Operation GEAR: The Gardener of Gratitude

Oh man, this bring back memories. There might be some stuff I forgot, but I do recall the basic premise here and it's great to see you giving this a new facelift!

On the prologue, oh right I remember Sutter being killed in that manner. Geez that map must be serious business. On your concerns if this was too violent, well I've seen worse in anime and Game of Thrones, and you warned about it at least.

The first chapter I recall some of the details, in particular the king proclaiming his sister against the kingdom and all the past kings turning into gold. The conflict with the sister I think I remember the full truth concerning that, but I'll keep quiet for now haha.

You mention giving Elenaor a different role, so I look forward to seeing her doing more engineering stuff. You also reference some stuff from the newer generations like Kalos and a few of the Alola Pokemon. At the moment those references are nothing more than that, but that's fine no need to force the newer generation stuff if not called for.

Looking forward to any more changes and such you're making!

A note: during the in-universe time this story takes place in, the Fairy-type doesn’t exist. As a result, Togekiss is its original Normal and Flying type.

-:-

CHAPTER 2: Brothers and Sisters

-:-

Fernando didn’t have to take Matt, Cassy, Eleanor and Sheena very far, as it turned out. Lingote Palace’s archive was adjacent to the museum, through a door at the end of the bronze mural. It had the same marble floor as the central hallway and heavy wooden bookcases lining its stone walls. At the very end of the room, there was a fountain that created a curtain of water in the place of a window.

“As you can see, this archive isn’t accessible to just anyone,” Fernando said to his guests as he ushered them in, turning the archive’s key over in his hand. “Normally you’d have to make special reservations to come in here, but these are exceptional circumstances. You,” he said, looking to Sheena before pointing at a large, rolled-up piece of material in a nearby container, “fetch that map for me.”

Sheena inhaled sharply when she realized Fernando was talking to her, but the surprise quickly wore off. She retrieved the map and brought it to the oak table in the center of the archive, where Fernando and the others had gathered.

“This is a map of the entirety of the land our kingdom once stood on,” Fernando explained while he spread it out across the table. “Those tourist maps won’t show you it all. If we’re going to find where the trail to the Golden City begins, we’ll need to see the whole picture.”

“Hold on a minute before you show us that clue you have.” Matt reached into his bag to get his laptop, then opened it and held its camera over the map. “I’ll take a picture of it, that way we can check it while searching.”

“Smart idea,” Fernando complimented. “You have some of your grandfather in you after all.”

Though these were words of praise, Matt still shrank back, his face reddening. Cassy, noticing this, stepped forward to take over the situation.

“We’ve got the map out, so let’s get this show on the road,” she forcefully suggested. “Let’s see that clue.”

“As you wish.” Fernando produced a piece of aged parchment, which he laid down on the table. “If you don’t mind, please read it without touching it.”

Cassy was the one closest to Fernando, so she leaned over and read the text aloud. “Gifts of air and gifts of earth. Without one, the other cannot be obtained. Man presses on, searching for that which cannot be found on the surface. The riches of the earth rest where man allows himself to be swallowed up by it, possessing more than he had should he return.”

“Somewhere where man allows himself to be swallowed by the earth,” Matt repeated. “It certainly sounds voluntary, right?”

“I’d agree with you there,” Eleanor concurred. “That means we can rule out something like quicksand. But at the same time, it clearly still sounds dangerous. Why talk about ‘should he return,’ otherwise?”

“You have a point,” Cassy mused. “And this part, ‘gifts of air and gifts of earth. Without one the other cannot be obtained.’ Not only is this proverbial man going into the earth willingly, he needs a gift from the air to obtain the gifts of the earth. You know what that sounds like? Oxygen.”

“So the implication is that if one goes into this place, there could be the danger of running out of oxygen,” reasoned Sheena.

“Wait, I know what this sounds like!” Matt exclaimed, pounding his right fist into the palm of his left hand. “A place where people voluntarily enter the earth to gain its gifts, but face the risk of running out of oxygen if they aren’t careful… that sounds like a mine to me.”

Matt’s proposal led to a wave of realization washing over the others. They all turned to Fernando, their stares asking him a question none of them had yet vocalized.

“I know exactly what you’re thinking,” he said, waving them off. “There is an abandoned mineral mine out in the desert.” Fernando put his finger on a spot on the map well outside La Ciudad Dorada’s present borders. “It was operational until several decades ago, but the buildings and mine remain there to this day.”

“If it’s that far out in the desert, how will we reach it?” Matt wondered.

“Down in the palace garage we have a number of vehicles I can loan you.” Eleanor’s eyes lit up the moment Fernando revealed this. “Come, let us go now.”

Fernando left the table and headed for the exit, gesturing with his hand for the others to follow. While they walked, Cassy caught up to Matt and got his attention by tapping his shoulder.

“Listen,” she whispered to him, “I’m going to stay behind and keep researching the books here. There might be information in this archive that could help. I’ll see you off and then get right back to work here.”

-:-

“Yahoo! This is exactly what I came here for!”

A bright afternoon sun hung in the sky over the desert outside La Ciudad Dorada as the group’s vehicle sped across the arid landscape. Fernando had provided them with what looked very much like a small truck with a flatbed behind its cab. There was, however, one big difference - instead of wheels, it had flat discs emanating the blue light of Arcane Science as they levitated the vehicle a few inches off the ground.

Inside the vehicle’s cab, Eleanor was overcome with giddiness just to have a chance at driving it.

“This is so much fun!” She couldn’t help herself from practically jumping up and down in her seat, just managing to avoid pulling on the steering handles on the sides of the vehicle’s glowing projection dashboard. “Matt! Sheena!” she called back to the others. “When this is over, we have got to see if Fernando’s got any books about these machines in that archive!”

“I wouldn’t mind reading those myself!” Matt said back to her, raising his voice over the wind.

For a while there wasn’t much else in the way of conversation between the trio. Eleanor remained caught up in her delirious joy over the machine, while Matt and Sheena watched the landscape and some of its resident Pokémon go by. A group of Hippopotas clustered under the protection of two Hippowdon, and further off in the distance, a line of Camerupt could be seen traversing the desert.

“They all look so peaceful,” Sheena observed. “What’s going on with us and La Ciudad Dorada isn’t affecting them. I hope it stays that way.”

“That gives us something else to shoot for,” Matt said in agreement. “The smoother our search goes, the better for everyone. Of course, Rosalita could be anywhere, so I think it’s best if we prepare for our next encounter now.”

“That’s a good idea.” Sheena moved to sit next to Matt so she could see his notes on his laptop.

“So far we know she has Heatran, Probopass, Electivire and Magmortar,” he said while reviewing images on the laptop’s screen. “All of them are weak to Ground-type moves, but they’re trained to use tactics that allow them to be competitive.”

“And they fight with great coordination,” Sheena added.

“That’s the part I don’t totally get. Rosalita must have trained them so well that they can execute defined roles within the attack even without her presence. We have to watch out for that Probopass to show up, for one. It was clearly playing support but the way it was able to levitate its allies around will be trouble.”

“Electivire certainly didn’t need Probopass’s help for that, though,” Sheena remarked, staring at the screen. “Those Magnet Rise-powered leaps make it more of an aerial threat than you’d expect.”

“You can say that again,” Matt concurred. “Magmortar’s fighting style was pretty straightforward, and really, Heatran’s was too. What we have to watch out for with that one is just how powerful its individual strikes are.”

“Not just that,” Sheena corrected him. Matt had a hard time hearing her lowered voice and had to move his head closer to make out what she said. “You have to be very careful with that spiraling fire move it used. That’s called Magma Storm. If your Pokémon is hit by it, it’ll keep doing damage for a while afterward.”

“That’s just great,” Matt sighed. “Between that and how easily Probopass can make it fly, Heatran’s going to be the biggest danger when Rosalita sends it to attack again.”

“Hey, you guys!” Eleanor interrupted. She didn’t turn her head, instead just yelling loud enough for Matt and Sheena to hear. “I think we’re here!”

Matt shut his laptop and joined Sheena in looking out at the small village they were approaching. A dilapidated factory stood tall above the surrounding buildings, themselves in similar states of partial ruin. Eleanor slowed the vehicle to a stop as soon as it entered the village, sending a cluster of Skorupi scattering as the three disembarked to explore the area.

“There’s more to it than I even thought,” Matt said to Sheena as he surveyed their surroundings. Neither of them noticed Eleanor wander off to investigate a nearby object covered by a huge tarp. “I was expecting an ordinary mining facility, not a whole community like this.”

“I imagine life was tough for them here,” Sheena ruminated, “but they got by. Maybe in a sense, the people who lived and worked here were the closest to living the way the original settlers of La Ciudad Dorada did.”

“You guys?” Eleanor interrupted them, her voice quivering. “I think you should come here and look at this…”

When they turned around, both Matt and Sheena could see how heavily Eleanor was breathing. They ran over to join her at the tarp as she held its corner with a trembling hand.

“What is it?” Matt asked her.

“See for yourself.” At that, Eleanor threw the tarp back with all her strength. It didn’t lift all the way off, but it was enough to give Matt and Sheena a look at what was underneath.

An Arcane Science vehicle identical to their own greeted them.

“You see what I see, right?” Eleanor nervously wondered.

“Oh, I think do.” Matt was careful to lower his voice as he examined the machine. “No way is a vehicle that was abandoned here decades ago going to look like it just came out of the garage yesterday.”

“You mean it was just brought here recently…” Sheena’s eyes grew wide as the realization of what this meant dawned on her. “Someone’s here… right now.”

The trio closed around each other and again inspected the ruined buildings surrounding them. They were searching not with curiosity, like they had been before, but with fear. Every partially standing wall, every broken beam, there was virtually nothing that couldn’t be hiding a potential threat.

Aside from the gusting wind, the air was silent. Yet, that silence was more deafening than any sound could have been.

“You see anything?” Eleanor asked Matt and Sheena.

“No, but I bet whoever’s here probably sees us,” Matt replied.

“I was afraid you’d say that,” added Sheena.

Suddenly, a loud crash in the house right next to the group pierced the silence. All three of them jumped, and they nearly fell over each other because of how close they all were.

“We should go investigate that,” Eleanor suggested, recovering from the shock first.

“Yeah, you’re… you’re right about that.” Matt slowly took one of his Poké Balls out of his bag, an act Eleanor copied for herself. “Stay close to me.”

The group clustered together with Matt in the lead, warily approaching the building. Their steps went from crunching sand under their feet to making the floorboards creak as they got close to the door.

“Workers’ Quarters, Section 9,” Sheena quietly read from the sign next to the entrance. It was hanging lopsided by one nail, the other having rotted away long before.

With his free hand, Matt gently pushed the door open. It groaned loudly, making the trio cringe, but the dimly-lit room beyond was empty. As if on cue, another crash from further down the hall told them exactly where to go.

No words were exchanged between the three as they made their way to the source of the noise. The door to the room in question was ajar, and once near it, they could hear some sort of rustling behind it. Matt pushed himself against the wall next to the door, and while Eleanor and Sheena mimicked his action he rolled the Poké Ball in his hand so his thumb was on its button.

Finally, after a quick nod to Eleanor and Sheena to ensure they were all on the same page, Matt inhaled deeply, then burst through the door.

Inside was a Cacturne surrounded by over a dozen cans of food he’d knocked off the shelves. He had one in his hand that was torn open, and when Matt surprised him he dropped it, sending the colorful beans within it scattering everywhere.

“Oh…” Matt uttered, dumbfounded. The Cacturne backed toward the window while Eleanor and Sheena looked over Matt’s shoulders at the scene. “Oh.”

“Sorry about that, Cacturne…” Sheena apologized.

“I saw in the brochure that Poké Beans are grown in La Ciudad Dorada…” Eleanor said, “so I guess it’s no surprise they were canned for use at the mine…”

“We better get back to our business,” Matt urged. “There’s still someone here wh-”

Matt’s words turned into a startled scream when something seized his ankles from behind. Both Eleanor and Sheena were grabbed by the same entity seconds later and reacted similarly. Matt and Eleanor’s Poké Balls both clattered to the ground, and Cacturne fled through the window with a can of Poké Beans in his hand. All three of them were then hoisted into the air and left hanging upside down when the substance restraining them - which they could now see was thick, sticky silk - was attached to the ceiling by the Pokémon that attacked them. Their attacker was an insect with a thin body covered in vivid green leaves.

“Well done, Elena,” the Pokémon’s trainer said as she emerged from another room. Her features were completely obscured by the black, hooded cloak she wore, leaving her voice as the only way Matt, Eleanor and Sheena could tell anything about her identity. The mysterious woman walked right up to the three as they hung by their legs, showing no fear in her forceful, deliberate steps. “Who are you? Why have you come here?”

“I should ask you the same thing!” Matt choked back at her.

“Difference is, I’m in a position to make demands. You aren’t.” She turned to her Leavanny, Elena, and said, “Take his bag, we’re searching it.”

Elena complied and started working Matt’s bag off of him with her spindly hands. Matt tried to pull it back from her, only to earn a sharp rap on his wrist for his trouble. The Leavanny then took his bag and passed it to her trainer.

Almost instantly upon looking inside, the cloaked woman froze. She stared into its confines for several long, tense moments before pulling out the puzzle box and confronting Matt with it.

“Where did you get this?” she demanded. “Just who are you?”

“My grandfather was murdered by someone trying to take that, and you’ll have to kill me if you want it!” he fumed.

“You’re one of the people looking to steal La Ciudad Dorada’s treasures, aren’t you?!” Eleanor snapped at the now-confused woman.

“Where did… no, I know where you heard that. You talked to my brother, didn’t you?”

“Did you just say… your brother?”

Instead of answering Sheena’s question, the woman said to her Leavanny, “Elena, cut them down. They aren’t enemies.”

Elena daintily stepped forward and extended one of her arms, which glowed with green light and lengthened into a sharp blade. She then jumped up and cut the three lines of thread with a single graceful motion, sending Matt, Sheena and Eleanor crashing down. Eleanor recovered first and stumbled into the storage room to retrieve the Poké Balls she and Matt dropped.

The woman then put the puzzle box back in Matt’s bag and pushed it toward him. “Here. I’m sorry.”

“What does it matter?” Matt kept the Poké Ball in his hand once Eleanor returned it to him. “You’re just going to kill us now that we found you, just like you did to your parents!”

“Now I know you definitely talked to my brother. He’s lying!” She reached up and removed her hood, revealing billowing, cloud-like blonde hair and the same intense green eyes Fernando had. “I didn’t kill them, he did. I’ve been hiding here since then, with what I could conceal from him. But you must be Sutter Chiaki’s grandson… why are you here? Did Fernando send you to find me?”

“If he killed your parents, then…” Matt trailed off briefly, lost in thought. “He killed your parents, then he wrote to me… but…”

“Answer my question!” Rosalita interrupted to demand. “Why are you here and why do you have that relic?”

“My grandfather left it to me after he was killed, alright? Fernando wrote to me and asked me to bring it here so we could find the Golden City and protect La Ciudad Dorada!”

“So you could find the Golden City and protect La Ciudad Dorada…” Rosalita repeated. “I knew it. He’s making his move…”

“If Fernando is the murderer, then what about Cassy?” Sheena asked.

Matt froze. He had been so caught up in what he was doing that he forgot Cassy was studying in the palace archive - under the same roof as a man who he’d just discovered very likely murdered his own parents.

“What are you talking about?” Rosalita questioned Sheena. She didn’t wait for an answer before turning to Matt, who was fumbling to get his laptop. “Who is Cassy?”

“My friend who came with me on this trip,” Matt answered. “She stayed behind when we came to this mine to do research in Lingote Palace’s archive. And now she’s there with Fernando…”

“He won’t hurt her,” Rosalita said, “or at least I have no reason to think he will. He gains nothing by doing it.”

“Fine, I’ll be the one to say it,” Eleanor declared, crossing her arms. “How do we know you’re not lying to frame him? Why’d you come out here instead of doing something to bring him to justice?”

“Rosalita would not lie, yes?” a tiny voice said. Matt, Eleanor and Sheena all turned to see a white-bodied, hedgehog-like Pokémon with grass and flowers growing from its back peeking out of the room Rosalita had been hiding in. “I stayed with her because she is the worthy one, yes?”

“Shaymin…” Sheena gasped in surprise.

“You’re the Pokémon from the mural!” Eleanor exclaimed.

“Wait, if Shaymin’s here with Rosalita, that means…” Matt trailed off as he took a moment to think about what he was hearing, though something Shaymin said quickly hit him. “The worthy one? Are you saying she’s the heir?”

“That’s what I’ve been trying to tell you.” Rosalita leaned down and ushered Shaymin into her arms, where the mythical Pokémon curled up in comfort. “Fernando framed me for the deaths of our parents. Maybe it was wrong of me to go into hiding, but I panicked and acted to take away as many of the tools he needs to seize power as I could. I’m trying to figure out how I can convince him to stop. How I can save him from himself.”

“Isn’t it a little late for convincing?” Matt said, a sound of disbelief breaking through his words. “How are you able to just forgive him so easily? He killed your parents, according to you!”

“I know, but…” Rosalita lowered her sad, watery eyes, causing Shaymin to look up at her in concern. “He was a good man and can be a good man again. I wouldn’t be who I am without him and I’m grateful for that… his knowledge of our kingdom and drive to protect it is second to none. We need him. It’s just…” Rosalita had to stop herself from sobbing. “Everything he’s done, he’s done it to save our kingdom. That’s what he really believes… I have to just get him to see that he’s gone too far. I have to save him…”

“It’s not really my place to say,” Sheena ventured, “but how has he convinced himself that murdering the king and queen helps the kingdom at all?”

“No, I don’t blame you for asking.” Rosalita breathed deeply, trying to soothe herself. “We don’t really have time for the whole story now, but he told you the truth when he said the kingdom was threatened. He believes that he is the only one who can protect us and wants Regigigas’s help doing so, but to do so he has to become king. That’s why I have to get to the Golden City first.”

“I’m still skeptical,” Matt said, having just finished sending an email to Cassy warning her to be careful. “I didn’t sign up for a family feud with power and immortality in the balance. I just wanted closure for my grandfather… you’re asking me to choose a side in something where I can’t fully agree with either side.”

“What do you mean?” Rosalita asked him.

