Watcher of Arceus
Disclaimer: I don't own Pokémon. Only the idea and OC's.
Author Notes:
-X-This will be used for scene breaks and for when the story switches to another character, but it does not mean that a new section of the story has started.
~xXx~ This will identify where each paragraph breaks.
"Human Speech" 'Character Thought' {Pokémon Speech}
Co-author: Catsithx
The following is a total and complete Reboot of the story "Watcher of Arceus".
~xXx~
Chapter 64 : Ambushed
"We have a situation!" A man called out rushing into the mostly empty room. "Oh dammit it... Where are they!? Security sensors got movement in the warehouses in Pewter Town. Monitors show what must be half the rangers in the city and who knows how police blocking off the buildings! Don't just fucking sit there. Move, do something! You know they won't just let us lose that place freely. Start getting as many men as you can and get ready for orders!" the first man shouted loudly.
"Lower chambers. But we have orders not to bother them," Another man replied, but the first man just ran for the stairs.
Barging into the chamber in the basement, he could only stare up at the golden Arceus in the room along with the pokemon he knew were really in charge. "What is the meaning of this intrusion?" A booming voice echoed making the man quickly fall back.
"Major disturbance at the warehouses in Pewter City. Dozens of rangers, Arceus Division and possibly hundreds of police are blockading the streets around the building. It has to be a raid for something, but I can't even begin to say how they knew about the place," the man gasped out, looking towards the alakazam for instruction.
'Should you find whoever has betrayed us, I want them alive. This will not go unpunished and an example must now be made. Rest assured, you have done the right thing coming to inform us, but . . . it is not my place to spare you. I will vouch that you have kept your word and performed well for us. I have picked this man for his discretion in all things, and although we have lost the warehouses in Pewter City, he has served our purposes well,' the alakazam stated, first looking to the man before turning to the golden Arceus.
"If you are vouching for them, then either he entices you or he has served you exceptionally well. I shall spare him for the moment, but he will no longer be working with the others. I am not yet ready to reveal my proper form to the world just yet and it must remain that way," the Arceus stated looking over the man, even approaching them, and using its front leg to force them to look up at it, judging and inspecting the him.
'You know very well who I desire, who I wish spared in my continued service to you. Radara would be an equal of myself like no other. As long as there is a chance that I can be with an such equal of my own power, an angel who will understand the power I have, I will eagerly continue my faithful service,' the alakazam stated, giving a small nod of their head as the golden Arceus continued their inspection.
"You have early on set cancer, and I'm not impressed with your liver. The cancer I can work with in time, but I want to know to more about his liver. It would be a shame if it were burn out and decay quickly. There's a chance he could accept my gifts, but I'd rather be sure first, know what I'm working with," the Arceus stated before turning back around.
"Go, and take our muscle to deal with the intruders. If the rangers of the Arceus Division are involved, assume that Soular and Radara are involved. The lucario and machamp can keep them busy while you take what you can from the warehouses, and destroy what you cannot reclaim. The twins must remain alive for now, I have uses and needs for them. But everyone else should be expendable if the need arises. Do what you need to to ensure we don't risk losing any more such storage facilities," Arceus stated.
'By your will, it shall be done.' the alakazam stated, turning towards the man and floating over to him, before helping him to his feet.
'Tell no one of what you saw here. Continue your loyalty, and you may have a great gift. The same power that now flows through Hurk may yet be yours, if you can survive the process. Begin contacting your doctors and have them run tests on your liver first, and ensure them that payment will not be an issue. I have work that needs to be done. Send word to our Sinnoh hide out to begin making room for train cars. At least four box cars, possibly two tanker cars, maybe more of both,' the alakazam ordered before teleporting away.
~xXx~
On the wall of the warehouse, a large switch was flipped with a loud thud from the unseen force that moved it. The machine in the middle of the empty chamber quickly started up again and two pokemon were teleported into the room.
'Time for some fun,' The lucario grinned, cackling with their aura to the other pokemon in the room, the machamp already set for some fun with him. Watching as the device started up, the lucario quickly began to feel his aura senses vanish but he didn't mind. The mere thought of how it would mess with the lucarios who relied too much on it brought a smile to his face, and then a malice filled grin of teeth. Adjusting a stolen tiara over his head, he looked down eagerly thinking about how easy it was going to be to torture the god child's beloved wife without her aura there to defend her.
[I couldn't agree more. Let's see what makes this god child so special] the machamp replied, two of his hands holding large canisters, his other two hands quickly pulling pins free from them. With a stolen taira already fixed to his head, he was ready too. Throwing one over towards the aura blocking machine, he dropped the other one into the newly opened hole to the room below, before reaching to his back and grabbing two more. [You sure you're ready for this without your aura sight little pup?] the machamp laughed.
