Chapter 63: Interlude X - Judgement

Laura's in the back of a taxi when the alert comes, on her way to Lavender Town to talk to a ghost.

The info on the flash drive her masked informant gave her made it clear that Silph is paying for someone's living expenses in Lavender, and that this person was in contact with Silph R&D. But Laura has never encountered someone with such little information available on them. There's no name or date of birth (the house is listed as owned and maintained by Silph Corporation for occasional trainings and corporate meetings), no contacts, no mention of profession or past. He's not even on the company's payroll.

It's just treated as completely unremarkable that there's a nameless man living in one of Silph's unoccupied houses whose bills they're paying, in exchange for his collaboration on certain projects.

She knows she shouldn't get her hopes up that the man is somehow connected to the disappearance of the scientists and engineers that Sam told her about. His description, according to her investigator, doesn't match any of the "missing" scientists or engineers she read about, few of which were actually reported by official sources as actually missing. But it's been years since many of their most recent photos were available, and if this man hasn't been using regenerative medicine he could have changed a lot since before he was in Lavender. Or he could have used plastic surgery, or been forced to.

The man's habits are pretty simple, according to her investigator's ability to spy through the windows. Wake up, shower, eat, staring at his computer or phone screen (reading seems most likely: one hand is often on mouse with minimal movement, while his expression stays mostly static and focused), work on his garden.

But occasionally he'd be hard at work on something, both on computer and talking on the phone. He never leaves the house except to buy things or sit in the park, according to the investigator. No social visits or trips out of town. No apparent employment. He must be still working for Silph.

Her investigator was good, but not good enough to figure out more about what the man is working on without breaking the law. He'd hinted in the past that as long as no one got hurt he would be willing to "bend over some lines a little, peek at what's on the other side," but so far she's managed to resist the urge to take him up on it.

And the urge has never been fiercer. It's clear from her investigation that President Silph either directly uses or willfully ignores the use of criminal actions to maximize the power and wealth of his corporate empire. That he's already targeted her in some way weaves a constant thread of anxiety through her days and nights, a drive to get things resolved as quickly as possible, however she can.

But she needs to do things ethically, or the entire investigation would have weak points through which it could be undercut or dismantled. If this scientist in particular is being held hostage by Silph, then she needs to make sure he knows she can help him get out from under the criminal mogul by revealing his activities.

Unfortunately without a verifiable online presence, the only way the man could be contacted would be through physical means. Hence the letters.

She finishes penning the latest one, then reviews it.

Hello.

This is a test to see if your place is bugged or being video recorded. I hope this is a safe way to communicate with you about your present circumstances. If not, then simply dispose of this note and make no response. If so, write a response on the note and put it under your doormat.

I suspect you need help, and if so, want to help you. Feel free to ask any question in your response. If I'm wrong, then feel free to let me know that instead, and I'll leave you be.

She doesn't like it. She'd told the ninja-girl that she was used to cloak-and-dagger stuff, but there are too many unknowns here. For all she knows the man may be a criminal himself who will warn President Silph about the strange contact.

She would have tried to get more information first, tried to answer more questions before taking a risk, but for Leaf's investigation.

A list of names for those who may have been responsible for the Mt. Moon incident… and one of them is a Silph subsidiary that was in a prolonged legal conflict over the rights of private companies to bid for dig sites along the mountain range.

And, what a coincidence, Silph made payments to someone throughout the dates of the dig. The only problem is that the file containing the payments didn't reach the date of the incident, so she couldn't check if they stopped after Yuuta was caught.

It's not a clear connection, but it's enough of one that Leaf's investigation clearly raised some serious questions that might lead to serious repercussions from Silph.

Damn that girl. And bless her. She's as driven as Red, and as likely to get herself hurt, one way or another. She told Laura she would sit on what she's learned, and Laura believed her, was proud of her... but also knows that there will be a limit to the girl's willpower and patience.

And maybe it's unfair, but Red's lie is still fresh on her mind. She can't assume she knows how any of the kids will act.

Laura puts the recently drafted letter in the small pile beside her, then starts thinking of how to approach the next one when her phone buzzes in a harsh tone. Her pulse kicks up as she pulls it out of her pocket and reads the message.

STORMBRINGER ATTACK IMMINENT ON VERMILION CITY. YOU ARE WITHIN POTENTIAL PATH OF DANGER. STAY NEAR SHELTER AND MONITOR UPDATES REGULARLY UNTIL DANGER HAS PASSED.

For a moment the memory of being at Sam's house when they heard the news of Zapdos traveling by Pewter is overwhelming. The same icy fingers clench around her heart, the same worry that she's about to lose something precious.

Then she remembers that Red is on the SS Anne, and she closes her eyes, hands pressing against her face in relief so strong it's almost painful..

Guilt follows a moment later. Blue is still there… and that girl she met, Aiko. Does Sam know? Of course he does. He wouldn't go though, would he? He can't, not after what happened last time—

The car is slowing. She looks at the driver, who rolls the car to a stop along the side of the road, then turns to meet her gaze.

"Can you drive?" the woman asks, face pale and eyes wide.

Laura is unable to process the question for a moment, then says, "Yes."

"Good. And do you have pokemon?"

"Just one, in my purse."

The driver closes her eyes, and her voice is strained. "Can you drive yourself the rest of the way to Lavender Town?"

"What?" Laura stares at her, wondering suddenly if she dozed off in the car and is dreaming.

"I have to go, my little sister lives in Vermilion." She looks at Laura with pleading eyes. "I have to make sure she's okay!"

Laura meets the driver's frightened gaze. What she's asking her to do isn't hard: cars drive automatically unless switched to manual control, and if attacked, many of their escape countermeasures are sufficient to distract pokemon and outpace them.

But if the car is attacked by something that can catch it… that's what the drivers are supposed to be for. Not just trained to evade pokemon, but also trainers who will protect their passengers if needed.

"I understand if you report me, after," her driver says, a note of desperation in her voice now. "I deserve it. But I'd rather lose my job than my sister. Please, just… tell me you'll be okay on your own."

Laura checks their location. Another two hours to Lavender. By then finding her sister would probably be impossible. "How will you get there?" Laura quietly asks.

Hope lights in the other woman's eyes. "I have an abra, bought it just a couple weeks ago. I can go straight there."

