Chapter 136

Chapter 136

CHAPTER 136

"Pffft— hahahaha!" Mira laughed, doubling over. "Oh man, you guys are a riot! You're telling me this guy doesn't even know what he's here for?"

"I don't even know you," Chase said. "You're making a terrible first impression."

"Mira..." Maeve groaned.

The pink-haired girl sprung up. "We should be friends—"

"No."

"I'm sorry, Chase," I sighed before quickly bringing him up to speed. He didn't seem to react very much, although I caught him sneaking some worried glances at Cece. "There, you're caught up."

"Okay. So what is this for? Are we going to fuck up these guys, or what?" He asked.

"You know what, I'd enjoy that very much," Pauline smirked. "But we couldn't even if we wanted to."

"All of us combined? They can't be invincible."

"Don't be stupid, guys," Denzel said. "We're not going after anyone. That's not what this meeting is for, this isn't a movie. Let the League do its job."

"We believe that since everyone here has been involved with Cecilia or Louis one way or another, we'd best bring you all into the loop and find ways to defend ourselves in case things go south again," Justin explained.

"I mean, I think I got the gist of what happened when Louis told us but... aren't your dads going to get arrested? We should be fine," Maeve said.

"Don't be naive," Pauline rolled her eyes. "See, this is why—"

A stare from both Denzel and Emilia shut her down.

Emilia started to speak. "What Pauline meant to say is that while yes, Harvey will probably get arrested, it'll take an investigation from the International Police and the League. They were implied to be transferring funds to Team Galactic, right? They'd be foolish to have left a paper trail."

"Harvey's days are numbered, but a cornered Pokemon tends to lash out even if it'd make no sense," Justin said, turning to Louis' friends and Chase. "And unfortunately, you're all involved, so you might be targeted."

"I'll beat 'em," Chase shrugged. "If this is when you ask to travel as a large group, then I'll have to say no."

"We weren't going to," Cece said. "It was just a general warning. Keep a Pokemon out with you at all times, and be careful of who you potentially befriend."

"Not sure this guy's going to make any new friends without me to help," Mira said, pointing her thumb at Chase. He just ignored her.

"Please take this seriously," I chided.

Her eyes narrowed, and she stared me down for a few seconds before relenting.

"Sorry, sorry! I'm a little bit of an airhead."

"Louis?" Cecilia asked worriedly. "You've been quiet."

"W—what?" He recoiled. "Maeve's been quiet too."

"Please don't throw me under the bus," she muttered. "I'm just scared."

"You should leave me, then," he said.

"Of course not. Plus, what's done is done. They already know we're friends."

"Let's get back on topic," Denzel clapped his hands. "Like Cecilia said, you should have a Pokemon with you, even in a city. That's the most important bit to take from this. Something with defensive capabilities would be ideal— like a psychic— but if you're like me and you don't have any, then a fast Pokemon would do the trick. Especially you, Emi, since you'll be alone in Hearthome. Second, we should create a group chat so we can all communicate. Since we're not going to travel together, it'd be good to keep tabs on each other until this whole thing blows over, at the very least."

"Don't forget to bring Vincent up to speed," I told her.

Emilia had tried to bring in Vincent, but he couldn't make it because he was working at his part-time job. We hadn't known if he'd been with us enough to warrant him being here, but we wanted to be thorough.

"Can't we ask the police for bodyguards or something?" Maeve asked.

"Bodyguards on the routes would basically be impossible," Denzel shook his head. "Maybe in the cities, but I wouldn't count on it. The only person they might give one to is Cece, because Abel seems interested in her, but even that isn't guaranteed."

"That's such bullshit," Pauline complained. "They don't give a fuck about us."

"I wouldn't go that far," Justin said. The redhead huffed and turned away from him.

"What's some crummy police officer going to do that we can't?" Mira shrugged. "We're getting to the point where we're more powerful than even those. The only thing that could be useful would be some League trainers, but it's not like that's ever happening."

"So you can be smart. Why aren't you smart all the time?" Chase asked.

"Maybe it's because I want to see your reactions," she joked.

"Emi, you'll have to keep training your Beldum's Confusion or get him started on Psychic, I think," I said. "Not like it wouldn't help with contests."

"I was planning on doing that anyway."

"Okay. Think you'll be alright, then?"

"I don't plan on making you guys worry about me. I've got to be able to do things on my own too," she said.

"Let's move onto Abel, then," Justin said.

"That Malamar psycho? What's there to say about him? Isn't he basically on our side?" Chase asked.

"As long as the money blows that way," Cecilia whispered. "There are still things we haven't considered. What if Clarence offers him a sum so ridiculous that he not only stops going after him, but changes his mind and comes after us again? Money is all he values."

"Pay him to fuck off?" Mira mused. "That certainly sounds possible."

"There's also Louis' dad to consider," I said. "He's more involved with Team Galactic than Clarence, if Abel's words are to be believed."

"My father... I'm going to get my chance to speak to him again no matter what," Louis said.

"Well, hopefully you'll speak to him during visitor hours in prison," Mira cheerfully said.

There was a small lull in the conversation, and I used it as my opportunity to bring up what I wanted to talk about.

"On the topic of Abel... I wanted to ask a question regarding Ditto. Justin, you know a bit about those, right?" I asked, and he responded with a nod. "Could a Ditto that turns into a human potentially grow stronger than one? The police said no, but I wanted to be sure."Yôur favorite stories at novelhall.com

"No. That older woman Cecilia described cannot be a Ditto."

