A/N: Just a quick spoiler alert for this chapter; There are references and ideas I've taken from two other pieces of fanfiction - specifically, Clouded Sky by Negrek, and Pedestal by Digital Skitty. There are details at the end of the chapter, but figured it safer to put the warnings at the beginning in case that matters to anyone.

Chapter 7 – The Champion

"I think it's time we brought this to the attention of the champion," the flat male voice said to his accomplice across the table. The room was dark, and both parties wore cloaks, the hoods hiding their faces despite being the only two people in the small room, as if to hide their expressions from each other. This was made easier due to the fact that the only illumination came from the few lampent scattered around the room and the litwick on the table they were seated at, carefully trying to avoid burning the stacks of papers around her. This, of course, was how the two humans liked it.

"The champion? Are you mad?" replied the female across from him.

"We need stronger trainers, you said so yourself. Tell me, who is stronger than the champion?"

"Yes, we need stronger trainers. But the champion? We're not ready for her yet. Besides, do we really want all that publicity?"

"This is going to get out one way or another," the male said, his annoyance evident in his voice. "It can't be kept a secret forever. I think it best to bring it to the public's attention before they find out about it on their own. They might start sending in more people to investigate this way."

"We can accomplish that just by asking a researcher. Or, if you insist, present it to one of the higher ranked gym leaders. We don't need the most powerful trainer in the region for this yet." The female shifted uncomfortably in her seat.

"Perhaps need is too strong a word. But it would speed the entire process along, would it not?"

"Of course it would speed it up, but I'm not convinced that your impatience is worth bringing the champion into the equation so soon."

"Well, I am. We either need a few elite trainers or an army of average ones. If we can get the champion, no doubt even the elite four will be unable to ignore it. And I'm tired of waiting while you second-guess every action. I am sorry, sister, but we can't afford to wait any longer."

While her brother's voice rose the more agitated he became, her reply was cold, calm, and calculated. "We have all time we need. But if you insist, I'm tired of arguing about it. I just hope you know what you're doing."

The sun had not even risen yet when the crobat returned to his trainer's home, an enormous, beautiful mansion at the heart of Araka Island. That was how he liked it, though. The large window with the awning over the top at the highest point of the building had been installed specifically for him, out of his trainer's own pocket money. Not that money was much of a concern to her. He glided through the open window effortlessly and landed on his perch, immediately flipping himself upside-down in preparation for sleep. It was only then that he noticed his trainer not in her bed far below him. Before he could right himself and take off in search, her voice echoed through the large room from somewhere outside his vision.

"Good morning, Crobat. Did you have a nice hunt?"

Crobat detached himself and opened his wings as he fell, gliding himself down to where he spotted his trainer sitting at her desk. He wondered briefly why she was alone in the dark at this time of day; she normally didn't wake for hours after he returned from his nightly hunts. From what he could tell, she wasn't working on anything either. If she had been on that big screen with the buttons in front, its light would have given him a harder time seeing when he came in. But he could see just fine so the machine must be off, and he knew that humans didn't have very good eyesight in the dark. She looked like she was just sitting there, her face buried in her palms. Nevertheless, he nestled himself in her crimson-red hair as he landed, and responded happily, "Cro, cro."

The girl wore nothing but a simple white t-shirt and silky light blue pajama bottoms – she had probably recently been asleep. Crobat was used to her waist-length hair being tied up somehow, usually in a tall ponytail or something similar, but at the moment it was down over the back of the chair she was sitting in, messy and sticking up in places, so he kept sliding backwards. He coughed a strand out of his mouth as he tried to lean forwards to see her chocolate brown eyes, but she still had them shielded by her hands.

"That's good," she said. Her smile was evident in her voice, but there was also obvious exhaustion and something else that Crobat couldn't place right away. As if reading his mind, the girl asked him, "You didn't see Venomoth on your way home, did you?"

Crobat was immediately in the air again, heading towards the window. "Cro," he said, now understanding the concern in her voice. This wasn't an unusual occurrence, at least not to him, but if she wanted Venomoth home, he would go find her. He made to fly out and search for her, but his trainer's voice stopped him.

