I got a very interesting review that asked basically why this entire story exists, citing that Lance should have taken other actions when he came across a terrified child and his Pokémon. I would have merely privately responded to this, but I realized it included a lot of meta/material I had written out and then discarded because I thought it bogged the first chapter down too much. Feel free to skip past the bolded section to get to the actual writing. If you want even more context as to why this story started, here you go:
Besides the obvious "if Lance didn't react the way he did, we wouldn't have this story," Lance's main goal at the time was establishing trust between the terrified child (Ash) and himself (Lance). Could Lance have called in officers Jenny and requested that they find Ash a home? Absolutely. Why didn't he? Lance basically saw six creatures, one human but otherwise not acting very differently, and following his empathy more than his common sense, which told him to soothe them until they were calm enough to interact with. Agatha needles him about this in the same chapter (on purpose, actually; she's wily enough to know that the way to convince Lance to stick to his guns is by challenging his ability to do so. Crone's been around the block a few times). Lance emancipated a six-year-old because technically, legally, Ash can't own those Pokémon and Lance recognized that if he lost even one, Ash would completely shut down. The only way to defend one's right to a Pokémon in this universe is to have it registered under one's name, and while Lance could have captured Mewtwo etc. as he was by then planning to become Ash's legal guardian, he was still trying to, again, establish trust, which would not have held up to a "Now that you're here, I'm catching your friends" approach. Also, children don't usually appear at the League surrounded by overpowered Pokémon; Lance was trying to figure out who the kid was while also trying to balance making sure he was okay. If you couldn't tell, he wasn't that great at that balance and slowly prioritized training Ash over trying to figure out what happened to Ash. This Lance is definitely on the younger side.
"Pardon me, Master Lance?" The League attendant alighted from his saddled Dodrio and walked over to where he stood. Lance spared a glance to look away from where Deino was relentlessly headbutting one of Gabite's legs while he kicked her away once in a while, sending her tumbling into the dust. Lance quickly gestured for the attendant to stop walking over with his companion Pokémon and whistled sharply; at the far side, Lance's Charizard paused just as he hoisted Haxorus into the air, about to throw him across the field. The winged lizard grumbled before slamming the Axe Jaw Pokémon on the ground in front of him instead.
"Alright, is there something you need?" Lance asked, keeping an eye on the brawling dragons in front of him.
The attendant whistled through his teeth. "I don't know how you control all of them so easily," he said under his breath. "A letter came in for you; it seemed too urgent to risk waiting for your return."
He nodded to him and called for Drakon, who was resting beside him, to slice the end of the envelope with an idle flick of a claw. Lance perused the note, all of three terse, scrawled sentences: "L, it's Scott. Incident at Battle Pyramid. Come ASAP, bring team."
Lance frowned. "Thanks for this, Seymour. I'll ask Frasier if his Alakazam can Teleport me directly there rather than fly over or respond." He turned back to the training field currently being ravaged by dragons. "Everyone! We're cutting training short today; I'm going to need you all in your Pokéballs and ready to go in one minute!"
The dragons all immediately dropped what they were doing to scurry over to Drakon, who was neatly arranging the team's Pokéballs in front of him. They growled at each other, pushing others out of the way, until Drakon barked out a snarl that cowed the other dragons into quietly waiting for their turn to return themselves.
Seymour snorted at the sight, shaking his head slightly. "Again. Couldn't ever do it." He gave Lance a nod before mounting his Dodrio once more and darting back to the League.
Lance turned back around to see Drakon and Wyvern left standing by the Pokéballs, snarling at each other. From what Lance could pick up, Wyvern was refusing to reenter her Pokéball while Drakon, confused and pride hurt, was trying to convince her to.
"Okay guys, no internal fighting," he chastised. "Wyvern, if you don't get in a Pokéball, I'm going to have to leave you here. You wouldn't be able to fight, if that's what ends up happening."
Wyvern, rather uncharacteristically, seemed content with that. Lance and Drakon exchanged a bewildered look before the human turned back to the more feral-looking Dragonite. "If that's your choice, please take your Pokéball and stay with Ash. I have reason to believe that he might be in danger in the near future. From now on, you're in charge of his safety."
The female Dragonite crooned toothily at that, snatched up her Pokéball, and began flying back to the League swiftly.
Lance sighed. "I was going to drop her off," he grumbled to Drakon, who smirked at his exasperation.
It didn't take too long to find Frasier and his Alakazam and ask for easy transport to Fuchsia City in order to track down the Battle Pyramid from there. Despite its general secrecy, it wasn't too much trouble for Lance to easily track it down. It was a bit hard to hide a giant metal structure from someone who knew its capacities.
Also, the spires of rock and ice and metal that peppered the ground outside of it were a bit of a giveaway.
Scott and Pyramid King Brandon were standing behind Scott's Beheeyem, who hovered in front of the two humans and had thrown up a Reflect shield. Scott had also released his Swampert and Brandon his Dusclops; the two Pokémon were standing just beyond the Reflect, hunched over in preparation for another round of battle. Scott had seemingly already connected with Swampert, as the water-ground-type loomed in his muscular Mega-state.
Standing before the defenders were colossuses of mineral. Lance had never seen one of the Legendary Titans, let alone all three at once, and he could see why the archaeologist within Brandon was so fascinated by them. There was something distinctly inhuman about how they stood, something mechanical about how they jerked their limbs and commanded their elements, and yet some element of a creator's touch that built the Titans with a deliberation and a touch of its own intelligence that was being turned against their current Trainer.
Regirock was a creature of rugged stone held together at its joints by clay that retained its structure while still dripping down its body. With every slow, staggered step forward that it managed to take, it sunk into the earth and rock clung to its form, amassing into smaller additional limbs that only served to propel it forward that small amount before crumbling away. Seven smooth stones were embedded in the lump that formed its makeshift head, and they flashed as the Pokémon took in more and more information about its surroundings. Every once in a while, all seven stones would flash and a sphere of condensed Electric energy shot out of the stone in the middle of its facial grid; Mega-Swampert would dive in front of Dusclops and absorb the energy, though he winced every time despite the Type-nullification that he supposedly had.
Regice seemed to have been carefully carved from five distinct pieces of clear, perfect ice, slotted together in a perfection that implied countless failures. Chilling air surrounded it, somehow both from its own aura and its own body, and though it seemed just as slow as Regirock, that seemed less from being so incredibly heavy and more from how it moved with such intention. Every single move that Regice made was calculated to be a perfect step forward, and it left behind a trail of frozen soil and air.
Registeel stood behind the other two Titans and wasn't moving forward at all. Its smooth body seemed oddly futuristic for a Pokémon thought to be built in the ancient past, and there was a craftiness that underlay its actions. The seven stones embedded in its head were arranged in a circle with one at its center, and they flashed in sequential order before all turning off and flashing once, a thin beam of light zooming out to explode the ground beneath where Mega-Swampert and Dusclops stood.
It was immediately obvious to Lance that the Titans were playing with the Pokémon in front of them, despite how exhausted they already seemed. Regirock, Regice, and Registeel were made to be indefatigable guardians of times past; few Pokémon could keep up with them, no matter how well-trained they were.
Lance quickly approached them, jumping off of Drakon and directing the Dragonite to run interference until he had fully figured out his plan.
