Creation began on 12-05-16
Creation ended on 12-31-16
Neon Genesis Evangelion
Time and Space Revelations
"What?" Gendo questioned Ritsuko once he had been informed of the Fourth Child's continued presence at the Giovanni Corporation's research facility. "The Fourth Child obtained video evidence of his time with the Third Child in the other dimension?"
"Yes," she answered him. "Not only that, but he also seems to have a creature of his own that was able to cross over into this world…in a backpack that the Third Child acquired for him there…and the Giovanni Corporation permitted him to keep it, as it was confirmed to be his."
"What type of creature?"
"A four-armed humanoid. Six feet tall, weighing three-hundred-fifty pounds."
"What were they thinking?"
Ritsuko decided not to tell him that the Fourth Child went and posted the video footage of the Third Child and his adventures on the Internet and was getting reviews and questions that were being answered to the best of his abilities.
-x-
It was actually Asuka's idea for him to put the footage on the Internet, but Kensuke figured that he was going to do it, anyway. It just helped to remind the world that Shinji was still alive, just displaced in another world, looking for a way back. He never expected to get reviews or questions about what the creatures were or how Shinji was about to control them, what he was doing in the other world or why the people cheered for him and others that owned a bunch of them on the battlefields.
"Hey, ladies," he greeted Asuka and Rei as he and Toji were walking down the street to school.
"Pilot Aida," responded Rei.
"Your posts got more questions than anything I had expected before, Fourth," Asuka told him. "Even Hikari had to ask about the ball-shaped Pokemon that explode."
"Voltorb and Electrode," he explained. "Supposedly, they were recent developments in the production of Poke Balls. Even Shinji said they look like the standard balls, only bigger and more intense."
"I asked more about those plant creatures that Kensuke filmed Shinji catching that were huge and tried to eat him every chance they got, and it was suggested by him that it was how they show affection." Toji told them.
"Victreebel," Kensuke explained, "and there were only two of them that ever tried to eat Shinji. It turned out they were evolved from their smaller forms called Weepinbell, which are, if anyone thinks about it, more pleasant to be around."
As they neared the school, they anticipated that the student body that viewed the video posts wherever they could would set to ask as many questions as they could about the Pokemon Shinji and Kensuke had either seen or caught and how Shinji had survived in the other world.
-x-
"…Hmm… The closest town is still about three miles away," said Shinji to Misato, checking his map and Poketch, as they were walking through the woods.
"Eevo," she responded, but then felt the fur under her purple scarf bristle with discontent; something had given her a mild spook. "Eee?"
Shinji looked away from his Poketch and turned to the left of the trees, seeing an old building in a small clearing.
"What the…" He uttered, recognizing it as the Old Chateau of Eterna Forest, which was hundreds of miles away from where they were after leaving Canalave City once they defeated the Gym Leader and earned their badge…and resolved Shinji's mild disgust of the guy's choices of putting passion before family. "The Old Chateau?"
"Eee!" Misato went, and Shinji looked down at her, seeing her nod her head in the negative. "Eevo! Eevo!"
He picked her up into his arms and responded, "I know how you feel, Misato. It's not easy to forget. Going inside that place just once was enough to give us nightmares. Once was enough."
Then, he carried her down the path leading away from the old mansion; although the young trainer had managed to catch Pokemon there, the building left its mark of discontent on him and his Eevee that was enough to haunt them for a long time, and they didn't need any more hauntings from the afterlife.
Even if it was nothing more than an illusion, it's best not to risk it, he thought, deciding to walk faster to get closer to the next time. Where are you when we need you, Kensuke?
-x-
"…None of us here can see any harm in the video footage Mr. Aida posted," Antonio told Misato as they were preparing to try and peer into the Pokemon dimension through Palkia again. "If anything, it helps to prove further that inter-dimensional travel is within reach."
"It's only because my boss is pissed," Misato stated. "He feels this will excite people a little too much and cause pandemonium."
