Searching Far and Wide - 137

Teams:

Pierce Lawson:

- Narcissa, Beedrill

- Orion, Onix

- Cygnus, Kadabra

- Bellatrix, Gyarados (Shiny)

- Andromeda, Vaporeon

- Regulus, Meowth

Lillian Dale:

- Root, Ivysaur

- Talon, Spearow

- Gem, Geodude

- Star, Cleffa

- Cinder, Vulpix

Vermilion City XXVII

“Wish you could stay some more,” Queen Ilene said and she looked like she meant it. “Alas, maybe we’ll see one another soon,” she added with a soft, somewhat sad smile. Pierce almost wanted to stay just to fix that expression. He couldn’t afford to, however. He had a sanctuary to finish putting together and a journey to continue.

Maybe not necessarily in that order.

“I hope so,” he replied with a smile of his own. “I’ll make time to teleport here as soon as possible,” he added, lamenting the fact that Cygnus himself wouldn’t have the chance to get them there himself for a while. Rota was too far north and away from most of their future destinations for that. Closest he’d be would likely be… Viridian, and he wasn’t going to go there until the very end of things. Not only was that what everyone did since it was a ridiculously demanding Gym, but it was also led by Giovanni…

Who may or may not be Team Rocket’s leader.

Pierce wasn’t going to go there unless he ran out of places to go.

Admittedly, if he decided to visit Pewter – which could happen, considering Cygnus and Orion’s families were there –, he’d be close enough for a teleport, especially if his kadabra got stronger. That’d work well enough, since Rota was north of Pewter and Mt. Moon. That was more likely than Viridian, although it’d also mean that he’d have only a day or maybe less to visit the Palace.

“Remember that you’re welcome to teleport to the entrance with Cygnus, if the chance is there,” Ilene told him, which made him grin. That’d make things a lot easier. She’d already told him as much though, but he appreciated the reminder. She’d also explained that Lance and him hadn’t teleported to the Palace because Pierce hadn’t been able to get explicit permission until he was there.

Good to know.

“I will,” he replied with a nod, running his fingers through his hair. Not for the first time, as he did that, he found himself grateful that Ilene didn’t seem to mind his lack of manners and etiquette. Not that he thought doing that was wrong, but he also wouldn’t have known if it was. He might look into it at a later date… then again, maybe not. He’d never been one to concern himself overly much with that so long as it wasn’t something ridiculously obvious. “I should be going if I don’t want my pokemon to get impatient,” he added, a little more lightly. He was never good with goodbyes, especially serious ones.

“We wouldn’t want that,” Ilene said, following suit and shifting the smallest bit towards a more casual speech. “Don’t be a stranger, Pierce.”

“Same, Ilene,” he replied, for a second feeling his insides twist. He really had a hard time talking casually with all these important people. Maybe he’d get used to it in the future? He felt like it was a little more possible at that moment, with the beaming smile the woman directed at him at his words.

Not long after that, Pierce found himself teleported back to Vermilion. Surprisingly, he’d even been taken to the sanctuary’s entrance instead of a teleport spot in the city. That was convenient, but he didn’t get a thank you out before the Psychic type disappeared from beside him. ‘Well, time to get back to things,’ he thought to himself, taking a moment to try and put his thoughts together well enough.

His mind still buzzed with all the Aura stuff he’d learned in the past day and a bit. It was like an annoyingly catchy song that kept making an unwanted appearance in his thoughts over and over again. He couldn’t focus on anything for long before his brain decided to remind him that his life was even crazier than he’d already thought it was, which was saying a lot.

‘Enough,’ he told himself, taking a deep breath in and then starting to walk. The pokemon in the sanctuary needed him with his head on straight, nevermind the staff and the sanctuary in general. His team also needed him to be able to focus, considering he still had to get through the day’s training session.

There was a lot of stuff to take care of.