“If I believe you, and with Shaymin vouching for you I have no reason not to, Fernando is a killer who betrayed his family and his home and then lied to me to help him attain power. But if it’s as you say, he did it for what he sees as a noble reason. You, on the other hand, you want me to help you stop him, but you also want to forgive him for all the crimes he’s committed. I don’t know if I can accept that.”

“I understand…” Rosalita bitterly said. “I’m sorry you all became involved in this. It isn’t fair. I can’t ask you to forgive my brother for what he’s done, but I still care about him and I can’t just let him destroy himself.”

Rosalita’s words struck a chord in Matt’s heart, leaving him silent. As much as he couldn’t forgive Fernando for his actions, Rosalita’s dedication to helping her brother moved him.

“I know that feeling, being willing to do anything to save someone you care about…” he thought. Images flooded his memory, ones that had happened years ago but still felt like yesterday to him. He saw himself riding on Anton’s back - at the time the Rhyperior was an unevolved Rhyhorn - through a blizzard. With him was a blue-haired girl wearing goggles to protect her eyes.

“Matt?” Eleanor asked.

“Sorry, I got… caught up in thinking about something,” he admitted. “I’ve decided. I’ll keep going and help you find the Golden City. But I’m leading this expedition with Sheena and Eleanor’s help. Rosalita, you’re coming with us but we call the shots.”

“That’s acceptable, yes?” Despite sounding like a question for Rosalita, Shaymin’s statement was actually aimed at Matt. “It will be like when I traveled to the Golden City with the professor, yes?”

“If Shaymin says so, I have no reason to disagree with your terms,” Rosalita agreed.

“Then we should get goi-” Matt cut himself off when the meaning of Shaymin’s words dawned on him. “When you traveled to the Golden City with the professor? What do you mean by that?”

“It was a great many years ago, yes? While I was serving at the side of Rosalita’s grandfather, the professor and his apprentice came here, and together we all went on a grand adventure to the Golden City. It was a very fun time, yes?”

Matt took a step back and put his hand over his mouth. His evident shock made Shaymin stare at him with its head cocked to the side.

“What’s wrong?” Sheena asked him.

“Sutter told me many stories of his adventures searching for the Golden City,” he answered, his voice faint. “He never told me he found it.”

“Wait, I don’t understand,” Eleanor intervened. She turned to Shaymin and said, “If you went to the Golden City before, you should know where it is. Why don’t we just go there now?”

“None will find the Golden City without first walking the path of the Three Pillars.” Shaymin’s response was automatic, almost robotic, and even lacked its typical verbal tic.

“The body shaped from the mountains themselves,” Rosalita added. Her recitation was less rigid than Shaymin’s, sounding more like the careful recollection of a student than a reflexive response. “The body forged within the blood of the earth. The body carved from the waters of life. So stand the Three Pillars, eternally guarding and being guarded by the great protector. Whence man steps forth to commune with the protector in its shrine, the path shall only appear to those who have gathered the light of the Three Pillars.”

“Regirock, Registeel and Regice?” Eleanor deduced.

“You are very wise, yes?” Shaymin said, its normal manner returning.

Rosalita couldn’t help but smile. “Yes, that is correct. Even with the location of where the Golden City should be, we cannot reach it without first finding Regirock, Registeel and Regice. That’s what the three clues and the puzzle box are for. Now, with all of that said, tell me why you came here.”

“Fernando showed us the clue he had and we decided it referenced this mine,” Matt revealed.

“That makes sense,” Rosalita said, putting her finger on her chin. “I had my own suspicions about this site. That’s why I came here to hide. I thought that if Fernando followed the clue himself, it would be safer to stop him out here away from the city. But since you’re here, Matt, and you brought the puzzle box, we can follow the trail ourselves and get there before he does!”

“Then we best get going,” Sheena suggested.

“You’re right.” Rosalita recalled Elena to the safety of her Poké Ball, then turned away from the three and gestured for them to follow her, much like her brother had done earlier in the museum. “The elevator to go down into the mine isn’t far from here. Come on, I’ll show you.”

Rosalita led Matt, Eleanor and Sheena back out of the workers’ building and across the village, toward a large building next to the abandoned factory. Not one of them realized that a Yanmega wearing a glowing collar was flying overhead, watching them.

-:-

The siblings who directed the attack on Lingote Palace’s garden had trekked a short distance into the desert beyond La Ciudad Dorada, leaving the city behind. They were huddled under the shade of a lone palm tree while the sister monitored what their Yanmega was seeing using her wrist device and a camera on Yanmega’s collar.

“Looks like they found the princess, Bro,” she said to her brother, who was fanning himself. Just as she finished talking, she squinted to examine the projected image more closely and gasped in surprise. “Yo, and that Shaymin’s with her!”

“Jackpot on that one, Sis!” This news so excited him that he pushed himself forward off the tree with his foot before spreading his arms and looking to the sky. “It ain’t gonna be long before our fortune is ours! Ya know what we should do with it?”

“What?”

“So if we go on back home, what do ya think of gettin’ our old gang back together? There’s gonna be so much cash in our pockets when this job’s done, ain’t gonna be a problem to help ‘em out, too.”

The young woman stopped to ponder her brother’s idea. It was true, the riches they stood to gain were far beyond what just two people would need for a more than comfortable life. Her mind wandered back to memories of their youth.

Pyrite Town in those days was an incredibly bleak place that offered its residents only three real options for supporting themselves. You could go to work in the mines of a city underneath Pyrite, appropriately known as The Under. If you preferred to stay in the sun, battling at Pyrite Colosseum was an option. The problem with both of those choices was that Pyrite Town was corrupted to its core. No matter what you did, at some point your livelihood intersected with the culture of crime that so permeated the city. It was that reason for why so many residents of Pyrite Town chose option number three: abandoning all pretense and simply becoming criminals themselves.

Those were the circumstances the pair found themselves in. For as long as they could remember, they only had each other to rely on, and with no better choices they turned to stealing food and money to survive. Other children on the streets were drawn to her decisive leadership and his surprisingly gentle, compassionate personality, and together, they created the family none of them really had. Those in their orbit grew deeply loyal to the pair they dubbed “Big Sis Noel” and “Little Bro Leon,” names that stuck even after Leon grew to be much taller than his sister.

“’ey, Sis, you awake?”

Noel shook her head as Leon’s questions snapped her back to the present. “Sorry, Bro, I’m here. I feel ya on that one. Wouldn’t be right if we just head home and forget where we came from.”

“Ain’t who we are,” Leon agreed. “And I gotta be honest, Sis, I miss ‘em. We’ve been flyin’ solo for way too long.”

“You can say that again, Bro. C’mon, we gotta get going.”

Noel shut off the projection, then joined Leon in putting on backpack-like machines they’d brought with them. The devices had buttons on their straps that caused pairs of wings to spread out from them once Noel and Leon pressed them, and the bulbs on them emitted a blue glow as the siblings lifted into the air.

-:-

On their way down into the mine using the rickety work elevator, Eleanor released a Litwick, a Pokémon that looked like a candle with a blue flame. She sat on Eleanor’s shoulder, giving light to the group as they started to explore. Matt, meanwhile, had taken out his laptop in order to record their search.

There was little discussion of anything among the four while they made their way deeper underground, following the narrow tunnels.

Unable to focus on the exploration, Matt couldn’t help but let his mind wander to what he’d seen and heard over the course of the day.

“Rosalita, I’ve been wondering about something,” he finally said, breaking the uneasy quiet over the group.

“Hm? What?”

“Your brother, does he have any Pokémon?” Matt narrowed his eyes. “I have to know.”

“I don’t understand where that question is coming from,” Rosalita answered, putting her hand on the side of the tunnel for balance while Shaymin held onto her head. “But since you asked, no, he doesn’t.”

“Oh…”

“What is wrong?” Sheena asked him. His lack of a significant response left her unable to tell what kind of answer he actually wanted.

“I needed to know if Fernando had a Dragonite,” he admitted, though his voice remained bland and lifeless. “After Rosalita said he killed their parents I started thinking that maybe he killed my grandfather, too. His killer attacked him with a Dragonite that was wearing one of those collars.”

“So that’s what you meant in the garden…” Sheena murmured to herself.

“I don’t know how much it means coming from someone like me,” Rosalita gently said, “but I’m sorry. What happened to him was horrible.”

“Yeah, I liked the professor, yes?” Shaymin added. “He helped us keep our secrets safe.”

“Since he found the Golden City and never told anyone, he sure did.” Matt sighed in resignation. “Not even me…” he thought, “but why?”

“Keeping them secret was the right thing to do back then,” Rosalita said to Matt and Sheena while they kept walking. “Times have changed. Since Sutter was killed, I’ve realized more than ever that all the secrecy is causing too much harm. I hope you’ll forgive me for saying this, but two families being destroyed over all of this is too many. It has to change.”

“Heads up, guys,” Eleanor called from the head of the group, interrupting the conversation before Matt or Sheena could press Rosalita for more details. “I found something.”

Eleanor had stopped at the end of the tunnel, which appeared to open into a much larger cavern. Matt, Sheena and Rosalita joined her there, but none of them could see through the darkness to what lay beyond.

“You hear that?” Rosalita put her hand to her ear to help focus her hearing. “I think I hear water.”

“I hear it too,” Matt said, mimicking Rosalita’s action before picking up a small rock and throwing it. It bounced off something deep in the murk and made a sound that echoed all around them.

“There’s no way we can safely explore that big an area in such darkness,” Sheena commented.

“Then we have to make it not be dark. Simple.” Eleanor extended her arm, allowing Litwick to climb down onto her hand. “Litwick, Flash!”

The blue flame on Litwick’s head flared several times greater than normal as its owner let out a cry that echoed through the cavern. She put all her energy into it, but was unable to light very far into the vast space.

“This isn't going to work…” Rosalita turned to Eleanor and saw how Litwick looked disappointed. “Oh, no, Litwick, you did a good job!” she said to the Pokémon. “I’ll get you some Poké Beans when we’re done here.”

Rosalita’s words of praise cheered Litwick up, and the candle Pokémon smiled at her.

“What’s that?” Matt pointed at a box he’d spotted on the wall of the cave a few feet away when Litwick used Flash. It was made out of rusted red metal and had two unlit bulbs sticking out of it.

Eleanor approached the box and started examining it. “It might be just what we needed… a generator. If it still works we’re set. Can one of you help me get it open?”

“I think so,” Matt said. He took one of his Poké Balls from his bag and opened it, allowing Anton to materialize. “Anton, use Smart Strike on that generator’s latch, would you?”

The Rhyperior assented to his trainer’s request with a grunt, then fixed his stare on the rusted latch Matt indicated. His horn started to glow with a metallic sheen as he lowered his head, and he headbutted the latch, breaking it off in one blow.

“Well done, Anton. Thank you,” Matt said, giving his Pokémon a pat on the arm.

With that task done, Litwick jumped off Eleanor’s shoulder to sit on top of the generator and provide light to her. Eleanor used both hands and all of her strength to pull the cover open. It made a horrible grinding sound as it moved, but she still managed to make it give way so she could look around inside.

“How does it look?” Sheena asked her.

“Like it’ll still work,” replied the engineer. “Everything’s still in place. I think it’s time for my number one rule when it comes to trying out machines like this - give it a go and see what happens.”

“Is that a good thing or not?” Matt couldn’t help himself from thinking.

Eleanor pushed the generator’s switch handle all the way down. Almost immediately, the two bulbs on the bottom of the box filled with the expected blue glow, and all around the cavern strings of lights flickered to life.

For the first time, the group could fully appreciate just how vast the mine truly was. The cave spread out all around them, making them notice that the cliff they were on was even smaller than they first thought. The lack of space on the ledge prompted Matt to immediately recall Anton to open up more room.

When Matt went to put away Anton’s Poké Ball, Sheena caught a glimpse of golden light shining out of his bag. “What’s that?”

“What?” Matt hadn’t been looking at what he was doing, and when he did look, he immediately saw the light as well. He furrowed his brow, handed his laptop to Sheena and reached in to retrieve the source of the light - the puzzle box. “It’s certainly never done this before,” he said, lifting it up. “Rosalita, do you know why?”

“Not for certain,” she answered, cocking her head, “but I have an idea. I think I remember reading something about it in the palace archive once… ‘the key shall show the road ahead,’ I believe.”

“It sounds like the puzzle box is going to guide us,” Eleanor reasoned. “Matt, see if it does anything to show us the direction we need to go.”

“Right, good idea.”

Following Eleanor’s suggestion, Matt stepped up to the cliff and held out the puzzle box as far as his arm could stretch. Nothing noticeable happened at first, so he moved to point it in different directions. After a few moments, its light suddenly intensified.

“There,” Matt said, “something must be over there.”

Eleanor joined him and peered out at the area the puzzle box was indicating. “That looks suspicious,” she commented, pointing at a ledge below that was connected to the main landmass by an old, rickety wooden bridge. “We should go check that out.”

“That bridge doesn’t look safe,” Sheena observed, having come up alongside Matt and Eleanor with Rosalita behind her.

“You’re right,” Matt agreed. He put the puzzle box back in his bag and took two more Poké Balls out. “But there’s one thing we have in our favor… how big this mine is.”

When he threw the spheres, Sally appeared alongside Matt’s Magnezone, both hovering over the edge of the cliff. Rosalita quickly tossed one of her own Poké Balls as well, releasing a Staraptor to join them.

“Sally, bring Sheena and I down to that ledge, would you?” he asked his Salamence, gesturing to the cliff below. He then said to his Magnezone, “Zero, please take Eleanor.”

“And we’ll follow them, Reyes,” Rosalita informed her Staraptor.

Sally was the first of the Pokémon to land on the precipice, allowing Matt and Sheena to climb onto her back. She then lifted herself back into the air and pulled away so Zero could take her place and collect Eleanor. Rosalita was last to get on her mount, but Reyes pushed to the front of the pack before the group started their descent.

“This place really is incredible,” Eleanor marvelled as she looked around at the cavern. “This isn’t what I was expecting a mineral mine to be like at all.”

“A mineral mine? I guess Fernando told you that.” Rosalita smiled sadly to herself. “The truth is, this mine yielded many more types of treasures than that. Matt, you’re Sinnohan so you might understand this the most. In the past our kingdom mined precious artifacts, stones and even fossils here.”

“Like the Sinnoh Underground,” Matt realized.

“Yes. From what I understand there are also mines in Alola that are similar,” Rosalita continued. “It doesn’t matter now, though. The mining industry stopped being viable for us years ago, so this mine was closed.”

When the group arrived at their destination, Rosalita jumped off of Reyes’ back before Matt, Sheena and Eleanor disembarked. Shaymin ran right to the sheer rock face and stared at it. The four humans followed and started examining the wall as well.

“I don’t see anything,” Matt said to the others. “Is this not the right spot?”

“It doesn’t look like there was any excavation done here,” Rosalita reasoned, “so why is there a bridge to this spot? What is this?”

“Matt, your bag!” Eleanor exclaimed, pointing at him.

He hadn’t noticed, but the light spilling out of his bag had intensified so much that the shape of the puzzle box could be seen through the material. The sight made him gasp, and he quickly took the cube out. Unsure of what to do with it, he simply held it up toward the wall.

The reaction was almost instant. A light matching that of the puzzle box emanated from the wall, and a golden archway and set of doors materialized right in front of the explorers’ eyes.

“What?” Matt uttered, gasping for the second time in under a minute. “How does that even work?”

“Did the ones who built it use Gaia’s power?” guessed Sheena. “If they did, making a shrine that only appears with a key would be possible.”

“It is possible,” Rosalita agreed. “The wanderer who came to this land seven hundred years ago left texts behind on how to use Gaia. As far as I know nobody has ever had the same talent in channeling it as he did, but construction of a vanishing shrine is probably within reason.”

“Then let’s investigate it before it disappears again.” Eleanor marched right up to the stone doors, which bore the same ‘H’ shape pattern of dots that appeared on the puzzle box. Sheena followed right after her, while Matt and Rosalita hung back with their Pokémon.

“Sally, Zero, I’d like for you to guard the shrine while we’re in there,” he requested, earning cries of agreement from the pair. “There’s always the chance we were followed.”

“Reyes, you too, please,” Rosalita said to her Staraptor, who replied with a determined squawk. She then turned to Matt and started walking with him to the doorway. “That was good thinking, I have to say. I’ve been expecting Fernando to follow us here the entire time…”

Matt opened his mouth to say something, but when he looked down at Rosalita next to him, he realized that her eyes were watering again. She had turned away from him and was staring rigidly at the doors.

“She expects it, but she doesn’t want it to happen… she still hopes there’s a way to fix everything with him, I guess…”

“Let’s get going,” Rosalita said to Sheena and Eleanor, her voice hard and emotionless. She marched straight past them and pushed the doors open.

Eleanor stepped inside after Rosalita, allowing Litwick to illuminate the chamber. Matt and Sheena followed, all of them carefully looking around at their surroundings for any sign of what to do next. It was a simple stone room whose only features were the colorful paintings of Regigigas, Regirock, Registeel and Regice that spread across the walls and floor.

“Come here,” Eleanor called out to the others, “look at this.”

The engineer beckoned Matt, Sheena and Rosalita to the back wall, where Litwick’s flame shed light on the writing inscribed on it.

“This writing… I’ve seen it before,” Rosalita said after leaning in closer to examine it. Instead of ordinary written language, whatever was recorded on the wall was in patterns of dots. “But I don’t know how to read it.”

“I do.” Matt stepped past the others, who looked at him with surprise on their faces. Lowering himself to be level with the writing, Matt began to read it, running his finger along the lines of text as he went. “Whosoever shall wear the crown, here begins the road. Walk this path with resolve and face the three trials that await. Here lies the first of the three trials. The body of rock shall only awaken for one whose gratitude blooms before us. Beware, for if gratitude does not bloom, destruction shall be at hand.”

“Shall only awaken for one whose gratitude blooms before us,” Sheena repeated. “It sounds like it wants us to express gratitude, but that wording is a little odd.”

“I don’t know what will happen to bring destruction if we get this wrong,” Matt warned, “so we best think about what our next step is before we take it.”

“Bloom, like a flower,” reasoned Eleanor. “Maybe that’s wordplay. What if it doesn’t want our gratitude but a flower that represents gratitude? We could try Shaymin.”

“It’s not Shaymin,” Rosalita realized. “Shaymin is the Gardener of Gratitude, but the gardener only plants the flowers. This message is referring to the flower of gratitude itself - the Gracidea.”