"Does Gendo Ikari even know how to spell 'pandemonium'?"
"I won't argue with you about that… Is Palkia okay?"
Palkia didn't seem as passive as it originally looked in its cell. It looked…restless, like it had plenty of energy, but no outlet with which the burn it up.
"Ever since yesterday, it's been feeling restless," Antonio explained to her. "I want for it to go outside for a while, but, just as you said about the video posts, we don't want to excite people too much and cause pandemonium."
"Time and space are one and the same," said Palkia suddenly, catching their attention. "Time and space… One cannot exist without the other… To possess one is the need to possess the other… To need time…only to have space… But…to desire space…one must…have…time…"
Misato and Antonio looked at one another, confused by the Pokemon's choice of words, not understanding what it meant.
"Palkia," Misato then said to the large creature, slowly approaching the tank. "What are you trying to say? What are you talking about?"
"Time and space," it told her. "They are but doors and keys to one another. I am the guardian of space…who serves as both key and doorway to the opposing guardian of time, who is but the same as I… To have one…is to need the other."
It then pressed its claws against the glass, which then rippled like water, only sideways.
Misato saw something in the ripples. It looked like…like a person she was only seeing from a grand distance lately, throwing small balls of plastic and metal at various, different creatures, night and day, without limit. They were a young man, accompanied by a small, fox-like cat in a purple scarf, either atop a red sea serpent…or an orange dragon…or some type of large, four-legged animal that might've been bred from a dog or something that wore a strange mask.
"What some would refer to as the Apocalypse, others call a revelation," Palkia told them as the ripples intensified, showing the man that Misato was convinced was Shinji, now standing in front of a cave entrance with a determined look on his face. "The boy you are trying to keep in touch with… The one trying to find his way back to this dimension…must face a revelation of his own that will hinder the chances of success…for everyone else involved for benevolent reasons."
Then, like something out of a ghost film, Palkia moved forward, passing through the rippled glass, just as the boy entered the cave after shouting something that couldn't be heard…and fell down to the ground, panting from exhaustion.
"To gain one is to need the other," he enforced, and then passed out.
Misato then looked to Antonio and said what was probably against her better judgment, but didn't think they had any other alternatives at the moment.
"I think we need all of Shinji's friends here," she told him.
"All of them?" Antonio asked her.
"All of them," she repeated, concerned.
-x-
It was beyond impossible. This cave simply didn't exist anywhere on the map or in his Poketch, but here it was…and Shinji was inside it, looking for someone that was calling for help.
"Someone, help, please!" The person, a young boy by the sound of their voice, called out again, and Shinji and Misato ran through the tunnel to find where they were.
It sounded like they were close by, but there was no sign of them.
"Where are you?" Shinji shouted, noticing how the details of the cave walls were similar to the ones he and Kensuke had seen in the previous regions and earlier in the Sinnoh Region before he disappeared back to the other dimension, but there was just something about this one that seemed…cobbled together, like some sort of labyrinth or something. "Where are you?!"
"Eevo!" Misato called out, too.
Roughly a month after the last gym match Shinji needed to gain entry into the Sinnoh League, he had expanded his collection of Pokemon by catching, unexpectedly, a Legendary Pokemon known as Darkrai. And then, again unexpectedly, he encountered the Lake Trio all at once at one the lakes they're known to inhabit…and they became part of his expanding group. Mostly because he felt like he had some bad luck on him for a few victories over several trainers that he was certain were just starting out…or that he had simply grown too strong to be in the same league as the common trainer. Unlike the ones that were either focused on quantity or quality when it came to Pokemon, Shinji wanted to be balanced between them; he couldn't swap out his entire roster of Pokemon for the Legendary Pokemon he had captured for the sake of power. One or two, perhaps, but never the whole roster.
"Eevo?" Misato got his attention, and looked down at her.
