Searching Far and Wide - 123

Teams: Pierce Lawson: - Narcissa, Beedrill - Orion, Onix - Cygnus, Kadabra - Bellatrix, Gyarados (Shiny) - Andromeda, Vaporeon - Regulus, Me

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

Vermillion City XVI

 “Well, that was a lot faster than I thought,” Pierce commented, leaning back, eyes slightly wide as he took in what Grace had just told him. The woman – picture of poise, as usual, with not a single platinum hair out of place – simply smiled at him, visibility pleased with herself.

“Well, the space you found was good and your plan for future expansions was smart too,” she said. Strangely, it didn’t feel like a compliment for him though. Almost felt like she was complimenting herself somehow. That was kind of annoying… but also impressive. How’d she even manage that? “I went over the League’s standing in regards to the sanctuary. With your estimate on the number of pokemon you can call on in case of emergencies, the League is willing to cover most of the costs to run the place, actually. Likely not all of them, but they are going to give you more of a bonus to get the entire thing running. This is without taking into account possible growth of your force-”

Hearing the school being called a force was certainly… something. Pierce wasn’t sure he liked that. However, calling it a school probably wasn’t very appropriate in this case. After all, chances were that he might “recruit” pokemon that weren’t Water types down the line.

Calling it recruiting sounded just as bad as force, he found out at that moment.

“-which will increase what you’ll be paid as an asset-”

Hearing her call him an asset struck him as similarly wrong, if he were quite honest. He knew neither she nor the League meant anything by it, but it was kinda… Oh well, so long as things worked, he supposed.

No use making an issue of something that small.

“-, but it’ll be a balancing act between the space available and the pokemon you can have join your force. We’ll likely still have to cover some of the costs and any expansion we make. I do think this has taken a turn for the better. You might not even have to wear some of the abominations the companies presented to me,” Grace continued explaining. It was a good thing that she mostly dumbed it all down for him, otherwise he imagined he would likely get lost in what she said. As it was, he managed to get most of what was thrown his way.

“That all sounds good to- Wait, what do you mean some of the abominations?” Pierce started, before backpedalling and directing attention towards a rather important bit Grace had just dropped on him. The woman didn’t seem phased by that. If anything, she looked amused.

“I’ll be sending to you the ones I think you should consider together with their benefits, pay and other important pieces of information,” she replied and if she thought he didn’t notice that she was kind of avoiding directly answering, then she had another thing coming. Noticeably, she didn’t send him that list at that very moment, which was also concerning. What kind of shit were these companies wanting him to wear for paid advertisement?

“... Anything else we should discuss right now?” he asked, kind of dreading an answer by then. At least Grace looked a lot more chipper than other days. Evidently, things were going very smoothly on her end. Maybe the numbers for his insane project were starting to make more sense. That was encouraging.

“We might as well start considering employers to run the sanctuary for you. The Sisters have started sending people and CVs my way, but I haven’t gotten to look into that,”  she commented, pulling a folder from out of the camera’s range and flipping through a few pages. “The League has some recommendations too, but half of them are for less experienced people that they want to offer a chance to grow. There’s some promising files on that side of the list, admittedly, one in particular.”

“I can start looking into those, just send them over,” Pierce told her, leaning back once more. He hadn’t even realized he’d leaned forward in the first place, honestly. “Speaking of, I’ve been meaning to talk about this with you, but is all this too much?” he asked, and the woman seemed a little taken aback by that, looking up and blinking at him. “Because if it is, we can put some resources into getting you some help, right? Hire some other people, form a team. This might be more than you were thinking it’d be when you agreed to work with me,” he explained as best he could, hoping he wasn’t messing it up.

Once more, Pierce found himself lamenting the fact that people weren’t as easy to deal with as pokemon.

