The Shadow warned the others of his arrival with the slightest blip of Ghost type induced fear from Banette before appearing at their side in the somewhat cramped room of the Pokemon Center.

  “Maw!”

  “Wak…”

  N and Lucas startled, some of the Pokemon turned towards him, but it didn’t much matter, not with what he’d been told in Unova.

  Not wanting to drag things out, he began the conversation by pulling a newly acquired device out, presenting it to his Lord.

  It looked like a watch, in a sense. Clearly meant to be worn around the wrist with how big the plastic strap was, the “face” of the device was very bulky, a mix of blue and black, displaying the current time on a digital screen.

  “I have retrieved a replacement for your phone, Lord N. This is considered an… early access version, so please do be careful with what sort of information you allow it to have. No doubt the creators in Castelia will be monitoring the data received from it particularly closely until the full release in a few weeks’ time.”

  N’s eyes widened as he approached and gently picked the device up out of the Shadow’s hand. “This is the C-Gear?” Lucas walked up beside him, inspecting the device but thankfully knowing better than to let his sticky fingers get all over something for once, even if the Shadow could see the desire in the boy’s eyes.

  The Shadow grimaced. “I… believe so, Lord N.”

  “Mi-kyu?” his Lord’s companion chimed in, clearly unimpressed by that answer.

  The television in the room hissed, and what the Shadow assumed to be the Rotom spoke. “How could you possibly have early access to hardware like this and not even know what it is?”

  He sighed. “The individual I got it from was the… eccentric type. She blazed through the explanations of its functions at a speed I was barely able to keep up with, and her terminology when referring to it was… unclear. In all the marketing I have seen for it, it has been referred to as a C-Gear, but once she started getting into the details she kept referring to it as a Xtransceiver, which for some reason she kept insisting is spelled with an X instead of just spelling out the word cross. Truthfully I am uncertain if the device is the C-Gear and the Xtransceiver is a functionality within the device or vice versa.”

  The Mimikyu’s false head sagged forward. “Kyu…”

  N nodded along. “I would be surprised if there is a marketing department.”

  “Mi?”

  His Lord shrugged.

  Missing conversations like this would always be an annoyance.

  But his duty was his duty all the same, and he would fulfill it. He quickly ran through the features that had been pointed out to him to the best of his ability, wanting to ensure that his Lord knew everything he might need to. He’d taken to adding contact information for him and his fellow Shadows as well, listed under RGB.

  And of course, Rotom quickly vacated the television and infested the new device.

  “Ah…” Rotom’s voice rang out, more clear and crisp than the Shadow had ever heard it, the buzz and hiss of electricity and static no longer noticeable, “There is something about a brand new device that’s truly unparalleled!”

  “Mi-kyu”

  Rotom groaned. “Yes, yes, Rotom knows better than to let it break. That would be quite unfortunate given its location on N’s wrist.”

  His Lord’s eyes narrowed. “You want to be in it while I wear it around? Won’t that be… restricting?”

  “This group is suspicious enough already. Rotom is hoping that people will see it as a simple watch and ignore it rather than harass Rotom because of this new housing. Rotom cannot be bothered answering questions over and over about how Rotom acquired such technology, and early at that.”

  His Lord frowned. “I suppose… but just say the word and I can take it off.” With that, he put the C-Gear on, strapping it to his wrist.

  It was then that the Shadow decided to give the rest of the news he’d come with. Delaying it would be pointless.

  “With that, Lord N, I am afraid that our duties in Sinnoh have concluded.”

  He could feel the prying eyes of the other Shadows on his back after that statement, but they knew better than to question it now.

  “Wile!” the little Steel type cried out, stomping her foot down adorably.

  “Kyu!” Mimikyu barked back at her, causing her to cross her arms and turn away in a huff. Turning to their Lord once more, more unintelligible Poketalk was directed at the green haired king-in-the-making. “Kyu-Mi!”

  “Maro…” the Fire type patted her on the back.

  Their Lord had the smallest trace of a frown on his face. “When you say they’ve concluded, what exactly do you mean?”

  The Shadow sighed, tugging at his mask a bit. “I am afraid that I have not yet been given the full details, but it would seem that our services are required in Unova for an opportunity that is time sensitive. We will be returning there for the foreseeable future.”

  Lucas frowned at that, pouting a bit but not nearly as badly as Mawile.

