Searching Far and Wide - 11 (Patreon)

Pewter City V

Neither Pierce nor Lily moved for a long moment then, as they both looked at the smoke rising slowly but decisively up in the air. Lower, closer to the mountain, there was a cloud of the stuff mixed with the dull brown of dust and dirt and probably rock too. ‘So it happened,’ Pierce thought grimly.

He’d suspected, of course, he’d planned for it to happen and what he’d do when it did but… Actually seeing it was another thing entirely. Before, there was a chance that his information was wrong or that maybe he was in a different world from what he knew. However… that wasn’t the case and something had happened Mt. Moon. His guess was the Rockets, of course, but he wasn’t sure and he didn’t want to assume. In the end, all he had to go on was an explosion and a cloud of smoke.

“We have to go to the Pokemon Center,” Lily said, looking more nervous than he’d ever seen her. He simply nodded and the two started on their way there. It was somewhat trainer protocol, in a way. When there was an incident and no call was made for trainer service, one had to move to the nearest Pokemon Center. They were, after all, strategically placed to have trainers in places where they might be needed during an emergency. Barring that, they would at least be in a place where they’d be close to where they needed to be, or so the planning of their locations went.

If Pierce was honest, the last thing he wanted to do was go there. What if they were sent to Mt. Moon to offer help? He really didn’t want to go anywhere close to where the terrorist organization that the League was having trouble with was supposed to be. That was a little out of his range of capabilities, he felt. Especially since all he had was a beedrill… With all the respect to Narcissa, of course, but still.

“What do you think happened?” Lily asked and Pierce grimaced.

“Strong pokemon gone mad? What even is there in Mt. Moon that could do that? A golem?” Pierce asked, trying to steer the conversation away from what he knew was the case. No need to make it sound like he knew more than he should.

“Or Onix, maybe. Even the Clefairy if they were disturbed, I guess,” Lily mumbled, eyes darting between looking at their path and the mountain off into the distance. As they moved, Pierce also started turning around. The residents of Pewter had already noticed what was going on, obviously, and there were nervous, fearful whispers all around. There were also people that started moving along the same way Lily and him were going. Evidently, some citizens were going to see if they had a call to answer to, even if they weren’t active trainers or anything.

Or maybe they were just concerned citizens that wanted to give a hand, who was Pierce to know, really.

The Pokemon Center was more crowded than he’d ever seen it when they arrived. There were so many people that they couldn’t even get in, with them gathering even outside the doors. Fortunately, whispers traveled throughout the place, informing everyone of what was said inside. People also started moving soon, which Pierce guessed meant that there was already information on what was going on and suggestions of what they should do.

If he was honest, he really wasn’t looking forward to that part of being a trainer. Even reading about the fact that he’d have to get involved in such events had made him nervous. He was just a normal guy with a beedrill, why did he have to get involved just so he could travel around and participate in a sport?

He knew why, of course, and he understood, but his mind couldn’t help but complain. Pokemon battles were more than a sport, and the government would be absolutely foolish to not use the power that trainers were. One just couldn’t have that many people, carrying forces of nature, without ways of controlling them at least a little.

Rangers could only go so far, after all. They were a fraction of the number of trainers out there. The disasters that hit the world were also often too much for Rangers to take care of by themselves, in scale at the very least. In power too, sometimes, Pierce had learned.

Looking around, he took some comfort in the fact that he wasn’t the only one feeling uneasy and nervous. However, he was probably the only one questioning things as much. From what he’d found online, these people were used to this. To them, this was how things worked. Having pokemon meant they had a responsibility to do something when shit hit the fan, a responsibility to their region, their city, their friends and family. Because if they didn’t help, there was a very real chance that someone would be affected.

That was another point that set them apart from Pierce, he supposed. He wasn’t from Kanto, he wasn’t from Pewter, and the only friends he had were Narcissa, Lily and her pokemon. If he took his pokemon partner and his friend away from conflict, everything would be fine… Except, he couldn’t do that, because Lily did have things to get involved for.

