Outsiders (ZnT/Pokémon Reverse Summon)
Season 1, Episode 16, Chapter 2
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Team Flare's illegal mega stone mine had long been cleared out. Boxed in with nowhere to go, they surrendered after less than an hour of fighting. Now the only evidence of their presence was heaps of rubble and battle damage. The police had cordoned off the entire area, as well as confiscated the mining equipment as evidence, but at the moment the illegal mine was deserted. Only the fluttering of Woobats could be heard as they attached themselves to the wall with their suction cup-like noses, intending to sleep as dawn rose from the horizon, only for a pair of footsteps to echo from down a tunnel. Soon, a boy and a girl walked in, surveying the landscape with scowls on their faces.
"Looks like they went down hard," the boy mumbled as he knelt down over scorched ground, rubbing his hand and picking up soot. Then he spat in disgust as he wiped his hand on his shirt, muttering, "Serves those bastards right."
"While I wholeheartedly agree, focus," the girl chastised. "We have a job to do, and the sooner we get done, the better."
"Yeah, yeah, I know," the boy replied as he stood back up, waving her off dismissively. He then smirked cheekily towards her and added, "Has anyone ever told you just how bossy you can be?"
"Only to idiots or those who can't follow simple instructions," the girl answered while giving the boy a half-lidded stare.
"Well, no one's ever accused me of being smart," the boy joked, then began to inspect one of the mirror-like crystals that lined the walls of Reflection Cave. "Remind me, what does the boss want with these things?"
"Ugh," the girl groaned and shook her head, then replied, "These crystals have special properties that can reach into other worlds. The boss wants to know if they can be harnessed for our ends."
"Right, right. That's what I thought. Don't see how that's going to work, I hardly understand how we got here in the first place, but what do I know?" the boy said, rubbing his hand along the crystal before noticing a raw mega stone sticking out of the ground. Kneeling to pick it up, he studied it for a moment before smirking and pocketing it, figuring either the boss would want it or he'd make a quick buck by selling it.
"Seems like Team Flare missing the forest for the trees is universal," he pointed out, and his partner nodded.
"Indeed. So focused on their immediate needs that they never once considered the bigger picture." The girl's fist clenched and she scrunched her face for a moment, then turned away to look at her partner. "You remember our secondary objective, correct?"
"Yes, I remember that. Scout this place out and find out what we can," the boy confirmed. "No need to remind me."
"Just making sure," the girl said, then smiled and walked up to him. "Now then, let's do everyone proud, shall we?"
"Took the words right out of my mouth," the boy replied, then adjusted his black cap emblazed with a rainbow-colored R on its front atop his head.
Saito and Louise were eating lunch in one of Geosenge Town's many cafés when they finally got the message that Reflection Cave was open for passage. While the specific tunnel that Team Flare had used for their illegal mine was closed off, secondary tunnels had been cleared for trainers to hike through. It couldn't have come at a better time, and after paying for their meals the two trainers and Derflinger set off towards their destination. As they walked, however, they couldn't help but notice that the sky was growing darker as clouds rolled in, and they could tell that a storm was coming soon. Not wanting to turn back, they hastened their pace.
"You know, I think I'm beginning to see color again," Louise admitted as she hiked through the forest with Saito.
"Really?" Saito asked, a little excitement seeping into his voice.
"Not a lot," Louise admitted with a shrug, "but everything's a little less...grey."
"Well, progress is progress," Saito said while patting Louise's back. "Anything you want to do when you get your eyesight back?"
"Don't know yet," Louise answered, a warm smile breaking across her face, then she looked up at him and added, "I'll let you think of something."
"Well, talk about putting me under the spotlight," Saito joked, then the two friends laughed as they reached the cave entrance. A few trainers were already walking in and out of the cavern, passing by without paying them any heed. That suited the two trainers and Derflinger just fine, who entered the cave without pausing.
