Hey kids, I'm back with the milk.

Gravitational Pull Chapter 17: Catching Up Is Hard To Do!

The Greeting Ring, October 1st, Morning

He was frustrated, a more common occurrence as time went on. Even as he worked toward his goals with redoubled focus, the scope of every project widened seemingly without limit, every initially straightforward destination fractalizing into near-paralyzing noise. Still, it wasn't as if he could just quit, even if he wanted to. No, he was in it for the long haul. However long it happened to take.

Good thing I'm not doing this alone. People began trickling in to the makeshift boardroom, either chatting among themselves or else making haste to a preferred chair. He idly wondered if he should take the time today to pick up some more office chairs to replace the obviously maligned wooden ones, but decided that was an all-day sort of activity best saved for the weekend. There was just too much to do today, hence the meeting.

With everyone seated, he finally righted himself, drawing their attention. "Right. Now we start." He turned to the person seated to his left. "Six." They nodded in acknowledgment. "You've returned from Eterna. How's progress there?"

Six reached into their bag, spread out the contents of the extracted manila folders, and quickly summarized the last few days on their end:

"We set up the meetings between us and the Eterna branch, the city, and the regulators. First round showed promise, with us hammering out the outline, but the second round ended with near dissolution of talks. Space is an issue, of course, and Eterna City is reluctant to host us, citing its image."

"They're perfectly happy with that fugly Galactic building, though," muttered the girl beside Six, casually toying with a collapsed Poké Ball. At a glance from him, she shrugged. "What? That thing's an eyesore."

"There's a bit of a gap between an ugly building and, well, Site "A1", if we're being real," B chimed in, but she just rolled her eyes.

"Functionally, sure: Project "A" is meant to save the world, and the Galactic Eterna office is meant to hold kidnapped Pokémon." She turned to him, then, and said, "Why do we have to deal with those goons at all, Jasper- J, whatever!" she amended at a look from him. "You're, like, a magic man, or whatever you call yourself; why bother playing nice with all these weird groups and government stooges when we know what we want, and how to get it, and can just do that?"

"Because, K," he began for what felt like the hundredth time, "we can't "just do that". I'm strong, we are strong, but we're not "build a city block-sized facility without Regional approval" strong. How would we source the building materials? The construction equipment? How would we construct "A1" while fending off authorities from a dozen jurisdictions? And that's just Site "A1". 2 and 3 are still entirely ephemera so long as Snowpoint plays hard-to-get, and Veilstone gives us the runaround, at least for now. If we're to make this work, we need to play along with Authority, or get stonewalled."

"Not making a case for working with Galactic, though," the man to the right of B pointed out, brow arched as he fanned himself with his stetson in feigned disaffection.

He suppressed a groan. "…Yes, I know, Galactic is trash, but again, we need to work within the system, and to get what we want while working within the system, we need to either spend a massive amount of time and a large sum of money navigating red tape and bureaucratic processes, or a large amount of time and a massive sum of money bypassing red tape and bureaucratic processes. Our time constraints are non-negotiable, so we need money, a lot of money, and Galactic Energy Group-"

"Team Galactic."

"-has a lot of money," he finished, turning a dim eye toward the man, C, who merely gestured toward Six with a small smile. Loathe to raise a fuss over the minor slight, he nodded, and Six continued:

"We believe we had all come to a compromise on day three. The abandoned manor location in the Forest is out—the local Gym Leader claims it to be a habitat for ghost Pokémon—but another location was picked a few miles south of the city, on Route 206. More favorable for us here, since it's actually closer to Mt. Coronet. Complications arose on day four, unfortunately."

"I imagine Oreburgh had concerns." Six nodded, and his scowl deepened. "Roark?" He asked really just to confirm; while the ghost-shy Gardenia could be counted on to resist any perceived threat to her beloved Eterna Forest, even the haunted Old Chateau, he doubted the Oreburgh Gym Leader would show up to the negotiations due to developments on a neighboring Route, even if he had to know they were the ones behind it. This feeling was confirmed by Six shaking their head, bangles hanging from their hat rattling with the motion.