It was a bitter realization, the one that he had at that moment. So, instead of going far, far away from the conflict, he continued moving forward as people started leaving the Center towards Mt. Moon. Interestingly, some of them didn’t seem to be heading straight to the mountain though. Some of them left in slightly altered paths that made him wonder if there was even more stuff happening than what he could guess from half remembered pieces of fanfic knowledge and such.

Soon enough, Lily and Pierce walked inside the Pokemon Center.

He was almost surprised by the changes on the reception. On the walls, where there’d been screens with the news and queue lists and such, now they were filled with different information about what was going on where and the big one behind the desk showed a map with the zones of importance highlighted. People all but flooded the reception desk too, asking questions from what he could pick up but that was about it. Pierce was honestly surprised the three nurses that were working there were as calm as they looked.

“Maybe we should go there?” Lily asked next to him and he turned to look at the screen she was pointing at, grimacing as someone pushed against his other side from behind. “The forest pokemon seem to have gotten into a fight with pokemon from the mountain,” she explained to him, not really looking at him.

Sure enough, Pierce saw the screen and it looked concerning. There were beedrill swarms, even butterfree ones, packs of rattata and raticate and more. There were onix and members of the golem line. There were zubat, sandshrew and paras. And between all of them attacks flew around, lighting up the place like the messiest firework show.

It looked like what he imagined a warzone would.

“Weren’t you telling me about not going towards swarms the other day?” he asked wryly to mask his nerves. Looking around… the other places didn’t look better. Everywhere was a mess. Mt. Moon’s entrance seemed to have collapsed and there was said to be an absolute mess of a fight going on inside. There was one camera of that too, but it showed very little. There was another commotion at the outside of the mountain too, but the only thing they could show was cameras approaching and then static. There was something there taking out anything and everything that approached that part. “What the fuck?”

“I think that’s… the best place for us to go, honestly,” Lily said, visibly gulping. “Maybe you can talk to the beedrill, calm things down… a little bit.”

“I can try, but the last time worked because those trainers weren’t really attacking,” he mumbled, running his fingers through his hair. “With all that mess going on… Although…”

“You thought of something,” Lily pointed out as they approached the desk little by little. From what Pierce was picking up, the trainers were asking for where they’d best help with what they had. The nurses, for their part, seemed to be directing them as best they could and taking note of everything. “What is it?”

“How likely do you think it is that I could get the butterfree to hear me out?” he asked, looking at that particular zone as he tried to think up ways to help there. Battling the veritable horde of pokemon into submission was a laughably ridiculous endeavor. The rangers and trainers already there seemed to be mostly trying to contain the mess so it wouldn’t spread and they were having trouble with just that. There were just too many pokemon wreaking havoc there.

“For anyone else, not very. For you, I think you could stand a chance,” Lily told him, although she didn’t look very sure.

“Name and pokemon,” the nurse demanded immediately once they reached the desk, interrupting that conversation.

“Pierce Lawson, Beedrill,” he said instantly, a little taken aback by the firm tone, even when he’d already heard it used on the people before. It just clashed quite hard with what he knew of the nurses there from the other days.

“Zone 5, mainly containing the wild pokemon, follow the ranger’s orders,” the woman said instantly, noting something down on the computer in front of her. “Next,” she called then as he moved aside to let someone else move.

‘Zone 5,’ Pierce thought to himself. That was the forest zone, which made him purse his lips as he realized that he really would have to go there.

“I have to go to Zone 2,” Lily told him once they met out of the Center. “That’s the cave entrance. The man said Root and Talon would be better there, helping clear out the blockage and keeping an eye out,” she explained, looking upset, nervous and guilty, for whatever reason.

“Guess we have our destinations,” Pierce said, trying to keep his mind calm and working. “I have to go to Zone 5,” he added, almost as an afterthought realizing that she didn’t know what he’d been told.