Laura breathes in, then back out. The price of abra had dropped quite a bit since Red and the others revealed their trick and sold so many. It likely led to the driver being able to afford one. It feels almost fated, that it would be up to Laura, now, to decide if the woman would get to use it.

And how could she decide otherwise? She would do the same for Red, if she knew he was in danger and she could help him.

"Go," Laura says. "I'll leave the car at the hotel. Good luck to you, and your family."

The driver reaches back and takes her hand, squeezing. "Thank you. Be safe." She doesn't waste another moment, getting out of the still running car and summoning an abra, which quickly teleports them both away.

Laura watches them go, thoughts on Blue and Aiko again. Would Sam go? She's suddenly not sure he wouldn't.

She realizes abruptly that she's a sitting target, and quickly collects her letters and goes into the driver seat. It's been years since she did this, her mother had taught her when she was young… but everything looks about the same as she guides the car back onto the road, then sets it on autodrive and checks the defense mechanisms. Smoke cloud, flares, pokedoll deployment...

She keeps her gaze moving as the car speeds her away to Lavender, trying to stay alert for danger as her thoughts are pulled to what's ahead and behind.

There are a lot of doors the name Samuel Oak can open.

If he wanted a ticket to the Cruise Convention? Even if he didn't know Hazo personally, they'd fall over themselves to offer him a cabin.

If he wants a seat on a regional council for the treatment of lab-raised pokemon? He helped form Kanto's council. No matter how many years he's been away, or how much he may disagree with them, he can walk right in and they'd let him speak.

If there's some politician campaigning in a city across the island, and Sam just happens to be in town and want a minute of his time? He doesn't even need to write a check. The endorsement of Kanto's premier Professor has interregional implications.

He makes no pretense at not being proud of these facts. If there was a time in his life where false-humility would be useful, he's long since past it. Sam is always aware that he has very little actual power, outside of his laboratory. The power his status grants him flows from those who appreciate the mind and acts that earned it.

But opening a door is just the first step. After that, it's up to his powers of persuasion.

"I'm afraid it's just not possible, Professor Oak."

Sam stands at the head of a table, where the sitting presidents of every Kanto and Johto university look at him with a mix of apology, discomfort, or bland disinterest. At least none are hostile, or at least not openly so. "Declaring something 'not possible' is a pretty strong stance, Daniel. What in specific makes it seem so hard to imagine?"

His old classmate doesn't seem to take kindly to the familiar name, or the reframe, but a different university head responds before he can. "It's easy for labs to say that we should just rely on the information in the pokedexes, but universities can't afford to test the information ourselves. You get to be producer, regulator, and consumer."

"It would just be for a little while," Samuel says, spreading his hands. "The journals are consolidating behind paywalls because they can. Because they know you have to pay for them. If you all decide not to, they'll bring the prices down. They'd have no choice, not if they want to stay relevant."

"And what if they don't?" another president says. "Field researchers are well and good to gather data and conduct the occasional imaginative study, but we all know that most of the listed experiments don't replicate."

"That's a feature, not a bug," Professor Elm explains. Sam's Johto counterpart is a wispy sort of fellow, with a long, earnest face and a lanky build that his lab coat tends to billow around during the frenetic motion that keeps his staff hurrying after him. Now he sits with his lanky legs crossed against the table's edge, a glass of some pale liquor in one hand. "Being able to see what others have tried-"

"No lectures, please, Professor," President Nara says. The oldest of the university heads, Sam first met her at a Tier 1 threat near a small town by Lavender. "No one here is doubting the value of the pokedex network. We all pay for them too, and we appreciate that the price is so reasonable, and how hard you fought for those subsidies. But journals are where the real prestige comes from for academics that have hung their belt up, or never threw a pokeball at all. You're asking us to leave our friends and employees out in the cold for what could be years."

"Not years," Sam insists. "Maybe one, tops."

"And then what?" Osamu asks. "The prices are high, yes, but this assures quality of research. Peer review will suffer if the reviewers cannot be paid."

"With all due respect, you're on the review board for three different journals," Professor Elm says, adjusting his glasses. "How many papers have you personally looked over in the past year, out of all those that those journals published?"

Osamu's face reddens. "Are you questioning my integrity?"

"Not at all," Professor Oak quickly says. "We know you're a diligent and rigorous academic. But there isn't enough time in the day for you to be solely responsible for every paper in even one of those journals. And instead of hiring more reviewers, the names of the reviewers are what's being paid for. It's become a mutually beneficial prestigious position, not something that assures quality."

"I'd like to add," Professor Elm says with a wry tone, "That the higher degree of accuracy in recent published research probably has more to do with better coordination in the scientific community, not higher cost of journals."

"An interesting hypothesis," one of the younger presidents Sam barely knows says, voice dry. "Would be nice if you decide to test it, sometime."

"This is getting personal," Sam cuts in. "Let's keep things focused on the future. There are people working to turn the whole system of how research is funded and available on its head. To make it more accessible and better for everyone."

"More about this secret project?" Daniel says. "Sly hints aren't going to convince anyone, Sam. Maybe if you're willing to finally be candid about what Bill is working on..."

Sam sighs, and shakes his head. "I'm sorry, but I can't. But you all know me, my reputation. I hope that you'll take it into account when I tell you that the longer you rely on the current system, the harder it will be to reach and adapt to a world that's approaching soon, where knowledge is free."

It was the wrong thing to say, he realizes immediately. The men and women in the room are good people, people who care about knowledge and truth and teaching. But they're also driven by the incentives of their positions: they run schools, and the knowledge that schools offer is not free. Could never truly be, or they would be out of a job.

"Thank you both for your time," Osamu says, voice cool. "Give us a moment to discuss, please."

Sam tries to think of something that will clarify his last point, undo the damage, but Professor Elm is already standing and stretching, then moves for the exit. Sam nods to the presidents, and follows.

David is leaning against the wall between the elevators. "They've grown too powerful, Sam." He says quietly, and takes a swallow of his drink, a frustrated tightness around his eyes. "We had chances to stop them, shape the culture, but none of us wanted to step into it. Same with the journals. The businessmen took over, and it's hard to argue with the results, from the perspective of... well, people running a business."

Sam nods and sighs, running a hand through hair that's finally starting to thin under his fingers. "I know. It's the politics argument all over again."