It was no different from how he felt about using Evolutionary Stones or trading to evolve his Pokemon. While he had been fortunate enough to catch fully-evolved ones in the wild, he just felt…uncomfortable evolving any of the ones he had that still could. He wouldn't even evolve Misato after discovering that she could evolve into any different type of Pokemon depending on the circumstances requiring a specific evolution because he liked her as she was, which was why he made her wear the Ever Stone to keep her from evolving.
"No evolutionary cheats for either of us," he reminded her.
"Eee?" She went confused by that, and deduced that he had thought back to how certain Pokemon required those rocks to evolve or needed to be exchanged, which made him uncomfortable doing so. "Eee."
Crack! The ground beneath them gave way, and they fell into the chasm below.
"Aaaaahh!" Shinji screamed, feeling as though he was falling into a deep, dark hole.
"Welcome…to the Underground," they heard the voice that called out to them, no longer sounding like they needed help.
-x-
"Ugh!" Kensuke shuddered, standing outside the Giovanni Corporation building as he waited on Toji, Hikari, Asuka and Rei (whom, despite not having any orders from either Gendo or Dr. Akagi, still came with them when she was informed that their presence could help in the matter concerning Shinji) to catch up with him.
"What's the matter?" Toji asked him.
"I just had a bad feeling about Shinji," he told him. "Like he's in trouble or something serious."
Suddenly, Toji felt a chill go up his spine, like someone had stuck him inside a freezer.
"Are you ready to see a Pokemon much larger than Brute-Chan?" Kensuke asked them.
"Don't ask me," said Asuka to him. "You've seen these creatures in the flesh, you've filmed them. Show us the big one."
He then led them into the building lobby and down a flight of stairs to the large chamber that housed Palkia. But Palkia was no longer inside its tank. It was levitating over everyone present, just moving wherever in the air.
"Aah!" Hikari gasped, wanting to leave, but grabbed Toji by his right arm. "That's…that's…"
"Meet Palkia, the Spatial Pokemon," Kensuke introduced them to the Legendary Pokemon representing space.
Because Palkia was looking up at the ceiling, it turned over to its left to face the teens.
"Greetings," it spoke.
"My God," Hikari gasped again, still clinging to Toji's arm. "How is it talking like that?"
Rei observed the draconian beast and found that, despite being quite massive, seemed unusually…cute.
"Friends of the boy you're trying to bring back here?" It asked.
"Yeah," answered Misato to the creature. "These are all of them."
"Welcome, everyone," greeted Antonio to them. "Don't mind the large dragon. It's just a little…restless for the time being."
"Dragon? Right." Asuka expressed.
"Dragon Pokemon exist," Kensuke responded.
"I'm not disbelieving."
"So, if I may ask," went Hikari to Misato and Antonio, noticing that there were several other people down here that were working on various cameras and other equipment, "why did you need us here?"
Misato and Antonio walked over to them, under the floating Palkia, and the man responded, "We would like your help in reaching out to Shinji beyond this dimension."
"Like how Kensuke did?" Toji asked.
"Yes."
"It's probably not all that different," Kensuke explained his experience with the process. "You just lie down, they monitor your vitals while injecting you with barbiturates while the film crew monitors Palkia…and slowly-but-surely, you're traveling to the world of Pokemon."
But Hikari had her doubts about that. Mainly because she had never done anything of the sort…and found it difficult to comprehend how one could travel to another dimension through a combination of drugs and videotape equipment used on a creature that didn't exist anywhere in this world. But she was seeing the impossible right in front of her, hearing it, even feeling it (she had actually touched Kensuke's Machamp and couldn't believe how thick his hide or muscles were, like he had existed to work out all the time).
"When do we begin?" Toji asked, wanting to help get Shinji closer to his goal of finally returning to this world.
"The next ten minutes would be greatly appreciated," suggested Antonio to them, leading towards a room.