“Be careful, Pierce, and don’t do anything stupid,” she told him, patting his arm.

“When have I ever?” he asked, receiving a shake of her head in response. “Good luck. Be careful yourself.”

“See you later,” Lily said, and they went their separate ways.

As he moved Pierce’s mind worked through plans to help there. Surely there were other things they could do instead of just trying to keep the wild pokemon where they were, right? If they left the creatures fighting amongst themselves like that… He could only imagine the damage that would be dealt all around.

So, he came up with some ideas… He was really hoping that he’d get to implement them. The nurse had said to follow the ranger’s orders. Would he even be able to do what he wanted there or would he be told to stay away? If the latter was the case… He didn’t think he’d argue much. They were the ones that knew the world around them better and worked with such things all the time. If they told Pierce his ideas were bad… Well, that’d be it.

No need to be stubborn and get himself killed, after all.

Still though… he had to try.

If only so he wouldn’t be haunted by pictures like the field of dead pokemon he was imagining the aftermath of the whole thing would be.

[}-o-{]

Once he was mostly out of Pewter City, Pierce followed the example of others that were on the same track as him and started jogging his way to his zone. He almost hadn’t noticed how… relatively calm things were in the city. Nobody was running, everyone just walked around, even with what was happening all around them. Either they were used to it, or they’d been taught very thoroughly what to do in such situations.

Pierce really hoped it wasn’t the former, if he was honest.

As he ran towards his destination, Narcissa buzzed next to him. She could have gone much faster, but he’d told her to save her strength. Something told him that they’d need all the advantages they could have once they made it to Zone 5. Especially with the way things looked and sounded once he started getting closer.

Soon enough, Pierce was greeted by the sight of trainers all over the place, forming a sort of line that spread from side to side. It looked like a dam had been placed there in the form of people and pokemon to contain the wave of wild creatures and attacks.

“See if you can hit any of the wild ones with ranged attacks, Narcissa, but stay close to me!” Pierce shouted over the deafening sound of… He didn’t even know how to describe what was going on around him except for maybe disaster. ‘Talk the beedrill into calming down? Into leaving? What a joke,’ were Pierce’s thoughts as he looked on, feeling his face pale.

Back in the forest, approaching the beedrill swarm had looked doable enough. Dangerous for sure, but doable. The bug types were reasonable enough, he’d found within a few days. One just needed to not be an idiot. Simple enough, right?

There was no way he’d be able to talk to any of the pokemon in Zone 5.

Things had looked bad back at the center through the screens, but it was ten times worse in person. The noise was almost deafening, like being in the middle of a club with the music so loud you could barely hear yourself, let alone others. Except, instead of rhythm, there was absolute chaos. Winds blew, rocks flew and things exploded. There were cries, shouts, screams, wails and howls all over the place. It was a wonder he’d been able to command Narcissa at all.

‘What am I supposed to do?’ Pierce thought to himself as he looked around at the other trainers for an idea. To his dismay, everyone else seemed to have as much of an idea as he did. Everyone was simply throwing attacks at the mass of pokemon in front of them, seemingly hoping for the best. It was baffling but understandable, he supposed. Most of them weren’t even proper trainers.

Even the rangers he caught sight of weren’t doing much more differently than the rest of trainers, surprisingly enough. What chance did he have when even the professionals didn’t dare even approach the mass of raging pokemon? It was all madness, what was happening at Mt. Moon, what was happening there, what they were doing and what they were fighting.

And things were just getting started.

There was a loud boom somewhere in the middle of the pandemonium and the very earth under Pierce’s feet trembled. That was only a signal of what was to come though, because a handful of seconds later, the ground broke and shifted. It was like one of those movie scenes where the earth was split open by an earthquake, rocks rose from the ground like deformed pillars. Then purple Poison Sting needle’s rained from above, and everything started looking even worse than before as winds picked up, creating a cyclone of dust, needles and rocks.