He could continue diving the aura hole later whenever he managed to find some free time. He’d probably add that to his Psychic Arts exercises and his studies. He had a feeling that it’d be better to abandon the former in favor of aura, but he’d have felt bad, considering how much Sabrina had helped him with that. He didn’t want to leave that just because it was harder than the alternative. They were different things, after all, so maybe it’d be useful and…

And the truth was that it felt wrong to just… stop, especially considering Sabrina was a friend of his by then. Just imagining telling the woman that he had stopped trying with the Psychic Arts the next time they met made him want to flinch and hide in a corner somewhere. ‘Yeah, no, can’t do that,’ he decided, lamenting the fact that he had yet another thing to add to his already very full plate. ‘I really do need days of 48 hours,’ he thought, sighing to himself.

Walking into the sanctuary, it wasn’t long before he found himself at the tent that Grace had been using for her work. He met several staff members on the way and he saw some progress made on the main building even from outside, but he’d check those out more thoroughly afterwards. Grace was likely to have all the information on whatever might or might not have happened during the time he was away.

Even if it was about a day and a half, it was still time in which something could have come up, after all.

Especially with how… lively pokemon could be.

[}-o-{]

“Things were surprisingly calm,” Grace said, straightening her back at the same time as a stack of sheets on her desk. “As Misty tells it, the pokemon behaved remarkably well. Either you’ve got them properly under control even while away for a while, or the staff and Misty herself have been getting the hang of it.”

“Or both,” he pointed out, leaning back and thanking the intern that passed him a cup of coffee. He’d already forgotten her name, admittedly, but he did remember that she was always very helpful. Maybe he could put in a good word for her with the boss… which was Grace, not him, contrary to popular belief. After a sip, he considered things. “And the sanctuary in general?”

“Adjustments and fixes in the main building are still ongoing, but some parts should be done soon. The storage areas are already being used. Didn’t need to work too much on those, thankfully,” the woman said, flipping through the pages in her hands. One day, Pierce would understand how she managed to work with paper so much instead of just using her computer for everything, but if there was a method to her madness, he’d leave her to it. She’d been doing an amazing job so far, after all. “Numbers are looking good and the permits for the pokemon attraction are underway still, but it shouldn’t take long. They are mostly waiting to see if things are as under control as they seem, which is only a matter of time.”

Pierce briefly pondered the possibility of just… throwing his weight around and asking for it to be sped up. Maybe it was arrogant of him, but he thought there was a good chance that he’d get away with it without it even affecting him much. He dismissed that after a moment though. It wasn’t worth possibly damaging the good will he might have. Beyond that, the wharf for the attraction was still not finished. Maybe then, if the League was dragging their feet, he would need to be drastic.

“Ok,” he mumbled, looking up at the tent “ceiling” thoughtfully. “What were we working on? What needs to be done?”

“We were discussing your contract with the association,” Grace reminded him and he snapped his fingers as the memory came back to him.

“Right, the jacket, wasn’t it? We can go with that, unless the situation changed?” he said and Grace shook her head. “Great, we can sign that and get those balls rolling. What else?”

“As of right now, on the business side? That’s about it. There is mostly just a lot of waiting to be done now, things need to settle down and construction needs to be finished,” Grace told him and he nodded slowly. He wasn’t a fan of that, admittedly. It felt like he was just wasting time doing nothing, even though it was important that they do things that way.

He loved spending time with pokemon as much as the next guy, but every day that passed, he got a little more restless. Maybe he’d been channeling his pokemon too hard as of late or something, but he wanted to get back on the road already. It’d be fine when he had stuff to do, pokemon to calm, things to discuss and look over, but… Now almost everything was ready and he didn’t want to just sit around, waiting.

“I know that look,” Grace commented, snapping him out of his thoughts. “You’re thinking about leaving,” she said and he blinked at her. She wasn’t wrong, but he didn’t think she knew him well enough to tell that much. “You can, if you want. Cygnus should be able to teleport you back in case of emergencies, at least for a few days. If you stay on a land route and within the beaten path, you can even call someone to teleport you back once you’re out of his range,” the woman explained and he was once more surprised by just how… good she was at managing things. He’d really lucked out, but he also had been wasting her talent just managing his finances at the start of things.