"About time you showed up," Brandon grunted, pressing the return button on an Ultra Ball he held. The beam of light shot unerringly towards Regirock, who shot a thin beam of light towards Brandon's feet, forcing him to dash away before the earth exploded beneath him.
"What's going on?" Lance asked.
"Beats me," Scott said. "We were having our monthly meeting to ensure that the Battle Pyramid is in perfect condition when these three went berserk. We don't know what their goal is; they haven't made an attempt towards killing us or anything. We've managed to keep the damage contained to here, but who knows how long that'll last." He shouted a command over to Mega-Swampert; his beloved starter grunted and began summoning what appeared to be the beginning of a Hydro Cannon, but a quick beam attack from Registeel flashed forward and exploded it before he could launch it, covering him in water. The Mud Fish Pokémon snarled loudly in response before diving forward to block another Zap Cannon from hitting Dusclops.
Lance grabbed at his holster and quickly threw out about half of his team in front of him as well as a couple of members at his side; Drakon had already leapt into the fray, shooting out precise Hyper Beams that intercepted the attacks that Regirock flung out. Coatl joined him, though choosing to focus on Registeel instead, casting it in freezing cold to slow it down even further. Haxorus was gleefully diving towards Regirock, followed closely by Salamence, who had already coated her wings in a metallic sheen. Charizard glowed in a spiral of flame from Fire Spin as he flew directly into Regice, the move just enough to combat Regice's natural cold energy though not enough to affect the Titan specifically. Flygon chose to hover over the entire mess, raining attacks down from her position above the melee and twisting behind one of the claw-like spires erupting from the ground whenever one of the titans tried to hit her.
A tall, tree-like Pokémon stood next to Beheeyem. He bent his neck down, three heads blinking blankly before they all made eye contact with Beheeyem and Lance at the same time. Groaning, Lance's Exeggutor crooned strangely before whipping its neck around the three humans and setting up layers of Reflect, Light Screen, and Protect.
"It doesn't matter how many times I've seen him do that, it's still weird," Scott commented. Exeggutor narrowed all three pairs of his eyes at Scott.
Deino was also standing with Exeggutor and Beheeyem, watching the fight intently. Lance could see her head twitching back and forth as she tried to take in the entire battle from her place.
Despite the overwhelming number of Pokémon now bombarding the Titans, they didn't seem too bothered, simply choosing to eschew movement and focusing on bringing down all of their attackers. Regice had identified that most of its additional assailants could not withstand too many of its attacks and quickly went on the offensive. It very quickly summoned a freezing, subzero chill that it wrapped around the surrounding mass like a horrible blanket; further spires of ice clawed their way out of cracked earth from which Regice had summoned the moisture to form the misplaced stalagmites. Charizard snarled, blasting fire around it as much as it could to try and combat the dropping temperatures, but it made little difference and soon the Lizard Pokémon gave up and returned to barraging the indestructible Titan of Ice with the conserved flame.
Lance cursed that Wyvern, the Dragonite with the most training in commanding Fire, had remained at the League, though Coatl's training in Ice had helped him withstand the temperature drop better than most of his other team members. He could feel the chill despite both his coat and his cape; Brandon seemed equally affected while Scott somehow seemed completely undeterred by the sudden cold. Exeggutor notably shivered; after a few moments of trying to simply bear the freezing cold, the long-necked Pokémon finally caved and summoned a surprisingly weak orb of false sunlight that hovered above the men's heads, unable to coax the sun into shining brighter.
Registeel was mildly encumbered by the cold as well, but Regirock seemed completely fine, merely pulling more stone to arm itself and flinging its missiles towards Salamence. She growled and tried to twist away; unused to the cold, her muscles seized in the middle of her movement and the rock hit her with a glancing blow, throwing her off-balance. Haxorus paused to try and help her steady, only to be hit back by a rock himself. Mega-Swampert had finally succumbed to both injury and climate and was bent over on the ground, panting heavily as he tried to regain his energy.
"Flygon, Haxorus: set up a Comet focused on Regice! Break its concentration!" Lance shouted up. "Everyone else, try and keep the other two busy— don't let them interrupt!"
Flygon crowed in response; Haxorus merely grunted before darting forward, both claws glowing. He struck out quickly, slashing his arms downward to try and force Regice down. The Titan of Ice simply turned, stones flashing in a specific sequence before it shone with a purple light. A couple more series of flashes resulted in a beam of pure Ice energy rocketing towards Flygon. Haxorus quickly switched tactics and coated himself in pure raw energy before dashing forward to intercept the beam and crash into Regice. He howled as the searing cold drilled into him, only barely faltering as he tried to push through the remnants of the move and actually hit Regice. Lance felt his face contort in sympathetic pain; Haxorus had never taken a move so potent from such a powerful foe, and he dreaded the extent of the damage that his team member had taken.
Flygon had not wasted the time that Haxorus had bought for her; while still in the air, she flexed her seemingly frail wings and rolled into an intricate series of movements that prepared her to move as quickly as she could and build up the power she needed for the combination move. She briefly glowed a fiery blue; she whipped herself out, hovering for a moment while she focused on Regice before diving straight towards it, summoning draconic and fire energy around her right before she crashed down—
"Cover your ears!" Lance shouted at Scott and Brandon.
His warning was heeded not a moment too soon as Flygon's open mouth glowed with an incredibly light blue light and she let out a loud screech, a sound wave rippling through the air as she crashed on top of Regice. The other Dragons battling knew to throw up a Protect shield when they heard their Trainer call for the Comet; Exeggutor merely grunted before strengthening the Protect layer around himself.
Regice let out a high-pitched buzz that almost sounded strangled; Brandon somehow heard it around the ringing in his ears and quickly threw what looked like a blue Pokéball at Regice. The Titan was still stunned as a result from Flygon's attack and returned to the Pokéball with little fuss. Lance could see Flygon breathing heavily as she quickly stumbled back to her feet, taking off with a slight stumble. He whistled to call her back to him and returned her with a solemn thanks. Haxorus snarled when Lance offered the same rest to him, stubbornly forcing himself back to his feet and crouching to dive back into the fray.
"One down," Scott said, calling his Swampert back. "If Exeggutor is fine staying here, I could send Beheeyem in to help out. I've left the rest of my team at home, I'm afraid."
"Foolish of you to do that," Brandon grunted, returning his Dusclops and sending out a Ninjask that vanished with a burst of agility and a buzz from its wings.
"Normally, Swampert is enough to clean up anyone that tries to bother me. I don't usually find myself attacked by a Legendary, let alone three," Scott retorted.
Lance grunted. "It's your choice, Scott. I can take care of it if you want," he said.
Scott raised his hands in a farce of a surrender. "It's all yours, Mr. Champion."
Lance chose to ignore that. "Brandon, prepare to recall the remaining Regis." The Pyramid King nodded in acknowledgement.
The temperature was slowly returning to normal, though too slowly to have too much of an effect on the battle. The Titans had fully recovered and were returning to their turret-style of battle, shooting off beams that Lance's dragons were now choosing to dodge rather than redirect or take head-on as they had before. They were tiring, Lance noted, and he only had a couple of others to fall back on. He had hoped to save them for much later in battle.
"Drakon, Coatl, Charizard, I need you to override Registeel," he called out. His faithful Dragonites let out similar croons before turning their attention to the Titan at the back, Charizard doing so silently. "Everyone else, focus on Regirock until my next say so!"
