Safety In Numbers?

Pushing through the closed doors, they arrived in a room but another door presented itself.

Mark went to open it, but it wouldn't budge. Strangely, it was not until the first door clicked shut, that the next door suddenly opened on it's own.

"Huh? That's weird."

Through the final door, the three were greeted by a forest.

The two children looked around curiously.

Seeing the mentioned arrow in the form of a small wooden sign, the two kids were about to follow it, but then they saw Noah wasn't following behind, so Mark looked back, causing Ashley to pause as well, "Let's go, Noah, we have to follow the arrow."

Noah was rubbing his forehead in thought, a habit when he was trying to figure something out, it was clear what they needed to do now, but Noah was curious about something. Based on his memories, and how long they walked through the sewers, it should be impossible that they arrived here, at most, they would be somewhere in the city.

"Wait a sec, I'm going to check something."

Going back through the door, he opened the second one and found it to be empty, no elevator terminal, nothing except a few broken chairs.

Nah muttered, "Teleportation technology, or something else?"

Ashley and Mark had followed Noah, and they shouted with surprise, "What's going on, where's the elevator?"

Looking to the younger Noah for answers, Noah shook his head, "I don't know either, for now, let's follow the arrow as we were told."

The trees along the path weren't densely packed, and the lack of thick underbrush made it possible to easily move off the path and traverse it if they were so inclined. The chirping calls of pidgey and shrill calls of Rattata could be heard from every direction, giving the three no small amount of worry.

Pokemon are creatures that wield elemental power, and they channel it into what is known as moves. Against an adult, a merely six-pound wild caterpie or a rattata would not be a major threat due to their difference in size, but for children, it would be a life or death struggle. Don't let their small size fool you, even a tackle from a weak seven-pound rattata is a threat to a much larger and heavier ten-year-old child.

Feeling insecure, the two children decided they would run through the path, as fast as they could, while Noah went with the flow and tagged along behind them.

The three came upon a large clearing, and in the clearing was a large wooden building with some smaller cabins orderly placed on its left side.

On the right, however, looked to be something resembling a large arena. Noah thought it as such because he didn't think there would be much point in digging a large thirty-meter wide hole eight feet down for no reason.

Standing in front of the larger building were two men, and pinned to their chests were two emerald R-shaped tokens.

The two children seemed to get cold feet, so Noah led the group towards them, before Noah could say anything, a middle-aged man with a scar under his left cheek spoke in a deep voice, "Wait inside with the rest"

As Noah was about to open his mouth, he was intercepted by the same man in a tone that gave no room for argument, " No questions!"

Mark and Ashley seemed frightened by the two men's appearances, but Noah smiled to reassure them, "It's alright, for now, let's get inside."

The two children simply nodded and followed Noah through the door, which was held open by the second man. He wore a black mask that covered his whole face, he spoke nothing and only stared with bloodshot eyes.

The inside was brightly lit, almost as bright as the outside sun.

Noah was confused about where they were getting the power from, as there were no power lines, but then he remembered that electricity was generated by voltorbs, and reasoned that they likely have their own voltorb to power it.

Inside the large open room were twenty other kids, and not a single one wore half decent clothing, after all, if you weren't desperate enough, then who would join Team Rocket voluntarily?

The back of the room held an elevated speaking desk giving the place the vibes of an auditorium from earth, except of course the many tables and chairs, and the several hungry children inhaling dry bread at the tables as if it were the most delicious thing in the world.

A brown-haired boy which was taller and better dressed than many of the rest called out, he looked to be nine or ten years old, albeit much taller and more muscular than the others, Noah heard him address the three of them with a friendly wave, and how he pointed to some chairs next to him, "Hey there, why don't you come and talk with us?"

Mark had been timid around the adults, but he gained courage when confronted with a kid around his age.

He looked towards his sister, and pulled her hand, and took the lead, then gave the large boy a firm handshake as they got closer, "I'm mark, this is my sister Ashley, and that's Noah behind me, do you know what's going on?"

In response, the muscular boy gave a charismatic smile, "Call me Nathan, and of course, I know, I've been here for two days already."

After some friendly chatter, the large boy whispered as if what he was going to say was a secret, so Mark leaned in to hear it, "Soon we will choose a pokemon, and then we will have to train it, but that's not all, there's a rumor, if you don't train it very well, then you will fail the next test" Nathan pointed to himself with a confident smile, " I'm very knowledgeable about pokemon and I can teach you three when the time comes, all I ask is you follow me, and listen to what I say, then we can all pass together!"

Noah had been observing his environment while the muscular boy talked, and he found that the children seemed to be separated into three different groups with some sort of unspoken divide between them, so he then reasoned that the others likely formed similar teams, or perhaps they just knew each other beforehand.

"Hey Mark, I think we should think this over first."

Mark looked back surprised, "Huh, why?"

"Just come, I'll explain after."

In response, Nathan only gave the same smile as if he expected the outcome, "Go ahead, talk among yourselves and give me a decision after!"

Moving to an empty area, Mark questioned Noah, "He's offering to help us, what's there to talk about?"

Noah sighed as he felt Mark was a bit too eager, "It might not necessarily be an advantage to join a group when we don't know the situation, it's more than likely that Nathan doesn't know anything more than the rest of us, so how about we wait and see? You also want to protect your sister, so is it a good idea if you allow a boy you don't know to lead you? " Noah gestured towards the other groups for emphasis.

The boy's eyes seemed to come to a realization, "Wait here Ashley, I'll go tell them."

Mark soon returned with a downcast expression, "He said if we aren't going to trust him, and join before the test, then we will be on our own."

Noah shook his head wryly, "There are other groups."

.

Over the next period, two of the other groups went to greet them and offered to let them join, but they were similarly refused.

Periodically, one or two kids, (almost all being boys), would enter through the front door, and a group would come to try to recruit them, and none had refused.

An hour later, when there were fifty kids in total, the scarred middle-aged man from outside walked in from a side door, and behind him was the masked man who could be seen pushing a stacked tray with five levels, and each level held fifty pokeballs.

The kids clamored and chattered excitedly among themselves when they pieced together what was about to happen, but they knew to hold themselves back from angering the scary man. They had seen the man kick a boy unconscious with his boot for annoying him, and word had spread to the rest.

The stern-faced man now stood at the podium and cleared his throat, then spoke with loud gusto, "Welcome to Team Rocket, most of you have dined and fed yourself well for the past few days, but that changes now." The man's eyes narrowed, "You will each be called up five at a time, and you'll each be given two minutes to select a pokemon, then you will walk out the front door and wait outside. Release the pokemon inside if you want, they have all already received some basic disciplinary training, and won't disobey. "

The man saw Noah's group from the back and grinned.

He then called Noah's group, as well as two stragglers up. Surprised to be called right away Mark got up quickly and pulled his sister with him, seemingly wanting to be first to pick.

Caterpie, Weedle, Spearow, Rattata, Pidgey. These were the names plastered in front of each tray.

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If this reaches 50 power stones an extra chapter will appear today! wOOoooooOooo *cough* *sputter*