"No, it's okay, Crobat. I was just curious. I'm sure she's just having a good time. She's just as tough as you, if a little more frail. I just worry about you all, especially when you're off on your own while I'm asleep. But I know you can handle yourselves. It's just… stressing."

Crobat flew back down and landed next to his trainer. It was odd, he agreed, for Venomoth to not be home before he was, but it had happened before; his trainer was just usually sleeping when they both arrived and never noticed. It was also true that tonight, he himself was home slightly earlier than he normally would be. She turned in her chair to look at him and put a hand on his head. There were those brown eyes – though most people probably wouldn't be able to see them in the dark, Crobat had no trouble making eye contact.

"Maybe I'll just go take a shower and head out somewhere for breakfast today," she said with a sigh, talking to herself. "I'm not going to be able to get back to sleep and at this time, it wouldn't be worth it. Go ahead and sleep, we don't have any scheduled battles today. I do have some publicity stunt scheduled for three though… shoot, I'm going to look like a zombie… Well, I'm glad you had a good night." With one last smile, the girl stood up and stumbled through the dark to the bedroom door, fumbled for a moment trying to find the knob, opened it, and dragged herself down the hallway and out of sight. Crobat watched her until then, before returning to his perch. His trainer seemed more and more wiped out these days, though she insisted she was fine. He couldn't help wondering what was causing this disturbing change. She'd never lied to the team before…

Sure enough, when she returned from her shower and hair and makeup and still wrapped in a towel an hour later, the sun had begun to rise and illuminate the room. She spotted her venomoth's antennae sticking out from under her bed; that was where she liked to sleep when not in her pokéball. Looking up, she could just make out Crobat's sleeping form near the ceiling as well. She smiled, relieved that her pokémon had both returned safely, and headed back to her desk to boot up her computer.

No emails yet. She let out a groan in frustration and buried her face in her hands once again. She had no idea just what she was supposed to be doing today and the League hadn't yet informed her of the details, only that she was supposed to be showing up across the region in Xioria later that day for some kind of public meet-and-greet. The thought made her uncomfortable and she shivered. Not because she wasn't used to the fame by now, but because Xioria was home to the region's psychic-type gym, and therefore, several psychic pokémon and trainers. She knew her team was well equipped to combat them, and she certainly wasn't expecting to have to defend herself. But psychic pokémon had made her uncomfortable long before she began training pokémon herself, and that had never changed. She laughed at how silly it was whenever she thought about it.

She spent the next twenty minutes lounging in her bed, distracting herself by reading her favorite romance novel. She was just getting to the good stuff when a ring from her pokédex interrupted her. She sighed, folded the corner of the page (though by now she'd read it so many times that most pages had bent corners and were hard to tell apart) and looked to see who could be bothering her so early. There weren't many who had access to her personal number, and even fewer who'd need her before the sun was up short of some sort of emergency. She only answered the phone after seeing the name of one of the members of Vidiva's elite four on her caller ID.

"Emily? What's wrong?" she asked right away.

"Oh! Nothing's wrong, sorry Kirsten!" came Emily's frantic voice. "I hope I didn't wake you up."

"No," Kirsten replied. "I've been up for hours actually. Couldn't sleep. It's weird for you to be awake so soon though. What's up?"

"I'll get right to it, then. I know you don't have to be here for another two hours, but the gym leaders of Phantom Village are here asking to see you. They say you told them specifically to come to you and they won't tell us what it's about. I told them you weren't here yet but they insist it's important and refuse to come back later."

Kirsten sighed. If Phobos and Deimos were at the League headquarters this early in the morning looking for her, whatever they found out couldn't be good news. So much for breakfast, she thought to herself. "Yes, I told them to keep their mouths shut. I didn't expect them to come all the way out here. Emily, they traveled across the region, would you want to be told to come back later if you were in their place? Is anyone else there yet?"

"Vlad was up at the crack of dawn, as usual," Emily said, not bothering to hide the edge in her voice. "But other than him, no. Which is a real pain because the three of them are at each other's throats, and soon that's going to be literally at the rate they're going back and forth."