While the Titan of Rock was kept busy, the three Pokémon that Lance had tasked with Registeel swept forward. Drakon and Coatl took turns sweeping forward to cut Registeel down while Charizard spat out bursts of flame, but it was stood firm, continually focusing in on its opponents and hitting them with what started out as inconsequential moves but gradually began to take their toll on the dragons.
"Haxorus, Earthquake! Everyone else, in the air!" Lance called.
The injured Haxorus grunted in acknowledgement, paused for his teammates to take flight, jumped up, and slammed into the ground, sending shockwaves through the ground. While it wasn't nearly as powerful as it would have been if he was at full health, the quake was enough to knock both Regirock and Registeel momentarily off balance, though they regained it rather quickly.
"Drakon, Coatl— set up a Thundersnow! Charizard, stay back until I say so!" Lance barked out. The two Dragonite summoned balls of their trained Type; Coatl unleashed his first, sending a focused Blizzard down on Registeel, followed immediately by a Thunder from Drakon that struck Registeel with a loud BOOM!
"Charizard, now! Fire Devil on Registeel!"
Charizard screamed in warning; the two Dragonite cleared out of the way. Charizard started by flying low, summoning dry, hot air behind him, and flying directly at Registeel, pulling up right as he was about to hit the Titan. Twisting out of the maneuver, Charizard sent torrents of energy directly on top of Registeel, flickering between flames and a purple, draconic fire. Registeel seemed to struggle to scramble out of the assault, but Charizard was able to dart around and redirect the flames that were now whirling in the air on their own thanks to a stabilizing Fire Spin.
Lance saw a spear of rock flying towards Charizard; Regirock had somehow managed to weave between the other dragons' assault and attack the one strongest against its ally. Drakon hurried over to send a quick burst of a Hyper Beam at it, but one relatively large chunk hit Charizard and send him barreling towards the ground. Lance quickly returned him. The Fire Devil was already starting to fall apart without its main source of control.
Brandon tried to take that as an opportunity to return Registeel, but the Pokémon had the wherewithal to interrupt the beam once more.
Lance noticed a strange glint in Drakon's eyes; before he could stop the Dragonite, Drakon had crooned something to Coatl and the two Dragonites were flying directly at Registeel. Lance could only blink in shock as Drakon and Coatl physically hoisted up the Steel-type Legendary and began to fly frantically into the air, their wings beating furiously to maintain height. Registeel was squealing wildly in response, flailing its arms to try and free itself as its stones flashed in an endless array of patterns. Lance saw his surprise reflected in both Haxorus and Salamence, who dutifully shot down the projectiles that Regirock was now throwing at the Dragonites to get them to unhand its ally.
"Do you think you have a good shot now?" Lance asked Brandon sardonically.
Brandon didn't bother responding, simply throwing an Ultra Ball at Registeel and returning it. The Dragonites stumbled slightly as their burden was unexpectedly taken from them before landing once more, chests heaving as they tried to recover from their improvised move.
"Can they do that with Regirock?" Scott asked.
"Probably not; they struggled a lot as it is, and Regirock is a bit heavier than Registeel," Brandon said. "I'd release one of these buggers to help us this time"— he gestured towards the Pokéballs containing Regice and Registeel— "if I was sure they wouldn't try and attack us."
"Yeah, probably hold off on that," Scott said.
Lance just smirked at them before unclipping his last few team members and releasing them. "Altaria, slow Regirock down. Gabite, help Haxorus out with whatever he has planned. Kingdra and Gyarados, freeze Regirock in place and rain down on it!"
Haxorus gave a growl as he stepped back to allow Gabite to appear in front of him. Gyarados immediately rippled into the air, undulating as she circled the Rock Titan, while Kingdra stayed close to the ground, hovering over a patch of Regice's melting ice. Altaria had chosen to take flight and circle over Regirock, letting out clouds of downy feathers that clogged its clay joints and forced it into a standstill. Within seconds, Gyarados and Kingdra had blasted Regirock with enough Hydro Pumps to fully distract it from Brandon throwing a Pokéball made to look as though it were carved out of a stone at it and turning it back into bright red light.
Scott looked at his watch. "Four minutes, thirty-seven seconds. Impressive."
"Thanks," Lance said. "Now, can one of you please enlighten me as to what the hell that was?"
"Your guess is as good as mine, Dragon Master," Brandon said. "They punched a hole in the side of the Pyramid and were about to make a run for it when Swampert and Dusclops caught up to them and engaged them long enough for Scott to call the League to send for you and keep them entertained until you arrived. I'm not sure why he decided only to call you over, personally."
"Well, if there's any one man that could take all three Titans on, it would be our indomitable Champion, no?" Scott asked. "I was a bit more concerned about making sure Fuchsia City remained intact than I was about calling in as much backup as necessary. Those dragons are a full army, Lance; they're terrifying to behold."
"Terrifying? You should see Agatha's ghosts," Lance muttered. "Were they the only Pokémon affected?"
"It seems that way," Scott said. "Beheeyem was out as she insists on being always, and she didn't go mad as you saw. I assume Dusclops was already out of his Pokéball as well, seeing as he was the one chasing the Regis down when we first saw them running rampant."
Lance furrowed his brow. "I'll make a note of this and ask the other Champions if anything similar has happened in their regions," he said. "If I have any questions, I'll reach out, but otherwise I don't have an immediate solution."
Brandon and Scott nodded solemnly. Lance recalled the majority of his team members before asking Salamence to bring him back to the League.
"Lance! Lance!"
Something was wrong. Lance pushed away the twinge of resignation as he put down some set-up paperwork for the Indigo Tournament and quickly stood up from his desk. He barely got up when Ash banged through his doors, Egg barely clinging to his shoulder.
"Ash? What's wrong?" he asked.
"It's Program! He's disappeared! I can't find him anywhere!" His voice cracked and suddenly Lance's arms were filled with a boy on the edge of tears. Egg let out a sad croon, jumping onto Lance's head.
"Is there anywhere he would have gone? You just downloaded one of Duplica's upgrades, right? He can't have gone too far," Lance said.
Ash let out a small whimper but didn't respond.
"Alright, let's go to your rooms and see what exactly happened," Lance said. Ash just nodded before detaching himself from the man and walking beside him.
The room was in the most disarray that Lance had ever seen it. Blankets were thrown to the floor, the mattress of the bed hovering in the air as Mewtwo systematically took the bed frame apart piece by piece to closely examine every section. Amber was dashing back and forth across the room, seemingly incapable of doing anything besides checking under tables, chairs, and counters. Fossil was scuttling in a circle, waving his legs around whenever he paused to look around. Bulbasaur was calling out as he jogged through the rooms, his growls sounding panicked.
Mewtwo whipped his head around upon hearing the door open and visibly sagged in relief when he saw Lance. 'Master-Drake, our companion- companion-friend-brother- has gone missing- nowhere-nowhere-can't find.' Lance had never heard Mewtwo babble before, but the psychic kept losing control of the precise words that he had been trained to use and reverting back to the headache-inducing stream of consciousness speech he used when Lance first met him. 'Gone-gone-where- where would he go? Is there anywhere nearby that he could have disappeared- vanish!-panic-worry- gone off to? Why would it induce him to go there without a warning- unknown-fear-where?!'
"I'm sorry, I can't think of anywhere off the top of my head," Lance said, striding into the room to look around for some clue of where Program might be. "We have a hardware room, but if Program was attracted to it he would have let on sooner. Nothing new has been installed or anything of that ilk. Can you give me a list of where you've already checked?"