Shaymin sat on Rosalita’s shoulder and smiled proudly as she approached the wall. Matt, Sheena and Eleanor backed up to give her space. When she stood directly in front of the message, she reached into her cloak and took out a small box. It bore the image of a canine Pokémon with wing-like ears, which was holding three spears colored brown, silver and blue. Behind the Pokémon was the shape of a flower with six petals.

The same flower as the one in the coat of arms was inside the box when Rosalita opened it. It was a vivid pink color with yellow stamens and a pair of green leaves sticking out of it. Rosalita held the box up to the dots on the wall, and in response to the pollen that wafted out, the symbols started to glow. A strange light whose source could not be identified filled the shrine.

“What’s happening now?” Eleanor wondered, putting words to the confusion all but Rosalita felt.

While the humans were distracted, the pollen of the Gracidea had also drifted over to Shaymin. Its body started to glow and change shape, becoming the Pokémon who was in Rosalita’s coat of arms. The grass on the back of Shaymin’s original form transformed into a mohawk-shaped tuft between its long ears, the two flowers surrounding its head became a single, scarf-like set of red petals, and its legs more than doubled in length.

“There is no need to be afraid, you!” Shaymin exclaimed, floating into the air once its transformation was complete. “This is the first trial on the road to the Golden City. The message said that, you!”

Eleanor was unable to stifle her laugh. “Thanks, but you sure have changed.”

“It’s Shaymin’s Sky Forme,” Rosalita revealed. “When Shaymin gets exposed to a Gracidea flower, it transforms and gains the ability to fly.”

“I get a lot stronger too, so don’t underestimate me, you!” Who Shaymin was talking to was unclear, but none of the four had much time to think about it. The doors of the shrine suddenly slammed shut, trapping them inside. “Don’t focus on me now, you! He is here!”

“Who is here?” Matt nervously asked, though Shaymin didn’t answer.

A beam of light erupted from the floor in front of the blocked exit, forcing Matt, Sheena and Eleanor to shield their eyes. Rosalita, on the other hand, wasn’t bothered by it. She stared straight into the light as she readied one of her Poké Balls, her eyes burning with determination.

“This is my fight now, so stay back,” she told the others. A shape was emerging from the light, though its features remained obscured at first. “I must do this if I am to prove my worth for the throne.”

Finally, the light began to fade. A deep, robotic voice echoed through the shrine as the figure emerged from the glare, its rough, craggy body constructed of what appeared to be stones of various shapes simply stuck together.

“Regirock…” Matt uttered as he took his laptop back from Sheena to continue recording what was happening.

“I’ve waited a very long time to meet you, Regirock. My name is Rosalita, princess of the House of Fernando and current heir to the throne of La Ciudad Dorada. I have come to prove myself and claim my birthright!”

Despite Regirock’s bizarre, inorganic appearance, it clearly understood Rosalita’s words. It stomped one of its feet into the floor and braced its arms, the ‘H’-shaped pattern of dots on its face flickering rapidly. In response to this seeming challenge, Rosalita threw her Poké Ball. It burst open to reveal a Bibarel, who immediately fell to all fours and prepared for battle when he saw Regirock.

“Regirock wants to see what Rosalita and her Pokémon are capable of,” Sheena revealed to the others after clasping her hands and using her power. “This isn’t a fight between predator and prey, or one living thing defending its nest from another. If I had to say, this is ritual combat.”

“We might be seeing something very few people are lucky enough to see,” Eleanor said in amazement. “Matt, make sure you record it!”

“I am, I am!” Matt hurriedly answered, making sure he had his laptop pointing in Bibarel and Regirock’s direction.

The dots on Regirock’s face flashed again while it grunted mechanically. It then raised its arms into the air, slammed them into the ground, and pointed them at Bibarel. A gust of sand burst out from around it, creating a sandstorm that spiraled around the chamber. Matt and Sheena had to back away to prevent the gritty vortex from getting in their eyes, but Eleanor nonchalantly donned a pair of goggles she’d been keeping in a pocket on her skirt.

Rosalita, meanwhile, put her hand above her eyes to shield them. “Sandstorm… I expected as much. Leonel, use Swords Dance!”

The princess’s Bibarel lowered himself in preparation to leap at Regirock. Sword-shaped bursts of light circled him before being absorbed into his body, causing an intense red aura to briefly surround him.

“You’re doing a good job, Leonel,” Rosalita called out to him as the sandstorm buffeted him. “Now, strike with Liquidation!”

A coat of water enveloped Leonel’s body before he finally sprang at the advancing Regirock. Their collision caused the water to explosively separate from Leonel’s body, while Regirock was thrown back several feet before it could brace itself again.

“That surprises me,” Sheena observed. “Everything I know about Regirock says it should be a lot more physically defensive than that.”

“It’s not a difference with Regirock, it’s a difference with Bibarel,” Matt deduced. “Its ability must be Simple, which would mean that Swords Dance had twice as much of an effect.”

“I see,” Sheena said, turning back to the battle.

Regirock raised its arms into the air, summoning forth a flurry of small, sharp stones. It then swung its arms forward, sending the rocks flying to slash at Leonel. The Bibarel dodged as many as he could, but enough hit him to force out a few pained cries.

“This is the sort of thing I know you can handle,” Rosalita encouraged her Pokémon. He looked back to her and nodded with a grin on his face, making her smile as well. “Let’s go with exactly what we practiced. Defense Curl!”

Leonel jumped into the air and rolled up into a ball. Where Swords Dance had drawn a red aura around him, Defense Curl elicited a blue one.

“So twice as much effect again, right?” Sheena asked Matt.

“Right,” he confirmed.

While Leonel remained rolled up, Regirock summoned forth the ammunition it needed for another Stone Edge. Before it could launch the jagged projectiles, however, Rosalita swept her arm in front of herself, making her cloak flap dramatically in the air.

“Leonel, Rollout!”

The Bibarel rolled out of the way of Stone Edge with great speed, leaving Regirock’s attack to crash harmlessly into the wall. He spun in a zigzag path toward Regirock before crashing into it. Regirock retaliated by pulling its arm back and charging the green energy of a Drain Punch into it, but by the time the legendary Pokémon swung its target had bounced off out of its reach.

Regirock’s dots flashed rapidly, then it jumped into the air and landed again with enough force to send a shockwave through the ground. Leonel was still rolling, but Regirock’s Stomping Tantrum knocked him off course for a moment. Eleanor had to jump back to avoid being hit.

“You’ve got a good pace going now, Leonel. Keep up using Rollout!”

Hearing his trainer’s words of encouragement helped Leonel get back on track, and he curved around to head for Regirock again. This time, Regirock readied its Drain Punch in advance, so when Leonel made contact it was able to swing and connect immediately. Green light flowed from Leonel’s body into Regirock’s as the Normal-and-Water-type flipped back through the air.

Leonel managed to regain his composure, however, and rolled back up before he landed. He barreled straight for Regirock at a greater speed than before. Regirock paused for a moment to appraise the threat, its dots flashing in tune with its robotic voice, then countered by firing Stone Edge into Leonel at point-blank range.

“Ah!” Rosalita gasped when she saw her Pokémon crash backward. His Rollout had finally been stopped.

“That was good while it lasted,” Matt said to Sheena while staring at his laptop. “She’d have to start a new Rollout all over now.”

“And Leonel probably can’t take too much more, even with a doubly effective Defense Curl,” she added, taking note of the scratches and other injuries on Leonel’s body.

Though Rosalita didn’t hear Matt and Sheena’s conversation, she was thinking of exactly the same things they were discussing.

“Can you keep going, Leonel?” she called out to him. Despite his weakened state, he sat up and cheerfully chattered back at her, raising her spirits enough to restore her determined smile. “I have to lead you to victory if I am to lead the kingdom, but I cannot and will not sacrifice those I’m responsible for… we must claim victory in this battle now. Swords Dance!”

Another ring of sword-shaped lights circled around Leonel’s body, but unlike the first time he did this, a red aura didn’t appear around him. This time, he glowed with a vivid red light instead.

“I think Leonel’s hit his limit,” Matt observed. “This really will end now, one way or another.”

Regirock appeared to have come to the same conclusion. It stood still for a moment, appraising its opponent while making a beeping sound, then raised its arms, calling forth the greatest volume of jagged stones yet.

“This is it, Leonel!” Rosalita cried out, sweeping her arm again. “Go forth and claim victory! Liquidation!”

Right as Leonel cloaked himself in water and launched himself at Regirock, the legendary Pokémon released its Stone Edge. Leonel weaved his way through the assault with movements much like those he’d use while swimming. He couldn’t evade every one of the stones, but the ones that penetrated his veil of water failed to rattle him.

An explosion of water and dust occurred when Leonel and Regirock collided, creating a muddy mess in the shrine. None of the group could see who came out on top at first, but as the air cleared, Regirock dropped to one knee. It groaned mechanically, then fell forward into the ground.

“We did it, Leonel!” Rosalita exclaimed, running over to hug her Pokémon. “We’re finally on the road we’ve prepared for for so long!”

“I’m proud of you, you!” Shaymin praised her.

“That really was something else,” Eleanor said, lifting her goggles as she approached the pair. Matt and Sheena were behind her. “I knew we were seeing something special.”

“This is the path the heir to the throne must take to prove their worth,” replied the princess, her manner turning serious again. “Ever since I was chosen, I’ve prepared for this.” She stopped for a moment and pet Leonel’s head. “I should say, we’ve prepared for this. The trials are only going to get harder from here, though… it’s a game of life and death for the kingdom, and our leader must be strong enough to give their own life to it.”

“Since you were chosen?” Sheena asked. “There’s quite a bit I’d like to ask you about. I came to this kingdom to learn more about my peoples’ connection to it.”

“Yeah, me too!” Eleanor exclaimed before adding, “Well, not that last part. But I love history and I want to hear all about it.”

“Your interest is heartening,” Rosalita said to them. “I wish my brother could see that there are outsiders who truly appreciate our way of life.”

Suddenly, Matt, Rosalita, Sheena and Eleanor all heard a strange, unfamiliar voice speaking to them. It was deep, rough and seemed to be coming from everywhere.

“A body of rock. To summon the king, such a thing must be obtained.”

“Who said that?” Matt wondered, looking around the shrine for the source of the voice.

“It was as if… it spoke directly into our minds,” Sheena thought out loud. She and the others settled their questioning gazes on Regirock, who had begun glowing with golden light.

An invisible force started to pull on Matt’s bag, and before he realized what was happening, the puzzle box floated out under its own volition. It was radiating the same light as Regirock, and the rays joined the two together. Regirock soon vanished, and the puzzle box lowered to the floor. When Matt picked it up, he noticed that the sides bearing Regirock’s dot pattern were illuminated.

“A body of rock. To summon the king, such a thing must be obtained,” he repeated. “That must be what this box really is for. It’s not just a map, it’s a key. It’s how we gather Regirock, Regice and Registeel together to find Regigigas and the Golden City.”

“You’re correct,” Rosalita said. “We still have much to discuss, but now is not the time. We must continue on.”

The quartet turned to head for the doors, but they hadn’t gotten far before they could hear the sound of an explosion outside.

“Now really isn’t the time,” remarked Eleanor.

“He must have found us…” Rosalita realized. She swiftly returned Leonel to his Poké Ball. “We’re not exactly in a great position for this right now…”

When the group rushed outside the shrine, they were greeted by the clearing smoke from the explosion they’d just heard. Sally, Zero and Reyes were standing firm in the positions guarding the shrine, but across the chasm stood Noel and Leon. Heatran was with them, along with their collared Yanmega, Togekiss, Honchkrow and Lickilicky, all of whom snarled menacingly.

“Yo, what the heck were you doin’ in there for so long?” Leon shouted across the crevasse with his fists on his hips. “You kept us waiting!”

“Why would it matter when we don’t even know who you are?” Eleanor’s expression had quite literally darkened compared to her typical, more upbeat personality.

“Get out of our way,” Rosalita ordered the pair, staring at them with an intense fire burning in her already intense eyes. “I don’t know if you’re with Fernando or not, but honestly, I don’t care. Walk away right now.”

“Yeah, that ain’t gonna happen,” Leon dismissively replied.

“Then I’ll make you move. Reyes, us-”

Before Rosalita could order an attack, Noel and Leon’s Togekiss used her wings to send a blade of wind cutting through the air. It crashed into the ground right in front of Rosalita’s feet, kicking up a small cloud of dust.

“No, no, no, you ain’t doing that either,” Noel declared, waving her finger. “This is how things are gonna go down. You’re gonna hand us that magic box you got, and you’re gonna give us Shaymin, too. We go to the Golden City, ’n maybe we let you outta this cave.”

“Wait, Sis, where is Shaymin?” Leon wondered. “Don’t see it with ’em now.”

“I’m right here, you!” Shaymin angrily announced, floating to the front of the group. “And I’m not going anywhere but with Rosalita, you!”

“It changed shape…” Leon realized.

“So there really is another form, huh,” Noel said to herself. She crossed her arms and smiled. “Ain’t gonna change a thing in the long run. You’ll be comin’ with us, whether we gotta make you or not.”

Rosalita opened her mouth to say something, but she paused when Matt touched her shoulder on his way past her.

“Use this chance to get Shaymin out of here,” he quietly said to her.

The princess nodded and stepped back, allowing Matt to take the lead.

“You gonna be a hero, dude?” Noel taunted him. “Ain’t nobody gonna get between us and our ticket outta this, ’specially not a dork like you. Don’t try me.”

“You better listen to what Sis is tellin’ you,” Leon added.

“Well I’ve got a question for you,” Matt countered. “My grandfather was murdered by someone who used a Dragonite wearing one of those collars your Pokémon have. Was it you?”

Much to Matt’s surprise, his question seemed to genuinely catch Noel and Leon off guard. Noel’s aggressive confidence broke, and she jabbed a finger in Matt’s direction.

“You got some nerve even suggesting that!” she angrily said to him, her eyes narrowed to mere slits. “Bro and I might be a lot of things but we ain’t no killers! We’re just doin’ what we gotta do to survive!”

“Is that so,” Matt responded, his voice turning bitter. “Because I haven’t seen those collars since then… until today.”

“The collars were on the Pokémon when we got ’em, dude,” Leon admitted.

“What did you say?”

Before Matt could get an answer, Rosalita saw an opening in how Noel and Leon were engaged with him. “Shaymin, fly out of here,” she whispered to the Pokémon.

“I won’t leave you behind,” Shaymin argued. “I must be at the side of the leader, you!”

“You don’t need to worry about me,” Rosalita asserted. “I’ll catch up with you. Just go!”

Shaymin hesitated, but did eventually turn and start to fly back up the way the group came. Though he didn’t see this, Matt still knew he had to draw out his argument with Noel and Leon.

“I’ll ask you one more time, what did you mean when you said you ‘got’ the Pokémon and the collars?” he demanded of them. “From who?”

“I don’t remember sayin’ anything like that.” Leon shrugged, taunting Matt with his knowing smirk. “You losin’ your mind, dude?”

“You rich folks have been lookin’ down on us street kids all our lives,” Noel angrily said with her arms tightly crossed. “We ain’t takin’ it no more. This job is our ticket outta this life, and you ain’t gonna take it aw-”

Suddenly, the pair’s Lickilicky interrupted Noel’s tirade with a cry of surprise. She’d spotted Shaymin making its escape.

“No!” Rosalita exclaimed when she realized her plan was shot. “Shaymin, run for it!”

It was already too late, however. The moment she saw Shaymin flying off, Noel got to work with the control device on her wrist and sent Honchkrow, Yanmega and Togekiss to block its escape route.

“Honchkrow, Icy Wind!” Noel directed. “Togekiss, Air Slash! Yanmega, Ancient Power!”

Honchkrow was the first of the three to act. Positioning himself directly in front of Shaymin, he flapped his broad wings to send a gust of chilled air over it. The attack wasn’t very powerful, but Shaymin was still stricken by the cold, losing some of its agility. As a result it was unable to escape when Togekiss and Yanmega barraged it with a blade of wind and spheres of silver energy. Shaymin cried out from the force of the repeated impacts and fell back down to the ledge, where Rosalita caught it in her arms.

“You idiots just made a big mistake,” Noel growled. “Since you did that, I’m doin’ this. Lickilicky, Dragon Tail!”

The blue glow from Lickilicky’s collar intensified, and purple light in the shape of a straight, pointed tail surrounded her typically curled one. She then jumped up and swept away the posts holding up the bridge on her side of the chasm, sending the rickety pathway collapsing uselessly to the opposite end.

“Oh, you guys did it now,” Leon mocked. “You made Sis real mad.”

“I’m done talkin’ to you.” With a sweep of her hand over her wrist device’s projection, Noel beckoned Heatran to the front of her army. “Shaymin and the box. Now. Or I start puttin’ the screws to you. We ain’t killers but we don’t have these Pokémon to not use ’em, and we got numbers on our side if you think you’re fightin’ back.”

Matt froze. “She certainly isn’t kidding about that,” he thought. “And we haven’t got nearly enough space to even try fighting our way out, anyway… what to do?”

“We aren’t afraid of you, you!” Shaymin was back to its old self, having already recovered from its earlier injury. “I’m not going with you, and you’re not getting the treasure either.”

“Guess the decision’s made for me,” Matt sighed when he saw Shaymin fly in front of him.

“You made that decision, then. Not me.” Noel manipulated the projection with her fingers and ordered, “Heatran, Magma Storm!”

Fixing her glare on Shaymin, Heatran opened her gaping mouth and blasted out a spiraling stream of fire. Shaymin ignored the very real danger this posed, and reared back to throw an Air Slash into the vortex.

Seeing that Shaymin’s counterattack wouldn’t be enough, Matt quickly called out, “Hydro Pump!”

The combination of Shaymin’s Air Slash and Sally’s Hydro Pump overcame Heatran’s offense, canceling it out in a violent, smoky explosion. Matt covered his face as the force of the collision blew against him.

Before the smoke cleared, Rosalita stepped up next to Matt and put her hand on his shoulder. “I have an idea to get out of here, but I need what just happened to happen again.”

“I don’t like the sound of that,” he answered nervously.

“We’ll need it if we’re going to get all the way down there.” Rosalita pointed over the side of the cliff, where Matt could see an Arcane Science-powered, multi-car mining train sitting abandoned on tracks heading into another spacious tunnel at the bottom of the cavern.