Kirsten quickly weighed her options. She had wanted to keep this incident a secret until she could assess the situation herself, lest the public find out and the region breaks out in a panic. But what could it hurt for the rest of the elite four to know about it as well? She made her decision on the spot.

"Alright. Then I'll let you and Vlad sit in on the meeting so you both know what's going on. If Blair or Devin get there before I do, keep them there and let them know we're having a meeting. Whatever their plans are will have to wait. Tell the leaders I'm on my way."

"You came all this way just to tell me you haven't found anything?" Kirsten questioned, struggling to keep the frustration out of her voice. Dressed now in her champion's outfit that her stylist designed for her – a yellow tank top covered by a very detailed, gold-embroidered, red cape, fingerless yellow gloves, form-fitting red bottoms with an almost solid gold belt, and crimson zip-up boots – she and the rest of the elite four gathered in the meeting room to listen to the Phantom gym's leaders. She sat at the head of the table; the two male elites on her right, and the two females on her left. The gym leaders sat across from them.

"Essentially, yes," Phobos replied, but before she could continue, her brother cut her off.

"We all know now that the ghosts of the Whispering Forest have been in an uproar recently," Deimos said. "But that's all we know. We went in to investigate, as you requested, champion. But the ghosts didn't seem to even recognize us. Neither my sister nor I could calm them down long enough to get any information out of them. Our pokémon hardly had better luck."

"There was one pokémon we did talk to," Phobos added. Deimos shot her a sideways glance but quickly returned his gaze to the champion and her elites. "A couple of trainers camping in the forest captured a sableye in there within the last week. We spoke with the sableye; he claimed that he and his ghosts were acting in self-defense, saying the trainers had attacked some duskull that were a part of his gang. He claimed he has no explanation for the rest of the forest ghosts' sudden aggressiveness."

"Then that leaves us back at square one," said the blond-haired, blue-eyed male to Kirsten's immediate right. "That information doesn't help at all." He fidgeted with the navy tie around his neck in frustration and tried unsuccessfully to smooth the white tuxedo underneath.

"Unless the sableye was lying, Devin," Kirsten replied.

"The ghosts have no reason to lie to us," Deimos interjected as the lavender-haired female to Kirsten's left tried to speak.

"So," the dark-haired male next to Devin demanded, folding his arms over his black top and dark brown vest. "What do you propose as the next course of action, then?"

"Well, mister von Heist, my sister and I believe that the champion should look into this matter personally," Deimos replied with a glare.

"And what good do you think that will do?" the man called von Heist demanded, slamming his palms on the table.

"Settle down, Vlad," Kirsten said gently, giving him a glare. "He does raise a good point, though, however blunt," she added, turning to address the gym leaders. "You two are Vidiva's ghost experts. Why would I have any more luck getting the ghosts to cooperate than you?"

"You may not," Deimos admitted. "For all the information we have, this may simply be a personal battle over territory or something internal. However, we must also take into consideration the recent disappearances."

"What disappearances?" asked the long, lavender-haired girl in a long-sleeved shirt that could only be described as tie-dye.

"Don't you watch the news, Blair?" Emily replied, pinching her nose, causing her glasses to slide down a little. She righted them and brushed her brown hair out of her blue eyes.

"No, ew," Blair replied. "The news is boring."

"Says the girl with a shirt that looks like a rainbow vomited on it and called it fashionable," Emily said with a smirk and an eye roll. Devin giggled quietly as well though he quickly blushed and turned it into a cough.

"You're one to talk," Blair shot back, insulted. "You're wearing next to nothing!" She waved her hand over Emily's sleeveless, form-fitting lime green top that exposed her stomach and her short, dark green skirt.

"Ladies, please," Kirsten said, hanging her head. She knew everyone was tired – so was she – but her elites seemed particularly quick to snap this morning. Blair huffed in defiance but stayed silent as Emily got the group back on track.

"A good dozen trainers have been reported missing in the last month," she said.

"That's nothing new," Vlad said, crossing his arms again. "Trainers go missing all the time. I have always believed ten to be too young an age to be sending children into the world where there are creatures that can bend time and space to their will." Emily nodded in agreement.