"For what it's worth, you'd make a terrible mayor," Elm says with a grin. "You'd turn Pallet Town into an experiment. Cycle through different laws every few months."

"I would put them up for a vote, at least."

"That and you don't deal with unpopularity well."

Sam smiles. "Think I handled their animosity alright." He reaches absently into his pocket to unsilence his phone. A room full of such busy people would barely be able to complete a sentence if everyone's phone was on. "If this doesn't work, which it doesn't seem like it will, we kick it up to the next level."

"Don't like involving politicians in this," Elm says. "Regulations might work for us today, might work against us tom-... Sam, what's wrong?"

Sam has stopped dead to stare at the screen.

Sixteen missed calls.

Five unheard messages.

Forty-three texts.

He has just enough time to register the words Zapdos and Vermilion and then his phone rings. Daisy.

"Sam!"

He looks up at Elm. "Zapdos is attacking Vermilion."

His friend straightens, eyes wide. "Go. I'll handle this. Go!"

Sam is already going, answering the phone with a "Where's Blue?" as he runs down the stairs.

"I don't know, grandpa, he wouldn't answer his phone!" Daisy's voice is tense, heavy wind blowing around her microphone.

"I'm porting home," he says as he reaches the first floor, knees aching, and runs out of the building to emerge into the darkening twilight, hand going to his pokebelt. "Where are you?"

"Passing over Argent Town. I can see the storm, I'll be in it in about ten minutes!"

That's my girl. "Stop there. That's my closest teleport point."

"Grandpa you can't!" Daisy's voice is sharp. "The doctor said-"

"Daisy," he interrupts as he summons Forun. The alakazam senses his tension instantly, and goes into combat readiness despite there being no threats around. "It's not up for discussion. Teleport."

The world wrenches around him, and then he's in his front lawn and withdrawing Forun as he goes inside to his PC, thoughts already turning to what pokemon he's going to take. No fire, rock, or flying, which means I'll need Ice and Poison for the Grass and Bugs...

Daisy is still trying. "Blue will be fine, he'll probably just help at a defense point or-"

"No, he won't," Sam says, voice quiet. "He's not like you, Daisy. You understand that you can't win against the storms, only survive them, only mitigate the losses." Thoughts of his daughter and her husband send a spike of pain through his chest, one he endures a moment, then puts aside as he types search parameters into his collection. Pokemon that have been trained together, pokemon that don't use audio or visual commands... "But Blue will try to find a win. Even aside from wanting to look good, wanting fuel for his legend, he needs a win against them, for himself. For your parents."

Daisy is almost crying, he can hear it in her voice. "We can't lose you too, Grandpa."

"And I can't lose either of you. Wait for me there in Argent. I have the last signal sent from Blue's pokedex. We'll find him together."

The last thing Sam grabs is a small bottle of pills from the dresser in his room. He takes a breath, eyes closed, then swallows two and heads outside to teleport again, hoping that he's not too late.

Seto could have run, when the alert went out.

It was a simple calculation. The price of a flight out of the city, normally affordable enough, even for someone living almost hand to mouth, had quickly skyrocketed to obscene heights. He could have emptied his bank account to buy a flight for himself, but not one for his mother, who was living on retirement funds.

What kind of a son would do something like that? To his own mother?

The voice was hers, ingrained from a hundred situations, repeated in a dozen tones, so often that she doesn't even have to say it anymore. He hears it himself, every week when she asks for money for this or that reason, and he considers telling her he can't. Every time she insists that he stop whatever he's doing to come help her with something as inane as attaching a picture to a message, or as difficult as moving furniture around the apartment.

"Seto! Where are you?" Her voice was high and afraid, and he felt a stab of guilt for even thinking of leaving the city without her.

"I'm coming there, mom. The hospital isn't far, we'll go there and-"

"The hospital?" The word scraped along his mind. "You want me to sit in one of those rooms, with all those... people?"

Foreigners, is what she meant. But no, that's not fair. He knew she dislikes being away from home, being surrounded by others, she rarely even took the bus anywhere, and it can't be a comfortable place, the shelters...

"Mom, you can't stay," he said as he got dressed. His apartment is small and messy and it's not far from her place, but it's his. The one major rebellion he'd persisted in, despite her complaints that it was too expensive to have his own place, despite her insistence that a good son wouldn't move out until he was married (and then take his mother with him to a bigger home, if he could afford it, which he should have been able to, if he'd followed her career "advice"...). "It's not just a Tier 3, it's a Stormbringer, there won't be any emergency services if something happens in your building!"

"You'll protect me," she said, like it's the most obvious thing in the world. "You still have those pokemon, don't you?"

Seto looked at his belt, hung up on the wall by the door with its three pokeballs. Yes, he had pokemon. Three that he'd bought and trained despite her insistence that he was wasting his time and money. The ones that he one day dreamed would be his ticket to a better life, despite being in his early 20s already (getting permission to become a trainer when he was younger had always ended in tears, either for him or his mother or both).

A pidgey, a venonat, and a mankey. That last one had been expensive, he'd saved up for a week, hoping the whole time that the listing wouldn't be bought out by someone else. "I... mom I only have three, and they're not very strong-"

"Well then what did you buy them for?" she demanded, breaths harsh and quick. "Seto I'm scared! People are leaving their apartments with all their things, they say the storm will hit the city in an hour! What if the electricity goes out? Come quickly!"

Seto could have left, even then. Or he could have gone to the hospital himself, helped the defense with his measly three pokemon and fifty or so hours of training, or just gone into the shelter there.

But what kind of son would leave his mother alone in the dark, with monsters all around?

One that wouldn't be there when a magnemite breaks through her living room window.

"Go, Mankey!" Seto yells, voice shaking with fear as it competes with the sound of the raging storm pouring in, and his mother's scream as she cowers behind him. "Chop!"

The magnemite's prongs glow as they build a charge, and his pokemon's attack comes simultaneously with the enemy's. The magnemite is knocked against the wall with enough force to crack it, while his mankey crumples into a smoking heap.

His mother screams again at the electric discharge, or maybe just for the sake of it. It makes Seto twitch, and then he's hurrying to withdraw his pokemon as the magnemite slowly rises up. He fumbles with an empty pokeball (he'd bought three, and never thrown one at a live pokemon before) as it starts to charge an attack again, realizes he's not going to make it in time, and throws himself behind the couch, empty pokeball falling from his hand and rolling across the room.