  Their Lord’s mouth opened for a moment, then closed as he thought better of speaking whatever thoughts ran through his head in that moment. “I see. Thank you for your service then, and I hope your next mission goes well.”

  “Kyu?”

  Their Lord ignored the Mimikyu’s words.

  “Thank you, Lord N, one of his fellow Shadows said from behind him.

  “We wish you luck as well,” the other concluded.

  And with that short goodbye, if you could even call it that, Banette took them away, sinking them into the shadows that gave them their namesake and bringing them far, far from Sinnoh.

  The whims of Lord Ghetsis would be served.

  “Ya can’t tell me that wasn’ sudden,” Mimikyu voiced his concern as they made their way out of the Pokemon Center.

  “Nobody is saying that it wasn’t. There’s simply nothing to be done about it. If they’re needed elsewhere, then they’re needed elsewhere. It’s not like we didn’t travel through Sinnoh just fine before they arrived.”

  Pastoria was really getting busy these days. N supposed that the festival must be happening either tonight or tomorrow with how many people were wandering about, Croagunk at their sides as they filled the streets.

  “I believe Mimikyu is more so suggesting that the suddenness of their departure is suspicious,” Porygon2 chimed in from Lucas’ Pokedex.

  “You’re the suspicious one here!” Rotom refuted from N’s C-Gear.

  N felt a tug on the leg of his pants. “Um, aren’t they the suspicious ones?”

  Using his bone, Marowak pointed to a group in the crowd. A woman in a light pink v-neck t-shirt, a darker pink skirt, her magenta hair done up in a bun with red glasses on her face. Beside her was a man in teal pants, a blue t-shirt, his periwinkle hair framing his face along with a pair of wireframe glasses. At their feet was a very… strange Croagunk. Lanky and misshapen, the cheek pouches looked more like orange balls hanging off its face.

  N took in a deep breath, slowly releasing it before he approached the group. The “Croagunk” tensed up as it noticed them approaching, tugging at the man’s pants, but went ignored as the humans talked.

  “Would you mind explaining what you’re doing here?” He asked, jumping straight to the point.

  “We’re innocent I swear!” Meowth held his hands up in surrender, immediately dropping any pretense of the disguise.

  James grimaced when he realized who had seen through them, but Jessie went straight to haughtiness, tilting her chin up as she was forced to address them. “I don’t know who you think you are, but we do have lives outside of work, you know! So what if we want to enjoy a festival here and there?”

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  N’s eyes slid down to the “Croagunk” at her feet. “Just enjoying a festival, is it?”

  “Yes!” James spoke up, only shrinking back a bit when attention fell on him. “I’ll have you know that I met my darling Carnivine in the Great Marsh when I was young! This is a very sentimental place to me… I wanted to give my friend a chance to see home again, and if the festival is on, why not enjoy it to the fullest?”

  N couldn’t understand these three. Stealing Pokemon for profit, and then saying things like that. They were walking contradictions.

  Lucas gave them a confused look, but N didn’t bother to explain to the boy. Not now, anyway.

  Sighing, he held back his anger with the trio. “Fine, then, if it’s just to make your Pokemon happy… we should exchange information, though. Have you learned anything since our last meeting?”

  Meowth guffawed from below. “What do we look like, a group of miracle workers? Our last meeting wasn’t that long ago, pal! What could we possibly have learned?! Besides, groups don’t move that fast, there’s nothing for us ta have learned in the first place!”

  “Apparen’ly Galactic works fast, then,” Mimikyu butted in, “cuz they just tried ta blow up the Great Marsh the other day.”

  Meowth’s eyes widened. “Blow up the Great Marsh?! Are they insane?!”

  His shout drew eyes from all over, but with the festival fast approaching none stopped and stared for too long, satisfied when Meowth let out a weak “Cro- Croagunk.”

  A fire lit up in James’ eyes at that information. “Those fiends! When I get my hands on them, I’ll-”

  “Will you put a sock in it!” Jessie insisted. “The twerps are right over there and they’re heading this way!” She hissed out the words.

  Before N could question them any further, Jessie dragged them away, leaving him to notice that she had been right.

  Ash approached, Pikachu on his shoulder and Brock in tow as he waved. “N, Mimikyu! How are you guys doing!”