"Perhaps," Deimos said, taking control again. "However, these recent disappearances have been increasing in number, and in less of a time frame. And not all of them were mere children fresh out on their journey."

"How does this relate to the problem of the ghosts?" Kirsten asked. "It could just be a spike in kidnappings or something… worse, as Vlad suggests. They could have been killed and eaten by some wild pokémon. Which obviously is something we'll have to deal with, of course, but the point is we don't know anything, yet."

"Of course. However, at least half of the recent missing persons had one thing in common." Deimos gave a pause as all eyes save his sister's looked to him in concern. He couldn't help but put on a grimace. "All of the reports we have state that they were last seen in or around the Whispering Forest."

"This, obviously, is what leads us to assume that the ghosts' erratic behavior is somehow connected," Phobos added.

"Trainers are starting to grow concerned," Deimos continued. "I have already received questions about what we plan to do about the disappearances. The police are clearly in no state to go looking for anyone in a forest full of hostile spirits."

"They never are, though, are they?" Vlad fumed. "They may have some pokémon, but they're not equipped for something like this. They're trained to stop criminals, burglaries, crimes of that nature."

"Loathe as I am to agree with mister von Heist," Deimos continued. "He is right. Therefore, it falls on us, the region's trainers, to handle this crisis before it gets out of hand. And, furthermore, we can't just leave it to any old trainer and hope it gets solved."

Deimos stood up and grinned as he prepared to lay his cards on the table. "We must take care of this issue. And by that, I mean all of us. Gym leaders, elites, even you, champion. After all, this way the trainers cannot say we aren't making an attempt… and after the events that took place in Sinnoh in recent years involving Nick Sayre and his followers, we believe it would be for the best not to take any chances and bring it straight to the top of the food chain, as it were."

Phobos could barely keep her face steady. That was his plan to enlist the champion? She absolutely should have been informed beforehand; she must have twitched, but she could only hope no one noticed the brief moment of surprise in her eyes.

She tried to recall the events that took place in Sinnoh that happened over the course of several years: There had been a powerful, champion-bound trainer named Nick Sayre who lost his brother to a wild Abomasnow. He had been enraged, and most believed rightly so, because the gym leaders and the Sinnoh League had turned a blind eye towards the rampaging pokémon, who had been wildly attacking trainers long before his brother's death, and claimed that if they had taken care of the aggressive pokémon when the reports started coming in, his brother would not have died. In a fit of rage, he brought his fight to Sinnoh's champion herself, killing half of her team in the ensuing battle, in what would become known in Sinnoh as "The Champion's Tragedy".

The whole fight had been televised throughout Sinnoh, as there had been a battle for Cynthia's title just moments before. Afterwards, Sayre's rant had gathered him a legion of followers (albeit without his knowledge or consent) who rebelled, in Sayre's name, against the Sinnohian gym leaders, elite four, and Cynthia, for their apparent lack of interest or ability to control their region and keep it safe. The revolt killed an unthinkable number of people on both sides, including several of Sinnoh's original gym leaders, whom had to be replaced in a contest of sorts that also ended up been sabotaged several times by Sayre's followers.

Eventually, Nick Sayre himself was killed during a confrontation with a former friend and slowly things calmed down, finally returning to something resembling normalcy about a year ago. During those years, pockets of similar rebellions cropped up in nearly all the other regions, though they never came close to anything more than localized incidents. Since the rebellion's end it was mostly a hushed up topic in Vidiva, as one of its own gym leaders had probably come closer to death than anywhere else. And here was Deimos, proposing that it could happen again. And as Phobos studied the faces of her colleagues, she realized that her brother seemed to have struck a nerve.

"I'm going to have to agree," Emily piped up, looking grim. "The last thing we need is some sort of fiasco like that here. The one in Sinnoh caused enough drama everywhere."

"Exactly," Phobos said, playing along. This was the path her brother set out; there was nothing else for it now. "This way, no one can accuse the gym leaders or the League of not taking action. Was it not you, champion, who made that announcement only hours after Sayre's assault on Cynthia, and on your own terms despite the League's opposition, declaring your promise for action in situations such as this?"