-x-
Kensuke's father would have never believed it if he hadn't seen it. It was difficult enough for three men to move furniture, but his son's Machamp, or Brute-Chan, was able to lift up the sofa without even breaking a sweat while he was able to vacuum under it. When he was done, he had the four-armed humanoid set it back down so they could sit down.
"Thank you, Brute-Chan," he praised the Pokemon.
"Machamp," Brute-Chan responded.
"I don't know if this is permanent or not, but as long as he's here, Dad, we should really make the most of it," his son had told him after introducing them. "Brute-Chan's good with heavy lifting and doesn't take up space when he needs to rest because I have his ball with me."
And you said he knows four specific moves that make him formidable as a guard, if need be, his father thought, trying to recall the moves his son lifted. Strength, Karate Chop, Seismic Toss and Mega Punch? I guess that would make anyone intimidated by him.
"But whatever you do, don't let anyone hurt him. He has a life and feelings like we do."
If Brute-Chan was like a pet, he was the most humanoid pet that has ever existed in this world so far. And because he was the only Pokemon any one person possessed here, it made Kensuke a little more popular than ever, almost in the same capacity as Shinji Ikari, but mostly because he was in this world still, body, mind and soul.
Ring! The doorbell rang, and the father gasped; he normally didn't have visitors, even on his days off from NERV.
He got up and grabbed the Poke Ball.
"Until later, Brute-Champ," he told the Pokemon, returning him into the ball. "Be right there!"
He pressed the white button on the ball and it shrunk down to the size of a ping-pong ball, which he then put in his pants' right pocket.
Upon answering the door, he was greeted by none other than Ritsuko Akagi herself.
"May I help you?" He asked her, hoping it wasn't about his son's Pokemon.
-x-
"…I just want you to know, Fourth," went Asuka to Kensuke as they were laying in cots while the medical staff injected the sleeping barbiturates into their IV drips, "if I get killed over there, I'm kicking your ass."
"I doubt any of us will die over there," said Toji. "We have to get there first."
Hikari yawned…and hit her pillow like a sack of potatoes.
Rei followed suit right after.
"What should we expect to see over there?" Toji asked Kensuke, feeling the effects of the drugs.
"Expect to see…a lot of Pokemon…" He answered, hoping their visit would be long enough to make an impact in Shinji's time there. "See you…soon…bro…"
-x-
Shinji came to after hearing Misato and feeling her jump up and down on his chest.
"Ahh…" He groaned, getting up to his feet.
"Eevo," his Eevee went, getting off him.
"Are you alright, Misato?"
"Eee."
"That's good to know."
They looked around and saw the hole they fell through. Unfortunately, it was too small for any Flying Pokemon to have them be carried up and Shinji didn't have Master with them to use his psychic powers to levitate or teleport them to a safe place outside the cave. This time, they had to find the way out on their own.
"Wee?" Misato questioned.
"Well, Misato, the only way we're going to get out of here is by finding the way ourselves," he told her, and then picked her up and started walking down a tunnel. "We've been through worse than this, and we're still around."
-x-
"…And Mr. Aida said his son had gone back to the Giovanni Corporation," said Ritsuko to Gendo and Fuyutsuki in the former's office.
"What about the creature that he brought back with him from the other dimension?" Gendo questioned her; this was mainly because he wanted to know how a creature of this sort could exist and how it evolved to be this way, even if it meant having to cut it open.
"He claims his son took it with him back to the Giovanni Corporation. He might've been lying, but he seemed convinced not to sell out his son's Pokemon for any reason."
"The Fourth Child's presence at the Giovanni Corporation may explain the absence of the First and Second Child's absence, since there was a synchronization test that they didn't come for." Fuyutsuki suggested.
This infuriated Gendo, having no control over the children's actions. If there was an Angel attack in the future and they weren't in the Evas, his scenario was endangered.
Then, just because he felt it was the right thing to do, Fuyutsuki walked from behind Gendo's desk towards the door.
"Where are you going, Fuyutsuki?" Gendo asked him.
"You know where I'm going," he said cryptically back to him and left.