“I’ll have to talk with Misty and the school, but… I think I might do that, yes,” he said idly, leaning back. It’d mean giving up his idea of going to Blaine, but he could live with that. As much as he wanted to afford Bellatrix some freedom while traveling, at least she’d gotten plenty of sea time while in Vermilion and even in the lake of Rota. It’d have to do for the moment.

Not ideal, but it was what it was.

If that was the price he had to pay for the sake of getting back on the road, then he’d happily pay it and he knew even Bellatrix herself would like it. Although, maybe he was getting ahead of himself. There were some t’s to cross and some i’s to dot, but Pierce was feeling optimistic about his chances. Especially after the report he’d just gotten from Grace, admittedly. Things were looking good, actually. Remarkably good even, despite the surprises and all that…

… He really hoped there wasn’t going to be another shoe dropping, because that’d suck.

“Hm, I’ll make sure there’s nothing that needs you immediately then, just in case,” Grace said with a nod, shuffling her trusty papers a bit before stacking them together neatly. “If that’s all, Mr. Lawson.”

“Yeah, I’ll let you work in peace,” he told her, taking a sip from his coffee and standing up with a groan. “Don’t overwork the interns too much, yeah?” he added with a glance towards the aforementioned people. None of them seemed to react in a way that told him Grace was doing such a thing, thankfully. “Actually, could I borrow one. I might need a hand or two while I check the place,” he commented, scratching absently at the top of his arm’s cast.

“Of course, Mr. Lawson,” Grace replied, looking to the side. “Irene, could you accompany Mr. Lawson?” she called. ‘So, that was her name, huh?’ he noted absently as the young woman scurried to where he was.

[}-o-{]

“... You got all that?” he asked Irene, who was hastily writing down on her notepad.

“Yes, sir,” she answered almost immediately and he held back the urge to grimace. “If that’s all, I’ll go look for this,” she added and he nodded, watching her dash away. She was a little too eager, bordering on desperation – or at least he hoped it was bordering and not actually that –, which was a little… worrying.

It was an errand to look for some pokeblocks and berry salads though. Surely it couldn’t be that bad, right? Maybe her situation motivated her a little too much? Maybe he’d have Grace check her background – and all the interns, really – to make sure none of them were in a bad situation. He’d feel bad if he was only making things more difficult for them. He could afford to help, after all, and surely that’d also help get some trustworthy hands on deck, which would be very welcome.

Maybe he was thinking about it too hard?

In the spirit of not doing that, Pierce turned to look down the wharf, where Misty was working with the gyarados. They were in the middle of a dance, by the look of things and all of them were doing well. He didn’t notice, at least from the distance he was standing at, any sign of the pokemon being in a bad mood. Misty herself seemed to be commanding the group easily and without issues

‘Yeah, leaving things here as they are might not be as complicated as I thought,’ he mused to himself. Admittedly, there were the pokemon that had been distributed to other sanctuaries and rehab places, but it wasn’t like he could do anything about those just yet. He needed his own place’s infrastructure to be solid to be able to bring them over.

He’d have to come back to welcome them, but other than that, they didn’t really affect his plans for the immediate future.

Andromeda’s yip brought his attention to his pokemon, who had been walking by his side. She was the only one in a mood to just do nothing for a bit, it seemed. The rest of the team had gone to a small clearing to work on moves a bit. Even Regulus seemed to have been in enough of a mood to train to turn down the offer to accompany Pierce around the sanctuary.

That had been a shock.

Back to his vaporeon though, Pierce noticed that she was looking off to the side, instead of at the gyarados show in front of them. That’s when he noticed Chief, the sharpedo, swimming closer to shore, where they were, by the wharf. He wasn’t alone though. His small school of fish-like pokemon was accompanying him.

Interestingly, there was a golduck and a gathering of more land-based Water types there. Blinking, Pierce wondered if that was what he thought it was… ‘What should I call this one? Captain? Major? General?’ he thought, more to amuse himself than anything. All the same though, he approached the pokemon. Might as well check what that was about before making assumptions.