The lucario just flipped him off in response, before stomping on a pipe on the floor and then reach down to take the end he had snapped off. [Bring it on asshole. Try to keep up, it would be a shame if you lost a hand in this mess.] The lucario barked back.
-x-
As smoke began to fill the chamber, Latias rushed towards the distortion shield device. 'No no no! We can't let them interfere with this! It's not run its course yet and if it fails before it's done, it could make things a lot worse! Protect it!' Latias cried out in a loud panic, Darkrai and Palkia coming over.
'I shall cover you from attacks, maintain the crystal.' Palkia quickly stated, the concrete floor slowly rising up in bricks, slowly surrounding the device and Latias. It wasn't fully covered before the canister in the room exploded smoke rapidly expanding and filling the room.
"Watch out! I think I saw something come through. Darkrai, get the device upstairs!" Xent cried out just barely noticing two shapes drop into the chamber. A sudden loud bell began to ring attracting their attention. Xent just barely turned in time and raised his new metal arm up to block a hard blow, but he couldn't tell what it was right away. He quickly learned what had tried to hit him when a large bluish hand just grabbed his arm and threw him across the room. "Shit!" Xent yelled out.
Thomas and Radara quickly tried to search around for minds, but only felt the cloudy presence of ones that were shielded. "They've got tiaras or something!" Thomas yelled out, trying to find anything in the smoke, only for something to rush past him. Thomas turned, trying to find it before ducking at the last second and avoid something being swung at him. Rebecca tried to help Thomas up, but without her aura, she was stuck with just her eyes and ears to help. Barely seeing something in the smoke, she struck hard with a weakened force palm to make sure she didn't accidentally hurt the others. Just in case, she was already preparing to follow up with an aura sphere as well, but without her aura sight, she began to feel helpless again.
What she hit turned out to be a support pillar, and made her thankful she didn't go all out. Still, she kept the aura sphere ready. Like Thomas though, she ducked at the last second and something hard smashed into the pillar she just hit and broke it clean in two.
Radara found herself slowly backing up besides Juno, trying to cover the wall that Palkia was putting up around himself and Latias to protect the distortion shield device. [Be my eyes... and make sure I don't hit anyone with us.] Juno stated softly beside Radara, and Radara quickly knew what to do. Rather then search for the minds of whoever was attacking them, Radara reached out and made sure to find all of them instead.
Quickly sharing this information with Juno, it was all the ninetales needed. A shift in the smoke beside them and Juno knew it was Zai rushing towards where Xent had yelled. Another shift in the smoke however, and Juno let loose with a blaze of fire, filling the space in front of her with bright blue flames.
Already unable to see in the thick smoke, and unable to have Radara guide her attacks towards a designated target in her place, Juno saw no point in trying to be precise. Instead, she opted to lash out where she knew the other's weren't instead, using large sweeping attacks to cover a larger area. If her inferno move at least hit something, then it would surely help them by burning whoever it hit. And if nothing else, then she was hoping that the bright light of the move might be able to reveal the silhouette of what was hiding from them.
Xent tumbled and tried to roll, instead just slamming into the wall. The arm had proven sturdy, but as he rose up, movement caught his eye. His crowbar came out in a rush and he lashed out, only to miss and notice Zai. "Where are they?" Xent asked.
Zai was forced to shake her head, unable to tell without Radara. There was also something in the smoke hindering her nose to the point she could barely smell Xent. Thomas yelled out for Rebecca and rushed towards them. He would have preferred to be more careful but right now they were on the defensive and needed to regroup.
"Rebecca!" Thomas cried out as he caught Rebecca who was picked up and thrown at him. He quickly moved her behind him in an attempt to ease her growing panic, keeping Rebecca inbetween him and the pillar Palkia had created.
'Latias, how long does your device need to run? We're cornered here and have no idea even how many foes we face right now,' Radara asked.
'I don't know. It depends on how much of the distortion is around! If the prison is reaching out this far, then it has to be a large crack in the protections mother gave our world against the distortion. If we leave it half finished, then it won't solve anything,' Latias replied, doing her best to keep the device working and even trying to find a way to accelerate the process.
"Is there anyway to safely speed up the process? I don't want to risk damaging the device until it's done," Thomas called out, trying to help Radara protect Latias and Palkia right now.
'This smoke is too thick. How many canisters did they fill the place with. If it gets any thicker we might have trouble breathing. Is there some way we can remove it?' Juno called out.
"The device is interfering with my ability to open portals and clean the smoke out. I don't want to force it and risk interfering with restoring the barrier against distortion," Palkia called out, turning and trying to reinforce the side of the pillar he had created after hearing a very loud thud against it.