“Ohhh, I get it now,” he said. “I think I do, at least.”

“What’s the matter, can’t decide how you’re goin’ to surrender?” Leon shouted across the chasm once the veil of smoke lifted enough to allow the two sides to see each other again.

“Tell Eleanor and Sheena the plan,” Matt quietly said to Rosalita. “I’ll handle this.”

Rosalita nodded quickly and retreated to the others, leaving Matt to face Noel and Leon. Sally, Zero and Shaymin lined up in front of him.

“Are you gonna give me what I want,” Noel demanded, “or do you think makin’ me do that again is a good idea?”

“I pick door number three,” he countered. “Sally, use Flamethrower! Zero, Thunderbolt!”

Matt’s Salamence roared as she spouted a jet of fire from her mouth at Yanmega. Zero, meanwhile, took aim at Togekiss with a bolt of electricity that arced through the air from the antenna on its head. Finally, Shaymin contributed to the effort by lashing out with another Air Slash.

Noel hadn’t expected Matt to actually try mounting a counteroffensive, so she wasn’t ready to coordinate a response. All she could do was frantically go through the different control options her wrist device offered, her distraction forcing Leon to step in.

“I got this, Sis!” he said to her before turning his attention to the Pokémon. “Honchkrow, Icy Wind! Lickilicky, Water Pulse!”

The cold air that Honchkrow blew toward Sally’s Flamethrower soon dissipated into a cloud of harmless steam, but the ring of water Lickilicky launched was able to lessen the intensity of the fire, so Yanmega took little damage from it. Immediately after, Honchkrow shielded his body with his wing, protecting it from a direct blow from Shaymin’s Air Slash. Togekiss, however, took the full force of Zero’s Thunderbolt, crying out and thrashing around while the electricity brightly illuminated the cave.

“Togekiss, escape that and use Hyper Voice!” Noel ordered the Normal-and-Flying-type Pokémon. In response to the command Noel gave with her wrist device, the light from Togekiss’ collar intensified, its influence strengthening Togekiss enough for her to break free from the Thunderbolt.

She then flew to a vantage point where Sally, Zero and Shaymin were all in reach, took a deep breath, and unleashed a loud shriek. Although Zero had a robust defense against Normal-type attacks such as this, the sheer force Togekiss put into it forced the Electric-and-Steel-type Pokémon back just as it did to Zero’s allies.

“You say you wanted door number three?” Noel bitterly mocked Matt. “Too bad, what you just did is only gonna get you door number two. Heatran, give ’im what he deserves!”

Noel swept her hand over the projection and then made a tight fist. In response to this motion, Heatran stomped forward, opened her mouth and spat out a Magma Storm more intense than the one before. Sally, Zero and Shaymin stood ready to stop it, and put all their effort into a combined Hydro Pump, Thunderbolt and Air Slash that met the vortex with explosive force. Matt, Rosalita, Eleanor and Sheena all had to brace themselves against the blast’s force, while Leon held Noel in place. The air filled with smoke once again, though like the Magma Storm that went into creating it, there was much more of it than before.

“Shaymin, now!” Rosalita called out.

“You got it, you!”

Without hesitation, Shaymin dove straight into the huge cloud of smoke. It tensed all its muscles and focused its mind, drawing the smoke into its body. As it did so, the two scarf-like petals on its neck turned black. Still, it pressed on, growling to get through until it absorbed every trace of the acrid cloud.

Once the cloud was gone, Shaymin strained to keep it all contained. Finally, it screamed, “Take this, you!” before flying straight at Noel, Leon and their Pokémon.

Noel and Leon had no time to react before Shaymin unleashed a blinding light from its body, followed by a massive and powerful explosion. The pair were thrown all the way back into the wall several feet away, with their army scattering around them. Even the heavier Pokémon, Heatran and Lickilicky, couldn’t stand against the force of the blast.

Meanwhile, on the opposite side of the destroyed bridge, Rosalita frantically told the others, “Hurry, we have to go right now!”

Matt, Sheena and Eleanor wasted no time in following Rosalita’s direction to execute her plan. All four of them got back on the Pokémon that had helped them descend earlier - Matt and Sheena on Sally, Eleanor on Zero, and Rosalita on Reyes - and set off even deeper into the mine. Shaymin followed as soon as it recovered from attacking Noel and Leon, leaving the pair and their army of Pokémon behind.

When they reached the lowest area of the cavern, Shaymin had already caught up with them. “Hurry up, you!” it barked at them while they recalled their Pokémon.

“Is Shaymin always like this?” Matt flatly and sarcastically asked Rosalita.

“Only in Sky Forme,” she answered, equally bitingly. “It would be best for us if we just listened…”

The quartet boarded the train and made their way to the engine at the head of it. All the cars and the engine had the same rusty, flaking red paint on them, and like almost all other Arcane Science technology, the engine had cylindrical bulbs sticking out of it. They were unlit, however, as were the controls Eleanor and Rosalita found when they went to examine the engine.

“I don’t know if it still works,” Rosalita confessed. “This plan wasn’t guaranteed, but it was the best I had…” Noticing how attentively Eleanor was inspecting the controls, Rosalita asked her, “Am I wrong? Do you see something?”

“The actual wires and machinery all look intact,” Eleanor said, poking at the cables. “It’s missing a power source, but I can fix that.”

Eleanor retrieved a Poké Ball from the waist of her skirt and opened it. A Rotom materialized out of it and floated in the air, the lightning bolt-shaped plasma surrounding its body trembling with every slight move it made. When it saw the machinery in front of itself, its smile turned into a toothy, excited grin.

“You want to power this train up, Rotom?”

Eleanor didn’t need to ask Rotom twice. The Electric-and-Ghost-type dove straight into the control panel, and its energy brought the engine to life. The bulbs flickered and filled with blue light, and the panel illuminated to display the train’s controls.

“Excellent!” Rosalita exclaimed. Looking over her shoulder, she called to Matt and Sheena, “Train’s running! Time to go!”

Eleanor mimicked the motion of adjusting a train engineer’s cap on her head before bringing her hands over the controls. “All aboard!”

At Eleanor’s prompting, the train started to move. It jerked abruptly forward and stalled briefly before getting going, rolling into the tunnel with its wheels clicking rhythmically on the tracks. The group traveled in silence for several minutes before Matt finally exhaled and relaxed.

“Well, that’s finally over,” he sighed, sitting down against the interior of an empty gondola behind the engine.

Sitting down opposite Matt, Sheena called to Rosalita, “Where are we heading, anyway?”

“I had a look at a map of the old mining system earlier,” the princess explained. “We entered the mine in section nine using the elevator. This rail line enters and exits the mine in section six, and there’s lodging for workers not too far from where this tunnel ends. We’ll be able to rest and recover there.”

“That’s a relief,” Sheena said before taking a deep breath.

“Who were those two, though?” Matt wondered, adjusting his glasses and putting his hand on his chin. “I heard her say that this was their ticket out of a life of crime… once we’re out of here I’ll look and see if there’s any public information on them. Maybe we can get an idea of who we’re up against.”

“They must be in league with my brother somehow…” Rosalita said as she joined Matt and Sheena riding in the gondola. Her serious attitude from earlier had broken, and she now both looked and sounded tired. “The collars, and those clockwork Poké Balls on their vests… both are Doradan Arcane Science technology.”

“Then someone connected to your kingdom murdered my grandfather,” Matt told her. “The witnesses to the killer said he had a Dragonite wearing one of those same collars. If it wasn’t Fernando, and it wasn’t those two we just dealt with, it was someone.”

“Once I take the throne I’ll find who in the court was involved,” Rosalita vowed, hanging her head and turning her eyes up to see him. “It must have been someone in the government. The general public wouldn’t know Sutter had that puzzle box.”

“Wait, that sounds… strange,” Matt thought, moving his hand from his chin to his mouth as he considered Rosalita’s words. “It’s true that not just anyone should have known he had the box. But if a new ruler must follow the path of the Three Pillars, and the box is necessary to gather them, then…”

Matt’s deductions were interrupted when Shaymin perched itself on the edge of the gondola. Seemingly both excited and agitated, it shrilled, “Look alive, you! The fight’s not over!” as it stared off behind the train.

Despite Shaymin’s alert, it wasn’t until an impact shook the train that Matt, Sheena and Rosalita stood up and saw the threat.

Noel and Leon were giving chase, flying through the tunnel single-file with their wingpacks. Yanmega and Togekiss remained with them.

“Oh, when will you just quit?!” Rosalita yelled at them.

“When you give us Shaymin and that box!” Noel shouted back. “I told you, we ain’t goin’ back to the way our lives’ve been!”

“Well your lives aren’t going to be made on the sacrifice of our kingdom, that I’m telling you now.” Rosalita climbed out of the gondola and beckoned Matt to follow her, both of them boarding the flatcar immediately behind it. Shaymin flew to Rosalita’s side, and she opened one of her Poké Balls, summoning her Luxray. “Shaymin, give me a hand here. Matt, you back me up.”

“Got it, you!” Shaymin excitedly said.

“Same, but without the ‘you,’” Matt added with a hint of sarcasm.

Seeing the defense being mounted against her efforts, Noel seized her chance to act first. Pointing forward, she commanded, “Yanmega, Ancient Power! Togekiss, Hyper Voice!”

Yanmega flew to the head of Noel’s group and formed several silver energy orbs around himself. Before he could complete his attack, Rosalita countered, calling out, “Isabel, Thunderbolt!”

Sparks of electricity crackled from the Luxray’s mane moments before she unleashed a burst of lightning from it, shooting down the spheres before they could impact the train. Togekiss dove in front of Yanmega immediately afterward and filled the tunnel with her earsplitting screeching, but even as it cringed from the pain the noise caused, Shaymin still rushed its enemy head-on. The mythical Pokémon stepped on Togekiss’ head to stun her, then backflipped through the air and flung a blade of compressed wind directly into her face before laughing mischievously.

“Why are you givin’ us such trouble?” Noel fumed. “You got a brother too! We ain’t doin’ anything you wouldn’t do for him!”

Rosalita took a step back, and although Matt couldn’t see her face, he correctly guessed from the way her whole body tensed up that she was upset and hurt.

“It’s true that I love my brother…” she admitted, the vanishing of her previous confidence reflecting how torn she felt, “and trying to better your lives isn’t wrong either. But you’re wrong, I’m nothing like you!”

Noel was so angered and distracted by Rosalita’s outburst that she nearly stopped flying after the train. “Of course you aren’t. Rich kids like you never understood livin’ on the street like we had to!”

During the argument, Noel had retrieved a normal Poké Ball from her belt, and once she was done fuming she opened it. The light within landed on the flatbed car and took the amorphous shape of a Muk. Unlike all the Muk Matt had seen before, this one had an oily blue body with green, yellow and pink flowing aimlessly through him. Some points on his body had solidified into small white crystals.

“Muk, use Gunk Shot!” Noel shouted.

Without hesitation, Muk coughed up a giant mass of sludge outlined by a golden aura. It was large enough to threaten both Pokémon assisting Rosalita, but while Shaymin could easily fly away from it, Isabel the Luxray had no such option.

A sudden flash in front of Rosalita and Isabel forced them both to shut their eyes. They could only hear the explosion that came moments later, and when they were able to look again, they discovered its source.

Standing in front of them on the flatcar was an Aggron. Matt had sent the Steel-and-Rock type out by opening his Poké Ball from around Rosalita’s side, allowing him to intercept Gunk Shot without harm.

“That was close.” Rosalita sighed in relief. “Thank you.”

“Don’t worry about it,” Matt replied before turning his attention back to his Aggron. “I’m tired of doing this… Tony, use Dragon Claw on that Muk, please.”

Noel grit her teeth. “Muk, get away using Rock Polish!”

Tony pulled his right arm back and advanced on Muk, his claws lengthened and glowing with a bright green hue. In response, Noel’s Pokémon smoothed out his body, a wave of white light working its way across him as the irregular parts of his mass became uniform. Just before Tony was able to strike, Muk slipped away and slithered to the underside of the flatcar, where he adhered himself to remain out of Tony’s reach. Togekiss then swooped into the opening, formed an Aura Sphere between her wings and flung it into Tony’s chest. The Aggron roared as he stumbled back from the impact.

“This is never going to end at this rate,” Rosalita realized. “Not with that Muk hiding like that… and if we reach the end of the tunnel they’ll have room to bring out all their Pokémon again.”

“We’ll be swamped,” Matt concurred.

“Good thing I’ve got an idea, you,” Shaymin said to them both after floating down to them. “I say just stop them from following us. Get what I mean, you?”

Shaymin subtly nodded to the coupling between the train cars, and Rosalita immediately realized what it was suggesting. “I got it,” she said to the Pokémon. “You push them back and we’ll take care of the rest. Isabel, with me.”

Rosalita carefully pushed by Matt and got back inside the gondola, then Isabel leaped over him to join her. She then gestured for Matt to follow her, and once only Tony and Muk remained on the flatcar, she called out to Shaymin.

“Do it now!”

With another mischievous grin, Shaymin reared back and spun multiple blades of wind into Yanmega and Togekiss. The pair were halted by the attack, while one of the Air Slashes came close enough to Noel to force her to stop flying after the train. Leon barely avoided crashing into her.

“Have Aggron use Dragon Claw on the coupling,” the princess told Matt.

“Alright.” He took Tony’s Poké Ball back out of his bag, then called to the Steel-and-Rock-type, “I don’t know if you heard her, but break the coupling with Dragon Claw!”

Tony turned around and grunted in acknowledgement to his trainer, then lumbered over and drove his glowing claws straight into the coupling between the gondola and the flatcar. The metal hooks cracked apart and lost their hold on each other.

Now no longer connected to the engine, the flatcar started slowing down. Tony roared in pride at his work, not noticing Muk come back up to the surface.

“Well done, Tony!” Matt praised him before recalling him into the Poké Ball, leaving Muk alone on the flatcar.

“You two might want to keep your heads down and back away for this part,” Rosalita told Matt and Sheena. When they both looked questioningly at her, she added, “Just in case.”

Though neither of them fully understood what Rosalita intended to do, Matt and Sheena shrugged at each other and went to the other end of the gondola as she suggested. Once Rosalita saw they were a safe distance away, she pointed at the ceiling and said to Isabel, “Use Thunderbolt and don’t let up.”

Thanks to the pace of the train, the electric bolts Isabel struck the ceiling with kept moving with her. The tunnel collapsed at each point she hit, filling the passageway with rocks that formed an ever-thickening barrier between the train and Noel, Leon and their Pokémon.

“That’s enough,” she told Isabel after a few minutes, prompting the Luxray to halt her attack. Rosalita gave her a scratch behind the ear, then went to join her companions at the front of the train. “They won’t be getting out of the mine this way, at least.”

“You fought well,” Matt said. “Not just now. Everything I saw you do today was impressive.”

“I must agree,” Sheena added. “La Ciudad Dorada is lucky to have such a driven leader.”

“Thank you, even though I’m not really the leader yet.” Rosalita sat down and frowned as she hung her head. “There’s so much that still needs to be done. It’s all rather overwhelming, and that’s before taking my brother into account. I know I have to face him eventually and that’s what has me scared the most.”

“Scared?” Matt wondered.

“I’m not scared that he will harm me. I’m scared that when I face him again, I won’t see the Fernando I love anymore. I’m sure those two goons were working for him and it leaves me to fear that he’s already too far gone to be saved… when that time comes, I have to choose between him or the kingdom and I don’t know if I’ll be able to make the right choice.”

By the time she was done talking, Rosalita’s whole body was trembling. Sheena sat down next to her and took the princess’ hand up in her own.

“I had to face a relative once who I was led to believe was a horrible person,” Sheena told her, “and I had to do things that made me feel like the weight of the world was on my shoulders. I made a lot of mistakes along the way but in the end I was able to help do what needed to be done. I’m saying this because I understand how you feel right now, and if it means anything, I believe in you.”

Rosalita was stunned by Sheena’s words of support and couldn’t form a response right away. “Th-thank you…” she finally managed to say. “I’m not even sure I deserve it. A real leader would have been able to deal with their own brother instead of running away the way I did.”

“You may have made a mistake, but I promise you that it doesn’t make you any less worthy of being a leader.” Sheena tightened her grip on Rosalita’s hand. “What matters is what you do from here, and I believe you’ll do what’s right.”

Unable to hold back any longer, Rosalita started to tear up. “Thank you so much, I mean it…”

“You’re already stronger than you think, you,” Shaymin told her in a manner totally different from its typically boisterous personality. “You know what the kingdom’s leader is expected to do and you’re preparing yourself to face it. That means you’re following in the footsteps of what your predecessors did, you.”

Matt observed the increasingly emotional conversation between Rosalita, Sheena and Shaymin in silence. Feeling he had no right to insert himself into the exchange, he climbed over the end of the gondola and boarded the engine instead.

-:-

That evening, Fernando watched the sun slowly dip behind the mountainous horizon from a balcony in Lingote Palace. La Ciudad Dorada and the vast tract of land where its empire once stood were bathed in the brilliant orange glow that had long been a notorious attraction for tourists.

Fernando had draped himself in a crimson, gold-fringed cape fastened around his neck by an emblem of his family’s coat of arms, which itself had three gold tassels hanging out from its sides. In his right hand, he held a staff that ended in an ornate, translucent gold bulb. Within the bulb rested a glowing, misshapen and prismatic jewel.

“I know you’re out there, Sister,” he said out loud. A breeze picked up, rustling his hair and cape for a moment. “Please just understand that I’m doing what I must to save us all… come home. There’s still time for me to fix everything.”

“Count Fernando?”

An aged man dressed in a regal purple-and-gold uniform stood in the glass doorway that led out to the balcony, waiting for acknowledgment before he approached or addressed his superior further. He had a medal with the coat of arms on it pinned to his chest, as well as a broad moustache.

“Ah?” Fernando said, turning around to face the official. “Oh, yes, I called for you. Come here.”

Having secured Fernando’s permission, the man joined him on the balcony. “What can I help you with, sir?”

“It’s beautiful, isn’t it?” Fernando asked him, not immediately answering his question. “The land, I mean. Look at it.”

“Of course it is. We’ve always worked to ensure it stays that way.”