Mewtwo closed his eyes, the bed slowly coming back together and the mattress slowly replacing itself as he concentrated. 'Bed, table, chair, water-room, capsule, bag,' Mewtwo recited. 'He would have made himself known if he were in any electronic device, wouldn't he?'
"If he's incapacitated, he might not be able to. Where's Ash's Pokedex?" The Pokedex wriggled itself out from under the mattress that Mewtwo had just lain down and Mewtwo floated the red device over to him.
When Lance opened the device, he didn't expect the first thing he saw to be a line of blinking red text on the top of the screen. He stared at it uncomprehendingly for a second before hurriedly dismissing himself and leaving the room.
Lance burst back into his office and immediately turned on a computer that connected to a large screen opposite to his desk. A calm voice greeted him and asked him what he needed.
"Connect me to Duplica. This is urgent," he said tersely.
'Certainly. Calling: Normal Master Duplica Carlysle.' A quiet song signaling that the call was connecting started playing. Lance tapped his fingers on his desk, unable to sit still for too long.
Lance thanked whatever Legendary was watching over him that Duplica was a prompt responder. She was wearing her Gym Leader outfit: a white tunic, black pants, and a shiny lilac cloak held together by a black string tied around two small black buttons. "Hey, Lance! Can't chat for too long; I've got a challenger in about half an hour. Did you need something?"
"Yes, hello, hi, you sent me some code for a programmed Pokémon, correct?"
Duplica cocked her head, confused. "Yep. It worked like a charm for .EXE— power boost, even a more streamlined look— so I would think it would work for almost any other Pokémon of that nature. Is something up?"
Lance clicked Ash's Pokedex open. "Well, the Projector that we've got installed in this Pokedex is reading a syntax error. The Pokémon itself has disappeared somewhere. Is there anything you can do about that?"
"A syntax error?! Hold on Lance, one second— Jeremy. Jeremy! Reschedule my match for today and mark me as unavailable. If the challenger gives you a tough time over it, sic Kangaskhan on his ass. Lance, I'm coming through to your office in five!" She reached over and disconnected the call without further fanfare. As promised, Duplica appeared in Lance's office, the Abra beside her quickly shrinking back into the blob that was Mini-Dit.
"Can I see that 'dex?" Duplica asked, holding her hand out. "Also, can I get access to your computer?"
"Yes and yes," Lance said, handing the Pokedex to him while backing away from the main control center of the computer.
Duplica quickly plugged the Pokedex into his system and pulled up a basic programming application— "Really, Lance, you've got to download Seviper at the very least,"— and connected to the files within the Projector on the Pokedex. She took a minute to scroll through the lines of code.
"First of all, this code is archaic at best. A Mankey with a keyboard would have better luck at writing something up with this. This is most likely not just a syntax error but a complete misreading of a line somewhere in this spaghetti that isn't worth the shit that comes out of a Rattata's ass," Duplica said. Lance raised an eyebrow at the unexpected language. She looked at him sheepishly. "Sorry. When it's my code causing a problem when it shouldn't, I get upset."
"Understandable," Lance said. "What does that mean for the Pokémon stored here?"
Duplica bit her lip. "I'm not sure, which is the worst answer, I know. I can shore this code up, make it perfect and polished, but programmed Pokémon are extremely tricky. It'd be a combination of trying to make sure that its sentience is somehow unaltered but its body is made stronger. Whoever wrote this somehow toddled into making a sentience— nothing here says that this should be a conscious Pokémon. If I touch it, I might accidentally erase the section that gives it life, or worse, give it two consciousnesses. Not too pretty if you do that; there are quite a few papers on the consequences."
"Is there anything you can do?"
"I can try to readapt the code I wrote up to match this," she said. "I'm not too hopeful on that, but I can try. There's no way to guarantee that it'll work, though." Duplica leaned back, rubbing her eyes. "Honestly? I'm shocked that this programming survived as long as it did. There are at least eight fatal glitches in the section I've glanced through alone. It should have expired a long time ago. I can give it a crack tonight but I'd honestly say that it's most likely a lost cause. Best bet is to take the bits and pieces of this Pokémon to hold onto and try to recreate the consciousness rather than fix this one, y'know what I mean?"
Lance sighed. "Alright. I can't give you this Pokedex to take back, but perhaps you can take a copy of the code with you and mess around with it in your own time?"
"Sounds good to me. Really sorry about how that turned out, Lance," she said.
"I'm sorry for making you delay a challenger just for this to be useless," Lance responded.
Duplica shrugged. "If they want a challenge they can wait. If they want the badge, they can attempt to overwhelm Kangaskhan and most likely go back to the Pokémon Center and wait." She poked Mini-Dit on the top of its head, prompting it to Transform into an Abra once more. "Let me know if you need anything," she said, vanishing back to the House of Imite.
Lance stood, staring where she was standing, trying to figure out what to do about the situation, when he heard the sounds of light footsteps running away. He closed his eyes, realizing that Ash had overheard enough of what had happened to understand what was going on. He steeled himself to go down to Ash's room and knock on the door.
It creaked open, just as it usually did, and he carefully walked in. Ash was curled up, holding Fossil to his chest as tears streamed down his face. He was lying on the bed, Egg curled next to him and Amber sitting beside him. Bulbasaur was at the foot of the bed, staring up helplessly. Mewtwo floated nearby.
Lance and Mewtwo looked at each other, Mewtwo probing and Lance allowing it to happen.
'He cannot be found,' Mewtwo said dully.
"Duplica beat herself up over it, but yes. It's beyond even her capabilities to guarantee that he can be brought back," Lance said.
Ash made no indication that he heard anything.
'Is there still hope?' Mewtwo asked.
Lance took a moment to think the question through. "I would say so, yes," Lance said. "It is very slim, yes, but I admit, I like to think on the positive side of things."
Mewtwo didn't respond, but he did nod to Lance. The Dragon Master took that as the dismissal that it was and chose to leave the room.
Ash was inconsolable for a week or so, refusing to leave his room for lessons with Lorelei and Lance. Duplica had contacted Lance every day, her updates reflecting that she hadn't figured the code out quite yet, but that she intended to. Lorelei didn't seem to know exactly what was happening with the group but didn't push it when Lance asked her to give Ash some space. Lance had the feeling that he wouldn't be welcome to Ash's room until he was able to bring them a restored Program, so he sent Wyvern to watch over Ash in his place. She seemed more than happy with the task, staying with the young boy for hours every day and slinking back to Lance late at night, when he inevitably went to sleep. Wyvern had always been his most aloof Dragonite, secretive despite being one of his closest partners; perhaps he should have paid slightly more attention to the gleams in her eye and how her gaze rested on him for a second too long.
One day, Ash, Mewtwo, and the Pokémon they arrived with vanished from their room. Bulbasaur had woken up to find them gone and frantically ran to Lance's office nearly in tears to babble for help. When he tried to ask her, Wyvern turned away from Lance, refusing to answer any of his questions.
Sabrina wasn't too forgiving when she arrived to the League to tutor Mewtwo in some new skill the next day.
"He's gone? Completely? All of them?"
Lance glanced down to the despondent Bulbasaur that had taken to tailing him everywhere, desperate to not be abandoned once more in his life. He bent over to pick the Pokémon up, carefully supporting his weight as the Seed Pokémon buried his head in the crook of his arm.