"Do we even know how many are attacking us?" Xent tried to call out, Zai hiding him in a illusion. A few feet to the side of where the call out had happened, something stuck the fake Xent. Xent instantly threw himself forward and slugged whatever had attacked with his new arm, throwing as much weight behind it as he could. The metal connected with the flesh of something, before two blue left hands slammed Xent in the gut. Once more instantly countering and trying to catch the head of what he now knew was a machamp, Zai tried to followed up but had to avoid a swing in her own direction.
"There's a machamp here!" Xent screamed out, at least revealing something, Zai now forced to run as the machamp focused on her. With Xent's call out though, Juno now had a reliable place to start attacking. With Radara revealing where Xent and Zai where, Juno let loose with another inferno attack, and this time hit the target and more. A loud bang, a scream of pain, and a minor breech in the the smoke revealed a bleeding machamp.
A few metal shards in their head, blood flowing over their face contorted in anger, it gave Radara the chance she needed. Ripping the stolen knight's tiara from the machamp. It wasn't clean, and the tiara being flung from its head had caught two of the metal fragments from the exploded fire extinguishers from its head only adding to the blood flow as well.
No longer with a shielded mind, Radara could easily find and track the first target with ease, and in turn share that information with everyone where the machamp was. Xent moved to follow up his former attack, Zai rushing along at him both running on adrenaline and neither one noticing Zai was injured herself.
The machamp caught Xent's hand as he gave another swing, not that he was too concerned about his new hand being crushed, it was all a distraction. Zai jumping over him, the machamp giving a wild swing in pain only for his attack to connect with nothing, before feeling a stabbing pain in his gut where Zai easily hit with a shadow claw.
Thomas and Rebecca rushed to add their own attacks, trying to bring the machamp down quickly now. Thomas let his electrical powers gather in his hands and tackled the machamp's legs in an attempt to paralyze it, while Rebecca struck with a pair of force palms along its arm that had grabbed Xent.
Behind them, Radara was suddenly forced on the defensive with Juno as something lashed out at them still hiding in the smoke. The computer, various bits of lab equipment and a table had been thrown full force at the pillar and Radara. Radara just barely noticing in time to protect herself and Juno. The pillar that Palkia had made did crack though as Latias cried out.
[No No! Don't let them interfere!] Latias yelled out. Thomas tried to return to the pillar to help out, but now that he was fully engaged with the machamp, it wasn't eager to just let Thomas leave. Ducking under a simple punch, the machamp moved to follow up with a kick and Thomas was forced back away, both from the machamp and the pillar.
Xent was still right there, seeing a potential opening tried to keep up his offensive, just to get baited. Where Thomas only being swung at with smaller basic physical attacks, the machamp wasted no time smashing an icy fist into the ground where Xent had just been standing.
Zai tried to dash to the side of Xent, her illusion getting swatted to the side with a flaming fist, only for a thunder punch to graze the real Zai. Zai's shadow claw struck one of the machamps arms only adding another open wound as she cried out in pain and found herself unable to reliably use her left leg, needing to get some distance with the partial paralysis.
As Thomas landed his own hard hitting thunder punch to the machamp's back with Zai's distraction, Rebecca tried tackling its legs again, managing to bring it down to one knee. The machamp grabbed Thomas and threw him back, smearing blood over his neck and face, but Xent quickly noticed the pattern now.
"He's intentionally not hurting wonderboy!" Xent called out, rushing forward and feigning a swing his new arm, easily baiting the machamp into lashing out at him. Barely able to avoid the machamp's ice punch, Zai was once against at his back, but well out of reach. Several swift stars pelted the machamp's back and head, making him turn around to try and cover himself. Leaving himself open, Thomas had already recovered and used the chance to see if it Xent was right.
He made sure to be seen as he rushed forward, his own thunder punch at the ready and sure enough the machamp only tried to grab and restrain Thomas's fist. More than physically strong enough to restrain Thomas for the second needed to try and toss Thomas away again. However, the joint efforts of Zai continuing her swift attack and Thomas keeping his attention proved a mistake for the machamp.
A loud explosion shook the floor above them but the group didn't let up. The blast did seem to activate the ventilation in the room though and quickly began to draw the smoke out but it was slow. They were just barely starting to get a better view of the machamp struggling not to hurt Thomas but also contain him.
Xent spared a glance over at Zai, finally noticing a lot of red on her and the glint of metal. In all the fighting, Zai never noticed that she had a fragment of the fire extinguisher in her left leg and all her running around was slowly making it worse, making the fur on her leg become matted with blood. There's wasn't immediately a moment to call Zai though, not with a foe almost defeated and with the ventilation shafts now at work cleaning the room, they could hopefully take control of the situation again.