Damn, so it really was some other shapeshifter Pokemon. I didn't even know that more existed in the first place, but there was no other explanation. It was the only thing that lined up with the behavior Cecilia had described.

I woke up to a soft, yet purposeful knock on my door. Togetic instantly sprung to action, and her eyes started to glow, but I stopped her with a gentle tap. She was sleeping with me tonight, just in case. Now that we knew even Pokemon Centers weren't safe, I was sure that we were all sleeping with at least one of our Pokemon out.

"Calm down, Princess," I yawned. "That's Cece's knock."

I lazily strode to my room, scratching my stomach until I reached the door. When I opened it, I immediately left my half-asleep, dazed state. She looked distraught. Her eyes were red, like she'd been crying. Slowking was diligently following behind her, and he stared at me with pleading eyes. She needed help.

"So you were affected after all," I softly said. "Come here."

I let Slowking through, closed the door and gently held her in my arms.

"I couldn't sleep. I'm so tired, but I just can't fall asleep. I don't know why," she sniffled. "I don't even feel particularly scared. I'm just on edge all the time. I can't stop thinking that something's going to go wrong."

I rubbed her back, letting her vent her worries.

"Can I sleep with you?"

"Come on," I said. "You don't even need to ask, you've done it a lot already. I can get Buddy to help, if you want. He doesn't need to sleep, so maybe you'll feel safer."

She hesitantly nodded, and I grabbed his Pokeball from my nightstand, releasing him. Jellicent stared at me curiously. He hadn't expected her to be here, or to be out tonight.

"You're on watch tonight. Remember how I said I'd keep you guys out more from now on for security?" I said.

The water type nodded and let out a smooth, deep cry.

"He'll be on top of things," I smiled. "Maybe he can bond with your Slowking too. Princess will probably fall asleep though, but she'd probably annoy Slowking anyway— wait, I'm rambling."

Cecilia smiled and shook her head. "It's okay, you know I like it. Plus, it makes me feel like everything's normal."

I relaxed as we both got into the bed. It was true that I was finding it easier not to panic than I thought it would be. In fact, I felt strangely calm. It wasn't like I wasn't worried, but a part of me had already expected things to go to shit. Harvey and Clarence had always been in the back of my head, and I'd known that something related to them would go wrong. Maybe it was because I'd been through so much at this point that I was starting to get used to it.

Then again, it wasn't me that Abel had threatened. It was Cece.

I placed her head against my chest.

"Do you feel it? My heartbeat."

"Mhm," she softly said. "It's so slow."

"Does it help? With destressing you, I mean."

She wrapped her arms around me. "Yes."

Jellicent was having a quiet conversation with Slowking, and Togetic was lazily listening while lying on his head, sometimes chiming in.

"Thank you for being there for me," Cece said.

"Of course," I said. "We're all here for you. The others too."

"I know, it's just... it's special with you. I feel whole with you there."

The conversation paused, and I considered what to say. What she needed was...

"What do you say we go somewhere tomorrow for a change of pace? It'll do both of us some good."

"There was a place I found... a place with a piano. You told me you wanted to play."

My heart fluttered. "You remembered?"

"Obviously. Do you want to go in the morning?"

"Hm, I've got to talk to Turtonator, so that might take a while. What about the afternoon?"

"There are too many people."

"Are you worried about spies?" I asked. Was she so shaken that she didn't even want to go outside when there'd be a lot of people—

"No, you'll just bother the people there. You don't know how to play, right? It'd be annoying to hear that."

"What?! Hey!" I protested.

She giggled, and I started laughing too.

"You know what, you're probably right," I continued. "Thanks for finding it, though. It completely slipped my mind. Oh man, now I'm nervous... I don't even know how to read sheet music. Am I just going to improvise?"

"Wasn't that always the intention?"

"Of course not! I thought I'd have more time to get ready. You need to play with me so that if something goes wrong, we're both to blame."

"Don't rope me into your schemes. I'd have you know that I already know how to play the piano quite well, although I might be rusty."

"Oh. That makes sense," I blankly said, remembering that she used to take all kinds of lessons. "Wait, then you can teach me!"

"I can't start teaching you until you learn how to read sheet music, Grace."

"I know a little. Do, re, mi... fa... la?"

"You might be a lost cause already."

"We all have to start from somewhere, Cece!"

We'd been supposed to sleep, but we didn't do so for two more hours.

—

I'd overslept, but it was for a good reason. I certainly felt a lot happier today than I did yesterday, and hopefully, things would settle down for a bit so people could have a period to unwind. The League would announce something about the Directorate this afternoon, and hopefully, it'd have to do with the apparent corruption there. It was probably too soon, though. They had only just found out about it, and surely they'd need to at least investigate.

I was back at Amity Square again, and I grabbed Turtonator's Pokeball. He'd told me his story, and I had told him mine, but we hadn't talked about what it meant for our relationship going forward. I released the hulking dragon, and he observed me with a curious eye. Tangrowth was standing behind me, soaking in the sunlight, but he was supposed to protect me from any attacks.

Not from Turtonator. From people.

"Morning, Sunshine," I smiled.

Turtonator responded with an angry snort, dismissing the nickname immediately by beating his tail against the ground. His reaction hadn't been as strong as I had expected, however. He didn't even raise the temperature, which was a big win in my book.

"Sorry, I just wanted to try it out," I said, leaning to the right. "Damn, you did a number on the floor. People work to keep it flat and the grass mowed, you know."

Turtonator ignored me, clearly not caring for the employees here and lazily laid down, awaiting what I had to say.

"Let's talk."