“Then you will understand why I need your help right now.” Fernando turned to gaze out over the city again. “I want you to have your men begin preparing the skyship for launch.”

“The skyship?” The official raised an eyebrow at Fernando’s request, then pulled at the end of his moustache. “If I may, sir, I’ve served La Ciudad Dorada since your father’s reign, and not one time during all those years did we need to launch the skyship.”

“But you always kept it repaired and ready in case it was needed,” Fernando said back. “Now is the time that you’ve been preparing for. I hope we will not need to actually launch it in the end, but La Ciudad Dorada is in danger and I need us to be ready.”

“As you wish, Count Fernando. I’ll give the order right away.”




END of CHAPTER 2

Yes, I do think you're going to see more changes the further in we get. That said, there will be things you'll surely recognize, too. I hope recognizing each thing as new or old will be fun for you.



Hm, I think him not having too much a reaction at that point does work. This isn't anything new for this version of the character; she is extremely diligent (to put it mildly) as a student so staying in a library is not a big surprise.



I think, and I certainly hope, that scenes like those two helped to establish both how different from the original Eleanor this Eleanor is, and also what kind of person she is here in general.



Her character is different, which is a part of me changing Fernando's character as heavily as I did, and then moving towards the themes of gratitude and sibling relationships.

The battle between Rosalita and Regirock was actually a last minute change I made. I originally intended to have Matt battle the titans, the same way he did in the original version of the story. In fact, I even wrote my planning notes to include it. At literally the last minute I realized that if Rosalita has to prove herself to inherit the throne, it makes far more sense for her to be the one battling the titans. As for Bibarel, I built off the presence of Simple as its ability and access to boosting moves - specifically Swords Dance and the Defense Curl/Rollout combo - to create the match. It was actually quite difficult to depict Regirock with an appropriate level of power while also not making Leonel look too weak with all the boosts he had.



I really want this Shaymin to stand out from the movie Shaymin in the new version of the story. I'm hoping that in chapter 3 and forward, I'll be able to depict a Shaymin that has a bratty and bossy personality, but at the same time is more dignified and responsible because of its position in the royal family and the amount of time it's served in that role.



Poor VS. rich is something that's a motivation for Noel and Leon, so it probably will not be expanded that far. Overall, the themes I'm intending to explore are sibling relationships and finding gratitude for what you have, which cover three main character pairs: Matt and Amanda (though she doesn't have a major role in this story), Fernando and Rosalita, and Noel and Leon.



I apologize if it was a little much, but I feel this was the best way to structure the chapter based on the events that took place. I would not be able to split the Noel and Leon battle from chapter 2 and merge it into chapter 3 given what I plan for chapter 3 to be.

Sheena's main role in this story is to provide a sort of mentor role to Rosalita, actually. She's gone through a number of the same responsibilities Rosalita holds, so she can feel empathy towards Rosalita. I think as the story progresses, Rosalita's character will become more clearly someone who is challenged to do what she must and struggles to come to terms with it, so it is very helpful for her to have someone she can look up to for companionship and advice.



Thank you! I will do my best to deliver what you want.

Aaah, thank you so much! You really have no idea how much that means to me. I always just wanted to tell the stories that come into my mind and hoped that they gave people enjoyment. I'm so happy to know my work meant so much to you.



This is a different Eleanor than the one she was before, so try to put aside what you remember of her original version. One of my goals for this remake was improve Eleanor overall, and I must give Bay credit for helping me on that.



I think this version is actually better than how it used to be, considering in the original version he actually managed to write a short note to Matt. Rewriting it, I realized that was really stretching belief, so I changed it to what you see here.

And no, you're not misremembering it at all. Chapter 3 will be touching on that a little bit.



Well, I wanted every character to have a fairly defined role, and the second point you made couples into the first. Cassy's character is that of a dedicated student, so her forceful personality relates to that.



This is another thing I set out to do with the rewrite. Well, maybe not by itself. What I wanted to do was have the rewrite act as a tribute to Diamond and Pearl/Sinnoh/the time the original story was written, but also include new things that have come out in the roughly 10 years since then. The 21st movie actually inspired me to do that by how it includes a Lurantis amongst a huge number of Kanto and Johto Pokemon. That was the seed for the idea, and it grew from there. Referencing Orre just came because I'm still a huge fan of it all these years later, while you'll see other things that are more recent, too.



I get what you mean. This version of the story is set at the same time the original one was, which places it parallel to the events of the final Enigma Shadow story. I added the "Operation GEAR" title to it for this version in order to more closely tie it to the rest of the Operation GEAR stories as a prelude to them, and I toned down the direct links between this story and the final Enigma Shadow story in order to help it stand better on its own. La Ciudad Dorada is still in the center of the region from XD^3, for example, but its name is not relevant to the storyline so it won't be referenced here. There will be one or two direct references at the very end that link them together, but those will act mostly as Easter eggs and not have an impact on the storyline here.

Thank you so, so much for your kind words and your continued support. It really means so much more to me than you can even imagine.

CHAPTER 3: The Purpose of Power

-:-

The end of the rail line out of the underground was far from the end of the journey Matt, Eleanor and Sheena had to take that day. After disembarking from the train, Rosalita led them on a hike through the wooded, mountainous terrain. It wasn’t an easy path to take by itself, but their exhaustion from everything else that had already happened made the trip even more grueling.

At first, they followed the princess and kept all their questions about the situation in La Ciudad Dorada to themselves, but as the sun lowered and the sky dimmed in the last throes of daylight, those questions only got stronger. Finally, while the group passed by a Lickitung that was slurping his evening meal of berries out of a tree, Matt couldn’t wait any longer.

“Why is it this far?” he asked Rosalita. “Wouldn’t it make more sense to have the quarters near the train so the workers wouldn’t need to travel?”

“It wasn’t like this in the past,” Rosalita explained. She did not turn around or stop walking while she spoke. “They had vehicles to ride back and forth with, but when the mine closed the workers brought them all back to La Ciudad Dorada.”

“That makes sense,” Eleanor said. “No reason to leave machines behind if they wouldn’t get used anymore.”

“But you can’t take a train with you,” Sheena commented.

“Exactly,” the engineer agreed.

Their trek through the woods continued in the waning daylight. Wild Hoothoot and Noctowl heralded the emergence of night with their symphony of cries from the trees. When the sun dipped beneath the horizon, an entirely different light started shining in the group’s midst, making them pause to look at it. The light was radiating directly from Shaymin’s body.

Eleanor brought her hand to her mouth and gasped, then asked the Pokémon, “Are you alright?”

“When the sun goes away I can’t keep this form, yoooouuuu-” Shaymin’s body morphed within the light while it answered. No longer did it have its canine appearance or ability to fly. It reverted into its original hedgehog shape and flopped to the ground, though it managed to land on its feet. “You understand, yes?” it asked, looking timidly up at Eleanor.

“So its demeanor changes with its form,” Sheena observed. “How curious.”

“That’s right,” Rosalita said, walking over to Shaymin and picking it up so it could nestle in her arms again. “In a way, I admire Shaymin more than anyone else in our history. It’s been here from the beginning, keeping our kingdom on the right track, yet that responsibility hasn’t changed it at all. It gives me hope at times like these that everything will be okay .”

Shaymin squirmed around in Rosalita’s arms to get more comfortable, then smiled. Multiple flowers emerged from the grass on its back.

Surprised by the sudden appearance of the new blossoms, Matt leaned closer to Shaymin and adjusted his glasses. “I didn’t know Shaymin could do that.”

“Shaymin appears in response to gratitude, and also gains strength from it,” Rosalita explained. “One person’s feelings of gratitude give it enough strength to grow flowers. It’s said that during the civil war, when the entire kingdom gave thanks for what they had together, Shaymin manifested a power so great it was even able to overwhelm Regigigas, communicating to it that the people felt remorse for what they did.”

“Even beyond the move it used in the mine?” Sheena said. “That’s amazing…”

“It is, isn't it?” Shaymin happily murmured. “It’s my Seed Flare, but better, yes?”

“Anyway, we should be going,” Rosalita told the others. She walked in front of the rest of the group and said, “It isn’t much further from here.”

That was truly an understatement. Once the group set off again they arrived at the camp in mere minutes. Unlike the one where Matt and the others met Rosalita, this one was just a single two-story building instead of a small town. It was covered in plant growth, but for its years of disuse, was in surprisingly fair shape structurally.

“It does look like a good place to stop for the night,” Matt said to Rosalita and Sheena as they stood outside the building and looked up at it. “Hopefully we don’t end up disturbing any Pokémon taking food this time…”

“At least this time we’d be expecting it,” Sheena pointed out.

“Yeah, that’s true,” Matt conceded, putting his hands in the pockets of his coat.

Rosalita advanced toward the building, but before she made it very far, Eleanor emerged from around the corner. She’d gone off on her own to investigate the area and returned with excitement evident on her face.

“You guys!” she called to Matt, Sheena and Rosalita. “Come over here and look what I found!”

Intrigued, Matt wasted no time in following Eleanor back around the corner, leaving Sheena and Rosalita with no choice but to go after the two of them. They were greeted by the sight of another Arcane Science vehicle that matched the ones they originally rode out to the mine using.

“I thought the workers took all the vehicles back with them when the mine closed,” Sheena said.

“I certainly believed that was the case,” Rosalita responded, taking a step closer to the machine. “It’s to our benefit that it’s here, though.”

Eleanor, meanwhile, was inspecting the vehicle’s controls. When she tapped her finger on its central panel, there was no response. She furrowed her brow and fetched Rotom’s Poké Ball from her skirt.

“Give it some juice, would you?” she asked the skittish Pokémon after releasing it.

Rotom flashed its trademark toothy grin and nodded, then discharged some electricity from its plasma body into the machinery before it. The Pokémon continued until Eleanor signaled it to stop by raising her hand. The vehicle’s control panel remained dark.

“Doesn’t look like it’s working,” Eleanor called to the others. Before any of them could say anything, she playfully asked herself, “Can I fix it? Sure I can.” Winking at Matt, Sheena and Rosalita, she added, “Give me time and I can fix anything.”

-:-

Once night fell in La Ciudad Dorada, Lingote Palace’s stained glass turned the castle into a vivid beacon over the town. Whereas sunlight filled its halls with color during the day, the electric glow from within cast the pigmentation of the glass out into the dark, cool air. Effectively, the palace transformed into a guiding star that ensured none could get lost within La Ciudad Dorada.

Only one room in Lingote Palace, the archive, lacked that light, but its absence didn’t bother Cassy at all. Fernando provided her with a lamp, and its flame gave her all she needed to read the books kept there. Sitting at the oak table with the lamp, a stack of books and a drink mixed from locally-grown Poké Beans that she bought in the market, Cassy was well equipped for a busy night of studying.

Cassy was well into a book about the history of the royal family when she discovered something that caught her by surprise. Upon turning one of the pages, something slipped out of the tome and fell to the floor. When Cassy went to retrieve it, she saw that it was an old photograph. That wasn’t what shocked her. It was when she realized who was in the photograph that she had to rub her eyes in disbelief.

Sutter stood squarely in the center of the image, flanked on one side by an aged man and on the other by a much younger one. The unidentified pair looked incredibly similar to each other facially, but it was the object in Sutter’s hands that drew Cassy’s attention the most. Matt’s grandfather was holding the puzzle box.

“What is this?” Cassy wondered out loud. As she examined the photo more closely, she noticed something else she recognized. She could see iron arches overhead, and in the background, a portion of a familiar bronze mural. “The museum, so it was taken there…” A realization suddenly hit Cassy’s mind, and she cocked her head while staring at the image in her hand and recalling Fernando’s words. “Wait a minute… this museum was designed by Godey at Fernando VI’s commission while the Space-Time Tower was unfinished. That’s when Sutter traveled here… but the museum is clearly finished in this picture…”

At that point, something else about the photo caught Cassy’s eye. On the left side of the image, she could see three of the gold-encased bodies of the previous kings in the background. The furthest one to the left was almost entirely cut off by the edge of the photo, and the other two were partially blocked from view, but Cassy could clearly see that the rightmost one was the last in the sequence.

Struck by inspiration, Cassy stood up with the photo in her hand and exited the archive into the museum. She walked through the exhibits, double-checking the photograph all the while, until she found the spot it was taken from. It was near a giant planetarium model where she finally stopped, raised the photo and backed up until the image lined up with what was there.

There was only one difference between the photograph and what Cassy could see from the same perspective. “I knew it,” she said to herself, narrowing her eyes as she stared at the line of former kings entombed in gold.

There was one more king in the row presently than there was when the photo was taken.

It turned her stomach, but Cassy knew what she had to do to concretely confirm her suspicions. She approached the kings, every step she took making her grimace further. When she could push herself no further she held up the photo so the aged man on the far left was right next to the last statue in the line.

Once they were side-by-side there was no doubt any longer. The aged man in the photo was identical to the last of the kings in the gallery.

“Fernando VI…” Cassy uttered. Glancing over to the youngest of the three men in the picture, she said, “And you must be Fernando VII… but then…”

Cassy’s eyes settled squarely on Sutter. She’d talked to him regularly in her years attending the Rustboro School prior to his death, but never had he puzzled her to the degree his image did at that moment.

“You… what were you up to?” she said to the photograph. “Why were you here then?”

-:-

Eleanor was busy working on the machinery of the broken vehicle, wearing her goggles while her Litwick provided light and her Rotom buzzed around in the air nearby. Matt, Sheena and Rosalita, meanwhile, sat nearby around a fire Matt started to cook preserved food they found in the camp. While he quietly worked on his laptop, Rosalita was happily regaling Sheena and Eleanor with stories of La Ciudad Dorada’s history. The chorus of lively cries from the colony of Woobat and Swoobat living in the surrounding trees as they awoke for their nightly flight filtered along in the background to the princess’s tales.

“You know,” Eleanor said, gesturing to Rosalita using a wrench without turning around, “I’m having fun listening to you tell these stories.”

Rosalita smiled wearily as she stroked Shaymin’s back. “Thank you. Preserving the kingdom’s mythology is another responsibility that falls to me, as the soon-to-be queen. I must be ready to pass it on to future generations.”

“I know you’ll do a good job,” Sheena said to her. “I have to do the same thing for the shrine in Michina Town. It’s not always easy, I won’t lie about that. But by watching you battle Regirock and seeing you tackle what Fernando is doing, I know you can do it.”

“I really appreciate that…” Rosalita reflexively turned away from Sheena to hide her face.

Even though he hadn’t been participating in the exchange, Matt had carefully listened to it. He sensed that Rosalita’s emotions were threatening to overwhelm her, so when the information he had been looking for appeared on his laptop’s screen, he silently thanked his luck for its convenient timing.

“I hope you guys don’t mind me interrupting,” he said to his three partners. “I found something on those two from the mine.”

“What? Who are they?” Rosalita rushed to ask him while Sheena and Eleanor stopped to pay attention. “Are they with my brother?”

“Honestly, probably.” Matt and Rosalita both frowned at the same time, but he didn’t notice, instead focusing his attention on the information surrounding the mugshots of Noel and Leon on the screen. “I heard her say something about stealing Shaymin and the box being a job that would get them out of a life of crime, so I thought there might be something out there on them. Turns out I was right. Their names are “Big Sis” Noel and “Little Bro” Leon. They led a gang of homeless orphans on the streets of Pyrite Town in Orre when they were kids. Back then it was petty crime just to get by, but as they got older the gang fell apart and they became Pokémon hunters who dodged the police by ambushing travelers in Orre’s lawless desert zones outside its cities. They did mercenary work for bigger groups like Cipher and Team Snagem on and off until recently, when Orre’s governor initiated a push for new laws to make desert travel safer.” Matt looked up to Rosalita, who was staring at him as she absorbed what he was saying. “Obviously such laws would endanger them, so I’m thinking they somehow got into contact with Fernando and accepted a job from him to help get him to the Golden City. In exchange, he pays them enough to live the rest of their lives in comfort.”

“I don’t get it,” Rosalita responded once Matt was done laying out his case. “All of this started because my brother thought he was protecting our home from outsiders. Why would he turn to not only outsiders but criminals for help?”

“Did’ya ever think that this whole thing was a setup?” Eleanor suggested, stopping her work to face the others. “Think about it. None of us are from here, and he already framed you for the murders of your parents. By having Noel and Leon do the dirty work while posing as someone who wants to keep the outsiders away, he can make it look like it really is all your fault, Rosa. As for us, he sent us along to do the work of finding the Golden City so Noel and Leon can swoop in and steal it and Shaymin for him while we, the outsiders, could later be framed as complicit. Boom, he gets everything he wants and has scapegoats to blame for it.”

“That could be it,” Matt said, “but there’s one part I doubt he anticipated. If you’re right about all that, I don’t think he expected us to run into Rosalita.” Turning to address Rosalita directly, he added, “Fernando didn’t know where you were. Since we’re with you, and Shaymin vouched for your character, he can’t trick us into thinking you’re the mastermind of this plot.”

“This is exactly what I was afraid of,” Rosalita admitted. Shaymin cast a worried glance up at her when it felt her hands trembling. “This isn’t him. Or at least, it used to not be him. I want to believe I can save him, but if everything you said turns out to be true…”

“Please tell us about the real Fernando,” Sheena requested, catching Rosalita by surprise. “Matt, what’s your opinion? I think that if we understand the good man Rosalita believes he still can be, we might be able to help her save him.”

“I, uh…” Matt shrank back. “Is it really my place to make her remember something that might be painful to think about?”

“I’m grateful for your concern,” Rosalita gently thanked him. While Shaymin nestled in her arms again and sprouted flowers from its back, she said, “I would be happy to tell you, so don’t worry. It’s just that…” Despite her words, Rosalita hesitated. “It’s just a little hard to think about how close we used to be.”

~:~

Fernando and Rosalita ran laughing through the garden outside Lingote Palace, playing in the bright sun of their homeland. Shaymin chased after the two children as fast as its stubby legs could carry it, while their parents watched from a wrought iron bench nearby.

“Come on! Come on!” the boy called to his sister and their family’s Pokémon. “Don’t fall behind!”

“I’ll catch you!” Rosalita playfully countered.

“You’ll catch me when I let you,” Fernando teased her back. He stopped running, turned around, and put his hand on his chest. “As the king,” he said in an exaggerated deep voice, “I name you, Princess Rosalita, as my most important knight.”