Xent charged for the machamp's legs while Rebecca aimed directly for its back. A crowbar in his right hand, and the clenched metal fist of his left hand both slamming into the back of the machamp's knees toppled him down and Rebecca, filled with fear, didn't restrain herself as much as she should have. A force palm on his back sent him over fully, and following up with an aura sphere out of panic. The machamp's head with a few pieces of metal shards in it collided with the concrete floor, just in time for a larger blast to heavily shake the entire room and Rebecca's panic seemed to fade as her breathing calmed, quickly looking into the slowly clearing smoke, now pointing to the second lucario in the room.
No longer dealing with the Machamp, Xent moved over to Zai and pointed at the shrapnel in her leg. Her eyes widened, but gritted her teeth before tearing the metal out in one quick motion. Not taking any chances, Xent quickly called her back into the pokeball to keep her from bleeding out.
Seeing the machamp laying on the ground, Rebecca standing over the body having been the one to finish it, the other lucario in the room just looked on in rage. 'No . . . more . . . games. . .' he snarled while glaring at the group converging on him.
"Ya know. You can save us all a lot of time here if you just surrendered now that your alone." Xent stated through gritted teeth, thinking of Zai injured in her pokeball. Gripping his crowbar harder in his right hand more tightly while flexing the fingers of his metal hand and still prepared for a fight. He knew enough to keep his distance for the immediate moment even as the group put their full attention on the lucario, wondering what last trick he might try to pull.
The lucario just gave a loud bellowing howl, before giving off a bright blinding white light, the light of an evolution taking place. "No no no! Latias! Work faster!" Xent screamed out.
"Lucarios can evolve again too?!" Thomas cried out in shock. Radara teleported Rebecca back behind them while Thomas quickly channeled his psychic power through the Guardian Aegis to put up a barrier right as an aura sphere smashed into it.
'I'm going to slaughter that love sick pup of yours!' a vicious and somewhat distorted raging voice sounded in their heads. It was like a talking angry headache pounding against their skulls. Cruel and radiating anger, the entire battle was flipped on its head once more as Thomas had to move. His barrier even boosted by the Guardian Aegis had cracked when a large red paw with a much larger steel spike had slammed into the psychic wall.
It held up against the second and third rapidly delivered hits, but the fourth and fifth hits caused the barrier to start collapsing. Xent just barely had time to track the now red, black, and blue jackal, throwing his crowbar as hard as he could for its head. He wasn't that surprised that the lucario very aggressively knocked it to the side without much of a care before Darkrai grabbed Xent and pulled him to the side. The aura sphere that the now mega lucario had countered with flew past where Xent had just been and collided with the wall of the room fracturing concrete and shaking most of the room.
With the impact of the crowbar just being deflected smashing against the barrier, Palkia left the small protective cone that he had made over Latias. "You deal with that, they need help." Palkia stated, rushing out of the safe space to lead the charge himself. "Follow my lead! I can only do this so many times, so make it my efforts count!" A bright pink light began to gather in both of the shoulder pads on Palkia, before light rushed down his arms.
Slashing upwards with his left arm, the energy within the pink light over Palkia rushed out in a mass of shifting, almost fire like spiral boomerang flung the mega lucario. The rabid jackal snarled out and slammed both arms forward, a glow off of his palms connecting with the attack that Palkia had used.
There was a massive blast as the two attacks connected, clearing out what little smoke was left in the room. The mega lucario was still standing, but knocked back a bit. A deranged angry fang bared smile on his face with a deep murderous growl, he watched as Palkia's second attack came rushing in. The mega lucario ducked under the attack and just dashed forward, a large pointy aura bone in his hands.
Xent was screaming in his own head hoping that Radara was paying attention, begging for Thomas to call Rebecca back to her pokeball. Already reaching for one of his side pouches, he was counting how many flash bang grenades he had remembering something that he had heard the rangers talking about. He could only hope that they had a similar effect on the mega lucario, but knew that if it worked, it'd also hurt Rebecca.
Radara was far too distracted helping Thomas though, both entirely focused on the barrier that they had put up protecting Palkia. Yet the mega lucario had swung its aura bone with enough force to heavily crack the barrier. Shards had already been knocked off the barrier from the force of its singular attack as Juno and Rebecca rushed to the side. An aura sphere was launched at the mega lucario's head but much like Xent's crowbar, it was swatted to the side and proved useless.
Juno's followup attack engulfed the lucario is a raging inferno as she let loose with all she had. Unlike the aura sphere and Xent's crowbar, there was no her flames. With Juno on the offensive and drawing attention, Thomas and Radara let their barrier down and Palkia released the energy in his other shoulder pad.