“... I see,” Grace mumbled, eyes narrowed. He had the sudden realization that maybe he’d screwed up somehow. “A team… How would this team work, exactly? What would I be in charge of?” she asked, voice measured and cold in a way that reminded Pierce of their first meeting. It also had the added effect of making him realize that she’d changed the way she spoke a whole lot since they started. He hadn’t even noticed, but he was definitely missing what little warmth had managed to appear in her ice-cold attitude.

“I mean, you’re the expert, right? And you know everything about my business,” he started with, scrambling to find the right words. Was calling it his business accurate or the best way to put it? It sounded wrong to his ears, but that might just be the sudden nerves talking. “I just wanted to make sure you weren’t getting overwhelmed or anything. You know, I thought I’d offer the chance to delegate some of your work and all that.”

“... So, you want me to form a team… to lead a team to manage your business,” she mumbled, her voice odd once more, but this time differently than before. That also confirmed to him that business hadn’t been the right word, but it wasn’t wrong enough for her to say something else, so he imagined it worked just as well? He decided to focus his attention on the important parts of what she said.

“Yeah, exactly. Can you do that? If you want to wait until we’re done with this or you don’t want that at all, I completely understand. I’m planning on giving you a raise either way. You deserve it, with all that you’ve been doing as of late,” he replied and he was rewarded for all his conversational stumbling with a beaming smile from the usually measured woman.

He decided that, despite all the inner panic, the talk was a definitive win.

[}-o-{]

Idly, he looked up from his medicine book and towards the sea. There, he saw both Narcissa and Cygnus training their mobility, dodging weak moves thrown their way by the school of Water types. Further to one side, Andromeda and Bellatrix were working with another group of pokemon on Ice type moves. The gyarados still polishing Ice Fang and the vaporeon taking a break from her struggles with Dig to get started with Aurora Beam. She already knew Haze, which should give her a nice and easy start with that.

As for Regulus and Orion, they much preferred to stay away from the water, but there were some Water types that didn’t mind indulging that for some light spars on the beach.

Everyone seemed to be doing well, from what he could tell. Narcissa was having the time of her life, already having gotten out of her system all the aggression and now happy to be doing something dynamic that would strengthen her. Otherwise, Pierce knew she’d have been tempted to attack back. Cygnus was doing well too. Hadn’t gotten hit once. Although…

‘You’re slowing down,’ he projected out as best he could, making the tail of a slowbro by his side twitch. Being no master of the Psychic Arts, he couldn’t be expected to send thoughts to specific targets, really. He thought it was already a wonder he could purposely project thoughts loudly for others to pick up. Was it the equivalent of shouting something out the window? Yes, but it got the job done, so long as there wasn’t a need for secrecy.

Besides, he just needed to get Cygnus’ attention so that the kadabra would connect with his mind again.

“I am,” the pokemon acknowledged, if reluctantly. “I can still keep going though,” he added stubbornly, and that was much more what Pierce expected. Now, he could tell the kadabra to stop, but that wouldn’t be well received. He could wait for a little longer, but the pokemon would push until he dropped. So, trying to strike a balance was paramount…

‘If there’s so much as a close call, you stop,’ he ordered, putting as much steel in his mental voice as he could. He liked to think he succeeded in driving the point across when he noticed Cygnus’ back straightening the smallest bit in between teleports. ‘If I have to treat more than one hit when you stop, you will regret it.’

“... Noted,” the kadabra said, somewhat meekly before the connection between their minds grew thinner once more.

Nodding to himself, Pierce glanced around once more and then turned back to his studies. There was a lot to work on, after all. Even with all the extra time he had on account of not being able to move as much – due to his injury as much as his newly increased fame –, he still didn’t feel like he could get everything done. He had to study medicine, make plans for training and battling, analyze information for the sanctuary and also try to keep somewhat of a social life.

That last one, at least, didn’t require too much work. Daisy was busy most of the day, between Gym duties and show ones, but they still tried to get at least a call in every day. Lily was – thankfully, even if the reason for it sucked – fairly busy too, by the look of things. His ex-traveling companion seemed to have attached herself at the hip to both Red and Blue. She still sent messages, but mostly she seemed to be trying her best to reassure herself of her friends’ continued state of living.