"Roark still hasn't made an appearance, and we imagine he won't, as long as we don't try to plop Site "A1" in Oreburgh itself. No, the mayor has concerns about us "disrupting Oreburgh's native industries and local ecologies". Maybe she meant "ecosystem", but really, it doesn't matter. The next round of negotiations is on Monday, and you're going to be there with us. Saturn from Galactic will be there, too, along with his Lieutenants, so we don't have to wrangle Jupiter's washouts in line. And with the Eterna representatives also being fans of the location, we can pile on the mayor until she folds."

He did groan at that, but really, he couldn't complain, especially since he was the one who sent Six into four back-to-back nine hour meetings with a revolving door of budget wonks, suits from various ministries and regulatory bodies, and local politicians with only a gaggle of Team Galactic grunts backing them up. With him, Six, and Saturn at the table, though, it would almost be overkill, which was needed given what they were trying to do. "Alright, I'll come in. Thanks for handling it as well as you have so far," he added as an afterthought. "I had hoped Jupiter would send her new Lieutenants if she couldn't come herself, but apparently that was too much to ask."

"We managed to get in contact with her on Tuesday, but she only said they were all too busy in the field."

"That's a weird way to say "someone's backyard"," K scoffed.

He turned to her then, prompting her to puff up in indignation, ready for a fight. Instead he only said, "S spoke with me about the Snowpoint talks concerning Site "A2" earlier. She had the negotiations there well in hand. What did you and C do in the meantime?"

K deflated a bit, but still answered haughtily, "What else? We went around Snowpoint and talked to people. Everyone we talked to had some idea of a facility potentially being built on Route 216, and that Galactic is involved. A few figured it was some kind of power plant, since that's kind of Galactic's thing." "At least they pretend it is" was the silent but just as loud second half of that sentence. "Still, most people don't really have an opinion on it. A couple are worried it'll take up skiing space, and a couple more are confused there isn't more information available on what's actually being proposed, but for the most part people are limp."

He nodded and turned to C. "Anything to add?"

C shrugged. "Pretty much exactly what K said. S'long as it doesn't disrupt the Temple or Lake Acuity, it looks like most people won't care, including the Gym Leader. We even had a few people excited about "A2" being a job creator." He looked to the chair at the opposite end of the table from J. "So, uh, I take it S is exempt from this "all hands" meeting?"

"S claimed schedule conflicts, so she gave me her report beforehand. She should be in Jubilife at this time. All told, it seems "A2" continues to provide good news." He leaned back as much as he could in his seat, taking a deep breath. "Shame about "A3", though!"

"Saturn's still jerking you all around Veilstone, huh?" B asked it innocuously enough, but he could practically see the jibing mirth in his eyes through the dark glasses. "Not giving him a reason why we need the "A" facilities within a certain range of Mt. Coronet and each other not working out?"

"Well, cut me some slack," he complained. "Saturn's a brick, but he's not going to hear me out on funding our pretty blatant attempt to undercut his Boss's plans of… well, whatever it is Sunshine actually wants."

"My money's on world domination," the man to K's left spoke for the first time. "Boss Galactic's got that kind of crazy, I'm telling you."

K shook her head. "I can't believe I'm saying this, but you've got to think bigger than that, big D. They're collecting every scrap of myth and folklore they can get their mitts on, scouting the lakes the Mythical Pokémon are rumored to live constantly- I really think between that and what he's having his new pet scientist and J cook up, Cyrus is trying to become some kind of God."

C put his hands up. "Ya'll are starting to make me feel crazy for thinkin' he just wanted to scam some venture capital for a few years, then run with the money."