-x-
"…Wha… What?" Hikari gasped, finding herself in a wood, laying against a tree. "Where… Am I here? Am I…really here?"
"We must be here?" She heard the groaning of Asuka, looking to her left and seeing the redhead getting up from against a neighboring tree. "If we're here subconsciously, it feels like we're really here, physically."
As Hikari got up, on her right, Rei came to and got up, wondering how they went from being inside an underground facility to being outside in a wooden area.
"Those nurses must've drugged me real good," the girls heard Toji, appearing from behind a bush. "Or I've died and gone to Heaven because of a bad reaction to those barbiturates."
"Oh, really?" Kensuke asked him, appearing behind the tree that Rei was near. "Why do you believe that you died?"
"Because there ain't no place like this near Tokyo-3," Toji explained. "It's so quiet and beautiful out here."
Kensuke searched his backpack, which he was grateful for having back in this world and was relieved to find his own Poketch in one of the pouches and placed it on his wrist before activating it.
"Hmm…that's weird," he said to himself.
"What is?" Asuka asked him. "Where are we, Fourth?"
"Well, we're in the Sinnoh Region, but the location we're in doesn't make sense. The map app on my Poketch says there's a cave nearby, but that's not right. There shouldn't be any caves near where we are. And… Oh, man."
"What?" Toji asked him.
"The calendar app says that it's been over a month since Shinji and I got separated."
"Just a month?"
"A month-and-a-half, give or take."
Stomp! Something shook the ground. Stomp!
"What was that?" Hikari asked.
Something appeared from behind a few trees away from them. It was…some sort of monster! Larger than a man, black and gray, covered in armor and had a horn over each eye!
"Kensuke, what is that thing?" Hikari asked, frightened by its presence.
"It's an Aggron," he answered.
"A what?" Asuka went.
"A Steel/Rock Pokemon from the Hoenn Region. They shouldn't be anywhere near Sinnoh."
"Are they…friendly?" Toji asked him.
"Grr…" The Aggron growled at them.
"No, they're territorial," he told them.
Kensuke then grabbed Toji and Rei by their arms and ran down the opposite direction, away from the Aggron.
Asuka and Hikari followed suit and ran for their lives.
"Follow me to the cave!" Kensuke told them.
The Aggron pursued them.
-x-
"…Hmm?" Shinji went, looking to his left down a tunnel that glittered with a sheen of crystal. "Misato, did you hear anything just now?"
"Eee," she responded in the negative. "Eevo?"
"I just thought I heard someone," he explained to her, and resumed carrying his Eevee down the ruby-glistening tunnel.
The cave just got larger and larger and felt like it went deeper and deeper than closer to a way out back into the woods. It made Shinji feel like he were getting sucked into the shadow of the Twelfth Angel all over again; a strange thought after nearly four years of wanderlust.
"Eevo!" Misato went, squirming in Shinji's arms.
"What is it?" He asked her, letting her go onto the ground.
"Eee! Eevo!" She told him, running further down the ruby-glistening tunnel. "Eevo!"
He followed her; all he could do was put his faith in her guidance that she knew something was waiting for them at the end of the tunnel. When left without a sense of direction, a trainer had to put their faith in their Pokemon to show them the way to safety.
"You lead, I follow, Misato!" He told her. "Show us the way!"
-x-
It was weak at first, but the transmission got better after a while, and the picture cleared up of static, showing the work crew, Misato and Antonio the kids running from a large, armored animal that was chasing them towards a cave.
"They're all there," said Antonio.
"…Quick! It shouldn't fit in the cave!" Kensuke shouted, leading them into the cave.
"I haven't seen all of the video posts that Mr. Aida put on the Internet, but I'm guessing that Pokemon isn't one of the friendlier ones," Misato expressed, seeing the creature, despite the futility of the kids, smash its way into the cave. "Oh, God."
The kids ran for their lives, going down one tunnel after another, with the creature still in pursuit of them.