"Most of them," Lance said.
Sabrina's eyes narrowed as they followed his movements; she herself stayed stock still. "Forgive me if I don't quite understand why," she said.
"Forgive me, Sabrina, for not quite understanding either," he shot back. "Wyvern refuses to tell me and no one else still here even knew that it was a plan. Not even Bulbasaur, who'd been more than accepted into that party before this happened."
"Wyvern knew?"
"She must have. She's too smart not to have figured it out."
Lance watched as Sabrina took a deep breath, pulled out a chair, and settled herself into it. "Well then," she said after a lengthy pause. "I don't know what to do with this information," she admitted.
"Neither do I," Lance said, walking over to his desk and sitting at his own chair. Bulbasaur curled up further in his lap, uncharacteristically silent during this exchange. "I take it Duplica told you what happened."
Sabrina nodded silently.
"It would be an understatement to say that they took it hard," Lance said.
"I can imagine so," Sabrina said. "Are you searching for them?"
Lance sighed and leaned back. "I'd love to, but you've taught Mewtwo far too well and you know how Ash is. If they don't want to be found, I have the feeling they won't be found."
"You never know," Sabrina said, though she seemed as resigned as Lance was.
Lance rubbed his eyes with a hand. "Anyhow, I'm sorry for not contacting you when it happened to cancel any appointment you had with them. I'll do my best to keep you updated on whatever happens."
Sabrina hesitated before standing up. "Master Lance, if there's anything I could do, please tell me. Despite how much of a brat he was, I do care for the child in my own way," she said rather stiffly.
Lance nodded to her, watching silently as she Teleported back home.
"Thank you all for coming here on such short notice," Lance said, glancing around the table. He and his guests were seated in a slightly more upscale room kept in the League for such formal occasions.
"Of course, Master Lance," one of his guests responded. The man looked to a watch on his wrist, each movement precise in its placement. "That being said, we should get on quickly with what it is we are discussing. Our own Masters want to discuss exactly our topic here today."
"Yes, yes, Steven, we know, you're always ready to leave the moment you arrive, and have been for the past year," a man with bushy auburn hair responded, sipping from a mug that one of the League attendants had offered him. "This is an excellent blend, Lance; where did you get it from?"
"We aren't here to discuss teas, Alder," a rather refined-looking woman in a white pantsuit said, her voice lilting in a somewhat musical accent. "This is a matter of international importance, and it would be uncouth for us to get too distracted." She looked back to Lance. "Please, Lance, continue."
"Thank you, Diantha. Now, I'm sure we've all noticed some strange outbreaks of Pokémon behavior or ecological imbalance throughout our regions."
"Nothing too big yet in Sinnoh," a young blonde woman sitting beside Diantha stated. "Roark reported some strange activity within Mount Coronet; some of the wild Pokémon were blocking off generally well-trodden paths. He had to go in with a few of his team members to negotiate leaving the main footpath through the mountain open. Some shipments to Canalave City have been greatly delayed in their arrival as well, and Snowpoint City has been reporting some of the most intense blizzards in recent history."
"Hoenn is similar," Steven said. "Some of the routes around Fortree have reported harsher rains, though as it is the rainy season we can't attest if that's natural or not. Some of the monks who work to guard the Cave of Origin have been reporting splitting headaches, and there's more sightings of Mirage Island, though it seems with the influx of rumor more Trainers have been seeking it out."
Lance's other guests couldn't think of anything too out of the ordinary to report, and Lance noticed one who he hadn't expected to agree to arriving.
"Professor Kukui, thank you for coming out here despite your region not quite being associated with the League yet; I understand that Alola is close to its native Legendary Pokémon and was curious to see if yours have been affected."
Professor Kukui nodded, fidgeting with the silver band on his left ring finger as the gazes of some of the most powerful Trainers in the League system turned to him. "Ah, yes, well," he said, "our islands are pretty connected to the Tapus, and I haven't heard anything yet of a disaster on any scale. They've been a bit quieter than the norm, if anything."
"Fascinating, to live among the creatures we fear," Cynthia proclaimed. "I'd love to see exactly how much your bond with those Legendaries affects the surges that we've been observing, as well as the connection of the Legendaries to the surges at all."
"Now's not the time for that kind of observation, Cynthia," Steven said. "Now's the time for action and for decisions. We cannot spend another month of observation in Hoenn. If our suspicions are correct, the very earth and ocean could override us if we wait too long."
Cynthia's grey eyes, once with a dreamy expression as she fantasized about the research opportunities, immediately went steely and honed in on Steven. "You may think yourself the elder between the two of us based on your age alone, but don't forget that I've been in my position for far longer than you and have spent even more time memorizing the histories of my home region," she said. "The ocean could rise in your homeland, but space and time itself could be rent in mine. Spear Pillar is said to have been the one place in the whole world that Arceus itself touched down to mortal land. My people would be torn down where they stand."
"Can we stop being so woebegone for a moment? Oh, to be young again and bothered by such things as pride," an older man, bald but with white eyebrows that trailed like Gyarados's whiskers, said, leaning back in his chair. "This tea is quite nice, Lance, Alder was correct in that. Galar cannot boast such terrifying mythos as the world itself splitting within our boundaries, but our heroes of legend possess an interminable amount of power themselves. I, for one, would not want my citizens to come across an angry Dubwool, much less any creature with the capacity to cease wars, as it is told to our children."
"We need a plan," Steven repeated, though slightly more bashfully now after hearing Cynthia snap at him.
"We will get to a plan," Lance said, already growing tired of the egos he had to balance in the room. His own inner Dragon was roiling to escape and to whip all of the other Champions in place, but he managed to swallow it back in favor of shouldering through this meeting. "You all have recounted incidents of hordes of Pokémon uprising. I have had the pleasure of having to wrangle three Legendaries to prevent them from destroying a major city in Kanto."
That caught all of the other Champions' attentions. "What city was close enough to the dwelling of three Legendaries?!" Cynthia asked disbelievingly.
"At the moment, Fuchsia City. I'm relatively good friends with Scott, the man who manages the Battle Frontier."
"He is such a strange man," Diantha mused. "Truly a spectacular spectacle-holder."
"He's nice enough," Cynthia defended. "We've opened up a Battle Frontier in Sinnoh, and it's relatively successful from what I can tell."
"One of the Frontier Brains of the Kanto Frontier is a man who goes by Pyramid King Brandon. Part of the challenge of the Battle Frontier, at least in this region, is that the challenger must find and defeat each Battle Facility in a specific order, and they are told where the next destination in their journey is upon completing one step. The final Facility is a place known as the Battle Pyramid, run by Brandon, and it's known for being the only Facility that isn't stationary. Don't ask me how Brandon hides a flying Pyramid. I can only speculate that he has a powerful Psychic Pokémon. Brandon is also known for his archaeological work." Lance turned to Cynthia. "You may know him as Brandon Norgay."
Cynthia raised her eyebrows. "He's well-known in the academic community for his practical research into ruins, yes," she said.
"He's also notorious within the elite circle in Kanto for his single-minded pursuit of the Legendary Titans. Last year, he managed to finally unite three of them found within this region."
"And you let him?!" Steven asked, fixing Lance with a bewildered look. Hoenn had been the ones to first uncover the Titans; he must have been educated on just how destructive they could be in the wrong hands.