He couldn’t begrudge her that, honestly.

Pierce was just happy that she hadn’t dropped him like a hot potato. If anything, she seemed genuinely intent in sending him as many messages as she could get away with. He supposed a fair bit of her fear had been because of him during the Vermillion incident and he felt bad for that. Her childhood friends still took priority, but that made sense. Not only did they have friendship seniority, but there’d been a lot more fear of them dying involved.

Again, Pierce completely understood.

He still didn’t really know what to do with himself most of the time though. He loved his pokemon to bits, but not only did he spend his every waking hour with them around, they were also not… the same as a human. No offense to his battle maniacs or anything, but there was a very noticeable difference there that they couldn’t really make up for.

Thankfully, his laidback attitude kind of transformed even the business talks with Grace and such into pseudo-social conversations.

“You’re not too busy, are you?” a voice asked and he blinked, perking up. People usually didn’t approach him while he was at the wharf. After all, no matter how much everyone seemed to love him, the school terrified them more. So, he was curious about who had decided to come and talk to him. That is, until his distracted mind got back to work and placed the voice and from where he knew it from.

“Misty,” Pierce greeted with a smile, the youngest of the Sensational Sisters grinning back at him. “How have you been?” he asked.

“Busy,” she replied, and in just a second her expression turned plenty weary. “Certainly couldn’t get bored though, between what happened here-” she commented, glancing rather meaningfully at the school. “-and then having to cover for my sisters while they went out to look for the Anne and the survivors.”

“I can imagine,” he said, a tired smile of his own on his face. “Your Zone saw a lot of action?”

“Not was much as you did, that’s for sure,” Misty replied, but his stare made her sigh. “It wasn’t fun, no. There were plenty of pokemon coming our way too. It was nothing compared to over here though, I know that much.”

“I mean, I didn’t have to face that all by myself-”

“You sure about that?”

“-, not for long, at least,” Pierce amended quickly after her interruption, drawing a smile from the girl. “Still, this isn’t a competition.”

“You sure about that?” she added jokingly, but her softened expression gave the game away. “It’s good to see you doing well though.”

“As well as I can,” he said with a chuckle as he tapped on his cast. “Good to see you’re fine too. Here for a break?”

“Yeah… and to check on you,” she answered, the last bit so straightforwardly honest that it caught him off guard a little. While he recovered from that, Misty moved to take a seat by his side on the wharf. “Believe it or not, it’s not just Daisy that’s fond of you,” she added, looking off towards the horizon instead of at him. “I know I kind of… got shoehorned in with the whole gyarados phobia thing and all, but still,” she mumbled, looking like she was trying to not appear restless and failing. She shifted where she sat, her hands twitching as if she were stopping herself from fidgeting and she was decidedly still not looking at him. “I’m sure my sisters have told you, but we don’t get a lot of friends with the life we lead.”

“I was told something to that effect,” he commented as he tried to find the right words for such direct speech. Daisy had told him something like that, he was pretty sure, when they had started going out. “And I do consider you a friend too, I just… I guess I was unsure too, but I did ask a lot about you from your sisters whenever I could. I’m glad to hear you’re doing well,” he offered, hoping that’d help.

If the almost beaming smile he got was any indication, it did.

“I’m glad to hear that,” she commented before once more looking away from him. “I see you’re doing well too, all things considered. I’ve been told about what you’re trying to do,” she added and he waited for her to add something. It sounded like she would, at least. Although, he started doubting that assumption when she remained silent after that. That is, until he saw her grow nervous once more.

Well, Misty seemed to be having a day of all time, by the looks of it.