As Juno was forced to take a break and breath for a moment, the mega lucario had a few patches of singed fur yet dashed forward. Thomas caught the mega lucario's aura sphere with his psychic boosted by the Guardian Aegis, but even then struggled to do so while Palkia let loose with his second attack. Radara tried to restrain the mega lucario and Rebecca threw another aura sphere at them to keep their attention, letting Palkia's attack hit.
The entire room shook again as Palkia's attack hit fully this time and the mega lucario was sent flying into the opposing wall. Losing itself to rage and anger, the mega lucario dashed out of the wall, but with a new target, Rebecca. With a snarl, the jackal formed two aura spheres and threw both at her. Thomas and Radara's combined efforts caught one of the two spheres and Xent tackled Rebecca away from the second.
The aura sphere slammed into the arena's wall, creating a sizeable hole in the concrete and twisted metal. The lucario continued pressing the attack while forming another massive aura bone once more. Xent barely had time to put up his metal arm hoping somehow to hold off the attack, but a second metal blue bar joined his arm. Thomas had to teleport to keep up, but with both Xent's arm being held by Radara and Thomas wielding the Guardian Aegis, they managed to survive the arching blow.
"He's after your wife, wonderboy! Get her in back in her pokeball now. It's the only place she'll be safe against that beast and maybe we can draw him out to a better location rather then this tiny ass room!" Xent snapped.
'I can help! Let me fight beside my lov-' Rebecca tried to argue, trying to use the chance with the lucario being held by Thomas, Xent, and Radara to go in with her own attack. A glowing light over her palms, she tried to put everything she had into an attack, but Rebecca's words and desire to fight for Thomas only seemed to further enrage the lucario.
It pulled back its aura bone suddenly, both Thomas and Xent losing balance as they almost flung themselves forward, and the mega lucario rolled to their sides, an easily exposed Rebecca ready to be struck down. So focused on Rebecca though, the mega lucario didn't notice another blinding pink light rushing up from its side.
Palkia's attack hit with full force this time, sending the lucario flying once more and Xent quickly used the small chance to talk with Thomas and Rebecca. "He wants you dead specifically, don't ask me why. Rage and anger, that's all these mega pokemon feel, right? It no longer cares about anything but apparently hating the love you two have for each other! She's safer in her pokeball right now, just like Zai!" Xent half shouted at Thomas and Rebecca, wanting the mega-lucario to hear it. While he was saying all this, he also showed off the case of seven flash bang grenades he had, making sure that both Thomas and Rebecca could see them.
"Might be the only chance we have, now get her to safety!" Xent continued. Rebecca was torn on wanting to help further, but both of them knew the effects that the flashbangs had on lucarios, disrupting them a bit more than other pokemon. With the effects of the aura blocking device already still tingling in her mind, Thomas didn't have much of a choice.
Pulling out her pokeball, Thomas gave Rebecca a partially resigned look and Rebecca gave a small nod, letting herself get very visibly returned to her pokeball and just in time. A raging howl in their heads from the mega lucario showed its growing anger and Palkia unleashed one more blast into the wall where the mega lucario had gone through.
"Come and get it, stupid dog!" Xent snapped, taking the first flashbang out and throwing through the hole. A loud bang rang out, the bright flash of light, and and giant thud all came from the other room. The mega-lucario had tried to charge out, only in time for the cooked flashbang to go off and disrupt his charge, making him slam into the wall. It had enough force to crack it, but its head was not an ideal battering ram. Holding its now bleeding nose, it looked up at the group, and even Xent had to take a step back. "Okay... taunting working a bit too well."
Palkia stood up fully again, panting a bit from exerting themselves so much already. The legendary had clearly meant it when he said he could only use that attack a few times. Thomas rushed forward to lead the charge for a moment, Xent following up right behind him with Juno. Getting the mega lucario's attention with a full thunder attack channeled through the Guardian Aegis, Thomas rushed to the left into the larger portion of the room while Xent and Juno moved right.
The mega lucario climbed out of the hole, ready to give chase and threw a few small aura bones at Thomas. With all attention turned on Thomas though, Xent had thrown a second flashbang right between the mega lucario's feet. The second bang once again heavily disoriented the mega lucario giving Juno and Palkia a chance to strike. As Juno let loose with another inferno, hoping to burn the lucario, Palkia let loose a stream of dragon breath. The two fires mixing into a bright yellow and purple flaming pillar over the mega lucario.
Although howling out in pain, a pair of aura bones were thrown from the pillar of fire. Palkia cried out loudly as one slammed in his chest, knocking him back, setting the ceiling on fire a bit before Palkia lost the attack. The second bone just barely missed Juno who had jumped to the side, forcing her to cut off the stream of fire. The missed bone however slammed into the pillar surrounding Latias and the distortion shield device.