All eyes were on Kirsten, who had hers closed and her chin resting on her hands, deep in thought, remembering the drama that was brought to her own region during the entire debacle. After several minutes, she let out a deep breath, and then spoke.

"Yes, I did. Alright. I'll see what I can do. The rest of you, assure anyone who asks that we're already looking into the situation, both of them – the forest and the disappearances. In fact, Emily, why don't you go make that a public announcement as well. The people need to be warned. I'll start my investigation of the forest this evening. But first, I have a public appearance of my own. If you all will excuse me, I have a flight to catch."

"We're never going to reach Ferrum by nightfall," Kimiko grumbled in frustration.

Kimiko managed to defeat Nyra after Alex's battle, though only barely. Radar had been quickly defeated by the shroomish, and Fantomé managed to put up a fight, taking down Nyra's grovyle, but had fallen to the deerling. Ariel only responded after taking repeated attacks, freezing the deerling solid with an ice beam. Kimiko hadn't known Ariel could even use the move, though Ariel hadn't done a single thing she'd ordered anyway.

Afterward, the duo decided to stay and have lunch at a local Blossom restaurant before leaving town, deciding if they had to camp the night, it was worth it in exchange for one proper meal. This particular diner had trained pokémon acting as waiters, most of them psychic-types for the ease of communication. It had been over an hour ago that the pair placed their orders, however, and their own pokémon were no more patient, though at least they were behaving now.

Of course, this was after Fantomé received a fierce scolding following an incident earlier in which he scared a family by hiding under their food tray so that when they lifted it up, he emerged and wailed at them all. Diamond thought it was a riot, smiling and laughing for the first time Alex could remember. Kimiko, however, was fiercely embarrassed and insisted on paying the family's bill for them, considering her ghost scared the young children half to death and the mother into an asthma attack.

There was a sudden crash from across the building as someone dropped what sounded like a very full tray, followed by a lot of shouting. Several people got up to go investigate, but after one employee opened the kitchen doors and narrowly avoided a stray blast of fire from inside, most of them scattered and returned to their seats. A few customers ended up leaving the restaurant entirely.

It took another twenty minutes before a rather peeved-looking alakazam in a chef's hat teleported to the pair's table and set down a large tray covered with a metallic lid in front of them. "Your pokémon's food is all inside as well," the Alakazam said telepathically.

Alex had already lifted it and recoiled from the smell. He quickly looked over the food and said, "Er, we didn't order any of this…"

"DEAL WITH IT!" the Alakazam shouted, his moustache flaring, before teleporting back to the kitchens.

The two humans exchanged a glance before attempting to pick out anything still edible to feed to their teams.

The thick growth of trees blocked out even the smallest rays of moonlight in the forest. Kirsten could barely make out the path even with her flashlight. She had an ominous feeling of being watched, which was not entirely unjustified. Ghost pokémon, she knew, were all too fond of those kinds of tricks, and just because she couldn't see them doesn't mean they weren't there. That didn't excuse the lack of activity, however.

"You know, for all the gym leaders' pleading, I was expecting a bit more… I don't know, commotion," she said aloud, more to herself than her pokémon. Her toxicroak croaked once but otherwise didn't reply. Her drapion didn't even acknowledge that she had spoken; he was too busy being grumpy at Toxicroak for riding on his tail, though he had agreed it was safer to have him watching their backs than to leave themselves vulnerable from behind. He just didn't expect his teammate to be so heavy.

"This is ridiculous," Kirsten said, stopping suddenly and pulling out a pokéball. "Come out, Venomoth." The bug emerged in a burst of white and buzzed lazily by her side.

"I know it's been a while, but do you still remember how to use flash?" Kirsten asked.

"Veno," her pokémon replied. That was all the warning Kirsten got before her bug's wings suddenly lit up like a Christmas tree star. She shielded her eyes with her arm, blinking the light away.