  “And who is your new friend?” Brock asked, a tone that N couldn’t figure out afflicting his voice.

  Lucas waved, not bothering to introduce himself.

  “This is Lucas. We… happened to be going in the same direction, so we’ve gotten to know each other a bit. Lucas, this is Brock, Pikachu, and-”

  “I’m Ash, from Pallet Town!” Ash butted in to introduce himself, shaking Lucas’ hand eagerly, throwing the younger boy off. “Me and my buddy Pikachu are here to challenge the Pastoria Gym! Have you guys checked it out yet?”

  Lucas’ response was to quickly dig his badge case out of his bag, showing off the shiny new Fen badge to Ash and Brock with a smirk on his face.

  Ash’s eyes widened. “That’s awesome! Was it a good battle? I heard the Gym here uses Water types!”

  Seeing where this was going, Mimikyu decided to step in. “Ah, Lucas ‘ere doesn’ talk much, I don’ think Ash is gonna get much conversation out of ‘im.”

  “The quiet type, huh?” Pikachu responded, scratching at one of his cheek pouches. “Do you know what the gym is like then? The way Ash is, I wouldn’t be shocked if he tried throwing Chimchar against it.”

  That caught N’s attention. “You caught a Chimchar?”

  He hadn’t seen any in the wild so far, and he liked to think that he was more observant of Pokemon than most. It made him curious where Ash had been lately.

  “Ah…” Ash scratched at the back of his head. “Yeah, in a sense. Chimchar and I have been together since Hearthome, actually…” His smile was slowly turning into a frown. “That jerk Paul just… well, I guess I can say that Chimchar is happier now. We’re great friends and I’m helping him become strong!”

  Though Ash was clearly reluctant to talk about it, it wasn’t hard to fill in the gaps.

  “Paul… that name is familiar…” He muttered.

  “Purple hair, rude, we met ‘im as he came outta the Oreburgh Gym,” Mimikyu reminded him.

  Ah. That was it. The little shit he had been determined to save abused Pokemon from. It had been.. A while, since he’d last thought of Paul. So many things coming up left and right had allowed the name to slip his mind.

  N couldn’t allow that sort of thing to happen again. Abusers couldn’t be allowed to escape because of his poor memory.

  And yet…

  N found himself smiling.

  “I’m glad to hear that you’ve-” liberated “-saved a neglected Pokemon, Ash. I knew you had a good heart in you.”

  Ash just laughed off the praise. “Well, anyone would do the same! Nobody likes jerks who don’t treat their Pokemon right!”

  N knew that wasn’t true. Knew that so many Pokemon suffered under humans. Ash… he really would make for a great member of Plasma, wouldn’t he? Though his high profile amongst the League would probably lead to a lot of problems as well. Perhaps after things had kicked off, after Ash could so clearly see that N was in the right…

  Brock seemed to have the same understanding of how special Ash was, if the way he looked at the younger boy was any indication, but the man chose to stay silent for now.

  “In regards to information on the Pastoria Gym, I may be able to help.” Porygon2 announced.

  N felt the slightest bit of static around his wrist as Lucas’ Pokemon spoke up, but Rotom played the part of a normal watch just fine beyond that.

  “Huh. Your Pokedex is smarter than mine!” Ash laughed as Lucas pulled it out.

  “Actually, I think there’s a Porygon living inside it,” Brock chimed in, his focus on the device.

  Lucas shrugged, letting the Pokemon speak for himself. “A Porygon2, actually, but I can hardly fault you for not telling the difference from voice alone!”

  “Woah,” Ash gasped. “I’ve never seen a Porygon2! I heard there were supposed to be some in Johto and Hoenn, but I never ran into any…”

  For some reason, Mimikyu let out a small, repressed laugh at that, but Porygon2 continued the conversation before anyone else really noticed it.

  “As I understand it, most Porygon2 are in the hands of the League and thus are unlikely to meet random travelling trainers. Getting back to the point, though, was there anything in particular you wished to know about our battle against Crasher Wake? I can tell you now that his team is not to be underestimated, and they’re quite fond of Ice type moves so you would do well not to rely on Grass type Pokemon.”

  Ash laughed. “Well of course! Just because my buddy Pikachu is an Electric type doesn’t mean we’re helpless against Ground types! Covering your weaknesses is important in competitive battles! I don’t want to spoil the fun too much, though, so maybe just keep it to…”

  On and on the conversation went, and N found himself mostly zoning it out, watching his old travelling companions.

