: So this chapter came out much quicker than I thought it would. Mostly I think it is due to the fact that the chapters for this story are going to be shorter than for my other story. Depending on how engrossed into this story I get, my chapters might stay shorter, or they may increase in length until I'm pumping out 4,000 word chapters for both my stories.
"Hey Michael are you listening to me? I want you to take this chip to Nett. He is the only person I know who has the talent to crack this thing's security." professor Krane said, waving the chip in front of Michael's face.
"Huh? Uh, sure. Where to again. Who am I going to deliver this to?" Michael said as he stared off at a tree not some distance away.
Professor Krane sighed. "So you weren't listening to me eh? Anyway it seems as if you've had your head in the clouds recently. Try to get that straightened out. I want you to take this chip to Nett he is an old accomplice of mine, who may be able to crack the security on this thing. You should find him in Pyrite town. He is the head of ONBS, thusly a sure ally.
Michael's eyes widened at the mention of ONBS. That was quite an honor, getting to meet a famous person. What am I thinking? My mother is a famous person, the assistant for Professor Krane, who is also famous. I battled with a leading member of Cipher quite recently too... his thoughts trailed of again into their own little land.
Thoughts about Lovrina had been plaguing him since his first meeting and subsequent battle. For whatever reason, he was unable to get his mind off of her. There was something alluring about her, but he couldn't quite guess what.
The professor waived his hand with the chip in it again, in order to get Michael's attention. His efforts bore fruit, as it did succeed in gaining Michael back from the land of imagination. One Michael was once again focusing on professor Krane, the knowledgeable man handed him the chip.
"Don't let anything happen to that okay? It's quite important." he said. Michael nodded.
After the little exchange with the professor Michael prepped all three of his Pokemon for the journey. His preparation consisted of healing them at the HQ's nurse facility, feeding them, and allowing them to get some exercise. This of course landed him a bit of trouble.
His Spinarak, which he stupidly let out of it's ball without supervision, had made a mess of one of the HQ's doors. Seeing that his Spinarak was a shadow Pokemon, it was quite temperamental and every emotion it experienced was in the extreme. It didn't know how to act on these feelings either. The right entrance doors and the windows and walls to the side, where completely gummed up with his Spinarak's webbing. The little fiasco delayed him by an hour as his mother caught the spider as it completed the act.
An hour of apologies, and clean up later, and with Spinarak safely inside of it's ball, he was mounting his bike. This was when Jovi approached him for the first time since lunch a few days ago.
She said one thing. More like a whisper, audible only to him and her. "Jovi knows what's wrong." she proceeded to walk away innocently as if nothing creepy at all had happened, her arms held behind her back in a show of innocence.
Michael suffered some cold chills, then he started his bike's engine. He had a few hours of traveling ahead of him. His goal was the town of rogues, Pyrite town. He couldn't imagine why someone such as the leader of the ONBS corporation would start something in such a nasty little place.
He supposed in the end that it had to do with the economy. When they first started, getting anything running must have been pretty difficult and expensive. Now they were world famous for their honest news. Very little propaganda went into what they recorded. They where a company based on finding the truth.
With hours of motoring ahead of him, Michael couldn't help but let his thoughts wander yet again to Lovrina, the girl he just met, yet who had piqued his interests like no other. He spent the two-ish hours driving to the town of rogues thinking about her. He wasn't trying to live some fantasy, just replaying his memories of her in his own head. The way she did a little spin when she sent out her first Pokemon into battle. The way her pinkened lips pouted when he defeated her Delcatty.
While the professor had charged him with using the snag machine to save all shadow Pokemon from their trainers, it wasn't as easy as it seemed. If Michael threw the pokeball while the target was healthy it resisted easily, and then the trainer was on their guard. When the trainer was aware of his snag machine, it became many times harder to take their Pokemon, because they became protective. Even members of Cipher, heartless as they where, still had hearts, so to speak, and attempted to save their Pokemon from theft.
He also had to catch the Pokemon while the trainer was off of their guard. If they where paying attention when he threw the ball, all they had to do was recall their Pokemon, or smack it out of the air. Usually it was the latter. He had only managed to capture two shadow Pokemon so far. The second hadn't even been purified yet.
The best remedy for shadow Pokemon was to spend time with them, temperamental as they where. He was sure that his Spinarak was close to opening it's heart. Michael preferred to purify Pokemon the old fashioned way. While it was much more time consuming, and he could only do it one at a time, it made for a much better bonding experience with the Pokemon. He did not agree with leaving them in a machine to be purified on their own.
Soon it was nearly noon, as well as nearly time to get to Pyrite. In the desert like landscape that covered most of the Orre region, towns could be seen from long distances away. Michael could see that in the noon day sun, he was a few minutes away from the town of rogues. While Michael had never been to Pyrite town, he had heard storied of it from his mother.
It was likely that he was going to be prompted to have a battle with nearly everybody in the town. There where plenty of shady characters there who where just as likely to steal from him as have a battle. The town's center piece, one of the few battling stadiums still active, considering the resort that had popped up southeast of the town, was dominating the view. The shadow of the giant globe covered nearly the entire town.