It took a moment for their eyes to readjust to the diminished light, but as before they were still able to see where they were going with little difficulty. Rather than do what they did last time and simply pick the most obvious path, instead both Louise and Saito pulled out their Pokédexes and used the newly updated map. True to the police's word, several newly marked paths were now available, dug out with the help of Rock and Ground-type Pokémon over the course of several hours. Of course, most of the tunnels were simply connecting natural passageways carved out by the native Pokémon that were previously inaccessible, but the end result was the same. There were now several alternate paths throughout Reflection Cave, with some joining back up with the main exit to Shalour City while others opened up along the mountainside. Picking out the closest path that brought them straight to Shalour, Saito and Louise began their hike through Reflection Cave, taking in all the sights and sounds around them.
The cave was filled with an abundance of Pokémon, now much livelier after Team Flare's illicit operation was cut short. Above their heads they saw Woobats sleeping along the roof of the cave, while small packs of Roggenrolas dug through the rocks around them, their energy cores glowing brightly. Carbinks were floating around large mirror-like crystals, and occasionally they heard the warbling of Solois as the bubble-like Pokémon floating through the tunnels. At one point, they saw a Sableye staring at them with its gem-like eyes from behind a corner, but it quickly darted out of view as they drew near.
"Hold on, is that the same Wobbufett as before?" Saito asked as they passed by a familiar blue Pokémon standing on a ledge above them.
Upon noticing their presence, the Wobbufett stood up straight and flashed a salute while saying, "Waagh!"
"…You know, I think it is," Derflinger admitted before giving a shrug. "But, then again, I've never been the best at telling those guys apart."
"Isn't that just because you're old?" Louise asked, a faint smile on her face.
"Maybe."
The trio chuckled, then continued their hike through the caverns. They saw a few trainers walk by, some trying to catch Pokémon while others were taking pictures of the crystals. A few waved them by, but none were all that interested in having a battle. Both trainers took it in stride, knowing that they'd have their chance at another battle soon when they both challenge Korrina, the Fighting-Type gym leader of Shalour City. Unlike Grant, Louise felt much more confident in facing her as much of her team was highly effective against Fighting-types.
For Saito, however, he knew the situation was flipped. While his team wasn't especially weak against Fighting-types, it wasn't particularly strong against them, either. Especially since Maindo was no longer part of his team. Admittedly, the Psychic-type would have been a valuable asset in taking the badge, but that was assuming Maindo would've cooperated in the first place. Something that Saito knew was highly unlikely. Regardless, Saito would make do without Maindo just fine. He just had to play the battle smart.
As the two trainers and Derflinger rounded a corner, they began to hear a people grumble from up ahead. Their interest peaked, they walked towards the sound and saw a pair of hikers nursing their Pokémon, applying first aid while keeping watch for anything coming towards them.
"Oh my God, are you guys okay?" Saito asked as he hurried over.
"Here, let me—" Louise immediately began, pulling out a bottle of Full Restore, only for the hikers to notice their arrival and snarl.
"You two again?! What the hell do you want now?!" one of them, a short, stocky man with a full beard shouted at the top of his lungs, his voice echoing down the halls.
"We already gave you what you wanted!" a taller, skinny woman also garbed in hiking gear screeched, throwing Saito and Louise off.
"What?" Louise asked, thoroughly confused which caused the stocky hiker to growl and stomp towards them.
"Dude, calm down," Saito calmly said while raising his hands placatingly, only for the hiker to jab his finger into Saito's shoulder repeatedly.
"Oh, you don't get to tell me that! What after you did to us! Hilary and I were just minding our own damn business when you two showed up, beat up our Pokémon and took our money!" he spat, then looked them up and down. "I see you changed clothes. What, that your disguise or something? Well it won't work."
"Sir, I'm afraid you're confused. We've never met before," Louise insisted, growing more alarmed by the second.
"Yeah, sure we haven't. You just so happen to look exactly like the pair of trainers who robbed us, who also had an ancient-looking Honedge with 'em," he said while pointing at Derflinger. "One that talks, and don't bother trying to pretend that you can't. I'm onto you."