'I still need another minute or two!' Latias yelled out.
Thomas returned to helping Radara on the defensive now as Palkia recovered and lashed out with another dragon breath attack. Hoping to draw its attention away from the pillar, Palkia advanced even during his attack while Xent threw one of his remaining two crowbars at the the lucario, while kicking the third flashbang towards the mega lucario's feet.
The crowbar slammed into the mega lucario's head and even through the dragon flame pouring over it, it turned and snarled loudly at Xent. Once more distracted and possibly unwilling or unable to learn in its angered and aggressive state, the flashbang went off at its feet opening it up to another attack. Darkrai rushed in from above, three explosive shadow balls assaulting its head and neck, with Juno charging forward to follow up with flaming claws.
Thomas and Radara tried to restrain it at the same time, slowing its movements, but as Juno jumped it and dug her claws deep, the lucario got another good look at Thomas and howled out. Throwing Juno off, it charged Thomas. A glowing light in one paw, a large fluctuating aura sphere in the other, Thomas just barely raised the Guardian Aegis up in time. The aura sphere knocked Thomas off balance even with the barrier he had put up. Radara then pulled Thomas to the side just fast enough to avoid a focus-blast from the mega lucario.
Missing Thomas entirely and hitting the protective barrier around Latias hard enough to shower her with shards of rock. Yet she paid it no mind, focused entirely on the crystal before her. 'Not yet! Not yet! Twenty! Maybe Ten seconds!' Latias yelled out again.
Thomas quickly recovered and slashed forward, filling the Guardian Aegis with electricity. A clean stab into the chest, but catching its metal ribs and stopping the blade from reaching the lungs. He couldn't stay long though as the mega lucario tried to swat him away with its aura bone once more. Xent appeared right beside Thomas in that moment, tossing a flashbang right into the mega lucario's open mouth.
Biting down hard on whatever was in its mouth, it never knew the dangers as the device went off, but incorrectly. Having almost been snapped in half, but the metal fragments inside its mouth still hurt and blew part of its jaw open making it swing its aura bone around wildly in pain. It didn't take long to recover though, radiating more and more rage once more catching sight of Thomas and going in for a kill.
'It's done! The barrier is restored!' Latias cried out loudly, and instantly Palkia perked up.
"And now I don't have to hold back any longer!" Palkia bellowed loudly. As the mega lucario rushed forward towards Thomas, a sudden portal opened up in front of him and the mega lucario ran right through it. There was a loud thud and shattering of stone. Palkia had opened a portal right into one of the supporting pillars in the room. "Get Latias and her crystal out of here. I'm going to bury this rapid pokemon!" Palkia yelled out, a look of finality on his face showing that this was now over.
Xent quickly threw the last three flashbangs he had to further distract the mega lucario while Thomas and Radara quickly telported the others up to the floor above.
Darkrai rushed up and blasted the mega lucario with two dark pulses after the grenades went off, with Xent jumping over Darkrai to slam his last crowbar over the mega lucario's head. The mega lucario attempted to counter with two more aura spheres of their own, only for a portal to open in front of and behind them, blasting himself in the back.
The heavily disoriented mega lucario began swinging wildly, smashed the last support pillar in the room and making the floor above creak ominously."Get to safety! A little rock won't bother me," Palkia yelled out. Xent went to move, only to fall into darkness, his world nothing but shadows for a moment before something grabbed him. Xent was pulled from a dark mass outside the warehouse. The rangers around the building were surprised by Xent's sudden arrival, but quickly helped him up once they realized who it was.
A few bright flashes of light showed Thomas and Radara teleporting Juno, Latias, the distortion shield device, and then finally themselves outside of the warehouse. "Get away from the warehouse!" Thomas yelled out, Radara informing the other rangers and anyone else close to the building about the impending collapse.
Already there was a loud rumbling, and then several loud crashes. A few points on the walls of the warehouse they were just in began to crack and crumble, revealing a small section of wall torn open revealing a large chunk of missing floor. Another massive rumbling, and then a full building collapse started as something smashed through up through the floor and even into the ceiling. A large chunk of the roof began to fall at last and part of the wall with it, taking chunks of flooring with it, and even some parts of the walls.
Xent rushed back away from the building with the rangers as the building fell into itself, falling over several feet away from the warehouse. Rolling over to make sure he was okay from tripping and grumbling about it, he watched as the building seemed to stop falling in on itself for now. "All that fucking evidence... gone..." Xent sighed loudly.
"The aura blocking device was already destroyed. Something was securely holding the lever in place. I had no choice but to try alternative means to power it down. I was forced to rip what I believed was the power line from the machine and it did not react well," Darkrai grumbled, lifting himself from the shadows near Xent.