"I mean, that's definitely also happening," B giggled. "If it were Saturn running the show, I'd say that was the start and end of it. But Cyrus has some ideas. What those ideas actually are, we'd have to find out the hard way, but our plans kind of include heading him off at the pass, you know? Plans," he said, turning back to him, "that require getting "A3" pinned down yesterday, boss."

"Yes, I'm aware." It was ultimately his plan, after all, albeit somewhat streamlined by S and B's input. "In the meantime, I take it you'll be in Jubilife today as well."

B huffed, his good humor soured. "Yeah, yeah, send me over to the Trainer's School so I can get stonewalled, too, good joke."

"What is going on over there? Why wouldn't they want to set up a class?" K wondered. "I mean, they definitely know of you, otherwise they wouldn't have agreed to meet with you at all. You'd think they'd be falling over themselves to set you up as a guest lecturer at least."

"I don't what's going on with that dean," B sighed. "He keeps asking me to come back, but these last few days, all I got was he "just isn't able to hold meetings". He looked perfectly fine the first few times I saw him, so I don't know what happened to him between Monday and Tuesday that he can still come to work but can't come to the meetings he keeps scheduling."

"You think you can suss out what's goin' on with the dean, Six?" C asked.

They shook their head. "We have never been to Jubilife City, so our ability to divine energies does not extend there, unfortunately."

"That's a shame," B said. "I'm gonna give it one more go today, but if nothing comes of it, I'm not even gonna bother going back tomorrow. I only humored this nonsense for this long because having a Beginner's Course meant I could keep a closer eye on our little "side project". But now the week's just about over, and I have nothing to show for it, so we might as well wait for Sunday when the kids strike out for wherever they're going to next. Oreburgh, probably, for the Gym."

"I've been having the strangest feeling lately that all these different plans of yours are gonna collide in a major way, J," D said.

"Strange, that. What makes you think so, D?"

"…"

"…"

"…" The air in the room shifted from awkward to baffling as D continued to sit silently, apparently fully alert, but content to simply… refuse to elaborate.

"…Right then," he acquiesced. "Moving on, I actually need you in Jubilife as well starting today. The Skarmory are gathering in bigger numbers than I've ever seen there. Seems the kids' stunt last week lit a powder keg they're not ready to tank. They're all likely to get swarmed the moment they leave the city. I'd rather our chosen not get killed less than a month into their journey, so keep an eye on the birds for the next few days, and if they go for the kids, intervene; you'll have backup soon, so don't worry about that, just do your best to not be identified. I'll get you the keys to the Jubilife base before you have to go."

"There's no need for that. I still live in Jubilife, after all; I just need you to get me there."

"Fair enough. Six, you're free until Saturday at the earliest. Go rest; you've earned it." Six nodded graciously, giving everyone a small wave before departing for their room. "K, if I may ask, will you be able to take these minutes to our guy in Canalave?"

K shrugged and grabbed up Six's papers. "It's not like I did all that much these past few days. You sure you'll be fine with no one on the bottom floor while I'm gone?"

"What's a few hours?" he waved off. "Do you need me to take you there?"

"Thanks, dad, but no thanks," she scoffed in mock-annoyance. "I can Fly there and back in an hour, easy. See you all later."

Once K had left, he finally turned to C. "I'll be honest, I don't actually have anything specific for you to do today."

"So what, I can just go back to bed, or did you want me to vacuum the joint?"

Keep testing me, and that just might happen. "Do as you will, C, just bear in mind that the weekend may see us "going loud", as it were. At least, as loud as we can without tipping off people we shouldn't. Sleep if you want. Train if you must. Tag along with D, B and me if you feel the need."

"I'll pass on the last one, thanks. Nothing against you guys, but free time is me time, far as I'm concerned."

"Yeah, love you too, buddy." B patted himself down, ensuring he had everything he needed as he stood up. "What are you doing today, J? You know, other than getting wombo-comboed by Galactic incompetence."