“Hey there,” he greeted with as warm a smile as he could manage, which seemed to set the group of pokemon even more at ease than they already were. It was nice to see that they weren’t tense per se, but more… uneasy, for some reason. “Something the matter?” he asked, eyebrow raised.

Both Chief and the golduck seemed to go to explain, going to great lengths to make themselves understood. At least, in Golduck’s case, since Chief was a little limited in that regard. Between the two though, they managed to get across their point well enough.

The pokemon were getting a little antsy.

Funnily enough, the gyarados were fine, since they had their dances, but everyone else kind of needed to burn some energy. They danced too, but not as much as the sea serpents, for one, and for another, not all of them were as eager. Pierce found all this incredibly ironic, really, since gyarados were supposed to be the troublesome ones.

“I’ll see what I can do,” he mused out loud, already having a few ideas to run through Misty and some of the staff. That was for later though. At that moment, he turned back to the Water types around him and addressed the point that had left him curious before. “So, you’re another leader here?” he asked curiously, looking at the golduck.

Immediately, the pokemon’s posture straightened, stiff and serious, and she quacked.

“Hm, well, we’re all counting on you to help around, yeah?” he said, patting the pokemon’s head. In turn, she quacked again, standing a little taller. “Coordinate with Boss and Chief if you need to, yeah? Although, I don’t think I needed to say that,” he commented, glancing towards the sharpedo, who barked a response that Pierce interpreted as ‘leave it to us’ or some such. “Well, they are almost done over there,” he pointed out, looking towards Misty and the gyarados again.

He considered things for a bit then and decided that he might as well go through with his idea. If everyone else decided to leave him out to dry, then he’d just have to pull it off by himself, even if it’d make it a little less… effective. It’d still work, probably. Besides, he rather doubted he’d be told no. If nothing else, because he was still the one in charge of the sanctuary, laidback as he tried to be.

“Can you two go around and gather everyone that’s feeling a little restless?” he asked and both Chief and the golduck nodded. “We’ll be burning some energy once everyone’s here. By the way though,” he told them before tilting his head at the golduck. “What should we call you?”

[}-o-{]

“Fake Out,” he called and Regulus followed through with an excited meow.

The Normal type was maybe too excited, but then again, it wasn’t often that he had an easy fight where he could enjoy himself. Pierce usually tried to challenge his team, but there was no need for that in this situation. It was more of a game than proper battling, all things considered, and Regulus loved that.

The poliwag they were facing wasn’t going to just roll over though, retaliating the attack with a Mud Shot that the meowth very much did not appreciate. Pierce followed that with a Scratch, to which the poliwag responded with a Pound. Little guy was surprisingly fierce for as small and weak as it was. That was a Fighter if he’d ever seen one. Pierce didn’t need a Psychic to know that much. Just the first few move trades had given it away.

‘Idea was good,’ he thought, glancing to the side.

Misty had agreed with him and organized the staff members that dealt with pokemon to put together a sort-of-but-not-really battle tournament with the pokemon of the sanctuary. It’d allow them to burn some energy and everyone would have a good time, hopefully. Pokemon liked battling, after all, and so long as they didn’t get too carried away, it’d all be fine.

The gyarados weren’t allowed to battle though, too big a risk. Which made it very convenient that they could deal with their energy and pent up aggression through competitive dancing. Convenient and also a little funny to think about, Pierce would admit.

“Dig,” he called, focusing back on his current spar and noticing that Regulus was starting to take the battle more seriously now that he’d gotten hit a few times. Not a lot of damage though, unless one counted the meowth’s pride. ‘Need more range options,’ he noted to himself.

Sure, Regulus was working on Water Pulse, but something else would be good too. ‘Pay Day,’ he decided almost immediately. His pokemon should have an easy time learning that one. Hell, maybe they could balance that with Water Pulse like how he balanced two moves with Bellatrix to prevent frustration. Something hard and something easy… ‘Yeah, I like the sound of that.’