"Thanks for the warning," she said half angrily, half thankful her pokémon still remembered the move. "Okay, listen up everyone. Drapion, this means you." Her three pokémon turned to her, Drapion not looking too amused at being singled out. "We're going to venture off the path from here and head directly to the heart of the forest. If we don't find anything before we get to Phantom Village, then I'm calling it a night. You two," she gestured to Drapion and Toxicroak, "keep playing lookout." She then turned around and pointed forwards, trying to ignore the sudden chill she felt. She shivered anyway, gripped her cape, and wrapped her arms around herself. "After you, Venomoth."

"That's it," Kimiko said angrily. "When we get to Ferrum, I'm buying warmer clothes."

"You should have done that before we left Crescent," Alex said, though he too wasn't feeling terribly comfortable. "Or when I mentioned it in Blossom. As much as I love that outfit on you, it's really not suited for camping."

The pair left the restaurant and found a less popular fast-food place before resuming their travels several hours earlier, but the extra delay left them short on travel time. They now were about one-third of the way to Ferrum and had set up camp for the night. Alex lit a fire and was cooking soup. He, Kimiko, Thorn, and Radar were sitting as close to the fire as they could without burning themselves, as it was a rather chilly night by now and the wind was picking up. Koyomi, Diamond, and Fantomé were in their own huddle not far away, the cold not bothering them much. Ariel was still refusing to communicate with anyone else and remained within her tightly clamped shell. She hadn't even been eating unless left completely alone. Still, Kimiko kept trying to let her out in the hopes that she'd eventually get used to being in a group.

Suddenly, Thorn tensed and bolted from the group, stopping and taking up a defensive stance in front of Koyomi and the ghosts. Radar bounded up to her and attempted to mimic her.

"What's up, Thorn?" Alex asked. The rest of the pokémon seemed to sense something as well. Koyomi started to shiver and Diamond took up a threatening pose on Thorn's other side. Fantomé began laughing madly. Ariel remained motionless.

And then a flash of purple and two new figures stood before them; a tall one that was possibly human, and one about a third of the former's height that was clearly a pokémon. Diamond immediately leapt at them, his claw glowing purple. Before Alex could call him off, the new pokémon jumped forwards, his own claw in a similar, darker aura, and sucker-punched the sableye, throwing him onto his back. This prompted Thorn to lunge at the newcomer as well, whipping at it with her vines, though the new pokémon didn't seem to even feel them. He glared over in her direction and readied his claw for another punch.

"Wait, Thorn!" Alex called, at the same time a new female voice said, "Toxicroak, hold!"

Both pokémon immediately froze, turning to their trainers. Alex knelt down beside Diamond, who was holding his head in his hands and looked dazed from the attack, but still conscious. He and Kimiko walked up cautiously to the new girl in the area. Her pokémon had fallen to its knees, panting heavily.

"No way," Alex said, seeing the girl properly for the first time in the light of their fire. "You look like the champion!"

"That's because I am," the girl answered, a hint of pride in her voice. "Kirsten Hammond, at your service. I'd offer a handshake, but…" She looked down and held up her arm. It was then that Alex noticed Kirsten was holding her right wrist at an awkward angle.

"You look terrible, no offense," Kimiko said. "Is that broken?"

"I don't think so, just sprained, but it hurts like a bitch. Don't remember how it happened. Where are we?"

"Route 502, a little less than halfway to Ferrum," Alex replied.

"Oh, that's not so bad," Kirsten said thoughtfully, more to herself than anyone else. "Sorry to startle you guys like that. We got a little lost and saw the light from your fire here and figured we could get directions."

Alex and Kimiko exchanged a worried glance. "What's the champion doing all the way out here?" Alex asked.

Kirsten looked around their campsite before speaking. "You have ghosts with you," she said, gesturing to Diamond and Fantomé. It was a statement, not a question. Her eyes narrowed.

"Yes," Alex answered, looking at her curiously.

"Where did you get them?"

"Whispering Forest."

"Really…? When?"

"Uh… a few days ago, now."

Kirsten looked at the two with wide eyes before turning to look at Diamond again. "You two didn't happen to meet the gym leaders of Phantom Village, did you?"