“Do you think I could work in that sanctuary?” she asked and he blinked at her. “I’m not a full Gym Leader, not like my sisters. I’m more like a very high up Gym Trainer, and that’s great and all, but sometimes I feel like doing other things, you know?” Well, it looked like once she got the words going, she couldn’t stop herself. Certainly a shift from her shy self from before, that was for sure. “And I love them to bits, but they have their shows that also occupy a lot of their time and I kind of wanted something for myself. And then I heard about your sanctuary, so I thought-”

“Misty,” Pierce interrupted, an amused smile on his face. “Breathe, would you?”

She chuckled nervously at that, but did as he told her. Taking a deep breath in, the girl in front of him crumbled the smallest bit, slumping and bringing her hands together to wring her fingers. Certainly different from the usually confident girl, but Pierce had seen her at plenty such points in her life, from what he knew.

He couldn’t help but feel that much worse for that.

“You don’t have to explain yourself to me,” he told her, pushing his shoulder against hers playfully. “Just prepare a CV, send it to Grace and we’ll look it over. You know, a bit of a formality. I rather doubt you won’t be qualified enough,” he commented with a grin, although she didn’t look so sure. He almost rolled his eyes at that. If Misty Waterflower wasn’t qualified to deal with pokemon in a preserve, then he didn’t know who would. Surely she could at least work with Water types, so long as they weren’t gyarados and what not.

That was the bare minimum that he expected.

Call him a nepotist, but Pierce decided then and there that he’d do his best to get her a spot. It obviously meant something for the girl if she’d almost had a meltdown while asking him for the job. He wasn’t sure why, even with her word vomiting, but he didn’t need to know either. He’d just have to help her.

“You’ll be fine and it’ll be nice to have someone I know in the sanctuary. Maybe I can make you my liaison of sorts,” he pointed out and as he said it, he rather liked that idea. After all, he’d admit, in the privacy of his mind, that he wasn’t a fan of just leaving the school and whatever other pokemon joined afterwards in the hands of strangers, qualified or not. He knew first hand that there could be bad people anywhere, after all. So, he’d be much more at ease if there was someone there that he could one hundred percent trust.

“I won’t let you down,” Misty mumbled, some of her confidence coming back with the appearance of a slight smile. “Probably.”

“Very reassuring,” he replied with a wide grin and a roll of his eyes.

[}-o-{]

[Misty Waterflower]

She only noticed the wide smile on her face halfway through her “exercise”.

Her mind had been, up until that point, too focused on the pokemon ahead and what the best course of action would be following that. There was a lot to take into account for Pierce’s dance routines, after all, no matter how easy the man made it look. One had to juggle minding the position of every pokemon, what the best move was from that point and what signal the pokemon could actually see and correctly interpret. The same motion could mean several different things depending on when it was made, after all, since the pokemon’s position could affect that a lot.

She had been getting better at that though, to the point Misty was confident she could pull off a gyarados show like Pierce’s. At least, one with less of the sea serpents, of course. She wasn’t that crazy. Yet. The idea was tempting though, ever since she’d gotten over her overpowering fear and started working with the pokemon like Pierce taught her.

It wasn’t about not being scared, it was about not letting that fear control you.

Cliché, but true.

She repeated that to herself a lot after she’d understood, and it had certainly helped her get better. However, even with her phobia – or pseudo-phobia – out of the way for the most part, Misty still didn’t… feel much better in Cerulean. She loved her sisters to bits, she really did, but she always felt like the odd one out. She’d joined their shows and even tried to get more involved. Hell, half the reason she was working on the gyarados show thing was because of that.

However, that really didn’t help much.

It was always the Sensational Sisters… and Misty. She knew everyone made that separation in their minds, no matter how much her siblings tried to push the fact that she was part of that set. Daisy, Lily and Violet were the Sensational Sisters, not her. She was fine with that too, but it did feel… grating at times. Like there was something she didn’t have, something missing, and she’d decided to try and find it.

She didn’t have any idea if what she was looking for was waiting for her in Pierce’s sanctuary, but that seemed like as good a place as any to start looking. The man had managed to solve one of the biggest issues she’d had, maybe he could help with another. And, to be fair, there was nothing to lose going to a place that’d help pokemon. Worse came to worst, Misty would have done something worthwhile with her time all the same.