"You and Shinji actually run from creatures like this?!" Toji asked Kensuke.
"We didn't always run from them! Shinji would sometimes catch them!"
They ran deeper and deeper into the cave…until…
BASH! They crashed into someone.
"Ahh…" Asuka and Rei groaned.
"I don't believe my eyes," they heard the voice of Shinji. "Are you really here?"
"Shinji!" Toji gasped, grabbing the boy by his shoulders. "Aw, man, you're here!"
"Toji? Hikari? Ayanami? Asuka? Kensuke? You're all here?"
Before anyone else could say anything, the wild Aggron appeared behind a corner.
"Grr!" It growled at them. "Grr!"
"Eevo!" His Eevee went.
"We got this," said Shinji to the others. "Stand back."
-x-
Taking out of his Fast Balls, Shinji unleashed his Entei.
"Grrrrr!" Pyro growled, trying to intimidate Aggron.
"Pyro, use Fire Blast," Shinji instructed, and the Entei unleashed a large ball of fire against the wild Pokemon.
"Whoa!" Hikari gasped, holding onto Toji.
Aggron, now partially burnt by the Fire Blast, fell to the ground.
Shinji, not willing to risk it getting up and attacking them again, threw a Great Ball he had on him at the Aggron. The ball sucked the creature into it and fell to the ground and started wiggling around a bit.
Ping! The ball went, no longer moving, and Shinji picked it up.
"This Aggron won't be bothering anyone, anymore," he told them, and then the ball disappeared from his hand. "How did you guys manage to get here? With Kensuke, it was an honest accident that was greatly appreciated. I mean… How were you able to come here?"
"The same way Kensuke did, Shinji," answered Toji to him, looking at Pyro. "Is this…the Entei you call Pyro?"
Shinji petted Pyro on the left side of his face and answered, "Yep."
"Oh, so cute!" Hikari gasped, picking up Misato. "You must be Misato."
"Eee?"
"Hikari, please, put down Misato," Shinji told her. "She doesn't know you yet."
He approached her and quickly placed his Eevee back on the ground…where she ran over to a cave wall and began relieving herself.
"Oh!" Hikari gasped.
"That could've been you," Shinji informed her. "You have to let her get used to your presence before she consents to being picked up by people besides myself and Kensuke."
Hikari and Toji looked at Kensuke, who gave a slight smile; ever since they found him staying longer than what seemed possible, this allowed Shinji's first Pokemon to get used to him to allow him to pick her up without being unintentionally urinated upon out of nervousness or fright.
"She's just not used to being picked up by others as much as she's used to being picked up by Shinji or myself," he explained this tidbit of information. "Give her a while to get used to each of you, and she'll eventually warm up to you."
When Misato was done relieving herself, she returned to Shinji's side.
"Eevo?" She went.
"They're friends, Misato," he told her.
Then, Pyro approached Asuka, who seemed intimidated by him. He sniffed her hair and face.
"Grr?" He went to Shinji.
"I believe if they were running away from the Aggron, Pyro, then they were outside and know how to get out of this cave," Shinji told him.
"Grr."
"Could you guys show us the way out?"
"Uh, yeah," said Toji to him. "We came in from down that way. Wow, man, you…you look so… I mean, look at you. Has it really been almost four years since you ended up here?"
"You'd be surprised at how little anyone changes during long periods of travel," Shinji told him.
Since Pyro was among the larger Pokemon Shinji had that could move around in the cave, Shinji let Hikari, Rei and Asuka ride on his back while he, Toji and Kensuke walked.
"I just can't believe you actually caught something like this, Shinji," said Hikari to him, unable to believe that Pyro was a Legendary Pokemon. "It's…incredible."
"He, Hikari. Not 'it'. Pyro's a male."
"Right. Sorry."