Playing along, Rosalita lowered herself to one knee before her brother. “I accept this honor, your highness.” She then stood up, smiled broadly, and said, “You’re so silly.”

“Well, it’s true!” Fernando said back, growing ever so slightly flustered before quickly regaining his composure. “It’s going to be you and me, Rosalita. We’ll be the best leaders the kingdom ever had!”

“Hey! Don’t forget me, yes?” Shaymin complained, having finally caught up moments before. “At least wait until I make my decision, yes?”

“Don’t you worry,” Fernando said to Shaymin as he picked it up. “Everything will work out. Rosalita and I can do anything.”

Without warning, Rosalita tackled Fernando, sending both the siblings and Shaymin falling into the dirt.

“I caught you, Fernando!” she exclaimed.

“Hey!” Shaymin huffed. “You’re both silly, yes? What will I do with the two of you?”

Both Fernando and Rosalita started laughing uncontrollably. Their cheer was so infectious that even Shaymin couldn’t help joining in.

~:~

“We were together like that from the beginning,” Rosalita recalled. While she stared into the campfire, its flickering flames reflected in her watery eyes. “Since the palace was our whole world, it would be accurate to say we were each other’s best friend on top of being family. Between the two of us and Shaymin, we didn’t need anything else.”

Matt remained silent, but nervously pressed his lips together and tightened his grip on his laptop. “It really is a lot like Amanda and I,” he thought.

“He sounds like he really was a good person,” Sheena gently said. “If it’s not too painful for you, Rosalita, please tell us about what happened to change that.”

“Yeah, I wanna know that too,” Eleanor added, looking back over her shoulder. “Someone doesn’t just go from saying they can do anything with their sister’s help to framing said sister for killing their parents.”

“Well, he was always prone to taking dramatic and grandiose actions, even when we were young, but he used to be incredibly caring. There was one time…” Rosalita couldn’t help but laugh sadly to herself. “One time when we were maybe nine or ten, I broke my leg and had to stay in bed until it healed. You know what he did to cheer me up?”

The princess halted her recollection for a moment to allow her audience time to consider her question. They just looked back at her, waiting for her to continue.

“He actually went and had Mother and Father recruit the merchants of Dorada Market to bring me gifts,” she revealed. “Basketfuls of berries, drinks made from the finest Poké Beans our kingdom can grow, new clothes, crafts made by local artisans… it was practically a second birthday for me that year, and he made sure I knew it was all his idea.”

“How sweet of him,” Sheena said with a smile. “Even if he was a bit egotistical about it, it was a wonderful gesture.”

“See, now you get the kind of person he is.” Rosalita stopped and considered her words. “The kind of person he was? Regardless, despite his ego he really was caring. I think it weighed on him, ironically. He was eager and proud to take on the ills of everyone in the kingdom, and was convinced he could fix everything.”

“Such a responsibility would weigh heavily on anyone,” Sheena mused, “but most particularly a young mind.”

Rosalita nodded. “You’re right. I think that’s why, as we got older and started being prepared for our futures as leaders of the kingdom, Fernando voraciously hunted for more knowledge. It was an obsession with him. He had to learn everything, even that which Mother and Father thought we were not ready for.”

~:~

The planetarium in the museum had fascinated Rosalita with its great size and attention to detail ever since she was a small child. Nothing of that changed when she grew into adolescence. That night, like many others, she stood before the model, staring up at it and letting her mind wander.

“I still wonder if there’s someone out there among those stars…” she thought. “Could there be someone looking at a model of our planet and thinking the same thing I am?”

A loud thump from behind her startled Rosalita out of her reverie. She turned to look for its source and noticed that the door to the archive was ajar, with light filtering out from the room.

“Huh?” she said to herself. “That’s unusual…”

Rosalita couldn’t just walk away and ignore such a strange circumstance. She swept across the museum, her light slippers making little to no sound as she walked. When she made it to the door and peeked inside, she was greeted by the sight of her brother collecting several books from the floor.

“Fernando?” she said in surprise.

“Oh!” Fernando jumped when his sister made her presence known, but quickly recovered. “Oh, Rosalita, I’m glad you’re here!”

“What are you doing?” Rosalita asked him as she stepped into the room. “Father told us we were only to study what he gave to us.”

“Fine, you caught me…” he confessed. “But I found something I think you need to know. For us to fulfill that promise and be the best leaders La Ciudad Dorada ever had, remember?”

“I remember, but we shouldn’t…” While Fernando returned to the table, where he had another book spread open, Rosalita couldn’t help but have her curiosity piqued. Her objection to Fernando’s actions faded away, and she joined him to look at the book in the lamplight. What caught her eye immediately was its reproduction of the civil war portion of the mural, specifically focused on the two identical crowned figures. “What is this?” she asked him, her nerves rattled.

“The history of our family,” he answered, lifting one side of the tome so Rosalita could see their coat of arms on its cover. “But this part… this is something that caught me by surprise. The great civil war of our ancestor Fernando III’s time… it was fought between Fernando III and his twin brother.”

“Twins?” Rosalita gasped. “Like us…”

“Not just like us,” Fernando clarified, his face rigid. “The only ones like us. We are only the second pair of twins born to a king in La Ciudad Dorada’s history. The first were the ones who turned factions of our military on each other and caused the civil war that destroyed our great kingdom.”

Rosalita could do nothing but back away from the table while holding her hand over her mouth. “Mother and Father never told us this… are they afraid we’ll…”

Fernando stood up from the table with such haste that he nearly knocked the chair over and pulled Rosalita’s hands into his own.

“Rosalita, listen to me,” he begged her, meeting Rosalita’s wide, nervous eyes with a fiery gaze. “We have to make another promise right now. Now that we know about this, it’s not enough to be the best leaders the kingdom ever had. We have to be better than the last set of twins. Promise me that. Promise me that we will never end up that way.”

“You already know I will support you,” Rosalita said, finding her courage. “As long as we have each other, we can do anything. I won’t let anything change that.”

~:~

“...of course, that ended up changing anyway,” Rosalita noted to the others before she wiped away a tear.

“He lied about that too,” Eleanor pointed out. “You guys remember, right? He said it was the king and an advisor who fought each other, not that they were twins.”

“That’s right!” Sheena exclaimed. “I remember that, too.”

“It makes sense that he wouldn’t tell you about that,” Rosalita said. “If you knew that twins fought the civil war and we were the first twins since then, you might have resisted going along with his plans to take the crown from me even if you didn’t know that’s what he’s up to.”

“Yeah, I hear you on that one…” Matt said in agreement. “But how is what he’s doing now not breaking that promise and risking another civil war in the process?”

“I’m sure in his mind he’s still technically keeping his promise,” the princess deduced. “Fernando III was already king when his brother tried to overthrow him, and they used the full resources of La Ciudad Dorada to fight each other. When the story says that the kingdom lost its way, it means that. The people all turned on each other and the two factions fought using all the things our kingdom should have been thankful for. That might be why he simply hired foreign Pokémon hunters and set you up to have the puzzle box stolen by them.”

“And if he doesn’t want to repeat history then that might be why it looked like nobody outside the palace seemed to know what was going on,” Sheena realized. “If the people think times are peaceful, they will not see a need to choose sides.”

Matt nodded his head in silent agreement, but as he did so, a thought entered his mind that made him speak up. “Wait, Rosalita… you said he wants to take the crown from you. What’s up with that? It sounded like he was going to be the king…”

“Until a certain day, we did not know for sure which of us was the heir to the throne. That’s where your impression was wrong.” Though Rosalita’s correction was gentle, Matt still cringed in embarrassment. “It’s understandable that you would be confused. A philosopher from a faraway land once said, “there are not two suns in the sky, nor two sovereigns over the people.” Do you know that?”

“I do,” Sheena said. “The philosophy section of Canalave Library has been like a second home to me. Reading those books helps give me perspective on my own duties.”

“I’m not really as into the topic as you are, Sheena,” Matt commented, “but the history involved does interest me.”

“Well, it may have come from far away, but that saying is true in La Ciudad Dorada too,” Rosalita continued. She turned her sad eyes down to Shaymin and put her hand on its back, while Matt continued transcribing her words with his laptop. “There can only be one king. Or queen, as it is. You understand what I mean. Because of that, there is a custom in place should more than one child be born into the royal bloodline, even if it’s only been needed twice. It’s up to Shaymin to choose which of the descendants will become the heir to the throne. And when that day came for Fernando and I… that was the day everything started changing.”

~:~

Fernando and Rosalita were walking briskly through a passage deep in Lingote Palace, guided by a pair of men clad in Bronzong armor and carrying staves. The panels of stained glass lining the walls had no light to illuminate them, leaving the glass to provide a somewhat ominous darkened backdrop for the siblings’ march to their destiny.

Fernando glanced over at his sister and saw her staring at the floor, her brow furrowed. “Are you okay, Rosalita?” he asked her.

“I’m scared, I won’t lie,” she quietly replied. “It’s one thing to just talk about the future, but… nothing’s going to be the same after this.”

“I do admit that’s true…” Sensing there was more on Rosalita’s mind than she was letting on, Fernando took her hand and squeezed it as they walked. “Do you remember that day in the garden, with Shaymin? It’s going to be you and me. We’ll be the best leaders the kingdom ever had.”

Her memories of their childhood brightened Rosalita’s mood, if just a little. “You’re right. As long as we have each other, we can do anything.”

“See, that’s the way!” Fernando’s voice echoed down the corridor. “This is just going to make official everything we already knew. After this, we can finally start working to protect our home for real.”

“You know what you’re talking about,” Rosalita said, “as always. It is scary to think that what we’ve prepared for our whole lives is here, but I think we’ll be okay…”

“You’ll see,” Fernando assured, “everything will work out.”

“We’re here,” one of the guards said as the quartet arrived at a set of gold-lined wood doors. “King Fernando and Queen Sophia await you.”

“Here we go…” Rosalita whispered to herself.

Each of the guards pushed open one side of the doorway to allow the siblings to pass, then closed the doors behind them. The chamber beyond had wall-to-wall stained glass and no solid floor, a fact Fernando and Rosalita quickly discovered when they felt their feet sink into the dirt.

Their parents were there waiting for them near an altar on which Shaymin was sitting. “My children, I welcome you,” Fernando VII greeted them with a proud smile. He then gestured to a nearby patch of earth, where a single Gracidea was growing in sunlight let in by an opening in the ceiling. “This is where La Ciudad Dorada began, the seed that our homeland grew from… the first Gracidea. This sacred land, where the bringer of gratitude first helped our ancestors, is where you will inherit the responsibility our family has had for centuries.”

While Fernando and Rosalita knew they were being summoned to a chamber they had never been allowed into before, that it was the site of the kingdom’s founding caught them by surprise. They both felt the enormous weight in the air and the significance of what was happening. All they could do was stare at the original Gracidea in awe, their shared trance only breaking when Sophia walked over and embraced them.

“I’m so proud of you both,” she told her children. “You’ve come so far to make it to this day. The dedication you both have to our kingdom, its history and its people leaves me optimistic for our future.”

“Well, naturally,” Fernando said. “Rosalita and I promised each other we’d become the best leaders La Ciudad Dorada has ever had. I intend to keep that promise.”

“As long as we have each other, we can do anything,” Rosalita added, repeating their oft-stated belief to their mother.

“I’ve always been happy to see how much you two can rely on each other.” Sophia turned away and took her childrens’ hands in her own. “Come. We must complete this ceremony first.”

Sophia led her son and daughter to the altar. Once they stood before Shaymin, the queen returned to Fernando VII’s side.

“As you know, my children, only one of you can inherit the throne and the gift of life that comes with it,” the king reminded them. “Shaymin will decide which of you is worthy of receiving this power and responsibility.”

“I have had many men come before me since the beginning of this kingdom, yes?” the tiny Pokémon spoke up. “All who obtain the waters of life must first understand their meaning. I want to hear what you two believe that to be, yes?’

“Well, it’s because a kingdom needs a strong leader to follow,” Fernando asserted. “When the right leader comes along, it is only natural that their life should be extended. That ensures stability for as long a time as possible. In other words, giving the king a long life is a testament and celebration of his being the leader that the kingdom needs.”

“That’s all true, but…” Rosalita looked down at the dirt. Her fears were finally able to come out. “It’s kind of awful to think about what the king must go through. By living for so long, he’s going to lose everyone he cares about.” The princess balled her fists and tightened them so much her fingernails cut into her palms. “The only way to avoid that burden is if the king accepts that the only thing that will live as long as him is La Ciudad Dorada itself.”

“I believe that it’s a confirmation of strength,” Fernando insisted. His missing her intended point made Rosalita sadly turn away. “A kingdom must have a strong leader that the people can put all their faith in. That’s the way it should be and the way it’s always been. The king shows the people the way, and they follow, thankful to have him share his wisdom.”

“A kingdom is about more than just a single person,” Rosalita quietly countered. “No kingdom would be anything without its subjects. They do feel gratitude for their leader, but the leader must know that he does not have anything without them and feel gratitude for them, too. I think that’s why we give the king extended life, when all is said and done. We give it to him so he will understand that he is a servant of our subjects and must act for their collective good. It is profoundly sad, but… it must be done. A leader must be attached to those they lead above all else.”

“Enough!” Shaymin intervened, its sudden intensity startling both Fernando and Rosalita. “I have heard enough, yes? Now it is time for me to make my decision.”

“The Gardener has spoken,” declared Fernando VII, closing his eyes. “My children, step forth and place your hands upon the altar.”

Fernando and Rosalita looked at each other before they followed their father’s instruction. The way she slouched and started dragging her feet made her brother cock his head in confusion as he followed her.

Once both of them had their hands on the altar, Shaymin tensed up in much the same way it did when it used Seed Flare. Bright lights emanating from Shaymin’s body, the altar, and the single Gracidea in the ground, reflecting off the stained glass surrounding them to flood the chamber with color. It wasn’t long before the brightness became overwhelming and forced Fernando and Rosalita to shut their eyes.

“There won’t be anything to worry about once this is over,” Fernando thought, allowing a smile to slip onto his face. “We’ll have all the time in the world for Rosalita to see what I mean. It’s just too much right n-”

A sudden gasp from his sister broke Fernando out of his self-absorbed speculation. Even with his eyes closed, he could tell that the light had suddenly vanished from the room. When he snapped his head around to see what could have possibly gotten such a reaction from his sister, he nearly fainted at what he saw.

A crown of Gracidea flowers was sitting on Rosalita’s head.

“What?!” he choked. He so disbelieved what he was seeing that he reached up to feel his own head, unable to fully grasp what was happening until he realized there was nothing there. “I don’t understand this…”

Rosalita, meanwhile, could no longer hold back her tears. She crossed her hands in front of herself, lowered her head, and said, “I was so afraid this was going to happen… Fernando, I’m sorry.”

“I don’t understand this at all!” was all Fernando could say. It was as if he didn’t hear Rosalita’s words. “Am I to believe that everything I did to prepare to be king was wrong? Is protecting La Ciudad Dorada wrong?!”

“You misunderstand. That is not why I have passed you over, yes?” Shaymin told him. “You have prepared valiantly to come to the defense of your realm, but you still do not understand the sacrifice necessary to be a truly wise leader.”

“Father, Mother, is this true?” Fernando demanded of his parents. “How can it be wrong to protect the kingdom?”

“Please, Fernando, don’t misinterpret what this means,” Sophia gently said. “You still have much to contribute to La Ciudad Dorada. Your drive to protect it is invaluable. This is not a judgment on the worth of your character, just your understanding of the meaning of power.”

“How can I believe that?” he continued fuming. He struggled to keep his emotions from flying completely out of control, but even gritting his teeth as hard as he could did little to check how he felt. “You can’t expect me to accept that all one needs to become king is some platitude about sacrifice. All that tells me is that being willing to do anything to protect the kingdom doesn’t make one worthy of the crown at all!” Turning to Rosalita, Fernando said, “What could you possibly know that I don’t?! Every day I’ve been training and gathering knowledge for how to best defend this land! How can you protect the kingdom as well as I could?”

“Fernando, can’t you see that this is a good thing?” she tried to reason with her brother. “You’re free. Now you don’t have to sacrifice your life… you can still help me protect the kingdom, but I’ll shoulder the weight of the throne. Don’t you remember? We’ll be the greatest leaders the kingdom has ever had. Nothing has changed that… the roles are just reversed. We can do anything as long as we have each other…”

“What good is that when there won’t be anything to protect?!” he snapped, making Rosalita visibly recoil. “The only way to ensure future security is to know everything about the past and be willing to use it. I’ve spent years gathering that knowledge! You didn’t! I sought it all out by my own volition! You didn’t! Until the day where you see my point of view, how could you ever be able to do what is necessary to save La Ciudad Dorada?”

“How can you say that when we promised we’d never end up like the twins who fought the civil war?” Rosalita shot back. “Have you forgotten everything already?”

“I will not make the mistakes of our ancestors,” Fernando declared. “I will simply prove to you that my views are correct, to lay it out as plain as day for all of you that the way I’ve been chasing all these years is the kingdom’s last, best hope. And when I do, that will be the end of things.”

With that, Fernando turned away from the altar and marched out of the chamber, leaving Shaymin, his sister and his parents behind.

~:~

“He has never stopped seeing that as a fundamental betrayal of the kingdom itself,” Rosalita explained with a weary voice. “No matter who tells him otherwise, he still sees it as a rejection of the idea of protecting the kingdom at any cost.”

“Sounds to me like he’s made it his whole identity,” Matt ventured. “Don’t get me wrong, all I’ve got to go on is meeting the man for a little while and what you’re telling us now.”

“No, you’re correct,” Rosalita said. “The Fernando I grew up with… he vanished. I want to believe he’s still in there somewhere, but… he vanished. He was consumed by his obsession with proving that his views were superior.”

Over at the vehicle, Eleanor shuddered at what she was hearing. “Kinda ironic when you think about it, Rosa,” she noted with a hint of bitterness. “It sounds like he sacrificed his identity after all.”

Rosalita hesitated to consider what Eleanor had pointed out. “I… had never thought about it like that before. Perhaps you’re right.”

“But there’s one link still missing, at least for me,” Sheena said, carefully thinking about what she knew and what she’d been told. “He clearly didn’t snap and kill your parents immediately. Was it the threat against the kingdom alone that pushed him over the edge?”