  He was glad to see that they were doing alright for themselves.

  Their parting with the Shadow Triad and brief meeting with Ash and company had been days ago.

  Now, with winter having truly set in, they found themselves travelling route 212 with the weather having taken a strange turn.

  Rain still fell from the sky, never seeming to let up in the slightest, but the colder temperatures saw to it that it quickly froze on whatever surface it fell on. Trees were gaining icy casings, enough that N worried they might snap and fall under the weight of it all. The ground was turning into more of a half frozen ice rink than a traversable route, leaving them to make their way across the route at a Ferroseed’s pace. The mucky, marshy parts of the route, those closest to Pastoria, had frozen over completely, allowing them to skate over the surface instead of getting sucked into the mud, so that had been a small benefit to the change, but… well, it also meant that the wooden trails over the river that led out to see were frozen over as well, forcing them to move with the utmost caution lest they fall into the freezing cold waters. Marowak had been of some help there, the heat from his flames working just enough to help melt away the most dangerous parts and keep the cold at bay.

  He hadn’t seen any of the Roselia from the route in days, and they assumedly had holed themselves up to protect against the weather, though other Pokemon like Bibarel were going about like it was business as usual. Few trainers were out and about in this, though a few determined fishermen were still hard at work.

  Really, N felt a bit silly for trying to make it through this area during winter. It felt needlessly reckless.

  He felt less bad about himself when he watched Lucas, though, the little lunatic insisting that it was fine for him to ride his bike over iced over logs that were draped over the river. Lucas had almost fallen countless times by now as he scrounged for whatever left behind goodies he could find, but somehow had managed to avoid actually falling.

  It made N nervous.

  “We really need to find some sort of proper shelter soon,” He muttered as he exhaled warm breath into his mitten bound hands.

  He’d had the sense to buy at least the minimum back in Pastoria. A bulky white winter coat, a green scarf that almost matched his hair, and mittens that matched the scarf.

  Lucas, apparently more used to this harsh weather than he was, being a Sinnoh native, had actually come prepared. He’d donned a winter outfit stored away in the depths of his bag and had swapped out his usual nighttime gear for a larger tent made of thicker material, thankfully big enough to house them all, even if Marowak clearly made the boy nervous with his occasional flames.

  And, as odd as it felt during winter, both of them had umbrellas out, trying to make sure that the rain didn’t fall on them and sap away what heat their bodies produced in this cold.

  Lucas ignored his words as he ran by, apparently having spotted something ahead.

  “I’m cooooold.” Mawile complained, shivering a bit as the cooled rain stole heat away from her giant maw, the umbrellas that the group not being quite large enough to fit all of them under while moving around, especially not with the way that her Maw took up so much extra space.

  “I’m trying!” Marowak reassured her, holding his flaming bone as close to the rain as he could without allowing it to get drenched in an attempt to heat her up.

  “Well, I’m pretty sure there’s a big ol’ place up ahead ‘ere, we could probably get ‘em ta let us stay a night or somethin’. Get properly warmed up.”

  N felt the buzz of electricity on his wrist. “The Backlot Mansion? Rotom has heard that they have heavy security, do you really think they’ll allow strangers to stay?”

  “A mansion?!” Mawile shouted, though she was ignored.

  “I don’ see why not as long as we don’ do anythin’ suspicious.”

  There was a pause for a moment.

  “So we’ll need to split up the duty of keeping an eye on Lucas,” N suggested.

  “If he messes up my stay in a mansion then I’ll eat him!” Mawile declared.

  “Good! Then you can ‘ave first watch!” Mimikyu immediately decided.

  “Wha- but that’s not what–”

  “Perhaps we can get Porygon2 to watch him? I’m not sure that he sleeps…”

  “Bzzrt! No way! He can’t be trusted!”

  N glared down at his C-Gear. “Does that mean you’re volunteering?”

  Rotom went silent.

  N sighed.

  He’d watch Lucas the entire time himself if it meant getting out of this weather.

  Finally moving out of Pastoria!

  A new chapter of Garden of Yesteryore is up, please check it out!

  As always, feedback is appreciated. (If you’re actually looking for a response, discord is the place to be)