Another blinding flash lights the room, followed by the smell of ozone and burning. He coughs, then looks up and realizes the couch is on fire.

"My couch!" his mom shrieks. "Put it out, Seto!"

He starts thinking of ways to do that before realizing the thought is insane, and reaches for another empty ball as he backs away from the flames. The magnemite has reoriented toward his mother as she runs toward the couch, table cloth bunched in her hands to beat the fledgling flames out.

In his imagination, Seto snaps his arm up to lock onto the magnemite, then pegs it and saves his mother.

In reality, he stares for a moment in horror, and then raises his arm and has to steady it with his other hand, and throws just as electricity arcs out and sends his mother crashing to the ground.

And misses.

"Momma!" he screams, feeling like he's in a nightmare. He's a horrible person, a lazy, ungrateful, disrespectful son who got his mother killed because he-

The magnemite is charging another attack. He should be running, or throwing his third ball. Instead he just stumbles toward his mother('s body) while reaching for a potion bottle.

What saves him is a giant scaly fist that punches through the broken window frame and grabs the magnemite with a crushing grip. Seto stares out the second story window in a state of complete shock, half convinced that none of this is actually happening, to see the nidoqueen rear its fist back and up, then smash the magnemite downward and out of sight. It roars in triumph.

The sound is literally stunning from this close up, and when it ends he's aware that he's wet himself and that this definitely all is really happening. He continues crawling to his mother's body, potion in hand.

"It's okay, momma," he whispers, spraying her burnt skin. "It's okay, I'm sorry, it's okay..."

He babbles until the potion bottle is empty, and his mother is still lying in an unmoving heap. The healing from the potion is superficial, and it takes him a moment to remember, through the distracting sounds of the howling storm and the crashing of the nidoqueen hitting the building again and again, that potions need flowing blood to be effective.

If the potions aren't healing her it's because her blood isn't flowing.

If her blood isn't flowing it's because she's dead.

What hits him, first, in that moment, even through the self-recriminations and self-disgust, is relief. Just a second of pure, relieved... freedom.

And then the guilt is back, worse than ever, a howling gale of self-loathing that he can't contain. I wanted her to die.

I let her die because I hated her.

I killed her.

I'm a monster.

He doesn't deserve to live.

The building shakes again, and the nidoqueen roars again, reminding him of its presence in a much more personal way.

He should let it kill him.

Seto pushes himself to his feet, stumbles, then walks toward the shattered window.

The nidoqueen saves him again, though less directly. Clearly frustrated by something on the left side of the building, she abruptly stamps her foot hard enough to crack its foundation there, causing a quarter of it to suddenly collapse downward.

Seto is knocked to the ground as part of the apartment breaks away with a grinding roar that drowns out the storm, for a moment. Pain shoots through his knee as it hits the uncarpeted tiles, and he groans, gripping it and curling up into a ball. He can't even kill himself without looking like a fool and wimping out...

He feels the spray of windblown rain on his face, and looks up with a blankly shocked expression. One of the walls is just gone, the apartment that had been next to his mother's cracked in half down the middle. He can see out into the street below, which means he spots the kid running up behind the nidoqueen.

It's hard to make out details in the intermittent light and heavy rain, but the kid is definitely wearing a pokeball belt. A trainer. A real trainer, if he's out in the storm. Seto is saved... through no effort of his own. Does he deserve saving? He's a horrible person. He just needs to end it.

Part of him rebels against this thought, suddenly. Kill himself? Why? His mom is gone, he's finally free to do whatever he wants...

The flood of guilt that drowns him then is debilitating, and as soon as it passes he starts moving toward the hole in the wall, where the nidoqeen is still raging at something out of sight. She's stretched up as high as she can, one hand clawing at a higher apartment.

The trainer behind her is close enough that Seto can see they have something in their hand. They're not summoning anything, though... just walking carefully closer. What are they doing?

Trying to capture it, of course. Its back is turned... they could just walk right up to it and-

Its tail suddenly thrashes as it lets out another bellow, arm jerking back and tearing more of the building out with it. Vines are wrapped around its arm, something bright yellow latched onto it. A weepinbell? The nidoqueen tries to pulverize the plant pokemon against the building, and Seto hears someone yelling commands above him. There's someone else in the building!

The trainer below has to jump back to avoid any debris, and its thrashing tail. His frustration is clear as he tries to get closer, still too far out of ultraball range to get a lock.

Another figure runs up behind the first, a second pokemon trainer. But she doesn't summon any pokemon either, and the two start to coordinate to get on either side of the rampaging nidoqueen without getting too close, so they can capture it when an opportunity arises.

But the storm is going to make it incredibly difficult, Seto distantly realizes. The nidoqueen is a big target, even he could probably hit it, but to get close enough to for the ball to lock on...

Even I could hit it... What's he doing? Just sitting here and... watching, as the nidoqueen crushes the weepinbell, then brings it up to its mouth and bites its body away from its vines, causing the person above him to scream out.

He should be helping them, he's a trainer too, he can catch it and he'd have an incredibly powerful pokemon...

No. All he has are pokeballs, scattered around the room (one fell out the newly opened wall). He would need an ultraball to capture something that massive.

But he can still help. He can keep it distracted...

...with a pidgey and a venonat. He pushes himself back and away from the gaping wall, survival instinct finally returning for a moment. He can't help with this, his pokemon are too weak, he's too weak—

Well then what did you buy them for?!

His gaze flicks to his mom's body, and he closes his eyes, groaning as his forehead lowers to the floor. Worthless…

And then the sky explodes with light, and a screech as loud as thunder echoes across the city.

Seto stares up at the glowing figure that descends from the storms, lighting the whole city in its intense glow. A constant current of electricity runs through its black and yellow feathers, making it easy to pick out but hard to look directly at. Its power is obvious and absolute, and if Seto wasn't already on the ground, he would fall to his knees. Instead he merely bows his head again.

God…

That's what this feeling is, what this power represents. Zapdos is a god, and his judgement is all around them, inside them. That's why he's been feeling the god's judgement: Seto has been found unworthy.

There's only one path to redemption for his sins.

He stumbles to his feet and walks forward again, out into the brightened night, out into the storm, eyes closed, waiting for the nidoqueen or the fall to kill him…

"Don't do it!"

