Prolouge – Dragon Pilot

There were 1,300 personnel working on the army base…and amongst them was a single traitor.

It was 2:00pm in the afternoon on a balmy autumn day. Despite the sunshine and clear skies, the afternoon was cool and there was a cold wind blowing. The North Pewter Army Aviation Centre in Northern Kanto is a secret facility hidden the mountains to the north of Pewter City.

Away from the prying eyes of the public, of journalist and of accountability advocates, this was where, amongst other things, Dracaena Tabuu's newly enacted subspace emissary developed and tested its experimental aircraft.

In the middle of a rocky valley, the base is impossible to reach by road, and treacherous on foot. Should any budding citizen every come near its boundary fence, they could expect to find themselves arrested and charged with conspiracy against the government…and that was if they were lucky.

The traitors name was Elle Hoshino…

Ever since Elle was young she had wanted to be the first female fighter pilot. She had never time nor affection for Pokémon. Elle had joined the self-defence force after finishing high school and trained as a pilot.

From there risen quickly through the ranks. Commended for her skill behind the control of just about any type of aircraft, she had been selected as a test pilot for a top-secret government project, and assigned to the North Pewter base.

But everything had gone wrong when another pilot had tried to sexually assault her. Though he was two times her size, Elle had managed to put him in the hospital. Now she was facing an uncertain future.

Stood down from regular pilot duties and reduced to the role of a technician, Elle Hoshino was to face a court martial. What would become of her after that? It had been made clear to her that she never serve as a test pilot again. She might even find herself working a fast food job in Viridian City.

Needless to say, she was feeling betrayed and pretty angry with her once beloved Subspace Emissary…and that was when the letter had arrived.

Slipped into her pocket in the middle of a crowd, on the condition of a meeting on a bridge in the middle of the night, a simple offer:

We know what has happened to you

We can offer revenge and riches

Be on the bridge outside cerulean city at midnight

Come alone

Elle thought about that night on the bridge as she crossed the base in her jeep, from the barracks to main hangar C. The man, or woman, she had met had not given her a name. They hadn't even shown their face, hiding underneath a black cloak. Their voice had been distorted with some sort of microphone.

The cloaked figure had been there to offer her a job. Two day. It would require all her skills as a pilot, and give her vengeance against the military and the government who had betrayed her. She would be paid 70 million Poké.

Elle pulled the Jeep up outside the Hangar, a black oval shaped building. There were six main hangars in total. All painted jet black, their only identifying maker being the letter painted in gold across the double doors.

Elle was not meant to be there. But dressed in the blue overalls of a maintenance officer and carrying a toolbox nobody would think twice about her. She wouldn't be stopped, or questioned, or asked to show ID.

After the entire base was secret and hidden in the mountains. All of the 1300 personnel who worked here had been checked several times by server all government agencies. They were not expecting to be attacked. They had no reason to believe there could be an imposter in their midst.

Elle stepped through the main entrance and came to a halt. She let out a small gasp as she laid eyes upon the thing she had come to steal…

The battleship Halberd. A naval vessel for the twenty-first century. As tall as Prism Tower and as long as two battle subway trains put together, the Halberd is capable of both atmospheric and spaceflight. It is even able to take off and land underwater.

In times of war, it was designed to carry an entire legion of Primids into battle. Armed to the teeth with cannons it could penetrate enemy lines and devastate cities.

Elle took a deep breath before striding over to the gangplank. There was a group of three technicians working there. One of them stopped her.

"May I enquire what business you have here?"

"The coffee machine in the mess has malfunctioned," Elle replied. "I was sent to repair it."

Of course the story was ridiculous. It would have only taken one phone call to determine whether this was true. But it was late in the afternoon. The technicians had been there all day and would be there for hours still.

Nobody would be able to leave until that afternoon's tests were complete. If take off was delayed so would finishing. And so it was that the technician didn't challenge Elle, but instead waved her on.

Elle ascended the gangplank and entered the great beast through an airlock. From there it was just a short passage way to the cockpit…

[Pokémon]

The Halberd's test pilot was Wolf. He was on secondment from the Cornerian army and was annoyed to have found himself stationed somewhere he'd never heard of.

Kanto…Where the hell was that?

His ears pricked and he looked over his shoulder as Elle entered the cockpit. He cocked his head, confused for moment, and then grinned.

"Well, hello there. Can I help you?"

Elle snorted. She recognized a flirt when she saw one, having been around so many.

"Actually, you can die!"

She opened the toolbox and pulled out a peculiar looking pistol. It was made of plastic, built using a 3D printer. Anyone who gave it a cursory glance might have mistaken it for a water pistol.

But it was in fact much deadlier. Instead of squirting water, it used chamber of compressed air to fire dart like needles containing the nerve agent VX. Wolf was dead before his brain even had time to process what had happened. The needle fired from the gun struck him between the eyes. Less than half a second later he slumped forward in his seat.

There was a co-pilot too. A young man not long out of the army flight school in Sinnoh. He didn't get a chance to say a single word before the deadly dart struck him in the neck…

Elle had always been on the smaller side. Even so she managed to pull the two much larger males out of their seats with relative ease, before taking wolf's place. She slipped the pair of earphones on her head and stroked the console.

She could feel the Halberd's power reaching out to her…Soon it would all be hers. She would have murdered fifty more of her comrades for that.

[Pokémon]

"Halberd one, you are clear to proceed to the runway."

The air traffic control officer watched with attentiveness as the great beast of an aircraft slid out of the hanger and immediately swings to the left. Watching it make its way across the tarmac and onto the runway, the controller wondered how such a device could fly at all.

Part of the answer to that question lay in the six powerful jet engines at the front, middle and rear of the craft. The rest of the answer was classified – only a handful of scientist and engineers knew all of the Halberd's secrets.

"Halberd one, you are clear to take off."

The six engines kicked into motion. The roar could be heated throughout the base. The Halberd begun to rise into the air like Harriet jump jet, kicking up a dust storm in its wake. It was quickly out of sight of the control tower.

The controller consulted the radar. The course was simple. The Halberd would ascend to forty thousand feet and travel north for one hundred kilometers before returning to base. The intention was to keep the vessel out of sight of prying and spying eyes.

The controller watched the dot on the screen. It had only been a few seconds since take off, but already it was veering off course. A problem with the navigation equipment maybe.

"Halberd one, you are veering off course. Make correction twenty six degrees to the left."

There was no response from the pilot. That was certainly odd.

"Halberd one. Come in Halberd one. Make course correction, twenty six degrees to the left."

[Pokémon]

Elle ignored the controller. Already the little man on the radio was starting to irritate her.

She needed her full concentration now. This would be the most difficult part of the operation. She needed to move quickly. Satellites would easily spot the Halberd, given its size.

It could be tracked by radar. It was filled with communication equipment that could easily be turned against her. She loved the aircraft, but knew it could easily give her away.

She had knew the route she had to take. Ascend forty thousand feet, and travel three hundred kilometers south towards the coast. The Kanto region had disappeared beneath a sea of white and silver clouds.

"Halberd one. Come in Halberd one. You are far off course. Please change direction and return to base. Halberd one. Halberd one…"

Twenty minutes passed – then came the most difficult part of the operation. Elle cut the two front engines and the Halberd fell into a steep nosedive. They were somewhere over the ocean now. The sea was rushing up to meet them like a solid blue wall.

Elle gripped the controls tightly as the nose made contact with the water. There was a bone grinding thud as the vessel dived beneath the waves…