“I don’t think so,” Rosalita admitted. She had to wipe away a tear before she could continue. “Fernando, as I said, became obsessed with proving that his views were superior. Every future ruler, once officially named as the heir to the throne, begins being educated in the information only the leader is allowed to know. I was no different, and that was when Fernando started spending every waking moment studying relentlessly in the archive. In fact, it wasn’t uncommon to see him spend several days straight in there. He just knew that there had to be something that would prove him right. A few years ago, I think he found something.”

“He did?” Matt said, his eyes widening. “What was it?”

“I don’t know. He just got up and disappeared, leaving a note telling us he was going to travel overseas for a while. When he came back… something had changed about him.”

~:~

La Ciudad Dorada’s train station was always a busy place, and that day was no different. Yet, it was a day that was far from normal. The presence of Rosalita and her entourage of three guards made that very apparent to the crowds around her. Murmurs floated around amongst tourists and residents alike, all of whom recognized the future queen.

She paid them no mind. They were why the guards had accompanied her from the palace. Her reason for being there was to intercept Fernando, who disembarked the train wearing a dark suit and black sunglasses.

“What do you think you’re doing?” Rosalita demanded, confronting him while the guards formed a semicircle behind her.

“I ought to ask you the same thing,” he coldly answered. “You have much bigger things to worry about than where I am. Come to think of it, that reminds me of something I need to ask you.”

Rosalita crossed her arms and pouted. “What?”

“Tell me, Rosalita…” Fernando said while sticking his hands into his pockets, “when you become queen, what will your policy towards the outside world be?”

Caught by surprise by Fernando’s question, Rosalita tilted her head toward him and raised an eyebrow. “What will my policy towards the outside world be?” she repeated. “Well, I guess… I haven’t really put too much thought into it yet, but I think it would be a good thing if we had more of a relationship with the lands beyond our borders.”

Fernando sighed in annoyance. “I was afraid you were going to say that,” he told his sister, spreading his arms before reaching up to take hold of his sunglasses.

When he removed them, Rosalita felt a chill run down her spine. His eyes were filled with an icy, focused anger unlike anything she’d seen from him before.

“What happened?” she managed to ask him in a shaky voice. “Where did you go?”

“I cannot support anything along those lines,” Fernando declared, ignoring her questions. “If you are going to so blindly expose La Ciudad Dorada to the dangers that lurk abroad I will have no choice but to refuse any role in your government.”

“Have you forgotten the promises we made to each other?” Rosalita pleaded.

“You will come to understand what I know.” Fernando retorted, once again ignoring his sister’s questioning. “It may not be right away, but you will see in time that the outsiders do not respect La Ciudad Dorada or its culture. They come here and take things from us while never appreciating what it is that we have here. That’s what I’ve learned. When the day comes that you understand that indelible truth, that will be the time for our promises to be fulfilled.”

~:~

“What happened after that?” Sheena wondered out loud.

“To tell you the truth, that’s it,” Rosalita confessed, once more looking down at Shaymin in her lap. “Even though that was a few years ago, nothing new actually happened until recently, when we received the threat against our kingdom. You know by now what happened then.”

Matt adjusted his glasses and took his turn staring into the fire. “I can understand why you want to forgive him now,” he said, “even if I still have doubts about him being redeemable.”

“There are things he’s done that I think should be punished,” Sheena agreed with Matt before turning back to Rosalita and adding, “but if you want to try and save him, Rosalita, we should do our best to accomplish that. He’s your brother, so it should be your decision.”

“Sheena’s right,” Matt admitted. “No matter what I think about him… I couldn’t imagine losing my relationship with my sister, so I have no right to not support you now. Amanda and I were a lot like you and Fernando… I can’t block you from trying to save that.”

“And for what it’s worth,” Eleanor chimed in, “I’m not gonna turn my back on you either, Rosa. We’ve come this far already. Besides,” she said, holding up her wrench, “you’re gonna need my help to keep your equipment going.”

“All of you…” Rosalita was stunned by the outpouring of support she was receiving. She couldn’t organize her feelings into words until Matt handed her his handkerchief to wipe her eyes. That act gave her time to collect herself. “Thank you. I have no right to force you into this affair…”

Sheena took Rosalita’s hand in her own once again. “I think I can comfortably say that I speak for all of us when I tell you that you aren’t forcing anyone.” Sheena checked for a quick visual confirmation of her belief, which she got with a nod from Matt and Eleanor shaking another tool in the air. “Like I told you, I understand how you feel with all the responsibility on your shoulders, Rosalita. We will see this through to the end.”

The princess hesitated, but she soon remembered something her father told her. She could practically feel herself back in Lingote Palace, as if she’d traveled back in time to hear it again. “Rosalita, when you become queen, it will be up to you to decide what kind of direction you want to take La Ciudad Dorada in. The truth about our history is but a tool for you to use in the course of your decisions. Shaymin choosing you is an acknowledgement that you possess the wisdom of a true leader.”

Her father’s words echoing in her head made Rosalita feel a surge of confidence swell within her. “You’re right. I’m not going to be afraid anymore,” she resolved. “I can’t be. The people of La Ciudad Dorada need me to fight for them, and I refuse to let them down.”

“There you go!” Sheena said with a smile.

“Let’s get to work, then.” Rosalita reached into her cloak and retrieved a pair of pieces of parchment, much like the one Fernando had showed them earlier in the archive. “These are two of the clues to where the Golden City is. Only current and future kings are permitted to have these, but I wasn’t able to keep all three of them away from Fernando. You surely know that already, though.”

“Yeah,” Matt replied. “Can I look at them? We’ll want to get going first thing tomorrow if we can.”

“Given the circumstances, I will grant you that permission.”

Rosalita handed the documents over to Matt, and he wasted no time in reading them. Or he at least tried to start reading them, but couldn’t restrain himself from vocalizing the surprise he felt upon seeing that the clues were written in dot patterns.

“It’s Braille, again,” he uttered. “This must be what you were referring to when you said you’d seen it before.”

“You’re correct,” Rosalita confirmed. “Although, as I also did say, I can’t read it. I never had a chance to learn how to. When did you learn it?”

“My grandfather was the one who taught me, actually.” Matt adjusted his glasses once more and then looked up at the night sky. The last of the Woobat and Swoobat living in the area were flying out of their trees. “I’ve got a sister who’s very important to me, just like how Fernando is clearly important to you. Her name’s Amanda. Thing is, she was blinded in an accident when we were both very young. That wasn’t going to keep her back, though… when our grandfather got us into the Rustboro School, he made sure of that.”

~:~

Sutter was sitting at his office desk, looking out over Rustboro City, when his doorbell rang. He pivoted his chair away from the window and called out, “Come in.”

With his grandfather’s permission, Matt opened the door and pushed through it, walking backwards to bring Amanda’s wheelchair into the office with him. Amanda, the blue-haired girl who accompanied Matt into the snow on Anton’s back, was wearing a diamond-patterned school uniform virtually identical to her brother’s. The cloudy look of her eyes gave away her lack of sight, but the wounds that robbed them of most of their function had largely faded. Only small scratches remained, ones that could only be seen if one looked for them.

“Grandpa!” Amanda greeted him.

“Ah, Amanda, Matt, I’m so happy to see the two of you,” Sutter wistfully said, leaning back in his chair. “How’s life in Rustboro treating you these days?”

“I dunno how I’m fitting in so far, to be honest,” Matt answered. “This place is really different from Snowpoint, that’s for sure.”

“It’s nice for it to be the two of us on our own, though,” Amanda added. “And it’s fun heading out to Mauville and Slateport, too. The Food Court and Battle Tent are great. Thanks for helping us get set up here, Grandpa.”

“It’s the least I could do.” Sutter clasped his hands on the desk. “You kids deserve the same chance I had, and that son of mine wasn’t giving you it. I’ll see to it that your lives here are better than that.”

“Thank you…” Matt muttered, his mood dampened by the reminder of fairly recent events. “I’m also enjoying everything Amanda is. It’s just a little rough getting used to a big famous school like this after living in a quiet place like Snowpoint.”

“Totally understandable. That’s why I’m going to teach you two something that’ll help you communicate better and ensure you’re both able to get the education this institute provides.”

“What do you mean?” Matt asked in surprise.

Sutter stood up and walked around to the front of his desk. He picked up a sheet of paper and showed it to Matt. “This is Braille,” he explained, gesturing to the dot patterns on it. “Amanda, you can’t see what I’m showing Matt, so listen closely. This is a written language that translates the alphabet into raised bumps on printed material. It was developed by a Kalosian researcher who based it on an ancient writing system from Hoenn and Sinnoh. These days it’s widely used so people like you, Amanda, can read just as well as your peers.”

“I’m ready, Grandpa,” Amanda said. “I wanna know all about it.”

“Anything that’ll help us is good,” Matt agreed.

Sutter couldn’t help but chuckle to himself as he put the paper down and approached his grandchildren. “You kids make this old man feel like his time’s almost up, even when it isn’t. Your enthusiasm makes me happy you two are my heirs.”

“What do you mean?” Matt asked him.

“One day, I want you two to inherit my responsibilities and continue my work. I trust you kids to make me proud when that time comes. For now, I’ll do everything I can to ensure you receive the finest education possible.”

~:~

“So yeah, Sutter taught us both how to use it. Amanda really excelled in both school and social life, so it was worth it.”

“Professor Chiaki really was a fine man, like the stories say,” Rosalita said to herself. “I guess that’s why my grandfather trusted him…”

“What?” Matt wondered, looking questioningly at Rosalita.

“I…” Rosalita froze. She hadn’t intended for Matt to hear her, so when he did, it made her uncomfortable. She shifted herself around, nervously trying to decide how she should answer. Eventually, after concluding she couldn’t tell him what she was thinking, she said, “Oh, I was just thinking of how he helped you and your sister get closer. Amelia, was it? She sounds like someone I’d like to meet one day. I wish I had someone like Sutter to help me patch things up with Fernando.”

“I feel like she’s not telling me something…” thought Sutter’s grandson. Despite that, he chose not to pursue the subject. “Amanda, but don’t worry about it. Let’s figure out what these clues say so we can work on getting to the Golden City before Fernando does, how about that?”

Rosalita let out a sigh of relief. “Yes, let’s do that.”

“Alright.” After returning one of the pages to Rosalita for the time being, Matt focused his attention on the one he still held. “It says… ‘heart of the realm and heart of the king. Both reside within the protection of the strongest barrier. Cross not will those who seek to pierce the heart. The strongest barriers stand like a shield, an impenetrable shield to protect the realm.’”

“I think I recognize what that’s referring to,” Rosalita immediately said, “but read the other one first.”

Matt and Rosalita exchanged the documents they each held. He started to examine the second one, but as soon as he did, he narrowed his eyes at it.

“What is it?” asked Sheena.

“This is strange. It doesn’t really say much of anything.” Matt turned the parchment around and held it up for the others to see. “Just ‘find the hidden message’ and this symbol here,” he explained, pointing at a strange shape drawn on the material.

Rosalita looked down at Shaymin, then back to the clue. “It does resemble Shaymin’s flower,” the princess said, tracing her finger along the outline, “but without the detail. I think I remember seeing that in a book Father and Mother showed me as part of my preparation for taking the throne, but… I really don’t get what message this is talking about.”

“Let’s put it aside for now, then,” Sheena suggested.

“Good idea,” Matt said in agreement. “Rosalita, about the first one…”

“Centuries ago,” she interrupted, unable to wait for him to finish asking his question, “when La Ciudad Dorada was at its peak, it was protected by a huge defensive wall. The whole realm was contained within it. Once much of the kingdom was ravaged by the civil war and Regigigas’ judgment, we pulled back to our current borders and abandoned what was left of the walls. They’re gone now, but the fortress that acted as the base camp for our first lines of defense remains. I believe we must go there.”

“Do you know where it is?” Matt asked. He presented her with the picture of the map on his laptop and requested, “Show me, please.”

“It’s here,” said the princess, pointing to a location directly south of their current position. “There is quite a ways to go between here and there.”

“You can count on me!” Eleanor chimed in. “A few more tweaks of this and a little bit of elbow grease on that, and this thing will be as good as new.”

“Thank you, Eleanor.” Rosalita said, smiling. Another flower sprouted from Shaymin’s back in response. “We have no time to waste. Fernando could end up causing the destruction of the kingdom if he upsets Regigigas. We must stop him from causing history to repeat itself.”

-:-

Meanwhile, Noel and Leon - both disheveled from their long trip out of the mine, stumbled upon the railroad tracks leading out from the mine. With the direct exit blocked, the pair were left to take their Pokémon and leave the mine the way they came before working their way back from outside.

“They ain’t here no more, Sis!” Leon shouted to Noel, having rushed ahead to check the now-abandoned train. “All that time we took tryin’ to dig our way out gave ’em a head start!”

“They can’t have gone far,” Noel bitterly said, crossing her arms. “Ain’t nobody who goes that fast on foot.”

“You got that right, Sis.” Turning away from the train, Leon plucked three of the clockwork Poké Balls from his vest and threw them into the air. A Dusknoir and a Roserade, both collared, materialized from them alongside the Yanmega from earlier. “Go find those guys who got that Shaymin with ’em!”

Dusknoir took Roserade in his hand and rose up into the air alongside Yanmega. The two Pokémon capable of flight then split off in opposite directions, prompting Noel to activate her wrist device’s projector so she could monitor their activity.

-:-

Later in the night, Sheena and Rosalita had retired to the workers’ quarters of the camp for rest. The bedding supplies were long gone, but they managed to find sleeping bags to use instead. Both of them were sound asleep, as was Shaymin, who was tucked comfortably in with Rosalita. Its mind wandered into a dream, one etched deeply into the depths of the long-lived mythical Pokémon’s mind.

~:~

One thing Shaymin never understood after coming to La Ciudad Dorada was how the wanderer who helped summon it didn’t die of the heat. All the other people in the city dressed so lightly, Shaymin noticed, yet he never wavered from wearing his blue cloak and heavy shoulder plates. That day ages ago was no different. The blazing sun beat down on the Sacred Hill and the rest of the kingdom, yet it didn’t even seem to affect him at all. He held Shaymin in his arm and gently pet it, while behind them, his Lucario and Golisopod patiently waited for their master.

Finally, the caped figure leaned down and set Shaymin on the ground. “Shaymin, I must bid you farewell now.”

“Why?” the Pokémon asked. “Are you not going to stay and help lead these people, yes?”

The wanderer rose to his full height and turned away to face Lingote Palace, which was still under construction at the time. “You are the one who must keep them on the path of righteousness and wisdom. I trust in you, Shaymin. As for myself… I am but a simple nomad. From the day I arrived in this land, my fate has been to leave it… I must continue on my own way. There is something I must find, and it is not here.”

“You’re going to leave, and you never told me what it is you’re looking for, yes…” Shaymin bitterly said.

“I apologize, but I will not burden anyone else with what I must carry.” The wanderer closed his eyes. “Although, I suppose I can admit that it’s a person, not a thing. I must not stop until I find them again, so I cannot stay here. This is your home, Shaymin. Continue to guide the royal family with wisdom and gratitude, so these people can continue to thrive.”

~:~

The memories Shaymin dreamt of caused it to reflexively curl up even more tightly against Rosalita. Even while it was asleep, the feelings of gratitude it recalled caused flowers to sprout from its back.

-:-

Meanwhile, Matt sat outside the building, working on his laptop while his Pokémon helped keep guard. Besides Sally, Zero, Rocky, Anton and Tony, the group of six was rounded out by the presence of an Ambipom.

Matt was so focused on his work that he didn’t notice Eleanor emerge from the building and approach him. “Hey,” she said, making him jump in surprise.

“Oh, Eleanor, it’s just you,” he said with a sigh of relief when he saw her.

“What you mean it’s just me?” she teased him, twisting her face into an exaggerated pout.

“Sorry…” he listlessly said. “I shouldn’t have said that.”

“I’m not mad at you, relax.” Eleanor sat down next to him and peeked over at his laptop. “Whatever you’re working on must be important, if you’re doing it instead of sleeping.”

“It doesn’t bother me, really,” he admitted. “Besides, if this works out the way I hope, a lot of people will benefit. That’s more important than I am.”

“You shouldn’t talk like that,” Eleanor said to him. “You’re important too, no matter what. Try to remember that.”

“I appreciate that. It’s just…” Matt turned away from Eleanor, preventing her from seeing his face. “I want my ideas to do some good for the world. That’s the only way I can make up for what was done with them before.”

“What was done with them before?” Eleanor repeated, bringing a finger to her lips. “What do you mean?”

“Well, let me answer that in reverse. Look at this.” Matt tapped a few keys on the laptop and then pushed it closer to Eleanor, allowing her to see the diagrams on its screen. “The Spheres that can be dug up in Sinnoh and other places grow larger when you plant them back in the earth. As they grow, they emit energy.” He traced his finger along an image of waves emanating from a spherical object to accentuate his point. “I’ve been working on ideas for technology that can harness that energy as a clean and cheap power source.”

“That’s awesome…” Eleanor murmured. She couldn’t pull her eyes off the screen, and her fascination was such that she was almost salivating at the idea of it. “Wish the gadgets I come up with were this useful.”

“I want it to be used to give everyone in my hometown of Snowpoint all the heat they could ever need. I love the place even despite…”

When Matt trailed off in the middle of his thought, Eleanor knew immediately that something was wrong. She looked up from the screen and tilted her head, asking him, “Despite?”

“It got so unbearable that Amanda and I rode off into a blizzard with my Rhyhorn rather than spend another day there. Needless to say, it was a stupid decision… dealing with our parents more would have probably been better than nearly dying out there in the cold. But then, dying in the cold might have been better than being saved by the founder of Team Galactic.”

“Oh no...” Eleanor gasped. “Cyrus? Of all the people who could have found you guys, it was Cyrus?”

“He brought us to his base camp at Lake Acuity to recover.” Matt’s face sank as he recalled what had happened. “Back then he wasn’t quite the emotionless monster the world came to know, but don’t let that fool you. He only saved us because he thought he could find value in using us. At that time, everyone believed he was just a businessman who had a fascination with history. Even my grandfather was fooled… they were in the same circles back then and knew each other well enough that Cyrus helped him make the arrangements for Amanda and I to move to Rustboro in the first place. All Cyrus wanted in return was me to share my research and ideas with him.”