Seto's eyes snap open, and he looks down to see the male trainer looking up at him, expression one of desperate worry. Seto barely even notices the way the nidoqueen turns right next to him, toward the sound of the yell.

"Don't do it!" the trainer repeats. "Don't give up on your life that easily!" How does he know? "It's the Pressure, you have to fight it! We're here for you! We're all fighting! Fight with—"

"Red look out!"

The nidoqueen's fists pound the ground, and the trainer who had been yelling up at him falls as the street buckles and cracks beneath him. The nidoqueen steps toward him as he scrambles away, and his friend rushes forward, ball outstretched, only to get caught by the pokemon's sweeping tail, skidding and rolling over the street.

"No!" the boy, Red, cries out as Seto watches, numb with shock and self-loathing. They're here for him, the boy said, as if he's worth all this, and now they're going to die for him…

Fight with us!

"Go, Venonat!" Seto yells, throat dry and voice cracking. His pokemon materializes on the edge of the apartment floor beside him, and he points to the nidoqueen as it steps toward Red. "S-supersonic!"

His venonat's antennae vibrate, and the nidoqueen raises a foot over the trainer… then overbalances, and has to take a quick step to the side to avoid falling.

And just like that, he saved a life. For a moment.

But sometimes a moment's enough.

Red is on his feet, staring at his friend and looking like he's about to run to her crumpled form… and then with a cry he's running straight at the nidoqueen, ball out. It spins around, tail whipping toward the trainer, who stops dead just out of its range, as if he could see the future a second before it happened. As soon as it's past he steps forward, holds position, and throws.

And then the nidoqueen is gone, the ball it's trapped in rolling along the ground as Red runs toward his friend.

Seto looks up, near the blinding figure of the Thunder God as it floats over the city, beautiful and terrible. The raindrops that blow against his face are bitter as tears as guilt suddenly surges through him again, dousing the moment of sudden hope and will.

He goes to sit beside his mother, hands covering his eyes as the dark flood pours down his cheeks. A distant part of him knows he should go and help Red with his friend, but for now, for just a few minutes, all the fight is gone from him, swallowed by a divine judgement that seems deaf to his whispered prayers for forgiveness.

It's been two years since Karen last faced a legendary pokemon's Pressure, and anticipation is like a drug in her system as she flies toward the storm around Vermilion. Most people would probably be afraid of flying into a thunderstorm, let alone one created by a legendary. Reckless is a word that's been used to describe her, a time or two. Or ten.

Stupid, however, is not: the key is to stay near buildings and fly below the tallest ones. That way all you have to worry about is the pokemon, assuming it's a Stormbringer's storm.

Okay, so some people might still call that stupid. But it helps that she now has an excuse to run toward the Pressure, whatever its source.

Two years ago, Entei burned a line north-west through central Johto, and trainers scrambled to wall it off from Enju City and divert it. Karen was on the fourth line that day, and she still felt it coming from miles away while it burned a path through the forests, smoke blanketing the horizon until it burst out of the tree line, a living inferno that seemed to burn the air itself.

That day what she felt was fear. Not fear for her safety, though that's a part of it that she also craves, as she never feels the rush it provides anymore. The woes of an adrenaline junkie, as her oldest brother used to say, before his own addiction got him killed.

What's more nuanced, more driving toward something productive, is the fear of losing. The fear of messing up, of being publicly shamed and judged unworthy. The fear of disappearing back into the masses.

It was the fear she dealt with every time Pressure hit her, a valuable reminder of what drove her. Being the middle child in a big family made her seek recognition and attention from a young age, and she knows that was the primary thing that pushed her to risk her life in the Tier 2 and 3 events that would occur around her during her journey. And each time she was around the Legendary Beasts, their aura confirmed that it was still her primary motivation.

She wasn't an Elite that first time, had just gotten her eighth badge, but she was already known for her reckless battle style, a mentality that made her and her pokemon go all out to prove themselves, no matter the risk.

She knew one day her luck would run out. Watching Entei leap the first line of defense and run through the virtual wall of water that met him at the second, only to emerge from the cloud of steam without pause, made her think that would be the day.

But it wasn't, and here she is: flying into a storm as she feels the Pressure rise in her thoughts like fog on a chill morning.

As the wind grows harsh and powerful and the cold rain quickly soaks her, she wonders what she'll feel now. One of the four Elites of the Indigo League, and by far the youngest… is she still afraid of obscurity? She has to know. Is being one of the strongest and most renowned trainers in two regions not enough for her? The Pressure will tell her. And even if it wasn't her job, she'd be diving right into it to find out for sure.

Reckless? Nah. It boggles her mind that more people don't seem to appreciate the insights facing legendaries gives. Who needs therapy, when you can literally face personifications of your deepest subconscious fears, and then blast the hell out of them?

She flies over the city until she spots a tall building near the coast with flares on the roof, then guides Orochi toward it as best she can with the wind buffeting him out toward the ocean. Her hydreigon isn't terribly large, having only evolved 7 years ago, but it's faster than any other she's encountered, and its three heads work seamlessly to keep them floating between the various buildings and billboards and light posts in the dark, rainy city. It's always been a mystery how the Dark Dragon flies, one the recent discovery of the Flying Particle shed no light on. At least flygon has decently sized wings, but Orochi just glides along with barely any effort from appendages on its back that look more like furred tentacles than wings.

When she gets close enough to the marked building, she finds another in the distance, and from there another, until she spots an occupied rooftop. She brings Orochi down into a dive and "lands" beside the figure of Lorelei, the dragon hovering just above the concrete. The older Elite is only identifiable by circumstance: her whole body is covered in the same type of Faraday suit Karen is wearing. Conductive wire mesh sandwiched between thick layers of fireproofed material would keep them safe from stray lightning bolts, though it does impede movement more than she'd like.

She's also standing on a platform strapped to the back of a hovering cryogonal the width of a couch, with half a dozen other ones of varying sizes floating around her.

Kind of distinctive, that. Particularly for a non-Psychic.

"Good to have you, Karen! First Stormbringer fight, right?" Lorelei shouts, voice calm and assured despite having to contend with the storm. There are radios attached to the neck of the suits, but in this weather they'd be practically useless.

"Right!" she replies, and alternates stroking Orochi's three necks, his scales slippery in the heavy rain.