Alex and Kimiko exchanged another glance. "Yes, we did," Kimiko answered.

"Small world," Kirsten stated. "They told me they had met a couple of trainers who caught a sableye in there a few days ago. They said nothing of the gastly, though. I trust neither has been giving you problems?"

"Not so far," Alex answered. "Diamond – the sableye – was a little reluctant at first, but so far he's cooperated, for the most part. And the gastly, Fantomé, has been the life of our little party."

The gastly in question bellowed with glee and began doing orbits around Kimiko. Thorn let out a small sound of protest, but Kirsten smiled. "Well, that's good. As it happens, those two asked me to check out the forest. I'm aware of the incident you two had in there, now that I know who you are. Phobos and Deimos were unable to find any answers for the ghosts' recent violence, so they asked me to step in and investigate myself."

"They spoke to Diamond," Alex offered.

"Just trying to get information on what's going on," Kirsten nodded. "At my request."

"So were you attacked?" Kimiko asked, gesturing to Kirsten's wrist and tattered clothes.

"You could say that," Kirsten replied. She sat down on a nearby boulder. "I was walking through the forest with Toxicroak here, and my drapion, acting as lookouts. My venomoth was guiding us. Next thing I remember, I'm standing right in the middle of about thirty ghost pokémon. I don't remember seeing any of them appear or anything, but from what I gather from Toxicroak, I was possessed by a gengar and lead my pokémon to that group. There was a battle and I guess I got attacked, but I don't remember even feeling it. Toxicroak here had the sense to get me out of the mess with feint attack, which I guess injured the gengar possessing me enough to make it stop. I recalled Drapion and Venomoth while they duked it out since they were basically taking on the rest of the ghosts by themselves and looked like they were really struggling. Not my best idea," Kirsten sighed, as though she was torn between having to recall her pokémon or let them fight for all their lives. She sat catching her breath for a moment before continuing.

"None of the ghosts other than that gengar seemed to know where I'd gone after Toxicroak moved me, but I guess I gave myself away with the pokéballs. Toxicroak threw off the gengar long enough for me to grab hold of him and have him get us out of there. We've been using feint attack to jump short distances for the past ten minutes or so, I would guess, looking for any sign of a city or a trainer to get our bearings. And that's how we got here."

Kirsten looked expectantly at the other two. It was Kimiko who spoke first. "Wow…" was all she could say, though.

"So, that's why your Toxicroak looks ready to pass out," Alex commented. "And he still almost took out Diamond with one move, and took all of Thorn's attacks without so much as flinching. He must be tough."

Kirsten kneeled down next to her pokémon and put her good hand on his head. The fighting-type actually turned away. "Don't feel bad, buddy," she said. "I think he feels guilty about not realizing the gengar had been following us in my shadow… but really, it's okay, I didn't notice either, and neither did Drapion or Venomoth. We're all out and okay and unharmed."

"Croak," the pokémon said, turning to look at his trainer's wrist.

"It'll be fine," she replied. "I would have been a lot worse if you didn't get us out. You saved us back there." She smiled and hugged her pokémon, but the Toxicroak didn't appear any more relieved.

"Er," Alex said awkwardly. "We were just making dinner, if you and your team would like to join us and recover a bit."

Kirsten detached herself from her pokémon and studied him for a few seconds before standing and turning to the trainers. "Thank you. I don't want to intrude on your dinner, but I think I will stick around, if it's all the same to you. I don't think Toxicroak is up for any more feint attack traveling tonight, and Venomoth and Drapion are probably in even worse shape."

"It'd be our pleasure," Kimiko said with a smile, picking up a very confused Radar and turning back to the campsite. "We've got enough soup for you and your entire team here. And we have some medicines here if you need them." Kirsten and Alex followed, trailed by their pokémon, save Ariel.

"Oh, I don't know about that first one, my team is pretty gluttonous," Kirsten said with a laugh and pulled out her remaining pokéballs. The aforementioned Drapion and Venomoth had bleeding cuts and bruises all over and looked just as ready to pass out as her Toxicroak. Kirsten's Crobat and Seviper gathered around their injured teammates to make sure they were all okay while Toxicroak had struck up a conversation with Thorn. Kirsten's Tentacruel sat behind everyone, beak embedded in the ground to stay upright, and only opened one eye to make sure his trainer was unharmed before dozing off.