And through it all, the only thing Pierce and everyone else could do was shout for their pokemon to try and mitigate the damage. That was when the rangers acted though, their much stronger pokemon being able to stop the mayhem before it reached them. All of a sudden, their efforts to stop the raging creatures, their little dam, was looking like the shoddiest thing Pierce had ever seen.

[}-o-{]

Four hours.

That’s how long the madness lasted. Even at that point, it hadn’t really stopped, but it was then that the pokemon started calming down. As the chaos of lights and elements settled, Pierce’s heart twisted into knots. The sight that greeted him when the air cleared was… He didn’t even know how to describe it, but it was certainly worse than the chaos from before.

There were pokemon spread over the ground unconscious – ‘Or dead,’ a part of his mind despaired – as far as his eyes could see. Limbs were twisted in clearly unnatural angles and some were completely detached. Blood was splattered all over the dull brown ground, staining it a disgusting tone of burgundy. Some pokemon weren’t completely still, but Pierce didn’t know if that was truly a good thing as he saw them try to crawl away pitifully.

To make bad things worse, he noticed something else, something that wasn’t even truly related to the pokemon. He saw some of the trainers around leaving. They just… recalled their pokemon and went on their way, like there wasn’t a massacre in front of them. Like it was none of their business now that things had calmed down and there wasn’t imminent danger anymore.

It was disgusting.

“Ok, everyone!” a ranger called then, and it took a moment for Pierce to realize that there were some move shenanigans involved for him and probably everyone else to be able to listen. “There’ll be efforts made to help the wild pokemon recover from this. Anyone that catches a pokemon in this area will be punished for the next day. Anyone that wants to help, if you don’t have a First Aid License, then find a ranger and help them however they might need.”

That was the end of it before the rangers started moving forward and doing their thing. Pierce saw even more people leaving after that, but some did offer to help, even on their own. He knew in which group he would be, that was for sure.

“You don’t have a license either?” the ranger he approached asked and Pierce shook his head. “Ok, take this,” he said, throwing a Preserving Box at him that he barely managed to catch. “I’ll ask you to pass me some things and I’ll explain the basics as I go, pay attention and maybe I’ll let you help out. Would certainly speed things up.”

“Shouldn’t I need a license for that?” Pierce asked even as he moved behind the ranger.

“Do you see this mess?” the ranger asked, waving a hand to signal the entirety of Zone 5 as he knelt down next to a butterfree with its wing twisted in an unnatural angle. “If it’s just us rangers and a handful of licensed people, we’ll be here for a while. We’ll need all the help we can get, unofficially. Besides, everything you do, I’ll check to make sure you don’t mess up. Should, hopefully, speed things up at least a little. Now pass me a potion, will you? Also, if you are squeamish, you might want to look away from this.”

Pierce did as he asked, but looked on with a frown. He was a squeamish person, the sight of blood nauseated him on good days, but he didn’t want to turn away. He wanted to help, and if that meant seeing, and possibly doing, some things that would turn his stomach and maybe make him lose his last meal… Then so be it.

After feeling so helpless throughout the whole ordeal, he needed to do something. Else, he’d feel horrible for who knew how long, he just knew. So, he soldiered on as the ranger took the bent wing and, very carefully, twisted it back to a somewhat natural look.

“Pokemon are resilient creatures. They can recover from almost anything as long as it isn’t life threatening or really bad,” the ranger explained as he took the potion Pierce offered and sprayed some of it on the wing. “That wing would have been fine with time, but time is something that these pokemon wouldn’t have otherwise. So, we speed it up a little. Push a broken wing closer to where it should be saves quite a bit of the natural process and the potion heals any damage you might unknowingly do.”

That sounded like some aura shenanigans were involved in the healing process to Pierce. It also sounded like a very… blunt, barbaric way to treat wounds. He didn’t say anything, but it seemed he didn’t need to.