"Then you're going to be under Giovanni in attack order!"

"Understood!" The idea that Elites are below Champions and above Leaders only applies when Champions don't do weird things like become Leaders afterward. "No appearance yet?"

"No! We'll be tracking the center of the storm and moving with it, in case it appears!"

Karen nods and turns as lightning flashes again, then again, illuminating the cityscape intermittently. In the moments between, she can make out a number of dull red spots, fires that even the intense rain and wind aren't putting out right away. There are also a couple of obscured spots where dust clouds from collapsed buildings have been kicked up, and not yet fully battered back down by the rain and wind.

"And in the meantime we wait," she mutters. Karen itches to go down and help fight, to protect the hospitals and pokemon centers they passed by, but she knows they can't. The Gym Leaders who could come and their people are spread out around the city already; the Elites' job is to stay fresh and ready for the cause of all this to make an appearance.

But that's assuming it ever even does.

"Where are we taking it?"

"My initial pull will be west-southwest! You and Giovanni will need to bring it as far out to sea as we can!"

"Right, but after that?" Cinnabar Island is in that direction, if they lure it that way they'd be putting the people there at risk...

Lorelei laughs. "I like your optimism!"

Karen smiles and squeezes the base of Orochi's middle neck. "You haven't really seen my baby in action yet!"

"Noted!" There's silence for a moment, and then, "If you get it past the bay, turn sharp south!"

Karen's smile fades, and she suddenly wishes she could see Lorelei's expression. By luring Zapdos south, there's a chance it would pass by or over the Sevii Islands, Lorelei's birthplace and home. Drawing it away from Cinnabar would mean endangering her family and friends and neighbors.

Of course, it could well miss the Sevii Islands entirely. They're not that large… but in the worst case scenario, well, the total population of all the islands put together is a quarter of Cinnabar's.

Simple math. Their primary objective is to ensure Zapdos doesn't travel further up the mainland to Celadon, or turn north toward Saffron, but past that… The only choices risk some deaths to save many more. And the consequences of indecision would be no different than making the choice.

Still, Karen knows the knowledge must feel like hell, and the Pressure is probably making it that much worse. Yet Lorelei sounded composed, and calm, a rallying point for everyone present. Karen can do no less.

The center of the storm has clearly moved, and soon they're moving with it, lighting new flares and placing them around another roof that's not the tallest in its area, but still high enough to have clear sight of the cityscape. They're there for about another fifteen minutes, and then they move again, waiting and watching for their opportunity while another wave of pokemon hits the city.

Karen has to fight the Pressure each time, the desire to do something burning through her. At one point they see another building collapse, and only Lorelei's unmoving figure keeps Karen in place. She can't look weak and impulsive in front of the other Elite, not while there are lives on the line.

Eventually Giovanni arrives, followed by half a dozen other trainers. They're all also wearing faraday suits, so she doesn't know by appearance who they are, but a vibrating chorus of high pitched noise accompanies them, as each of the trainers is riding a flygon, and that makes it pretty obvious. She'd be surprised if even Blackthorn Gym has this many flygon among its members.

"Good evening, Elites!" Giovanni's voice is loud but clipped, and it makes Karen feel a little better about herself. She knows it's petty, the Viridian Gym Leader has faced Pressure at least five times as often as she has, but the fact that the legendary Sakaki is struggling with it too makes her feel less weak.

Karen always feels awkward around the ex-Champion. His decision is one of the reasons she's even in the Elite Four. She has no illusions that she could beat Lorelei or Bruno if they were going all out… or even Agatha, despite the Type advantage Karen's strongest pokemon have against hers.

There are a number of Champions that step down from the position, but most do so to pursue other vocations, like Professor Oak, or travel to other regions. Brock is the only other ex-Champion Leader in Indigo, and he only won his match thanks to Aeosis; he must have known he didn't deserve the title when he stepped down, wouldn't be able to hold it against a challenger that prepared for that monster.

Giovanni? He might still be Champion, if he wanted to be. She wonders how it makes Lance feel. As far as she knows the two have never battled.

"Good to have you, Leader!" Lorelei's tone is neutral. "I wasn't aware that you would be bringing others!"

"All volunteered to be here, and are under strict orders to observe! They will only assist in pre-discussed emergency situations!"

It's been a problem in the past, trainers who attempted to attack legendaries, either in a bid for revenge or glory, and only ended up getting themselves killed, or worse, interfering with the League's plan. Giovanni probably didn't bring his Second or Third, but Karen feels better with the other trainers around. She's used to facing Johto's Beasts in groups, both to effectively drive them in a certain direction and to deal with the rampage that would come in their wake.

"Very well! Attack order is myself, then you, then Karen! Hard south after the bay, if possible!"

"Respectfully, Elite, I would suggest I go first!" Giovanni yells. "Our pokemon cannot fly as effectively over water as land!"

Lorelei doesn't seem happy about this, from what little body language Karen can read. Which isn't much, given the storm and suit. "The first pull will be the hardest! My cryogonal are more expendable than you or your people! If you reach the bay, let Karen continue, and assist the city!"

Giovanni is silent a moment, then bows his head. "By your command, Elite!"

Karen isn't sure who she agrees with, but she finds herself happy that she'll have Zapdos all to herself once they're over the water… even as the idea of being the sole target in the Legendary's crosshairs sends cold fingers down her back to grip the base of her spine and squeeze until she's shivering, legs numb…

Hello fear. She smiles, breathing hard as she focuses on how she will feel when she comes out the other side of this, alive and triumphant. It's nice to feel you again, for a time.

Because what is there to fear, really? From the perspective of moment to moment experiences, in a few hours the fear will either be gone, or she'll be dead.

Those aren't the only outcomes. I could be maimed. I could lose Orochi. I could fail and cause others to die.

Karen's pulse is faster, her breaths short. This Pressure is tenacious. She lets the excitement and fear war within her, drive her to greater heights. Fighting Pressure is all about framing. She stares out at the storm and grins. Your greatest weapon will only give me strength.

They move as a unit to another two rooftops and well past the midpoint of the city when it finally happens: the god of thunder's cry splits the sky as it descends from the dark like a slowly falling star.

Its presence below the cloudline transforms the city from a strobing world of dark and light to an endless black room with a single impossibly bright bulb hanging in it. Karen wishes briefly she could take a picture of the cityscape, illuminated from a single central point. The shadows the buildings cast move as Zapdos floats with deceptive slowness across the sky.