"You're like a celebrity back home on the Internet, Shinji," Toji told him. "When Kensuke got his footage of you here during a monitoring experiment, he posted what he had so far for the world to see. People know you're still alive and ask all sorts of questions about how you ended up here and everything about your Pokemon."
"Oh, really?" Shinji questioned, looking back at the girls on Pyro. "Like what, exactly?"
"Like how you managed to survive your encounters with some really powerful hitters," Asuka spoke up. "How you're able to endure being burned, shocked and sent flying off your feet."
"It comes with the profession of being a trainer. But I'm far from indestructible or anything. Nobody is when facing Pokemon that are just much stronger than human beings are. But people and Pokemon coexist without much difficulty, except from those that believe that Pokemon are merely a means to an end or desire power for the sake of taking the world for themselves."
"Like these different organizations you've faced before?" Toji asked. "These…Team Rocket, Team Magma, Team Aqua and Team Galactic lunatics?"
"Among the type of people I've encountered in the regions I've been around so far. After the Pokemon League here in Sinnoh, since I need to catch more Pokemon from the other regions, I'm going to head to the Unova Region and try my luck with the league there."
"Oh, Shinji, we might've found out something from back home that may help you," Kensuke reminded himself to inform Shinji. "Something about what the Palkia there told Ms. Katsuragi."
"Go on, then."
"She said that it said that whatever Pokemon you catch later, if they're of these rare and powerful sorts, to catch one is to need the other," Hikari informed.
"Time and space are one and the same," added Rei. "Doors and keys to one another."
Shinji stopped walking and took out his Sinnoh Region Pokedex.
"Palkia," he uttered.
"Palkia, the Spatial Pokemon," Dexter uttered, displaying the limited information on the Legendary Pokemon. Revered as a deity in the mythology of the Sinnoh Region, Palkia is believed to be able to distort space and create spatial gaps in any given location."
Then he switched to a different Pokemon that seemed similar to Palkia, but was of a darker coloration and not as draconic in its appearance.
"Dialga, the Temporal Pokemon," Dexter revealed. "Revered as a deity throughout the mythology of the Sinnoh Region, Dialga is believed to have power over the flow of time with every beat of its heart. It is believed that time began the instant Dialga was born."
"Temporal?" Toji questioned.
"It's another way of saying 'time'," Shinji explained. "Dialga and Palkia are part of what Sinnoh people refer to as the Creation Trio, comprised of both of them and a third member called Giratina, the Renegade Pokemon."
"Giratina?" Rei questioned, and Shinji swapped to the next Pokemon on his Pokedex.
The creature looked like some sort of yellow, gray, black and red dinosaur-like creature with six legs and a pair of wings.
"That Pokemon looks rather scary," Kensuke told Shinji.
"Giratina, the Renegade Pokemon," Dexter informed. "Believed to reside within a reverse world where it was banished due to its savage aggressiveness."
"And they're all part of this…Creation Trio?" Hikari asked.
"Yeah," Shinji answered in a sigh. "Time, space and antimatter. To have any one of these three Pokemon…is to need the other two."
"But…that means you'll need to catch a Palkia…and the only Palkia we know of…is in our world," said Rei.
"There's bound to be more than one Palkia, Rei," Kensuke told her. "Legendary Pokemon are rare, but not extinct or endangered to the point of there being only one in existence. You just have to be able to find them."
"How do you hope to catch one, Third?" Asuka asked.
"The same way I catch any other Pokemon, Asuka," Shinji responded. "I look far and wide, searching any terrain, exploring any place that a Pokemon is known to inhabit, and do my best to catch them."
Even though there was a gap in the length of time between them, Shinji was more than three years older than they all were, so his three-and-a-half-year-long absence from their world had left the boy vastly educated on much of what these creatures were and how to deal with them.
"Asuka, very little time may have past back home, but I'm far from the house-broken male you saw me as," he told her. "You spend time traveling around here, you end up finding things that give you new meaning."
"Like what, something better than piloting the Eva?"
