The New Normal – 12-14 – Interlude – Roark
Roark had always been a huge fan of archaeology and geology. It had practically been his whole childhood, and that passion for it never left him even as he grew older and took on more responsibilities.
It was the one thing of interest that he still shared with his father – difficult as the man was to deal with sometimes – but discussions about geology could always form a common topic.
It was why the discovery of the Icicle Plate was such a momentous bit of news for him. He had been to Celestic Town many times since its discovery just to learn more about this Legendary artifact. It was the most awe-inspiring thing he had ever seen in his life.
Yet, at the same time, one particular detail about its discovery stuck in his mind – the fact that the Icicle Plate was the cause of the unnatural frost that spread throughout the underground caves of Snowpoint City.
Even now, as the Icicle Plate remained displayed in a specially created container, small tendrils of frost could be seen spreading around the specially heated glass display before quickly melting. The Plate was an eternal generator of Ice energy.
The reason he found this so interesting was because he distinctly remembered a very unique ruin from within Iron Islands. The Iron Islands used to be a prosperous mine of various ores, but they had long since run dry and subsequently abandoned due to the lack of profitability. However, there was one particular ruin that could be found deep within that was almost filled to the brim with hardened steel.
He remembered being escorted to it with his father when he was but a young trainer, and how odd he found those ruins. He had seen many ore deposits in his life, especially iron ones, and none were as dense and as packed as what he had saw that day.
He recalled asking his father why they had abandoned the mines when there was obviously such a large deposit of iron sitting right in front of them.
His father had chuckled, "You aren't the first to think of that, kid. But let me show you why." His father proceeded to take out his Aggron and ordered it to try rip out the a chunk of the iron in the wall.
He remembered the surprise that went through him when Aggron was barely able to rip out that piece of iron. And this was from an Aggron – one of his father's most physically capable Pokémon – that had struggled to tear out a small chunk of iron. And it had taken it over a full minute to do so!
"So you see kiddo, we aren't ignoring it because we want to, but because whatever this iron is – it's too dense to break through. It's also very difficult to melt, far more so than usual ores of iron." His father had told him, "Basically, we tested it with a few other miners and their Pokémon, and we ultimately decided that it just wasn't worth the time and hassle to dig this out. It'd probably cost us far more time and money to get this out than we would get for selling it."
His past self had agreed, not thinking too much about it. Back then, he had simply assumed that it was just a unique ore vein, and left it at that.
However, now that he had read the reports about how the Icicle Plate had formed very dense and extremely hardened chunks of ice around itself, that strange ore vein continued to linger on the back of his mind.
And then it hit him - what if it wasn't just an unusual ore vein, but instead was actually because of the presence of a Plate? Or more specifically, an Iron Plate?
That moment of enlightenment never left his mind. Even though he had no way of confirming it, his gut was screaming to him that there could be no other explanation. In his many years of being a geologist and a miner, he had never come across such a phenomenon before, and it was far too similar to the reports written about the Icicle Plate for him to ignore.
He was confident that there was something there, just waiting to be discovered.
Unfortunately, just because he had thought of it doesn't mean he could actually put his plans into action. The most difficult problem for him to overcome was that he did not have a way of breaking through the hardened iron – not efficiently, at least. Ripping out small chunks one at a time every few minutes was definitely not a solution.
He knew that he needed a team to assist him, but it couldn't just be any team of miners. No, he couldn't just rely on the miners that he had employed at the Oreburgh Mines. It had to be a specialist team – one equipped with specialised equipment that were capable of breaking through such hardened iron.
And that was where the problem lied; he simply did not have access to such a team. Even though he was Gym Leader of Oreburgh, his connections did not reach that far. And as far as he was aware, his father had no such connections either.
Therefore, he had agonized over what to do, wracking his head for any solution to his problem.
The easiest solution was to reach out for help, to ask around his contacts to see if they could assist him with this matter. However, to do so would be to reveal his suspicions, as they would undoubtedly ask why he needed such a specialised team.
A part of him really did not want to do that. This was his idea, his discovery, his glory to earn. The Celestic Town Research Centre had been showered with praise ever since their past discoveries of Kleavor, Zoroark, Avalugg, and the Icicle Plate. Especially that last one.
So he had wanted his own slice of that adulation that they received, because he knew that if he shared the credit then his name was likely to be buried by all the other big names that were almost certainly going to be attached. He would no longer be able to use this discovery as a means of stepping out of his father's shadow.
It would no longer be his discovery.
However, after struggling with himself for far longer than he wanted to admit, and exhausting option after option, he finally decided to swallow his pride and reach out for help.
He had accepted that he wouldn't be able to do this without outside assistance. But if he was going to reach out for help, then he wanted to do this properly. He did his research, and he picked out the exact group of people that he wanted assistance from – they were perfect for his needs.
He rang up the number that had been provided to him.
"Hello? This is Steven Stone." The man on the other side replied, "How may I help?"
"Steven? This is Gym Leader Roark, of Oreburgh City. I have a proposition that I'd like to make…"
A.N. A setup chapter for future events! I know that the Icicle Plate and its discovery has been put on the backburner for some time, but I hope this demonstrates that it's not been forgotten about. There will be further developments coming, and I wanted to outline Roark's thought process about how he figured this out!
And yes, the ruins that Roark is thinking about is a direct reference to the Iron Ruins that can be found in the depths of Iron Island in the games. This is my way of adapting that into the story. Hope you enjoyed!
And to anyone who wants to support me, please check out my p atreon at CartecTNN where you can read 8 advanced chapters! Thanks to those who have supported me already!