"It was more of a case of 'if Brandon can do it with the right research, then who else could?' than his commanding the Titans was a concern to us. It was safer for him to learn all that he could about them while training them, and then we had a guarantee that nothing nefarious was being done with them. It felt like the best solution," Lance said. "Scott didn't complain too much; he just gave Brandon more funding to galvanize the Pyramid for battles. I don't meddle with the Frontier's inner workings. Scott has his own somewhat terrifying reputation, and I'd like to avoid poking him, personally."
"Why did you bring up Brandon, Lance?" Cynthia asked.
"He and Scott were having a scheduled meeting that was rudely interrupted by rampaging Legendary Pokémon," Lance said drily. "Long story short, they contacted me quickly and held their ground until I could come in and take them down. While I would like to dismiss the whole event as a fluke, we could have a potentially huge disaster on our hands if more Legendary Pokémon suddenly lose their minds."
"What would you have us do?" Alder asked. "The Legends have always been unpredictable at best. For them to sporadically turn on whatever and whoever is around— that could destroy the world, no matter how large a figure they are in our respective mythologies. I, for one, would not want Reshiram and Zekrom restored to tear Unova apart again, and from what you imply, only those deemed Masters have the raw power capable of even attempting to hold the Legends back. I assume you were not aiming to incapacitate the Titans but to distract them so their proper Trainer could recall them."
Lance nodded stiffly. "It took almost my entire team's strength to simply tire the Titans until Brandon could wrest control back from them. As much as I trust my Pokémon, I can't actually guarantee that they could have beaten more than Registeel; Regice would have been practically insurmountable if they were fighting capture. The Titans never went above a manageable power level; the idea of a wild Legend using all of its power to escape capture is honestly terrifying to me. Even idly, the Titans twisted their environment; spires of metal and ice and stone were erupting from the ground when I arrived, and only because I distracted them did no others form."
"You're making this sound like a hopeless situation, Lance," Diantha stated. "The Titans are known for being lesser Legendaries as synthetic Pokémon that were at one point fully understood. The Legendary Pokémon as a whole are fragments of the powers that govern our world. Land and Sea and Sky themselves breathed within Steven's home region, and Life and Death once ran and flew through mine. The idea that these Pokémon will stop being mere story and become world-altering forces once more— it's, frankly, frightening to consider."
"Our regional Masters may be the only thing that can truly be depended on to defend our regions, and that leads to my proposition." Lance commanded everyone's attention now. "I propose we create an interregional group specifically designed to look into any suspected Legendary-affiliated disasters. I'll talk to Charles Goodshow to see if we can put it under League purview and avoid having to deal with some of the politics ourselves so we can focus on keeping our constituents safe. I'm sure that my Fire Master, Blaine Nigma, would be more than willing to work on exclusive communicators that we could use between us— Steven, perhaps your father would be willing to help out as well?" The Hoenn champion pondered that for a second before nodding slowly.
"My Electric Master, Clemont, could also be trusted with this," Diantha said. "He may be rather young, but he is known in our region for his ingenuity when it comes to inventions. I'm sure he would be more than willing to make this project his top priority, especially if it came as a direct order from me."
Lance mentally frowned at her dismissive treatment of one of her Masters but nodded. "We can begin to amass a team from those we trust for this," Lance said. "Kanto and Johto are both now governed by Masters I trust, which reminds me— a corrupt man just left his seat of power within Kanto and should not be trusted in any region. If Giovanni diLaon attempts to enter your region, know that he is nothing now and should be brought down via any means necessary."
Cynthia's eyes narrowed as she studied Lance, her gaze surgically working away at his words. "Any means, Lance? That hasn't been called for in a long time."
"He has been the principle force driving an abominable scientific act, among other things," Lance said. "The breadth of his crimes are still being uncovered. I want him brought down. I don't care how it happens."
"Bold words, Dragon Master," Mustard murmured. "Such fire. Such pride." He chuckled out a dry cough. "Ah, to be young again."
"Let's return to what we came here to discuss," Steven said. "I will talk to my father about at the very least funding the invention of an exclusive communicative device. He will most likely ask to hold onto any blueprints so that our engineers could use some components for a more commercially available product to sell. That's just how Devon Corporation works when it comes to outside collaborations. With that funding, we would have a team headed by Master Blaine and Master Clemont. We use their invention to stay in contact and keep an eye on anything we deem as a 'Legendary disaster,' as Lance put it. We may have to publically state that we are looking into criminal activity so that the public does not panic over the concept of their world being torn apart and reborn by rampant Legendary Pokémon."
"A long-winded summary, but yes," Cynthia said.
"A member of a government-sponsored organization, after Goodshow gets his hands on it." Alder shook his head in wonder. "Never thought it would happen to me. Zekrom's bolt."
"I, for one, am looking forward to becoming a G-Man, even just unofficially," Kukui declared. "It's an exciting endeavor, don't you think?"
"I'm sure it will be," Cynthia said, leaning back into her chair. "G-Man. Has a nice ring to it, even if it sounds a bit exclusionary. Good going, Professor."
"I feel silly calling myself such a thing," Steven said. "It almost feels like a childhood game."
"Well, we need to call it something," Lance said with a sigh. "Alright. I'll start the process of getting the G-Men approved. Steven, I'll get you Blaine's contact information if your father agrees to sponsor this invention of ours. Otherwise, feel free to send me a missive." The other regional representatives readily agreed to this before departing.
Sabrina had taken to visiting the League when she had previously scheduled lessons with Mewtwo. "I did not realize how relaxing it felt to close the gym and leaving the city," she admitted. "I love Saffron and would lay down my life for its people, but it can be loud and dissonant. My head can't cope with it all of the time."
Lance watched her almost lazily flick a finger to stir a spoonful of sugar into her tea. "I can understand that," Lance said. "Blackthorn was a quieter city than most, and Saffron is overwhelming for the most robust travelers."
"That is perhaps the quintessential definition of an understatement," Sabrina said, leaning back as she hovered her teacup over to herself.
Lance sighed, stretching his neck slightly. "I've been trying to dig up anything on Giovanni's past for days," he said. "It's all been heavily encrypted, even within the League system. Duplica hasn't made a dent in it, and she's one of the most skilled programmers we have."
Sabrina looked at him sharply. "What would you want to know about him?" she asked.
"Anything that would give me more information," he muttered. "Mewtwo and Ash haven't spoken extensively about their life previous to being here, and—" Lance stopped himself for a second, remembering belatedly that Sabrina didn't have all of the information he did. "It's a more tragic story than I want to get into," he said finally. "I believe Giovanni is tied to its more sinister elements. It has taken his disappearance for me to realize that I barely know anything about the man."
Sabrina's eyes had gone emotionless, and she was staring into her teacup now. Her Alakazam had opted to meditate beside her, and he was casting concerned glances to his Trainer as she sat stock-still.
"I haven't properly talked to Giovanni in years," she said with a voice barely above a whisper, "but he approached me once."
Lance looked at her sharply. "I'm sorry?"
"It was almost five years ago now," she said, still not looking up. "I had just met you. I don't know how he learned about me. I was still struggling with the extent that my powers were expanding, I was young, and I was afraid. He approached me, introduced himself as the Ground Master, and said that he wanted to help me. He claimed to have pharmacologists, psychologists, neurologists, dozens of people that could help me truly understand what was happening to me. Of course, in exchange, I would work for him. I was just reaching thirteen; I wasn't capable of paying him or somehow earning the money for such treatments otherwise.