“Move and Scratch,” he called, taking a deep breath and swaying to the side when Regulus dodged a Water Gun and clawed at the poliwag. Slowly, he got into the flow of things and even after they dealt with poliwag, both Pierce and Regulus felt like continuing, so they called for the next opponent.

Some of those in the sanctuary weren’t that high level, really, what with most of them being wild pokemon that had just been swept into the Wave. Yes, some were strong, but there’d been a few mostly harmless ones in the mix too. Those were the ones that he was pitting against Regulus, since he was the new one in his team and thus the “weakest” even if he’d never call him that to his face. The gap wasn’t even that big anyway.

Eventually, his Normal type got tired though. That’s when he swapped with Andromeda, who wouldn’t have any trouble holding back so that the weaker pokemon of the sanctuary weren’t too harshly defeated. Following her was Orion, who didn’t like the match ups – at all –, but went for it all the same.

After that came Bellatrix, who couldn’t hold back but also wasn’t the best battler in the team, even if she was big, scary and strong. She was still getting the hang of things, really, and that was partially Pierce’s fault for coddling her a little too much. Following her was Cygnus, competitive but still smart enough not to overdo it.

Last was Narcissa, the one who knew not the meaning of the word restraint. She faced exclusively the members of the school that could put up a decent fight. One of them even managed to defeat her, which was when Pierce ran out of pokemon. He then started commanding some of the sanctuary Water types until everyone got at least one fight done. Some of them even got several though. Having time to recover and never really fighting until the other side dropped kind of helped with that.

“That was a good idea,” Misty commented once all fights were wrapped up. The staff was now going around treating the pokemon that had gotten a little too roughed up. Everyone seemed to be feeling fairly good though, in their own way. It was like they’d all finished a workout instead of what felt like a good two hours of fighting. “They’ll feel that in the morning, but they’ll also have calmed down plenty,” the redhead said, looking pretty pleased herself. “Which is good. I hear you want to leave?”

“I’ll try and see if I can continue my journey now that things are mostly done here, yeah,” he said, taking a deep breath in and then letting it out in a long sigh. He’d burned plenty of energy himself, even if all he’d done was give orders. His mind was tired, that was for sure. Maybe his method of battling was a little too taxing on his poor, smooth brain. “I think you and Grace can hold down the fort well enough, by the looks of it.”

“And you’ll be a call away,” Misty added with a grin. “Leave it to us. We promise not to burn the place to the ground.”

“I’d be concerned if you could manage that, what with all the Water types,” he joked, getting a smack to his arm – the good one, thankfully – for his troubles. Admittedly, it’d been a very bad joke, but still. “You doing alright yourself though? This what you wanted?”

“I think it is,” she replied, nodding and looking off towards the pokemon. “I’m liking this a lot more than I thought I would. Maybe it’s because it’s new, but I’m enjoying myself.”

“Glad to hear that,” Pierce told her, absently reaching to scratch at the top of his cast again. ‘One more week,’ he told himself, sighing. “Well, should be about time for dinner soon, right?” he mused out loud, getting a confirming hum from the redhead by his side. “Neat. You finish wrapping up here. I’m starving.”

“Wha-? Hey!” she started, a little scandalized. Did she expect him to invite her? No way. There was work to be done, after all. “Stupid boss,” he heard her grumble behind him.

Sometimes it was nice to be the one in charge, he decided with a grin.

[} Chapter End {]

Hey guys! How’s it going?

Some more sanctuary before, apparently, leaving it and continuing the journey. I thought Pierce was going to stay like, at least one or two more chapters here, but maybe he decided not to challenge the Cerulean Arc just yet. In truth, there’s several reasons for him wanting to leave and continue his journey other than what’s been stated, but that’s something for the next few chapters.

I hope you guys enjoyed the chapter.

Discord Link: discord.gg/UTDransjJZ

Random Question: So, people in the Discord server should be aware of this, but I recently stumbled into two plot bunnies that seem to be oddly compelling for no apparent reason. What’d you be more interested in me writing, a PJO fic or a Worm fic? (A small summary of these ideas can be found in the Discord server.)

See you.