“It’s not ideal, but if we don’t hurry up… Well, it might take us too long to go through all the pokemon here. It’s not only a matter of saving time either. It’s about saving their lives. Some of these pokemon need to be treated fast,” the ranger continued then, as if he had read Pierce’s thoughts. Maybe he had, for all he knew. Psychic humans were probably a thing and if not, maybe the guy had a psychic pokemon. “An antidote, please?” he said then and Pierce looked for the item while the man checked on a sandshrew.

That’s how it went from that moment on. The ranger would find a wounded pokemon and ask Pierce for the supplies he would need while dealing with the damage. It was a tedious, stressful task, but Pierce only needed to look at the injured pokemon to simply swallow any discomfort.

They weren’t the only ones in their group for long though. Soon, a woman that could have been around the age of Pierce’s mother joined and then a teenager that seemed to be a new trainer too. At first, all of them were simply helping the ranger, Roy, check pokemon and holding supplies out for him. Soon though, the woman, Nancy, and Pierce himself were allowed to dress wounds themselves with Thomas, the younger man, extending the supplies to them with the help of his mankey.

Pierce felt incredibly slow as he worked, like he was taking forever while the pokemon were suffering on the ground around him. However, he didn’t want to mess up, or forget something. He also didn’t want to waste Roy’s time by making the man have to re-dress wounds and such. He saw it happen with a pidgeotto that Nancy had treated and one look at the woman’s dismayed expression told him that he didn’t want to be in her place.

Better slow work than bad work, he decided.

“Good as new, buddy, go along,” he said softly, palming the space between the ears of the nidoran he’d treated. He was careful not to touch any of the poisonous barbs as he did so though. “Roy over there will check you and then you can go back to your pack, yeah?” he said, signaling to a group of the nidoran line that was situated off to the side. There were nidoran, nidorino and a nidoqueen there, the latter of which seemed to be the most wounded of the bunch, even if she was the one that was standing, looking over the group with an imposing gaze despite the fact that she was covered in bandages.

The little thing Pierce had just treated gave a weak cry before it limped over to the ranger.

He took a deep breath in before sighing wearily.

He wasn’t feeling any better than before, having had to see and deal with the wounds of so many pokemon. He guessed, however, that it was better than how he would feel if he hadn’t done that. It was the lesser of two very shitty situations, he supposed.

“Good work so far, man,” Roy told him then, throwing him a water bottle. “Let’s keep going, yeah?”

“Yeah, of course. I just… yeah,” Pierce mumbled, taking a gulp out of the bottle before pushing himself up and starting to walk towards the next pokemon, who had Narcissa perched next to it to signal Pierce where to go. “Thanks, girl,” he told his pokemon companion, who responded with a buzz before floating herself up a little and dashing to the next pokemon so that she could start calming them down if needed or patch them with a String Shot.

It was going to be a long, tiring day but…

Maybe he would feel better after everything was said and done.

Pierce could only hope.

[} Chapter End {]

Hey guys! How’s it going?

That… didn’t turn out as I thought it would. I had plenty of plans for this, but you know it goes by now, guys. The situation twisted itself into being as you can see – er, read? – and I just went along with it.

Maybe people expected more action from this than they were given, but I honestly couldn’t extend it for longer than I did. I think it’d have turned out a lot of repetition of the same thing, since the whole situation was a chaotic mess until it stopped being so. So, I’m sorry if it wasn’t what you wanted or how you’d have liked it, I guess.

Regarding update time: This post was made at the usual time instead of the time I have been testing with this and DbD, I know. I’m an impatient bastard and I couldn’t wait to get it out there, so since I was free, I did it. I wanted to know though, would it be fine by you if I held the update time a bit flexibly? I’ve had several times when the update time is a bit inconvenient and I’d like to know if it’d be annoying or something if I had to do it earlier or later for whatever reason.

I hope you enjoyed the chapter.

Discord Link: discord.gg/UTDransjJZ

Random Question: Are you squeamish? I very much am.

See you.