"I didn't decline immediately, though I wish I did," Sabrina said almost bitterly. "I held onto it for long enough that Giovanni invited me to a facility he ran on the outskirts of Viridian City. It seemed like just an office building connected to a laboratory; he claimed that his group was just starting but that I would receive top-of-the-line care. I was walked through the hallways and introduced to some of the administrators; apparently, Giovanni had asked them to come in to meet me. There were only two when I was there, a man and a woman. They were kind enough, but it felt like they were studying me rather than trying to persuade me to work for them. In the end, you and my father devised a solution I preferred and so I declined Giovanni's offer. I haven't truly spoken to him since."
"He was recruiting from the Masters?" Lance asked.
"I wasn't quite a Master yet," Sabrina said. "It was a few months before I challenged Father and won the title from him. That might be partially why I didn't immediately recall this incident. I became very quickly consumed in Mastership; Giovanni's strange job offer wasn't important in the grand scheme of things."
Lance bit the inside of his cheek, remembering strange stuttered words that a boy had told him years ago. "Do you remember the man or woman's name?" he asked.
Sabrina sat, deep in thought. "I believe the man called himself Archer and the woman Ariana," she said. "Ariana acted strangely close to Giovanni; she seemed to treat me more like his pet. Archer was a more focused individual who didn't see me as important enough to speak with."
"Ariana, did you say?" Lance asked. "This may be a strange question— can you describe her hair more thoroughly for me?"
"That is, in fact, a very strange request, Dragon Master," Sabrina said, deadpan. "You ought to be grateful that I have an eidetic memory. It was a vibrant red, close to the color of a ripe cheri berry. Rather crimson more than vermillion. Judging by the state of her roots, however, it was completely natural. Same with Archer's lighter blue hair, which I would have thought a completely unnatural color."
"Duplica's got teal hair," Lance pointed out.
"Duplica is no human. She is a demon sent from another plane to haunt me," Sabrina muttered.
"She sent Mini-Dit to buzz in your vent only one time," Lance said.
"That was one time too many."
"Point taken. As useless as that information seemed, it's definitely very useful to me." Lance sighed. "I guess I have to try and research that facility you mentioned.
"One more thing for you to look for, Lance; Giovanni did say that it was still a working title rather than an official name, but he called his company Rocket Corporations when he tried to recruit me," Sabrina said. "Perhaps that will be a useful tidbit to you."
A few weeks after meeting with the other Champions, Lance was suddenly overrun by reports of bizarre instances around Cerulean City. Daisy had called him, saying that sections of her city were being plunged into blackouts while others reported fuses blowing and the electrical grids for many houses exploding. She found herself handing the Gym Leader mantle to two of her sisters and patrolling the city's streets, trying to keep any sudden fires under control.
"I'm, like, mostly worried about this massive thunderstorm that just rolled in from the south, Lance," she said. "It looks disgusting! So many houses could be hit by lightning, and I can't be everywhere at once. Do you know what's going on?"
"No clue," Lance said grimly. "I'm stuck in the middle of negotiations over the Indigo League Tournament or I'd be out there, too. Try calling in William Montgomery, maybe? He might be able to provide some assistance. If you just need people on the ground, Pokémon Tech might have some seniors you could call upon quickly, or you can see if Nolan from the Battle Factory is busy."
"Alright, sounds good. I'll try and send a few calls out," Daisy said. "I'm, like, going to have to go. This is so stressful! I can't believe how unprepared I, like, feel!" Lance could hear her releasing a Pokémon and start running down the street. "I'm going to hang up; I'm really worried about the Pokémon Center."
"Wait, actually, Daisy, before you hang up, as soon as you get to the Center, call Blue and ask him to transfer his Marowak to you," Lance said. "I believe he's got one that has Lightning Rod; it won't be able to redirect everything, but it should help."
"Amazing! Good! I think Brock's King has Lightning Rod too— I'll try and get them both to either come or lend me their team members." Lance heard a loud crash through the phone. "Oh shit, oh fuck! I need to call other people in; I'll call you back with a better report! Vaporeon, Hydr—" The line went dead.
Lance felt his jaw set as he put his Pokegear away. He felt utterly powerless, not being able to call together all of his Masters sooner to tell them about the G-Men or help Daisy in Cerulean. No matter how much was added onto his plate, Lance had to keep himself at the League to facilitate communications; he had left often enough in the past few weeks that he at least could give them that. Lance sighed before turning back to his computer, glancing over the draft of the email he had yet to send to Blaine, and fixing a couple of typos before sending it off. Wyvern and Deino were curled up in a mound of dragon off to his side, Bulbasaur buried somewhere beneath them; Lance looked at them for a long while before folding his arms on his desk and leaning his head down, giving himself a moment to re-center and calm down.
He heard a chorus of confused growls mere seconds before he heard feet on the floor; Lance looked up, having not heard anyone open the door.
A dripping wet Ash stood in front of him, Pokéballs on his belt holster, Egg balanced on his shoulders, Mewtwo floating somewhat behind him. He was wearing the clothes that Lance had shown him to explain how to analyze the quality of travelling gear; water dripped from his shirt. The boy looked like a drowned rat and hadn't moved a muscle since appearing, but behind his shivers, there was a spark of energetic fire in his eyes.
Lance blinked a couple of times before releasing Altaria and sending the Humming Pokémon off to find a large towel. Altaria obliged, returning swiftly to dump the wet cotton on Ash's head, snapping him out of his trance. Egg zoomed off of him, shaking the water in his fur out.
Ash's stride barely broke as the towel landed on him; he was already moving around Lance's desk and throwing himself into Lance's arms. Lance embraced the wayward child, feeling him shudder beneath the thick layer of cloth.
'Master-Drake?' Lance looked over to Mewtwo. He looked abashed, guilty. 'We apologize for our... disappearance. In a moment of folly, we thought perhaps that it wasn't as safe here as we thought it was. We were traveling east of here to find a new home when we came across a large electrical facility in the middle of a storm. When we went in, we were nearly beaten down by overpowered residents.' Mewtwo's gaze dropped. 'We thought ourselves powerful enough for the world. We were wrong. Please, don't make us leave, this is all we had. We were fools to not acknowledge that sooner.'
"Of course you can stay, Mewtwo," Lance said. "It was as much my fault as it was yours; I should have been more transparent so that we could all work together on feeling safer. The world has gotten more dangerous even in the weeks you were gone."
Mewtwo nodded. 'The world itself breathes now,' he said. 'I feel it within me, the power influx. The world is crying out for me to reshape it, and I'm sure I'm not the only one. Fire-Drake-Lance, it scares me. It is intoxicating, and I do not trust myself with it. It wants to shape me into a tool, but I am more than that, aren't I?'
"You are," Lance said. "We can work through this with the proper training." His mind caught up to what Mewtwo said. "Also, if you could explain to me what you mean by the world crying out for you, I could find more answers for us both."
'It's... painful,' Mewtwo said. 'Even now I hear it. I can feel it here' — tapping in the center of his chest— 'and it feels excruciating to ignore. It feels as though the world's energy is straining within me. If I were to relent and allow it to do what it wanted, I would have the power and will to shape the earth itself into whatever I wanted it to be.'
