Chapter no.2

Today was meant to be a quiet day – no scheduled visits in or out of camp. So it came to me with surprise when I saw someone attempting to escape our perimeter; he was crawling along the undergrowth, attempting to mask himself with the local flora.

I stared for a moment, reaching for the communicator as I trained the man in my sights.

"Base?" I asked into the receiver, frowning at the slight sound of static. "This is West Guard. We have a civilian making an unscheduled trip from camp. Course of action?"

Static filled my ear for a moment, before the low, gruff tones of a man's voice. "West Guard? This is Commander Flite. How old is the civilian?"

Commander Flite was an old general of approximately forty years. He was a serial womaniser; his service record was his key to success, so to speak. The stories we had been told about him were wondrous; he had supposedly managed to take down a frenzied garchomp with only a weavile claw as a weapon. Probably falsities, but the man was well respected nation-wide. I never fully learnt his full back-story, I only knew that he pushed himself harder than anyone ever did, supposedly to make up for some atrocious crime an ancestor of his had committed.

He never would reveal the full details.

I frowned again, bringing the scope of my rifle to my eye. He carried a withered old book in his left hand, I could see that the cover was frail and in pieces – it made me wonder just how old it was. I was able to find his face easily – rust coloured hair, pale skin, dark blue eyes and a thin build. Shit! I cursed inwardly, identifying him at once. He was Alex Sanders, one of the most promising medics we had within our community.

I swallowed nervously, letting out a hollow sigh. "Approximately fifteen years old, identified as Trainee Medic Alex Sanders," I responded, watching him continue his slow crawl out of camp lines. Just what was he doing? We'd had runaways before, though they'd occasionally been captured and either sold back to us, killed or even betrayed us. And then there were the ones who found Pokémon, and were either eaten by the beasts, or used them to lay waste to our camp.

Why would a medic want to harm people?

Flite's grunt of indecision reverberated in my ears. "Alright West Guard, we're sending someone now to cover your position. Follow and report. Detain if necessary, eliminate if found with pokémon." His voice came out rough and tense, and I found myself understanding why. Alex Sanders was one of Flite's many illegitimate children, though the knowledge was a guarded secret.

The fact that he ordered his child's probable death showed how harsh our culture was.

I nodded emotionlessly. "Roger." Once more focusing after Alex, I made my way down the guard tower, leaping the last few steps to land in the undergrowth. Glancing up, I found my replacement staring after me. I gave him a thumbs up and indicated my objective before I started after the boy, remaining as quiet as I could.

Child of our revered hero or not, if he was endangering us, he wouldn't see the end of the day.

Alex was used to this area – I could tell that much. He navigated through the woods with childish ease, sidestepping pitfalls and local pokémon.

Myself on the other hand, found it a lot harder.

I had the boy constantly focused under the scope of my rifle, though had to multitask with navigating after him without disturbing any pokémon, or giving any indication of my presence. Once or twice I narrowly avoided stepping on the trap leaf of a victreebel, the plants would leave the leaf lying across the floor, and at the first touch of pressure they would swallow you whole, acids dissolving you slowly as you struggled to escape.

A truly horrific way to die.

We slowly made our way into the inside of the forest, where the hairs on the back of my neck all flared on end. Everything about such a location seemed mystical, causing me to frown. I'd never heard any intel on such a place before, so why was it that it existed?

I pressed the communicator in my ear again, whispering as clearly and quietly as I could. "Commander Flite? Have followed the suspect to an unknown location within the Everdeep Woods." I stopped, watching the boy for a moment. He stared at some strange shrine within the centre – it was a poorly constructed totem that gave off a strange green aura. Whatever it was, it was most likely a threat.

"He appears to be waiting for something by some sort of mystical object – possibly pokémon related." I felt my finger slide easily over the trigger of my rifle as I prepared for the worst. "Transmitting location now," I whispered, pressing a small button on my belt. It flashed green once, whirring almost silently with mechanical ease before it silenced. It would take five minutes for a squad to assemble at my location, which gave the boy five minutes to stop his plan.

Or five minutes to live.

The boy stared a moment longer at the shrine before pressing his hands on it and humming gently. My eyes narrowed in suspicion, wondering just what it was he was attempting to do. He continued humming for over a minute, during which I spent the whole time with my rifle pointing squarely at the base of his brain. If he were to do something, I'd stop him before he got the chance.

His humming suddenly stopped, and he stared skyward. I watched after him, barely restraining a hiss as the sky suddenly lit up with a brilliant green light.

Blinking the haze from my eyes, I stared back towards him, finding disbelief running in my veins.

For floating alongside him was a celebi.

Brilliant.

The creatures were natural time travellers, and within pokémon nomenclature were known as legends. All legends had powers unparallel to other pokémon, and were significantly harder to kill.

A celebi had to be disposed of in one shot, one shot that took out both its time travel abilities and its life. Take only the time travel, it would kill you instantly afterwards, and heal within the hour. Its life was only forfeit if it could no longer time travel, otherwise its last instinct was to warp back to a place of healing.

In short, I had one chance to make this.