"Wow… those must have been some really strong ghosts to be able to beat up half of a champion's team this badly," Kimiko noted as Kirsten got to work spraying potions over her three injured pokémon.

"To be fair, it was essentially two-versus-thirty for a while, there."

"Why don't you call professor Spruce?" Alex suggested afterwards. The champion looked at him curiously. "He's a professor and a researcher. Maybe he can help you investigate the ghost problem."

"Hah, that's not a bad idea," she said, looking into the fire. She shook her head. "Anyways, I'll let Emily know I'm okay too, but that's actually not a bad idea," she added, pulling out her pokédex. "I'm going to advise bringing a few good trainers with him though, and some pokémon who can handle ghost-types. I don't think anyone should be entering that forest alone for the time being. …By the way, which of the professor's hopefuls should I tell him I'm currently pilfering dinner from?"

Kirsten escorted Alex and Kimiko all the way to Ferrum the next day, with the help of a rested Toxicroak, even treating them to lunch when they arrived before departing.

"I have to get back to the League HQ and let the rest of the elite four know of my… little mishap," she said. "Emily's frantic wondering why I didn't come back last night after I called. And maybe I'll get my hand looked at after all; it doesn't seem to be getting any better… Anyway, I'll check in with professor Spruce tonight and see if he came up with anything, he and the elite team he picked out of his trainers are going to check out the forest today."

"I'll do the same," Alex said.

"If there's anything we can do to help, give us a call," Kimiko added.

"I'll keep it in mind," Kirsten said with a smile. "You two are going to want to toughen up a bit though if you really want to help. You saw what those ghosts did to my team, and you saw firsthand how dangerous they can be. Either way, I don't think this will be the last time we meet," she added with a wink. "Good luck with your gym battle. Cyrus is pretty tough considering he's only the second in the circuit."

"Thanks," Alex said. "I think I can take him. Good luck with the ghost problem."

"Thanks," Kirsten mimicked. "Somehow I think I got the short end of that one," she added with a laugh. She saluted to the two trainers before turning and leaving the pokémon center.

Kimiko insisted on going clothes shopping for a better traveling outfit, so they decided to check out the city and train a little bit, saving the gym for tomorrow. He couldn't find any information on the gym's special ruling, but he did learn that the leader used steel-types, which seemed to him like a valid reason for Kirsten's warning about him. After a little training and some new moves, the pair retreated to the pokémon center to get dinner and a room. Alex decided then to call the professor's lab and see if he learned anything about the ghost pokémon.

No one answered.

A/N: So, in regards to this chapter's fic references:

The first one is in how Kirsten and Toxicroak use feint attack to travel short distances (and, coincidentally, had the added bonus of being a dark-type move, thus damaging the gengar possessing Kirsten during the first use and expelling it from her body - not part of the credit, just offering an explanation). The idea for how the move works comes from Clouded Sky by Negrek. This is probably the most unique variation of a journey-style fic I've ever read, and I highly recommend it.

The second is probably the more obvious one, especially to anyone who's read Digital Skitty's fic, Pedestal. This, of course, is the reference to Nick Sayre and what is essentially the summary of Pedestal's entire plot that Deimos uses here as the key argument in his effort to make his case to Kirsten. (Also from Pedestal, the idea that gym leaders/champions have personal stylists... this might be a thing elsewhere, but it was the first time I'd seen it, and I liked it.) Pedestal is what really inspired me, not just to write in general, but also to get my gym leaders and minor characters more involved in the story than I probably would have otherwise. It also ties in surprisingly well with my own plot, so I'll probably continually reference Pedestal throughout this fic.

Of course, at the original time of posting, I'd gotten permission from Digital Skitty to use their story as a reference, especially considering how huge of a spoiler it is that I plan to be borrowing. I may or may not still have that PM, but who knows anymore with FFnet's glitches.