"What do you want it to be, Mewtwo?" Lance asked. "What would you do with that power?"
'I want to keep Ash safe,' Mewtwo said, 'and I want to be greater than my origin. I would want to conquer Mew and claim my superiority to the entire world.'
"Before you left, Ash, you were very interested in combination attacks."
That perked the boy up from the uncertainty he had been wearing. Mewtwo was hovering closer to the door, merely observing the two humans interact. Egg sat on Ash's shoulder, as was usual.
"From what I recall, your instinct is already to lean towards linking moves together, at the very least," Lance said. "Your mind doesn't just think of the move you're making, but the move that should follow and the next strategic point you're trying to reach. That's an important part of discerning a combination move: you have to know what you want the move to accomplish.
"Do you remember the combination moves that Brock asked me to polish last year?"
Ash nodded.
"The few combination moves that he showed in that display had specific purposes. Aida used Stone Spires, which was meant not only to be an offensive move but also to be both a disorienting tactic and a way to control the environment. Onix's Pleiochroia, as he stated then, is an offensive move disguised as a defense. Brock has had quite a few more years of experience than you have, so I don't expect you to think of every possible use, but having a purpose in mind is important in building a move well."
Now Ash seemed confused.
"I'm not going to make you come up with a combination move right now," Lance said. "That would be foolish. I spend hours researching every way that my team members have used various basic techniques in the past, as well as their general behavior in order to come up with a combination move that I'd like to pull off." Lance took out a small, very worn out notebook from one of his coat pockets. "I've carried this with me since the day I started out on my own journey away from home. I've taken notes on all of my team members, from diet to when they evolved. It's one of my prized possessions. I also draft all of my possible combination moves in here."
Ash stared at the notebook with wide eyes; Egg let out an appreciative chirp. "Why haven't I seen it before?" Ash asked.
Lance opened the notebook; despite having written in it for just over two decades, he was only two-thirds of the way through the thick book. "I keep it in my pocket at all times. The idea of anyone else even knowing of this book's existence is a bit frightening to me, to be honest." He turned to his most recent entry and gestured Ash over. The boy scampered to his side and, after getting a nod of permission, looked at that page of dense writing.
He read the title aloud. " 'Dragon's Tomb'?"
"It's a working title," Lance said with a shrug. "Typically, I don't come up with combination moves until I know for certain that the move would serve the Pokémon in its fully-evolved and actualized state. However, I've had extensive exposure to a Garchomp commanded by one of my other regional counterparts, and as such I know that Gabite would be able to execute this just as flawlessly post-evolution if he learns it now. Today, I'm going to have you observing this training session. As a warning, it will most likely take all day for him to even begin to get the timing down, and tomorrow I'll continue to drill it into him. I don't expect him to make any huge progress on it for a couple of weeks."
"A couple of weeks?!" Ash said.
"This is a rather complex set of moves," Lance said. "Something like Brock's Fury Dash? That's a simple concept translated into action. This? A member of the Gible line wouldn't do something like this naturally. It will have to be trained, honed within Gabite, and ultimately adapted for his own comfort. Polishing a move on this level will require focus and lots of practice on his part and adaptability on mine."
Ash made a noise of recognition.
"When you're ready to observe, please go stand by Mewtwo. You should all get as comfortable as you can."
The boy walked to the edge of the room and sat down, eyes fixed on Lance. Mewtwo turned to him; Lance could hear Ash quietly chittering to his companion.
The Dragon Master released Gabite in front of him. The Cave Pokémon burst out of his Pokéball and crooned in the air, landing in a crouch, eyes darting around him. When he realized he was alone with Lance, he turned to his Trainer and cocked his head to one side in confusion.
"Yes, we haven't had a solo training session in a while, have we?" Lance asked. "The others are still working with each other, but I finished drafting up a new tactic for us to attempt to cobble together. You're not too far off from evolving, if the teeth you're growing in are to be believed, and I want to get started with this."
Gabite growled in excitement. Lance had taught it a few more basic tactics to carry over and improve on upon evolution; this would be the first major set of training he had ever received.
"I have it written down here as Dragon's Tomb. It sounds similar enough to the two moves it's mostly based on, so I'll be coming up with a better title for it in order to obscure its nature better. For now we'll be using that," Lance said. "It is to be a hazard, mostly. Reshaping your environment in order to ensnare your opponent so you can damage it more with something else."
Lance had Gabite using Dragon Rage on the arena floor in as many angles as it could manage. It leapt in the air to spit out the globule of energy and watch the impact over and over again, sometimes merely dashing forward before springing up and other times hopping a couple of times before jumping as high into the air as he could.
"That's the one!" Lance called out as Gabite managed to leap from a complete standstill and spit the Dragon Rage on the ground, a huge dust cloud billowing around the point of impact. "Block all sightlines! No one can see what you're doing- now, I need you to Dig down and hollow out the ground in a two foot radius."
Gabite howled, leaping up, sending a Dragon Rage towards the ground, and using his momentum downwards to dive beneath the ground fluidly. Lance felt a slight rumble under the ground. He stomped on the floor; after a couple of seconds, Gabite poked his head up, confused by his interruption.
"Try one more time but be gentler. I could feel you that time, and I'm just a dinky human." Lance half-smiled. "Imagine using this move against a Dugtrio. It would know exactly what you were doing immediately."
Gabite grumbled before hoisting himself back to the surface, growling in preparation, and leaping once more, Dragon Rage already glowing in his mouth. It took Gabite a handful of tries before he figured out the right speed to be travelling in. Lance took a step forward onto what he knew to be hollow ground; he couldn't feel the difference and nodded in satisfaction.
"Alright, Gabite, do you want to take a short break from training so that you can practice this?"
The dragon crooned in agreement.
Lance wandered off to the side of the arena, leaving Gabite to Dig out the beginnings of his trap. He walked over to Ash and Mewtwo; Ash and Egg were watching Gabite practice with wide eyes, Mewtwo was looking over at Lance, vaguely impressed.
"Interesting?" Lance asked.
"I want to do that," Ash said resolutely. "I have ideas- I could do it. I bet I could."
Lance smirked. "I'll get you a notebook. We can discuss your ideas tomorrow."
Duplica is my favorite minor character from the Pokémon anime. I can't explain why. She is the only one whose name I remember without having to look her up (outside of Gym Leaders), and Mini-Dit brings me such joy.
For those curious: Flygon's "Comet" move consists of Dragon Dance and Laser Focus to set up with Draco Meteor and Fire Punch for most of the damage. Right before impact, she uses Boomburst to both damage and startle her enemy. Charizard's "Fire Devil" was a Heat Wave set-up, a series of Flamethrowers and Dragon Pulses to give it substance, and a Fire Spin to control it.
Remember that time I got so wrapped up in Shield that I didn't write for weeks? Guess who got PMD: DX and Animal Crossing this month? The only reason I'm writing at all is that I've already beaten the main plot of DX and I don't feel like time traveling and am thus taking AC slow. I've also been slowly 100%-ing Breath of the Wild, which is inspiring a story based on it now. No worries; I plan to finish this story before even cracking into that seed.
Speaking of this story finishing, I have two more chapters planned for Wild Boy before it comes to a close (for now?). Between now and then, I'll be accepting any questions that you readers have and answering them in a final chapter of this story. Feel free to review or PM me any questions that you want answered in that last hurrah; I'll probably throw in some trivia about it as well.