He finally stood, weathering the sparks and waves of pain rolling through his body; he had spent the entire night on his chair, reading through the minutes S gave him, as well as talking with yet more associates. "Bouncing between Veilstone, Jubilife, and here. Jenny's bound to be positively rancorous down there, so I really ought to carve out some time for her."

"Definitely a good idea," B agreed, before he froze, reviewing what he just said. "'Carve out…' ah, you bastard."

"I was worried that one would slip by you!" He cackled a bit as everyone else still in the room groaned, C quitting the scene as he did. "Alright gang, hop on and I'll Shift us over." D and B each took a hold of one of his shoulders, and with a crack, the makeshift boardroom was finally empty.

Jubilife City, October 1st, Afternoon

B was doing the same thing he had done for the last three days now: loitering about the Trainer's School waiting for someone to tell him what to do. He milled about the halls near the dean's office, avoiding passing groups of students; it was the end of the school day, and everyone was rushing to head home.

For the tenth time, he studied the nearest bulletin board's helpful explanation of the courses provided: the Beginner's Course was for new Trainers just starting out on their journey, teaching not only basics like type match-ups, status conditions, and proper item usage, but also survival skills and wilderness preparedness essentials; a Trainer could expect to camp out in the wilderness between towns for days at a time, so proper training was essential, especially when it came to treating injury or illness.

The Intermediate Course was for somewhat more experienced Trainers who had begun earning Gym badges. Having less than a third of the students as the previous course, it taught more specialized classes, counseling Trainers on how to tend to the needs of their Pokémon specifically, and methods of healing and care if they were unable to reach a Pokémon Center. It also coached them on specific battle strategies and the intricacies of Pokémon Abilities.

The Advanced Course was smaller still, only a roomful of students per round, and it was only held in the evenings. It held the weird position of most and least inclusive course in the school, since you could qualify either by completing the two previous courses with at least a B overall, or you could earn five Gym badges. Trainers learned the beginnings of specialist roles there, occupations like Breeder and Ranger or exclusive Trainer classes like the renowned Ace Trainer. It was from there that most serious Trainers typically left for their chosen profession's programs.

The Expert Course's blurb was exceptionally vague, but outlined that applicants required an "A" grade in the Advanced Course, as well as eight Gym Badges. B figured it was prep for Pokémon League hopefuls, but he couldn't know for certain.

B returned to his pacing, walking past a few early birds for the Advanced Course. He absently noted that he couldn't have been more than a few years older than even the youngest of them. "What is taking him so long?" he muttered. Ugh, I was here all day, too. I may as well head to the hangout.

"Hey, man, nice shades!" a passing girl called out to him, jolting him back to reality. He readjusted his lenses in case they were slipping and managed a hasty "Thanks," before she was out of earshot. I guess wearing these inside would attract attention, he thought. Still beats not wearing them, though.

Vmmmpt! His phone vibrated, and dread flashed through him before he shook it off. "What was that about?" he said to himself as he pulled it out. The dread came rushing back when he read the text, though:

Guess what I saw today.

"Oh gods no." More than anything else, he wanted to put his phone away and pretend he didn't see it. But he did see it. Which meant she knew he saw it. And he didn't want to know what she'd do if he tried to ignore her. So, he took a deep breath and texted back:

What?

It took a minute for her to respond with what may have been her worst find yet: it was a small, painted statuette of what would've been a shirtless man walking a dog Pokémon, except their heads were switched. That wouldn't be anywhere near as bad as some of the other things she'd presented him with, but there was a lot more wrong with it, that he noticed in a particular order: the man-headed dog was flesh-colored and hairless, and its nipples looked to be "dripping" blood, with the artist having lovingly painted a pool of crimson under it; the man's dog head was bloody, too, and when he zoomed in, he saw there was a human face under what was actually a dog-skin mask. She sent another picture of the statuette from an angle that showed the man's bare back, revealing a tapestry of intricate scars in the shape of Cyrillic script; what it said, he couldn't begin to guess, but on the whole he felt much more uncomfortable than he did just a minute ago.