It had been the opportunity that presented itself, she supposed. Maybe it’d work, maybe it wouldn’t, but either way she’d at least be doing something about the problem. That was something else she’d learned during her time working on her gyarados issue. She didn’t want to wait until the solution was dropped on her.

She needed to do something about it.

So, that was what Misty was trying to do.

“You’re doing great,” she heard Pierce comment and she smiled a little wider, thinking that he was talking about her decision, her attitude, instead of the way she was handling the Water types. This was made easier when he just stepped beside her and didn’t add anything to that, simply watching the pokemon dance in front of her.

He might have broken her out of the trance she’d entered, but she wasn’t angry about that. Much as she was proud of what she was trying to do, she didn’t want to think about it too much. The entire thing didn’t make her feel great, really. That’s why it was an issue, after all. Misty was all too happy to just focus on moving, herself and the Water types.

“I’m sorry for just dropping by to ask for a job,” she said during a particularly slow part, with the pokemon floating about in easy patterns. “I just… Well, with my sisters back and taking over the Gym while I took a break from covering for them… I got time to think, I guess.”

“Again, you don’t have to explain things to me if you don’t want to,” Pierce replied softly, turning to give her a smile. Misty wondered if he knew how reassuring that was to look at. No wonder the pokemon loved him, even in the middle of crises. Faced with that, she could believe that things would be alright.

Not only that, but there was a sense of… confidence, clarity, assuredness coming from him. He stood there, looking to the world like he had no problems, like he was fine and he had everything figured out. She’d heard Daisy say that he was dealing with stuff, looking for his place in the world – and wasn’t that relatable – and yet Misty couldn’t see it. All she could see was a man that could stand, with a broken arm and a half-crumpled half-wet shirt, looking like nothing could phase him at all.

“And if I want to?” she asked, moving her arm sharply up and to the side, making two gyarados leap out of the water and starting another more energetic bit in their dance. Even when it was her own question, she couldn’t help but wonder if she did want to talk about it with Pierce. She felt like she needed to explain things, considering she was the one asking for a favor there, but she didn’t know if she wanted to.

“If you want to, then I’ll do my best to help with whatever I can,” Pierce said and she felt herself relax, even though she hadn’t noticed any tension before. “You’re a friend, Misty, even without your sisters,” he added and something must have shown on her face, because he continued with: “I like to think we spent plenty of time becoming friends while we worked with the gyarados. You said as much, didn’t you?”

Misty guessed he wasn’t wrong, but…

“Or we can get there,” the man told her, smiling a little wider. “I could always use more friends.”

She thought the same, as it turned out.

So she returned his smile with a hesitant one of her own.

And Misty thought she’d made the right decision, wherever it might be taking her.

[} Chapter End {]

Hey guys! How’s it going?

I’d apologize for the sanctuary plotline taking over the story so much compared to everything else, but I find it very fun to write about, honestly. I’m trying to kind of mix it with other stuff as best the Muse will let me and I think it’s going well. I’m mostly enjoying myself because a sanctuary kind of idea has been something I’ve wanted to write for a while. I actually have a side-story that I was kind of working on that tackled this as the main thing as an option for whenever one of my stories ended.

No idea how it happened here instead, but I’m not complaining.

Anyway, I hope you all enjoyed the chapter.

Discord Link: discord.gg/UTDransjJZ

Random Question: I’m gonna blatantly abuse the random question more than I’ve ever done so (just like I did in GoM)… Do you guys know any fun family friendly local co op games? I’ve set up a desktop computer on our living room as a “pseudo-console” and gotten four controllers. So, I’m on the lookout for anything good to play. Right now, we’re getting by mainly playing Horizon Chase Turbo and Pummel Party. I do have Overcooked 2, Unrailed, Brotato, Stick Fights and Inversus ready on the side too though. (I have Stardew Valley and Rocket League in my to-check list too)

See you.