"…Well, there goes my plan in calming you down," Derflinger joked, causing the man to flare his nostrils in frustration, then the Honedge added, "But in all seriousness, none of us have any idea what you're talking about. We just got here. Don't believe us? We have a—"
"A Kirlia, right? Both of you?" the hiker cut him off, stunning the trio into silence. The man then grimly nodded and said, "Yeah, no thanks. Both of them are sadistic little freaks."
"Okay, while I admit Maindo is a piece of work," Louise interjected, raising a finger while Saito nodded along, "Esprit is an angel."
"Angel of death, maybe," the woman, Hilary they assumed, shot back, and Louise growled before Saito showed the pair of hikers his Pokédex.
"Look, this tracked our exact path since we got here," Saito explained as he handed the device over. "I don't know who you guys saw, but it wasn't us. We literally just got here."
Both hikers studied the Pokédex carefully, glancing up at both Saito and Louise for several minutes as they tracked their path. The air around them seemed to grow heavy and thick from the tension, but finally the hiker sighed and shook his head before handing the Pokédex back.
"Looks like you two are telling the truth," he admitted. "Sorry about that, you guys just looked so…similar."
"It's okay," Louise replied, then handed both hikers several vials of Full Restores who gratefully took them. As the medicine was applied to the injured Pokémon, Louise asked, "I assume she's Hilary, but I didn't catch your name."
"Name's Edmund," the hiker revealed.
"Can you tell us what happened, Edmund? You and Hilary looked like you took some nasty hits," Saito pointed out, and Edmund looked up at Saito while crossing his arms.
"My wife and I were hiking to Geosenge Town from Shalour," Edmund explained. "Originally we were going to over the mountain, but since a storm was brewing we decided to go through Reflection Cave instead. Everything was fine at first, but about half-an-hour ago we ran into a pair of trainers that looked exactly like you. Only real difference was their get up. Looked like they were wearing some strange Team Rocket cosplay or something with a rainbow-colored logo plastered all over them."
Saito and Louise looked at each other and frowned, then Louise looked back towards the hikers and asked, "What happened?"
Hilary snorted then gestured towards her Pokémon while stating, "This is what happened. They attacked us and beat our Pokémon to a pulp. After that, they took all the money we had on hand then…I don't know, interrogated us."
"'Interrogated?' About what?" Saito asked, growing more alarmed by the second.
"Everything!" Hilary exclaimed while throwing her arms into the air. "Recent events, the current champion, state of political affairs. Arceus, it was like they were going down a list. We would've run but they surrounded us with their Pokémon, and only let us go after we answered all their questions."
"That's…concerning," Derflinger muttered, looking at both Saito and Louise who were both frowning.
"Which way were they?" Louise asked, and Edmund pointed down an adjacent passageway that wasn't on their set path.
"We saw them over there a ways," Edmund explained, then shook his head before returning all of his Pokémon into their Pokéballs. "Look, again I'm sorry for accusing you two. But I gotta get outta here and get Geodude and Sandshrew to a Pokémon Center. If you run into those bastards, tell 'em Edmund and Hilary said hi."
With that, the husband and wife hiker duo ran off, leaving Saito and Louise behind who stared at their retreating forms. Once they could no longer hear their footsteps, they turned their attention down the cavern that the hikers' attackers were supposedly down.
"Well, what do we do?" Louise asked, clenching her fist.
"Normally, I'd say we let the police handle this," Saito admitted, frowning as well. "But we just got accused of being members of Team Rocket."
"You mentioned them once before," Louise recalled. "The Team Flare of Kanto, right?"
"More like Team Flare was inspired by them," Saito clarified. "Team Rocket is a big crime syndicate centered in the Kanto and Johto regions, but they're rumored to have branches all around the world. They're less 'terrorists' and more 'organized crime,' and they're very good at it. Pretty much every criminal organization in the world tries to style themselves after Team Rocket. Team Magma, Team Aqua, Team Galactic, Team Plasma, Team Flare, the list goes on, but none have really reached their heights. Or, for that matter, have lasted as long."