"Yes. Yes, better than that. Like flying on a Pidgeot or Charizard, or swimming with Gyarados or Seaking. Heh, even waking up to the singing of some Dodrio or Taillow in the morning. I do enjoy the time I spend here, for better or for worse."
"What about using Pokemon for personal gain?"
"That's mostly frowned upon. You treat Pokemon like they're pawns or weapons just because of what they can do, then you're no better than a criminal. I've dealt with my share of people that misuse Pokemon for personal gain or some other cruelty. They're as alive as any of us are and deserve to be treated with respect. I've actually met the guy that was once my Charizard's trainer back when she was just a Charmander and then a Charmeleon…and he was among the worst people I ever met that dared to call themselves a Pokemon Trainer if he saw them only for their power, not for them. It turned out that he was excommunicated from the Kanto League after he was found out to have abandoned over twenty of his Pokemon, including my Charizard and another Charizard belonging to a trainer that's in the Unova Region; if you're discovered to have abandon a certain number of Pokemon within the region you travel around, you're prohibited from participating in that region's Pokemon League for the number of years associated with the number of Pokemon you abandoned."
"Twenty years?" Hikari asked. "That's a long time."
"He wouldn't have to wait that long if he had proof that his abandoned Pokemon were simply released instead. All he had to do was shatter his Poke Balls used to capture, proving that he set them free. Instead, he kept the balls and used to catch other Pokemon. Wherever he is now, I pray that he's treating his Pokemon with respect and not as tools of the trade."
"Eevo!" Misato agreed with him.
-x-
"Sub-Commander Fuyutsuki?" Misato questioned, seeing the elderly man step into the large room. "What are you doing here?"
"I…just had to see this for myself," Fuyutsuki explained, seeing the large Pokemon that was being filmed and monitored by the crew. "Incredible. Truly incredible."
"If you think Palkia's incredible," said Antonio to him, "you should take a look into what the other world is while we're still able to."
Fuyutsuki walked over to the console and saw on the monitor the children and Shinji himself.
"While we're still here for the time being," said the pig-tailed girl to them, "could you show us where this Sinnoh League is, Shinji?"
"Yeah," said Shinji in response to her. "It's where we're heading. It's held annually on Lily of the Valley Island, over in the south. The Lily of the Valley Conference where the Sinnoh League takes place is still a long while away from now, it's not a bad thing to go there still and get everything in order with the registration for the competition."
"How long of a while are we talking about?" Toji asked him.
"Two months from now," he answered.
"Two months before you can compete in the Sinnoh League?" Kensuke questioned. "Are you sure about this?"
"Yes, I checked with Prof. Rowan after I defeated my last gym. Shall we?"
"Lead the way to this…Lily of the Valley Island," went Asuka to him.
-x-
Gendo decided to view the online footage that had been posted by the Fourth Child. But all he saw was not the exploits of a displaced Third Child as he fought against other people in these battles for recognition and glory. No, he saw these random creatures capable of things that would have made a human army a thing of the past. Creatures made of or covered in dense rock, large, aquatic creatures with tentacles and stingers, giant birds of fire and electrical surges. If anything, he had his own ideas about Pokemon…and their usefulness.
Very interesting, he thought, seeing the Third Child capture a large, rhino-like creature with a drill-like horn and a long tail and a large, bear-like creature with a ring on its front. And if such creatures can be controlled, any one person with a large number of these animals could mow down a small army.
And after watching a scene where the Third Child carry a small bunch of dragon-like serpents from a large group of ball-shaped creatures with eyes and attitude as they blew up, Gendo felt that he needed a backup plan to go with his scenario. If the Giovanni Corporation ever achieved their goal and also managed to bring the Third Child back to this dimension and if he had any of these creatures with him…he wanted them for himself.
"An army of these Pokemon would prove most useful against SEELE," he told himself, seeing his son clasping wrists with a strange creature that looked like a large, humanoid cat.
To be continued…
A/N: Happy New Year!