"Palkia's fine, right?" Xent asked, pulling himself up.
"He should be." Darkrai stated, just watching for a moment, then giving a small nod. Something was rising up out of the fallen building and moved to the other side of the crumbled structure.
Thomas, Radara, and Latias looked on over the building, waiting. The distortion shield device sat dormant behind them, and Juno was busy looking herself over. "So... we have little if any evidence of this link to Hurk after that. No way that much in the hidden room survived, and we clearly lost the aura blocking device." Thomas sighed loudly.
'But we can still prove that the attack originated from here. Between the bomb trucks and the information that Darkrai had told us about them, we still have some options of investigation open to us. Once the building has stabilized, the rangers can begin collecting evidence while we protect them. Someone clearly doesn't want us here and we should be ready for additional interference.' Radara said.
'And we didn't entirely lose the aura blocking device. I know what to look for back in Alto Mare now. That thing needs a lot of power for the air compressors. Now that we know the device needs power and outputs a lot air, me and Latios can refine the systems in Alto Mare to look for similar effects and then go check on them in person.' Latias added.
"That will help us put a stop the blocking effect in Alto Mare, but this evil acts like it's one step ahead of us at all times. They won't believe us outright unless we explain what is happening, and its been so long since we were truly a part of the world with them. Changes like that need time to explain, but do we even have that much time left?" Thomas asked, just as Palkia came up out of the building, merely moving right through the walls.
"Do you sense the evolved lucario?" Palkia landed in front of them, still cautiously looking over the rubble.
"No. I sense nothing from the building." Thomas stated, looking to Radara. She just shook her head.
'Then let us hope that we have dealt with both of them. I do not enjoy the prospect of fighting these... evolved pokemon. In the mean time, we should begin digging up the room and hope that there was more that we missed, or that something survived the collapse.' Radara stated, getting up and looking to the rangers and police who approaching heavily concerned about things.
'I will explain what has happened and see what I can do to help begin cleaning up this mess. Latias, would you return to Alto Mare and see if you can begin finding the aura blocking device?' Radara added, before turning and walking up the the rangers.
"I'll wait here and make sure that we're ready just in case we only knocked out that lucario." Thomas stated as Palkia opened a portal to Alto Mare, where a concerned Latios was waiting.
'No time to explain, we found out what was the causing the lucarios to lose their aura senses. Help me calibrate the D.M.A. to find one on the island!' Latias quickly stated as she rushed through, Palkia picking up distortion shield device and setting it down gently through the portal he had opened.
Xent finally came running around the building up to Thomas, still looking over the mess. "Darkrai said he'd look over the rest of the buildings for any other bombs before letting us know if it was safe to continue looking over for anything."
"In the meantime... the thought of this great evil of yours having gotten their hands on a few mega-stones is more then concerning. Any ch-" Xent started.
Their conversation was quickly interrupted by Darkrai jumping up between them. "We've been played. The trucks, schematics, the vats of liquid, its all gone. The machamp and the lucario were a distraction. Someone has cleaned out the place while we occupied."
"I'm sorry, come again? Did you just say that we lost everything?" Xent asked, almost slack jawed in shock, before throwing one of his knives at a nearby tree where it sunk into the trunk with a loud thunk. "Those fucking whores!"
"What do you mean gone?" Thomas repeated just as shocked as Xent.
"Not a trace of them left behind. No signs of movement, no mess left behind. Someone teleported them out while we busy. Given the amount of things teleported in such a short time, I can only assume that this was a well practiced group, or a trainer using one of those control stones to help a psychic type evolve again and move them while empowered," Darkrai stated, looking around at the other warehouses before shaking his head.
~xXx~
An hour of investigation later, and just as Darkrai had stated, there wasn't anything of value left behind. All of the trucks, paperwork, even some of the work benches, anything that might have helped them had been removed. It would take days to clear up the rubble just for a chance at finding anything left behind, leaving them with little choice to wait. Returning to Alto Mare, Palkia opened the portal for them to move through.
A small scene of violence was shown through the portal and Thomas rushed through into the Alto Mare Museum. A lucario was having a panic attack without their aura and Sarah was trying to help. "Please calm down!" Sarah yelled out, Thomas catching the aura sphere that the lucario had thrown at her. Sarah rushed up and tackled the lucario, holding them down as best she could, before Radara had come through to help as well.
"I know its bad, but you volunteered for this. Look! Palkia is back. We'll have a chance to send you back to the kingdom." Sarah stated, slowly getting.
"We found out what's causing your aura to be blocked. Latias is working with Latios right now to find the machine." Thomas quickly called out, Rebecca rushing up behind him.