"And now we have two people pretending to be us working for them," Louise added, and Saito nodded. Louise growled, then pulled out her wand and declared, "I will not let this besmirching of our names go unanswered."
"Took the words right out of my mouth," Saito added, then both trainers released their Pokémon and explained the situation to them. As soon as everyone was caught up to speed, they carefully made their way down the cavern, keeping an eye for anything suspicious.
Saito and Louise crept through the cavern, keeping their eyes and ears peeled for their supposed impersonators. Esprit and Tanuki were leading the way, the Kirlia fine-tuning her psychic powers like sonar while Tanuki was using his aura sight to watch for anything that was alive. Thus far, they hadn't found much of note. Reflection Cave was teeming with life, as well as containing a strange background noise that made it difficult to concentrate. To Tanuki, it looked like a fuzzy blur concentrated along the crystals, while Esprit heard a constant ringing in her head that only grew louder they closer they got to them. Nevertheless, they kept going, eager to get to the bottom of this mystery.
Only Maindo wasn't with them, still secured in his Pokéball. None of them cared, instead focusing on the task at hand with no distractions. After what Edmund and Hilary revealed, it deserved nothing less than their undivided attention. If someone was successfully pretending to be them, there was no telling what kind of damage could be done to their names, much less the possibility of them being arrested for crimes they didn't commit. They already had INTERPOL agents believe that they were agents of Team Flare based purely off of circumstantial evidence, a belief that almost got them arrested before they set the record straight, and they didn't need any more undue attention thrown their way.
"Hold up, I see something," Saito called out, holding up his arm as they came across a fork in the cavern, one path leading up while the other curved to the left.
The party stopped, then he walked over to a crack in the wall. Running his fingers along it, he found that it was still damp as through a high-intensity jet of water went right through it. Trying his best to estimate the angle of the attack, he turned towards the upward path, then gestured for the teams to follow him. At once they all moved, creeping up the path while staying low to the ground.
As they traveled further along, they came across more evidence of their targets. Damaged rock, discarded potion bottles, as well as bits of tattered clothing. Clearly Edmund and Hilary had not been the only ones targeted, which became more apparent as they came across several Pokémon-shaped indents in the cave walls. The atmosphere grew tense, especially as the signs of battle grew fresher.
'They're close,' Esprit declared, straining herself to focus as the number of crystalline mirrors increased. Then her faced scrunched in confusion, and she muttered, 'Hold on, that's not right.'
"What do you see?" Louise asked as they rounded a corner, then heard a pair of muffled voices from the next room.
"I think we're done here," one of the voices declared, strangely sounding familiar to both Saito and Louise. It sounded almost exactly like Louise's, but that should have been impossible.
"Yep. Got lots of intel for the boss," the other replied, this one sounding exactly like Saito's. "Hey, you think money from here will work back home?"
"I don't see why not," the girl admitted, and Louise took the opportunity to peek from behind her cover.
There two trainers around their ages, a boy with short black hair and a girl with long strawberry-blonde hair that fell down to her waist. The boy was a few heads taller than the girl, and both were wearing identical black uniforms with multicolored belts around their waists. Several collapsed Pokéballs and Luxury Balls were strapped to the sides of their belts, and atop their heads were back hats. In between them was a Honedge, and all were facing towards one of the crystalline mirrors without noticing their presence.
Shaking her head, Louise looked towards Saito and silently nodded. This was their best chance to catch them off-guard, and they had to take it. Nodding back, Saito carefully stepped forward, intending to get to the other wide of the cavern and take cover behind an outcropping. But, as he took a few steps out into the open, his foot pushed aside a loose rock. The girl with pink hair shifted her attention towards the noise, then turned around while pulling out a stick, then aimed it right at Saito.
"Rock Smash," the girl said, then Saito felt the air in his lungs leave as an explosion went off in front of his chest, sending him flying back. He bounced along the ground before rolling to a stop, and his Pokémon, even Maindo, immediately rushed to his side out of protective concern.