I'll get a translation for the text on the back, then head to Jasper's to see what he thinks of it. You meet with the dean yet?

Putting it out of his mind as best he could, he texted back, Nah, im getting walled by his secretary again. think ill just meet with you guys. Weighting on it for a second he added, You should probably keep to initials on the phone at least, s. He was certain he was secure, and S only contacted people on burners, but he couldn't say the same of everyone else in the crew.

"I suppose it wouldn't hurt, B," she purred in his ear. To his credit, he kept himself from flinching, and whirled around to face her, having to look up to meet her gaze. "Still beats being around J when he's in work mode. You want to come back tomorrow, see if we can't get into the morning class?"

"Are you sure you won't ice the dean out if we actually get in there?" B knew how S was like with new people.

"That's what acting class is for," she replied flippantly.

"'Is'? I thought you stopped going to that."

"It was only a week off." She made for the exit, and he followed. "Actually, you wanna go home?" she said as they left the school. "I remembered that I don't like the feel of J's little hangout."

"Huh? I mean, we can if you want, sure, but what do you-" He fell silent as her hand curled around his, and she fixed him with an unreadable look, and smiled.

"I'll tell J about it in a bit, don't worry." 'And don't look around,' was what she didn't say, but came across loud and clear. He flinched inwardly, but locked his gaze on the pavement as they walked down the street. "Let's cut across this way," she continued for the benefit of someone else. "We'll get home quicker."

They entered an alleyway as if without a care, scattering a band of Spearow without slowing down. By the time the birds settled again, they were long gone.

"So!"

Dawn started, and looked up from her bag to see Slifer standing over her, beaming. "…So?" she eventually said, when the redhead did not continue.

"So, I asked the rest of the gang to go with me into the city, and I've come to offer you that same courtesy."

"Don't you think going into the city's a bad idea, given our track record?"

Slifer waved it off with a Psh. "Please, Holly and I've been getting lunch in the city every day since, and nothing's happened yet. Come on, it'll be fun! I saw a fortuneteller advertising yesterday, and I wanna see what's up with that!"

"I… I dunno, Slifer," Dawn said, continuing to pack her bag. She'd personally never been to a fortuneteller before, not putting much stock into the practice. Honestly, she wouldn't have guessed that the generally derisive gadgeteer before her would, either, but hobbies were hobbies, and she was sure a few of her own interests would raise a few eyebrows, as well.

The bigger issue was the prospect of dealing with Jessica Slifer for potentially several uninterrupted hours. While Dawn didn't dislike the other girl, she also hadn't spent much time with her prior to the start of their journey. The past few days had only confirmed that there was a reason for that: Slifer was intense, and not in the hyperactive, scatterbrained way Barry was. Even when she wasn't competing with others in the class, she just had a way of cornering others in a conversation that Dawn just didn't want to deal with on as regular a basis as Slifer apparently did. It didn't help that Dawn was apparently the only one still embarrassed by the circumstances of their first meeting. "I was just gonna turn in early today."

"Oh…" she said, as if realizing something, and continued in a lower voice, "Is it because of Holly coming along?"

Keeping the grimace off her face was difficult. "No," she began with a bit more bite than she wanted, "it's not because of him. Me and Lucas are fine." Slifer's face told her how believable that last part was; the last few days saw Dawn under a cloud, only leaving the Pokémon Center dorms for school, calls from her mom, and the occasional trip to the library for information for their Pokédex, otherwise sequestering herself in the nearly empty girl's dorm either studying Beginner's Course material, or playing with Wukong and the Starly she kept on her team, whom she'd named Red on a whim. Really, she had been distancing herself from everyone in their group, even Barry to an extent.