'Listen to us! We found the cause, its almost over! We'll be able to freely use our aura in Alto Mare again!' Rebecca called out, Radara translating.
The lucario listened some and as soon as Xent and others were through the portal, Palkia opened a second one to the lucario kingdom. Sarah let the lucario go and it ran back through the portal to the kingdom before Thomas sighed. "Go. Rest there for a while. Explain to Morag what we found there, about the aura blocking device and the mega stones. They need to know the dangers." Thomas said softly, and Rebecca nodded.
"I will join her for a moment. I can use the temple to contact our mother more discretely." Darkrai added, going through the portal with Rebecca.
"You found out how the lucarios have lost their aura sight?" Sarah repeated as things calmed down.
"Some kind of machine. Air compressors and some kind of nozzles are what Latias said. She rushed into the gardens an hour ago to have Latios help her recalibrate the D.M.A. to try and find. If they aren't here though, then they still have to be recalibrating it in the under garden." Thomas stated.
"And that's not all. We saw a lucario mega evolve while we there, and we have to assume that the machamp could have as well." Xent added with a deep sigh.
"And there's more isn't there?" Sarah asked.
"The entire attack against the prison originated from Pewter City. We found evidence of more bomb trucks, more vats of that liquid called bait of all things, and then... we lost all of it while we were fighting the lucario and the machamp who ambushed us." Thomas said.
"How did things go on your end?" Xent asked, desperately hoping for some good news.
"I didn't find anything with Suicune when we searched Rota, and then Palkia came to get me. The lucarios are getting a bit worse here. Suicune stayed in Rota for now to make sure we didn't miss anything, while some of the others headed for the prison site looking for signs of other breaches. I can't say much more then that," Sarah said, shaking her head some.
"Mega lucarios and mega machamps... Should we just start assuming that every pokemon has an extra evolution stage at this point?" Sarah asked.
"It's not a bad assumption." Xent said, biting his lip. "I'm dropping off Zai at the pokemon center and then I'll be in my room on the Lunar Blessing. I need to go through my footage and see if there is anything there's anything we missed."
"What footage?" Thomas asked.
"As soon as we found the bomb trucks, I started recording. I just hope I got something," Xent said, giving a small wave.
"Zai's hurt?" Sarah asked rather concerned now. "What about the rest of you?"
"She'll live. Medics treated the worst of it, but I want to be sure," Xent replied, already moving along.
"Zai got some metal shards in her leg from an exploded fire extinguisher, the rest of us minor bruises." Thomas replied. "I'm going to see if I can help Latias and Latios calibrate the D.M.A. to find the machine that's blocking the lucario's aura senses."
"Anything I can do to help?" Sarah asked.
"If I think of anything, I'll let you know. I'm not sure what I can do right now," Thomas said, moving into the D.M.A. chamber.
-x-
Hours had passed, and while Latias and Latios has managed to reconfigure parts of the D.M.A. to look over the entire island for any machine of similar nature to what they had discovered in the warehouse, it was slow going. The D.M.A. wasn't designed for scans of such modern technologies over the island, and isolating and reviewing everything that it did find was a slow process. Most of them were just resting the gardens for the moment, trying to figure out what to do next when a loud angry cry came screaming from the Lunar Blessing's supposedly sound proof hull.
Zai bounced quickly from her seat and went rushing to the Lunar Blessing, even Dahlia getting up confused going to check on things. Xent quickly rushed out of the Lunar Blessing first though, holding up his pokedex and with his laptop in hand. "We're fucked!" he snarled.
"What's going on?" Dahlia asked very much concerned. "What did you do you to my boat?"
Xent just rushed past her towards where the others were still gathered, opening his laptop, he pulled up a single photo. "I started recording everything as soon as we found the bomb trucks in the warehouse. This was taken in the hidden chamber under the aura blocking machine." He stated quickly pointing it out.
Already zoomed in a fair bit, the image wasn't crisp and clear, but it still showed a set of shelves along a wall, with a few plastic trays. The labels were clearly visible, showing the names of various pokemon that didn't have evolutions or were fully evolved, the containers seemed to hold small lightly blurry rounded shapes. Uniform in shape, all the same size, and appearing to be slightly colored, Xent just turned and screamed again.
'What... are we looking at?' Radara asked, the group carefully looking over the image.
"Lucario, Gardevoir, Audino, Tyranintar, Lopunny, Blastioise, Venasaur... And those are just ones I can clearly name with a few images. My camera was damaged in the fight at some point, so I only have this single clean image. Small, uniform spheres, with the names of those pokemon? And Hurk going on and on in our meeting at the research station of "who knows who else might evolve again". Those fuckers have a stockpile. I can reliably count at least seventy three of the fucking mega-stones there." Xent snarled loudly.