"Saito!" Louise shouted, then broke cover while aiming her wand towards their adversaries while shouting, "Fireball!"
Just as she cast the spell, the girl's companion got in front of her and took the blast, sending him flying back and crashing against one of the mirror-like crystals, shattering. He fell to the ground, flat on his stomach, but his partner immediately rushed over to his side to help him up just as Louise did the same to Saito. Once Saito was up, both trainers and they're Pokémon rushed into the room, Louise's wand at the ready as she aimed at both.
"Okay, you two!" Louise shouted. "I don't know what kind of trick you're trying to pull, but if you think you can frame us then-!"
Louise's words died in her throat as she finally got a good look at their faces. Saito did as well, and he openly gasped and stepped back in surprise. To their credit, their targets were just as surprised, and shot up straight while backing up, their bodies tense and their attention focused entirely on the other party. She studied the girl's features. The small nose, the pink eyes that housed a sense of superiority behind them, the long pink hair, and the well-toned body underneath that uniform honed from months of hiking. The boy was the same, from his broad shoulders, striking blue eyes, and black hair that was slightly spiked.
"Who…who are you?" Saito demanded, his voice shaking.
"I could ask you the same question," the boy shot back, scowling heavily. This time, there was no mistaking the voice. It didn't just sound like Saito's. The voice was Saito's.
Frowning, Louise pointed her wand back at her apparent doppelgänger, and demanded, "Who. Are. You?"
The girl stood up straight, then pointed her own wand back at Louise and answered, "My name is Louise Françoise le Blanc de la Vallière. He is Saito Hiraga, my partner. Now then, who are you?"
Both sides stared at each other, neither moving as the truth became known to both of them. None of them knew what to do, the situation coming so far out of left field that it was almost funny.
Then, Louise heard Esprit's voice echoing from inside her head, saying, '…What the Hell is going on?!'
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Hello, everyone, and welcome to the latest chapter of Outsiders! Now, the match no one was expecting: Saito and Louise vs Saito and Louise! Hold onto your butts, folks, because this is going to be an exciting ride. We had a lot of fun planning this out and we can't wait to show you all what we have in store. Special thanks to Darwin Candidate, Grendel4823, and Yuri Vampire for their help in bringing this to life.
Now, onto the Q&A:
Seraphy64: That's because this is a different type of story than canon FoZ/ZnT. Canon was a harem comedy at its core, not to mention the vastly different situations that hit Saito, in canon, and Louise in this story. Going from a medieval fantasy setting to a modern day one is a lot easier than the opposite, just in terms of society. Not to say that what Louise did to Saito in canon wasn't on the up and up, but do keep in mind that the anime did flanderize a lot from the original source material. Point is, this is a different type of story than the original FoZ/ZnT.
Guest (1): Well, in a roundabout way, you might just get your wish.
Slayer of The Abyss: Probably the latter, as I don't want to separate the two stories and all the reviews/discussions that went into them. It helps that Outsiders has the Seasons built-in with the chapters, so it can be considered just a different season.
.549: Well, you're about to find out!
keybladelight: As you can see, we're definitely playing around with the mirrors in Reflection Cave. They're too interesting to ignore.
fangs of death: You'll find out soon enough, don't worry.
fanfic-addict91: Thank you. I'm glad you gave it a shot and enjoyed it. As for not knowing much about ZnT, that's perfectly fine. I aim to make it so that my stories are as accessible to everyone as possible regardless of source-material knowledge. And yeah, the whole Maindo situation was borne from him refusing to see the truth. It got as bad as it did because of him and his pride. Also, Elizabeth does have an egg, it just isn't with her at the moment. That's on purpose, though, and we'll be addressing it in due time. As for Louise's last Pokemon, we have a plan for that, too. One that I think you guys will enjoy.
Vein Bloodborne: Yeah, this is really the start of Maindo's character development, but it's going to take a lot to really get there.
Shadowwolf of Phantasms: Well, you're half right!
That's it for this time. Let us know what you all think, and I hope you enjoy!