And then Lorelei is floating rapidly up and to the side. Her swarm of cryogonal forms an array around her and starts to gleam with extra ice that forms on them in a protective layer. After getting in position, one of her pokemon starts accelerating faster than the others, and Lorelei's voice is suddenly sharp as steel in Karen's headset. "Initial pull starting now."

The cryogonal disappears into the distance, followed by Lorelei and the others. Giovanni follows her, but not at maximum speed, and Karen takes her cue from him, though it galls her to just hang back here doing nothing.

Wait. Your chance is coming. Wait.

She keeps Orochi behind the Leader as she strains her eyes against the glaring brightness of the god's electric aura. Eventually a thin beam of blue and white lances out at it in the distance, and the jealousy churns through her. Lorelei's attack has begun.

Zapdos doesn't react to the attack, and Karen imagines that it might not have even felt it through its Light Screen. Once there are three beams hitting it simultaneously, however, lightning flashes down around it, and its cry once again echoes over the city in a thunderclap.

Karen wonders how many of the cryogonal just died, but a moment later more beams hit the legendary pokemon again, and finally the glowing bird turns to face them head on.

Karen sees the light around the bird flare, and banks Orochi into a steep turn just as a twitching ball of lightning flies out at them. The Zap Cannon is far slower than an actual bolt from the sky, but wherever it goes, arcs of electricity snap out from it to the buildings below, the rain evaporating into a hazy mist behind it.

Orochi manages to get out of its flight path in time to avoid being struck by it, and Karen turns to watch the glowing orb fly out over the coastline and out past the edge of the storm, where it quickly loses coherence. Orochi's left head roars at Zapdos in defiance, and she quickly smacks its neck to get it to stop before looking over the city, and feeling a ball of ice in her stomach.

Roughly a dozen buildings in the path of that attack are on fire. Their lightning rods were overloaded.

She turns back to the Thunder God. There are more beams of icy light hitting it from the front, keeping it turned toward the ocean as it starts calling lightning down on its assailants again. They need to get it out of the city as quickly as possible.

She realizes with a start that Zapdos is closing the gap between them rapidly, now, and sees Giovanni abruptly loop and turn his pokemon toward the coast. She quickly follows suit, and they lead the legend across the city, racing to stay just out of its range.

Karen trusts her pokemon to keep them from hitting anything and turns to watch the battle as best she can as the rain pelts her face through the mesh of her suit. There aren't any new attacks hitting Zapdos, however, and she can't make out Lorelei at this distance. The only reason the Thunder God is so visible is how bright it is.

Karen feels a chill go down her spine. The engagement has barely lasted a minute, and Zapdos is still a long way from the coast. Is Lorelei out of the fight already? She carefully drifts Orochi closer to Giovanni's flygon. "I don't see any more Ice Beams!" she yells.

"Maintain course! I will engage if it starts to deviate!" Giovanni calls back. "Be prepared to pick up if it does again after me!"

"Right!" Karen clenches her jaw against the impatience swirling in her. Lorelei knows better than to personally get in range of an attack, but determining the range of an enemy that can call lightning down in a thunderstorm is difficult, to say the least. There's no truly safe way for a prolonged fight against legendary pokemon, who seem to shrug off all but the most powerful or effective attacks…

And their response when truly challenged, is always to retaliate with overwhelming force.

Lightning crackles through the clouds and pours into the tallest buildings, blinding Karen and probably anyone who's outside, for a moment.

The thunder hits a split second later from everywhere at once, a grinding roar of noise that seems to practically vibrate the air around her. She blinks spots out of her eyes as her ears ring, and feels Orochi vibrate under her as all three heads roar in pain this time, the sound muffled.

She notices her dazed pokemon is drifting aimlessly to the side, and taps a command against his neck to get him to turn and speed up again. When she thinks to look behind her, she sees Zapdos is no longer facing them.

Before she can panic, a burst of light speeds toward the legendary's glowing figure, and starts splitting into multiple sparks, each leaving a glowing trail behind them.

Most of the barrage misses Zapdos, but some hit, and its screech is a distant scrape against her throbbing ears. It turns back toward the coast, chasing Giovanni now, whose pokemon doesn't bother attacking again and merely goes for pure speed as lightning blasts it.

Immune to electricity as flygon is, the heat from bolts of lightning is not so easy to ignore, and Karen knows that Giovanni's suit can't take many hits like that. The Gym Leader manages to outpace the Thunder God for a brief time, hopefully letting the wind and rain cool him off, but Zapdos is locked on and focused, and another Zap Cannon suddenly launches out.

Karen is far enough to the side to avoid the sphere of lightning without drastic action, but the others from Giovanni's gym have to scatter. Zapdos keeps trying to turn after one of them, and Karen realizes they're buying their Gym Leader time, each trading off to be the one chased while keeping Zapdos aimed unerringly toward the docks.

She's not sure how this qualifies as an "emergency situation," but it's clear Giovanni's people were prepared to do this at the first opportunity and help their Leader escape danger by taking some hits themselves. But with their pokemon and suits, they should be okay...

...and soon enough the ground below Karen gives way to docks, which give way to water. The squadron of flygon disperse rather than float over the sea, and Zapdos seems to be choosing which of them it wants to chase.

Now, finally, it's her chance. "Come on, Orochi," she mutters. "Let's show them all what we can do."

She taps out a command to the two side necks, then another to the middle one, hands adjusting along his neck to steer as he banks toward Zapdos while flying south-southwest as two of his heads curve back behind it and emit a pair of dark purple beams.

Karen watches the energy splash against Zapdos's glowing form, and from this distance the speed at which it turns toward them is startling. "Go!" she yells with a surge of adrenaline even as her hands grip in the actual command, and her pokemon's wings sweep all at once and jet them forward.

Lightning blinds Karen as they soar out over the bay, and Orochi cries out in pain, but doesn't stop moving. She blinks away the spots and taps out a different command, and the next attack to come from her pokemon's mouths is a pulse of darkness so complete that even Zapdos's glowing form is obscured by it, for a moment, and the world returns to pitch black again.

She dips Orochi down in that brief darkness, then turns and darts back the way she came.

Then the legendary's glowing form is revealed again, like the first sun being born in an endless void, and it screeches in rage… but in front of Karen, this time, rather than behind her.