And especially Lucas. Apart from passing 'Hi's and 'Bye's, the few times they were in the same room together had conversations grind to a complete halt from the insurmountable awkwardness between them. Just thinking about it made a groan boil in her throat, but she clamped down on it as Slifer said, "Well don't worry about that, cuz he turned me down; said he had to make calls to Sandgem, so he'll be at the Pokémon Center all day. Ashur's sticking with him while that's happening, so it'll just be me, Hibiki, Cedric, and maybe Harlow if he manages to pull his Gible out from under his bed."

Huh? "I'm sorry?"

"Oh, you didn't know?" Dawn shook her head. "Yeah, Harlow had to skip class today-" Slifer gestured at the rapidly emptying classroom, "-cuz Garvey went and wedged himself under his bunk. Maybe Harlow'll have him loose by the time we collect him. Or not."

"Why didn't Vance just recall him?" Simply returning Garvey into his Poké Ball seemed like the most obvious solution to Dawn; Vance seemed too down to earth and straightforward to miss something like that, though, so it was likely Slifer's tale left out some pertinent information.

"Oh, yeah, he can't," Slifer confirmed, "Garvey had his Ball in his mouth when he got stuck. Apparently he was playing keep-away with it and tried getting under the bed to get clear of Harlow. And you know what happened after that."

"Right," Dawn nodded. She looked back to her bag, mulling things over for a few seconds before she stood up, slinging it over her shoulder. "You know what, I will go with you guys. It beats staying in my room all day."

Slifer's grin stretched even wider than before as she flashed a thumbs-up. "Good on ya, Berlitz," she said as they left the classroom with its last few stragglers. "Now if Harlow can make it that's my entire reservation filled. Hey man, nice shades!"

The last bit she called out to someone Dawn didn't catch over the rush of students, but she was more interested in what she said just before. "You made a reservation before you knew how many people were coming along?"

"Yeah, but it's not that big a headache if you know what you're doing," the redhead waved off. "I already know who in the group has schedule conflicts thanks to Holly drawing up itineraries for study sessions, so I plan around that and who seems most likely to go for a given outing."

"I take it you've done this before."

"Oh, a few times. Nothing you'd be interested in," Slifer said breezily, but she did nothing to hide a mischievous grin, and Dawn felt a wry smirk of her own tugging at her lips as they left the Trainer's School, her slowly blooming good mood only improving as Barry, Dan, and a positively ragged Vance met up with them. A cautious optimism crept over her as she let out Wukong and carefully placed him on her shoulder, her and Barry striking up conversation as they walked; the past few days saw her withdrawn from everyone, whiling the hours away lying in bed doing nothing, but maybe this odd outing was just what she needed to get out of her funk.

Naturally, people who remember this story back when I began it in 2016 may want an explanation as for why it's been so long since my last update. Quite a few things happened between early 2017 and early 2025; in order:

writer's block;

my then laptop bricking, forcing me to abandon everything I had written up to that point;

a fire forcing me out of my home for over a year;

Just not wanting to look at a word processor for the life of me, even after returning to my home;

my work closing down unexpectedly, forcing me to take two very stressful part-time jobs to stay afloat until;

2020. COVID (twice!), lockdowns giving me the time to pick this back up again, but a brain too fogged over with long COVID to write anything worth keeping;

Also I've been getting into Yu-Gi-Oh! For some reason. For the sake of your wallet and blood pressure, just avoid any Konami product like the plague. It's too late for me, but I can still warn you! Don't watch Progression Series; worst decision of my life!

And so we come to December 2024, where I am so wired and aware of how much I wanted to write this fic back then, how much it had warped and evolved in my head over the years, how Fucking Shit things are for so many people, and how I can only substantially help the few in my own life. So I thought, To hell with it, I might as well, and over the course of two months wrote a chapter that became a mega-chapter that became a few chapters. Maybe this will spark joy for someone who could really use some right now. Maybe it's dumb enough to be good for a laugh. Either way, I'm happy this made you happy. It's good to be back. See you in the next chapter, where we're going back, FLASHback! For maybe half a chapter. Till then!