Once Michael actually entered the town he found a spot to park it motor bike, then he proceeded to chain it up every which way. With that a success he headed out into the streets. Immediately he was deterred by a woman running by. Not soon after she had a passed, a man holding large recording camera followed.
"Wait!" he said. Soon they were both out of sight. Well that was weird.
Michael made his way through the town, and true to his mother's word no less than twenty people challenged him to a battle, and none of them would take no for an answer. Not many of them were very good trainers though, and all it took to beat them was his Spinarak. Even though his shadow Pokemon was unpredictable and would not be very likely to obey his battle commands, it still worked out just fine. One of the best ways, he had found, for opening a show Pokemon's heart to him was to battle alongside it.
After another hour of wading through trainers and pickpockets he finally came to the entrance of the ONBS news building. Inside he was greeted by a nice receptionist at the desk, who gave him more than a little bit of background information on ONBS, and what they did. Michael explored the facility at his leisure unimpeded. His mission was to look for Nett, but he kept getting side tracked. Eventually luck smiled upon him when he entered a room with a single man in it at a desk. He looked quite official and important.
"Hello I was wondering if you could help me. I'm looking for a man named Nett. I was sent by Professor Krane to deliver something to him." Michael said.
"Yes well you came to the right place. My name is Secc and I'm Nett's personal secretary. I handle all of his accounts and the like. I'll page him to tell him he has a visitor, just follow the stairs outside my office and they should lead you to his room, and apartment. They are on the top floor of the building so it shouldn't be too hard to find." Secc said, as he typed something on his computer.
Michael just nodded his head and left the room, searching for the stairs that Secc mentioned. It took less than a few seconds of looking around for Michael to find the staircase, considering that it was right outside Secc's office.
Going up the staircase exposed Michael to the afternoon air, which was only getting hotter as the day went on. Not that it bothered Michael much. He had lived in the desert region for all of his life and was quite used to the extreme temperatures.
In front of a steel sliding door stood a man attempting to look intimidating. In truth, he was scrawnier than Michael which was saying something. Michael was by no means a strong man. He was more of the athletic running type of guy. He couldn't lift much weight, but he had a tall and wiry frame.
"Hello I have a delivery for Mister Nett." Michael said.
"I'm sorry sir, but Nett is not taking anybody at this moment. He is quite busy." the door man said.
Suddenly a muffled voice could be heard coming through the steel sliding doors.
"Let him in. I was expecting a delivery from professor Krane. Secc paged me about it." the voice said. It probably belonged to Nett but Michael was not completely sure. Considering that he responded though, it probably was.
"Yes sir, right away sir." the door man moved out of the way.
Michael approached the door and it automatically slid open revealing a man at a desk typing on a computer while talking to yet another man.
Once he entered the room, the door closed concealing the three from the outside world.
The man at the desk stopped his task in order to speak to Michael. "Okay so I presume that you are Michael?" Michael nodded, "Okay then. My name is Nett, and the man in front of you there is Bitt. I understand that you have a special delivery from the professor to me?"
"Yeah. We weren't able to get through the security system in this chip at the lab. Professor Krane thought you might be able to do it." Michael said.
Nett leaned back in his chair, raising his arm to act as extra cushioning for his head. "That be the truth. I can probably get into that chip, just give me a few hours. I'm sure that every single file on that thing has it's own specific security system..." he trailed off.
Michael handed the chip to Nett and he immediately set about cracking the thing.
"Michael you can go hand out some where this probably won't be finished until evening. Go kill some time at the Colosseum or something. I understand that you are quite the skilled battler. Whatever you do just make sure you're back to pick this thing up in a few hours. Don't want you getting lost and mugged in the streets, now do we?" he laughed even as he was focusing on completing the task just issued to him.
While Michael did intend to leave, he had no intention of going to the Colosseum. He had had plenty of battling for the day. No, he would probably go to a diner and get himself a late lunch. Michael made his way through the building, passing by familiar hallways, and familiar faces on his way out.
"Have a nice day!" the lady at the reception desk said as she waved goodbye to Michael.
Outside of the ONBS building, Michael bought a bottle of moo moo milk to hold himself off until he found a place to eat. He had a certain weakness for milk. It did not matter whether it was strawberry, chocolate, or any other random flavor society could think up. He would like it because he liked milk.
In the crowds he waded through to get to a diner- the streets where especially narrow- he continued to battle strangers. Eventually Michael came to an intersection, where he could see a nice looking place, if anything could be considered nice in the rustic town of Pyrite. All the buildings where made of iron or steel. And most had large chunks of rust coating them.
He crossed the street, making his way through to the other side of the road where the diner was at.
Suddenly he felt a small, soft hand grip his arm. Michael was pulled into an alley, out of sight of the public. He was dragged around a small corner in the alley. Now nobody passing by would be able to see him at all. In the entire ordeal he wasn't able to get a look at his captor.
Then he was slammed into the wall of whatever building they were behind. It left him seeing stars. As quick as he was able to, he shook his dizziness away. What stood before him, hands on her hips, was the person his thoughts had been distracted with for the past few days. The person angrily looking down at him was none other than Lovrina.
AN: I would really like to hear from any of you out there, my readers. I want to know your thoughts because when you review or send me a PM about this story it lets me know that people actually care as they read this.