Gods still need to see. Karen grins and flies behind the stormbringer, letting Orochi rest as Zapdos flies ahead.

Minutes pass in the harsh winds and soaking rain, and Zapdos flies over the water like a shooting star. Karen stays alert for any sign that the legendary is turning, but it's hard to tell without the city to navigate by anymore: there's nothing but water all around them. She watches the lightning bird as best she can through its blinding aura, and can just make out the dark patch in the back of its glowing form. All the while, the Pressure batters at her mind, making her itch to do more. She ignores it, for now. Part of mastering her fears, proving she's stronger, is being able to resist it when necessary. She has a job to do first, and once it's done… the fear of failure will be gone, and all that will be left is the invigorating fear of death.

Zapdos is flying farther and farther ahead, and she realizes Orochi has been getting tired, which is bad for multiple reasons, not the least of which is that they're effectively in the middle of the ocean. She takes some ether out of her bag and taps its necks one at a time so they can bend around and open wide for her to point the nozzle into each mouth and spray. Ether's effects on the body would work no matter which mouth Orochi ingests it with, but for the mental effects…

Her pokemon dutifully speeds up, and she finishes the bottle off by pointing the nozzle between the bars of her mask and spraying the last squeeze of ether into her own mouth before she can stop herself.

It's like swallowing rubbing alcohol and coffee while a bolt of clarity lights her brain up from the inside. She feels more wired and alert than she can ever remember, and drops the empty bottle into the ocean as she leans over Orochi's neck, body vibrating with energy as she grins even as worry rises up in her. Dangerous, taking ether, lots of side effects, but side effects don't matter if you're dead.

Time loses all meaning as she flies behind the storm god. She keeps her eyes away from it as much as she can, worried about damage to her eyes and hoping Orochi will be okay, and eventually the endless expanse of water below stops, and she realizes they've reached the mouth of Kanto's massive bay.

She did it. She brought it all the way out to sea… assuming she can turn it in the right direction, at least. If it hadn't drifted since they left Vermilion behind then Cycling Road would be directly ahead and on either side of them, but instead the enormously long and poorly named bridge is a distant string of lights to Karen's right, and to her left… yes, there's Fuchsia City in the distance.

She has to turn it hard west, now, to minimize the storm's effects on nearby towns and pokemon populations, then south to minimize its chances of flying to Cinnabar.

Or… she can take it by surprise… fly up to it, get within capture range… throw an ultraball…

Karen almost stops breathing as she pictures it. The first trainer in history to catch a Legendary pokemon… to have the god of lightning on her belt… it would prove her greatness to everyone, once and for all… she just needs… to fly a little closer…

Karen carefully pulls an ultraball from the pouch on her saddle. The ball is slippery in her gloved hand, and she feels herself sweating in the thick suit. Zapdos is harder to look at the closer she gets, and she starts to feel warmth, then heat. How is it not cooking itself? She suddenly has doubts that even an ultraball would even make it through that constant electric aura, but she has to try… She pushes Orochi a little harder, trying to get just a little closer...

It's the buzzing in the air that she feels which snaps her out of it, the way Orochi vibrates and squirms in pain. She quickly has him back off. What was she thinking? Effective range of an ultraball in these conditions would be maybe three meters, and they're flying at speeds that would make any throw almost impossible.

Been in the Pressure too long… By the Guardians, how long have they been flying?

The land is too close, now, she has to turn Zapdos before he flies over it. She carefully commands Orochi to turn to the right and fly faster. Karen tries to judge the right distance, making sure they're not too close while being at the right angle… then has Orochi's left head fires a Dragon Pulse.

Zapdos is hit, but as the energies clash around it the Thunder God barely seems to notice or care. She has Orochi fire again and again, but her pokemon seems too tired to hit it with much power.

She quickly sprays more ether into its mouths as they start to pass over land, hands fumbling with the bottle in her haste. She's fucking it up, she should have turned him earlier, should have paid attention…

Draco Meteor, she taps out, and her pokemon's three heads each pour glowing orange death out at the glowing god, hoping no one is below them to get hit by the attacks.

Zapdos finally seems to notice them, and she quickly wrenches Orochi around to the right to lead it back on a chase. Electricity crackles through the storm clouds around them, but no lightning hits her and her dragon, and soon they've left the narrow strip of land, as well as the even narrower bridge, behind.

Now. She has Orochi turn slowly southward, and uses Dark Pulse again to distract Zapdos a couple times when it cuts through the inside of the curve to get closer to her. It fires another lightning ball back, and this time they're too close to avoid it: electricity plays over her suit and Orochi's body as the ball sails past, and she feels a surge of sympathy for Orochi as he endures the electricity and just keeps flying, a single bellow his only concession to the pain.

That, and he's going slower. A lot slower.

Karen quickly orders another Dark Pulse, then opens the pouch at her side and grabs a syringe full of potion out of it, then another for electric injuries as Zapdos's blinding light is temporarily obscured. She searches as best she can with her thick gloves for the soft spot between the scales in Orochi's shoulder and injects both healing liquids into his bloodstream one after the other.

Orochi puts on more speed just as the Thunder God re-emerges, screeching in anger, but it's too late to attack them again, and soon they're leading it south… and then, exhausted though she and Orochi are, south-east. There are no islands in this direction. If she can take Zapdos as far out in this direction as possible, its odds of harming anyone else would be effectively zero.

Some part of her is aware that this is the Pressure pushing her to do more than she needs to, to rise above expectations and stand out. She ignores that part of her. She's saving lives, by doing this. She can keep going. She has to prove that she can. And then… all this fear and struggle… will have been that much more worth it… what's another hour of flying, after those she went through already? Will she even remember it as being any worse?

Still, no reason not to be smart about this.

Karen orders another Dark Pulse, and prepares to dive down and loop behind it again. The wave of pitch black spreads out behind her…

...and Zapdos dives under it, screeching in anger and firing another Zap Cannon at them.

The light engulfs her, and she can smell ozone and burning canvas as her pokemon screams in pain… then starts to fall.

Karen desperately blinks spots out of her eyes as the stormy ocean rushes up at them, hands fumbling for the medicine pouches along her saddle as her suit burns around her. The last thing she hears before they hit the angry waves is the Thunder God's cry of victory.