“If I’m remembering correctly, Team Galactic’s public cover was as an energy company, wasn’t it?” When Matt answered her question by nodding, Eleanor raised a finger into the air. “You can’t blame yourself for being tricked. Everyone thought that was what they were, so why would you think otherwise? It would only be natural for an energy company to act interested in a clean energy source.”

“You don’t understand,” Matt said. He took off his glasses and sighed sadly. “If I just misjudged his character, I wouldn’t care as much. Before anything happened I found out that he was conducting terrible experiments on people and intended to use Amanda as a subject. Sutter helped us cut ties with Cyrus and made sure we’d be safe if he sent anyone to target us, but nobody ever came. You want to know why? He already had what he wanted from me. By using my ideas and altering them to use pieces of the Veilstone City meteorites instead of Spheres, he created the system for the prototype Galactic Bomb. The one that was detonated at Lake Valor.”

Eleanor was left stunned, unable to say or do anything other than look on in worry with her lips puckered. Matt didn’t notice her at all. He just slammed his fist into the wall behind him.

“It’s all my fault!” he seethed. “If Team Galactic was never able to create that Galactic Bomb, they would never have been able to get as close as they did to-”

Matt’s anger at himself was cut off when Eleanor suddenly grabbed the sides of his face, forcing him to look directly at her.

“You listen to me,” she forcefully told him. “You didn’t design that machine to be used for destruction. Cyrus twisted its purpose, and you can’t blame yourself for that.”

“But I made it possible to-”

“It doesn’t matter!” Eleanor had to take a breath before she could speak again. “Machines are neither good or bad by themselves. They can only become either depending on who they’re used by. Sure, Cyrus took your idea and used it to try destroying worlds, but you designed it for a good reason. That makes it a good invention and you a good person for making it.”

Matt pulled his head from Eleanor’s grip, sighed once more, and put his glasses back on. “You’re right. It still weighs on me, though… I want what I create to help people. It’s easier to get people to understand you when you give them something for them to see your intent in.” He turned back to face Eleanor again, this time voluntarily. “Words are tough sometimes, you know?”

“Yeah, I feel you on that. I never felt totally at home where I was born, the big city of Orsay in Kalos…” It was Eleanor’s turn to look down at the ground. “Hundreds of thousands of people around and you don’t feel like you connect with any of them. Ironic,” she said with a bitter laugh. “I always felt like I belonged somewhere else, like Avignon Town, if I couldn’t make it to the Azoth Kingdom and live there. Messing around with gadgets and machines, though… that makes me happy. I always felt like I understood them more than I did other people.”

“They don’t judge you no matter what you say or do,” Matt agreed. “You’re right about that.”

While Matt and Eleanor conversed, Sally sensed something nearby. She lifted her head into the air and looked around, though she was unable to discern what it was that had aroused her suspicion. The Salamence turned to her fellow Pokémon and grunted to them, prompting Tony the Aggron to respond in kind. He’d had the same suspicious feeling Sally did, but like her, he was unsure of why.

In the trees some distance away, Dusknoir and Roserade were watching them, concealed by the thick cover of leaves.

-:-

“Looks like we found ‘em, Bro,” Noel said, observing what Dusknoir and Roserade saw through her wrist device’s projection. “There’s another camp not too far away from here.”

“Is that so, Sis?” Leon replied. “Call ’em back, then, and let’s go waste those fools.”

“Nah, you know what, Bro? I got a better idea.” Leaning against the train, Noel turned her hand over and extended two of her fingers, then told her brother, “Let’s kick back and relax tonight. We’ve been through a lot today, and besides… followin’ ’em is better. Those spoiled brats will lead us right to the next stop on the way to the Golden City. All we gotta do is keep on followin’ ’em and then swoop in to grab up the next prize.”

“Good point, Sis, I didn’t think of it that way before.” Leon sat down on the ground and clenched his fist. “Ya know, there’s somethin’ botherin’ me, though. Why are we doin’ all this work for that rotten prince? Dude’s got everythin’ he could ever want already. This job ain’t fair to us no matter what he pays.”

“I think I get what you’re sayin’, Bro… and I think I like it.”





END of CHAPTER 3

Well that's quite a flashback chapter there. Yeah this version of Fernando is more sympathic as he seems more genuine in wanting to make his kingdom a better place but upset all his effort and preparation felt like nothing. Don't know if this version you'll have him go too far down the rabbithole, but still curious where you'll take him next.

The part where Fernando is against outsiders coming to the city reminds me of the Disney movie Atlantis: The Lost Empire, which funny enough I watched just a few days ago. In the movie after the exhibition group discovered the city, the king is against outsiders while his daughter believed they could be able to help the people and culture from Atlantis not perish. Just want to comment that scene of yours I got some vibes from that movie there heh.

I too thought it was neat Braille has been featured there! You already know how much I enjoyed Matt and Amanda's sibling relationship throughout your several works heh.

I don't remember if Amanda and Matt's backstory includes Cyrus, though that shouldn't be a surprise to me do to their personal history with Team Galactic. I do like Eleanor reminding him all of this is not his fault there.

Still another fun chapter, look forward to more!

I've let this one slip by me for far too long, I think! Anyway, this will be a review of the prologue and first chapter. And it's a really interesting start, isn't it? You've got unfinished business, an unsolved murder, and mysterious letters from the rulers of impossible cities; the stage is set for a great big archaeological romp, with all the blatant grabs for power, absurd battles, and advanced ancient technology that anyone could wish for. I haven't seen this kind of story in this fandom before, so it's cool to see it now!

I like how you weave in the shaymin and regigigas stories – which I think have their roots in stories from canon, if I'm remembering that right? – with stories from a pre-existing mythos, tales of the fountain of youth and El Dorado and all that. Everything is familiar, but presented in a new way, with the end result that both the pokémon stuff and the other stuff comes across as fresher and more interesting than it might otherwise have been. And I'm sure we've got more to learn, too; Fernando is certainly keeping something back here, and I'm still wondering how Sutter ended up with the puzzle box at all, considering it's so critical to the succession of the Ciudad's royalty. Lots of fun questions to turn over!

I think if I had some critique to offer, it'd be on a prosaic level – sometimes your sentences are a little overstuffed with information. Like here:



There's so much to absorb here – the name, the role, the setting, the location of the setting, his preferences, his desk … It's a bit much to fit into one sentence, honestly, and especially for the very first sentence in the fic. That amount of information would be better delivered at a slightly more leisurely pace, so the reader can take it all in properly.

I also feel that you have a slight tendency towards overwriting at times; when you write that '[h]is vaguely wraith-like garb and evasive response to a simple question about his identity left Sutter uncomfortable with his presence', for instance. It's not a huge issue, and it might just be down to personal preference, but I think it does sometimes take away from the action – like, saying 'a great volume of blood' is a strangely clinical way to describe someone's dying moments.

Anyway, here are a few smaller things that I noted as I read through:



There are two full stops here, and an H missing from 'whiling'.



You're missing the closing quotation marks here.

And finally, Fernando introduces himself in the letter as a count, but by chapter one his title seems to have become 'king'. It also struck me as a bit odd that he just invited two random tourists to join his, like, national security meeting along with the two people who were specifically meant to be there – it just seems like weirdly lax operational security, I think.

Anyway, that aside, as I've said, I really like the premise; I'll have to catch up some more sometime soon!

This chapter will contain a scene of violence elevated a bit beyond what’s happened most of the time prior to this point. It’s not going to be as violent as Sutter’s death in the prologue, however.

-:-

CHAPTER 4: Iron Will

-:-

The next day, Eleanor drove the group to the location Rosalita pinpointed on Matt’s map. Their trip was marked with lingering tension and anxiety - they all agreed that their act of collapsing the tunnel out of the mine would only serve to slow Noel and Leon down, and that the hunters would attack them again soon enough. Matt and Eleanor mostly kept to themselves during the ride, neither sure of what to say to the other after their conversation from the previous night.

The uncomfortable silence between them was broken when Eleanor moved her hands over the vehicle’s control panel to bring it to a stop. “Looks like we’re here,” she announced to the others, snapping Matt out of the thoughts he was lost in and also interrupting the conversation between Sheena and Rosalita.

Eleanor’s three passengers gathered at the side of the vehicle’s flatbed, where they got their first full look at the fort they’d come to investigate. It was a structure built from gray stone, with a spacious courtyard spreading out in front of it. At its peak it was an imposing building that could almost be called a small castle, but ages of disuse left it a shell of its former self.

“It’s a little different from what I was expecting,” Matt remarked.

“In what way?” Rosalita asked him.

“Well…” Matt nervously scratched the back of his head. “It looks… like a fort, there’s no mistaking that. I guess I just wasn’t expecting it to have such a big courtyard. We can’t even get close to the actual fort inside except on foot.”

Without any hesitation, Rosalita climbed over the side of the flatbed and jumped down to the ground. Her shoes pressed into the soft soil, making quiet squelching sounds as she positioned herself.

“There’s no time to waste,” the princess declared, gazing ahead at the fort with cold determination in her green eyes. “We must be off.”

“That’s right, yes?” Shaymin added as it restlessly squirmed around in Rosalita’s arms. “Onward, yes! Onward!”

“You’ve got legs,” Eleanor teased the Pokémon, having disembarked the vehicle with Matt and Sheena following her.

“I’ve got legs but that ground is all muddy,” Shaymin countered, sticking its nose in the air and frowning dramatically. “I’m the royal Pokémon of La Ciudad Dorada, yes? I must always reflect my station in life.”

“If nothing else, you certainly have the attitude of a noble,” Matt sarcastically said.

Sheena, meanwhile, stepped up next to Rosalita and gently set a hand on the princess’s shoulder. “Are you ready for this?” she asked.

“As ready as I’ll ever be,” Rosalita replied, stiffening her body even further. “There are only two of the Three Pillars left to go, and the quicker I do this, the quicker I can officially take the throne. Once that’s done, I hope Fernando will come to his senses.”

“I hope so too, Rosalita,” Sheena said, tightening her grip in hopes of reassuring Fernando’s sister. She tilted her head in the direction of Matt and Eleanor and suggested, “Let’s set off, shall we?”

No objections to Sheena’s proposal arose, so Rosalita marched into the fort complex and the rest of the group promptly followed. There had once been an iron gate attached to the stones, but it had long since rotted away in the many years of weather it had been left to endure. All that remained was a small amount of rusted, twisted metal protruding from the walls.

Inside the courtyard, the terrain was surprisingly rough and rugged. The fallen remains of what had once been parts of the fort, such as lookout towers, had been turned into rocky outcroppings by the passage of time that transformed the courtyard into what almost seemed like a maze. A Mismagius popped out from behind one of the piles of stones to curiously observe those who had come to visit her home. The newcomers didn’t notice her, however, and they did nothing that appeared to threaten the fort. Satisfied that the quartet approaching the main building posed no danger to her or her home, the Mismagius turned and quietly slipped back into the shadows.

Much like the front gate of the complex, the wooden door that once provided entrance into the fort had was largely gone, having been consumed by the flow of time. Only a piece of the its side still remained, hanging forlornly on what remained of its frame, creaking back and forth in the wind. Rosalita carefully pushed it away and stepped into the cooler air of the fort’s interior, with Matt, Eleanor and Sheena following closely behind.

Holes in the ceiling allowed rays of sunlight to shine into the fort. They glistened in the tiny streams of rainwater running down the stone walls. As the group inspected their surroundings, they found more rotting wooden doors all around them, both on the ground floor and a second floor they could reach using stairs straight ahead of them.

“Which way do you think we should go first?” Sheena wondered aloud.

“There’s one way to find out.” Matt reached into his bag and pulled out the puzzle box. Its presence in the fort had already triggered a reaction in the cube, and the gentle glow coming from it confirmed to the group that they had indeed followed the clue correctly. “Here goes.”

Acting on a hunch, Matt turned to his left and held out the box. He pointed it both up and down, but the amount of light radiating from it did not change. His idea’s unexpected failure left him to cringe in embarrassment from the judgment he imagined to be coming from the others. In an attempt to undo what he feared, he pivoted to point the box in the opposite direction, completely missing it briefly brightening when it was closer to the stairs.

Rosalita, however, did see it, and quickly tapped Matt’s shoulder for his attention.

“Wait, check straight ahead again.”

“Huh?” he uttered in surprise. “Oh, right.”

Matt followed Rosalita’s suggestion and pointed the puzzle box directly toward the staircase. Sure enough, much more light spilled out from it, as if the box were crying out to be taken to something the group could not yet see.

“That doesn’t tell us that much, though,” Eleanor mused. “Up the stairs? Down here in that direction?”

“It’s Rosalita’s trial, yes?” Shaymin piped up. The tiny Pokémon pulled itself from Rosalita’s arms and jumped down onto the floor, then looked back up with an intense expression and said, “Show me you can solve this, I say! You can find the way forward as the crown princess, yes?”

“You’re right. I’m the crown princess… it’s up to me.” Rosalita held her fist against her chest and closed her eyes. “Last time, in the mine… we used the box to find the shrine’s exact location. It guided us straight there.”

“Did you think of something?” Sheena asked Rosalita, seeing a slight shift in the princess’s expression.

“Yeah, I did.” Turning to Matt, Rosalita pointed forward and said, “Take the box up the stairs and see how it changes. When we found Regirock’s shrine, it brought us directly to the door. There’s no reason it should be any different now.”

“You have a point,” Matt acknowledged.

Holding the puzzle box firmly with both hands, Matt slowly advanced toward the staircase. The cube’s light intensified with each step he took and by the time he reached the foot of the stairs, it was blinding. He looked back at the others, and after receiving confirmation in the form of a quick nod from Rosalita, began to ascend.

By the time he was roughly halfway up, there was an undeniable change in the puzzle box’s state - but it wasn’t what he had expected. It had, in fact, grown less bright.

“Wait, stop!” Rosalita called out to him. “It’s got to be somewhere immediately around the base of the stairs.”

“I have to agree with you on that one,” Matt said as he returned to the ground floor. The puzzle box once again shined incredibly brightly, prompting Matt to laugh to himself and mumble, “It’s almost like this thing’s alive.”

Rosalita, Sheena and Eleanor hurried over to join Matt at the stairs, and together, the quartet slowly started to walk around them in a half-circle. They quickly discovered that the further around to the right they went, the brighter the glow from the box became. Following that clue lead them to the wall below the stairs, and after a moment’s hesitation, Matt held the box up to it.

A new light almost immediately began radiating from the wall, the rays merging with those given off by the cube. An intricate pattern of curved lines spread out across the stone, and the four explorers heard a loud thud as a hidden mechanism activated. They stepped back as what they believed to be a wall revealed itself to actually be a door, which slid back and revealed a narrow path heading underground.

“I knew you would be smart enough to put it together, yes,” Shaymin smugly noted after plodding over to join the group.

“Hey, you’re the one who knows all of this already,” Eleanor pointed out. “You’re cheating.”

“But if I just tell you all the answers, there’s no fun in that, yes?” Shaymin teased her back. “It’s for the one who will take the throne to solve the mysteries, yes.” Pausing, Shaymin considered what it was saying, before hastily amending its words, “Or... at least it’s their responsibility to do as much as possible, given the circumstances. In normal times, Rosalita would know how to read the secret messages, yes?”

“That is true,” Rosalita admitted, turning her eyes downward. “I never had a chance to learn Braille from Mother and Father before Fernando killed them and started all of this…”

“That’s why I’m here,” Matt said, doing his best effort to shore up her confidence. He held the puzzle box into the tunnel, allowing it to illuminate the stairwell. “Let’s keep going. We should be getting close to the next piece of this puzzle.”

Matt’s encouragement helped lift Rosalita’s spirits, and she straightened up with a hint of confidence. “You’re right, let’s make the most of our lead.”

After giving Rosalita a slight smile, Matt stepped into the tunnel and started down the steps. Rosalita picked up Shaymin and followed right after him, while Eleanor and Sheena brought up the rear. As they descended, they could hear the sound of water dripping somewhere nearby, though its precise location remained impossible to discern.

It wasn’t long before the group reached the underground chamber at the bottom of the stairwell. Much like Regirock’s temple in the mine, it was a plain, open chamber whose walls and floor were covered in paintings of Regigigas, Regirock, Registeel and Regice. Eleanor noticed the similarity and promptly fetched Litwick’s Poké Ball from her skirt, releasing the Ghost-and-Fire-type Pokémon so she could give the group her light.

Once Litwick was perched on her shoulder, Eleanor rushed over to the wall at the far end of the shrine. “Look at this!” she called over to the others, gesturing to the facade. “There’s another Braille message here.”

“I expected as much.” Matt stowed the box back in his bag and made his way over to join Eleanor, with Rosalita tagging along at his side.

“What does it say?” the princess asked.

“Let’s see…” Matt leaned forward to look closely at the writing, again guiding himself by running his finger along the symbols. “He who wears the crown shall unlock the future for all of the kingdom. He who shall wear the crown must unlock their own future. None who fail to open their own doors shall open the doors for the people. Here lies the second of the three trials. The body of steel shall awaken only awaken for one who uses the key held by the one who brings forth gratitude.”

“So it’s Registeel this time,” Sheena observed, having walked over to the others at the wall. “That means Regice will be last.”

“Is it asking for Shaymin this time?” Matt wondered, scratching his chin. “The one who brings forth gratitude. That’s Shaymin, isn’t it?”

“That’s what you really think, yes?” Shaymin asked him. “What is the key that you think I have?”

“Well…”

“Wait, look at this,” Rosalita interjected before Matt could fully answer. Her attention had been caught by a thick line painted under the Braille, and she leaned down to follow it to its end. In the floor was a strange opening cut out of a stone that was slightly higher up than those around it. None of the others had seen the hole until Rosalita pointed it out. “You know what I think? This message wants an actual key of some sort.”

“What about the part about ‘the one who brings forth gratitude,’ though?” Matt asked. “We don’t really have that much of a lead on where this key is.”

“Let’s split up and search the fort, first,” Rosalita proposed. “I think it should be somewhere in here, whatever it is. Nobody who served at this fort could have used it without the puzzle box, so it would be safe to have it here.”

“That’s a good idea,” Sheena said in agreement. “I’ll go with you, Rosalita.”

“So Matt and I will do the other half,” Eleanor confirmed. “Sounds like that’ll work.”

-:-

Lingote Palace’s bunker-like hangar was located at the back of the castle, built partially into the Sacred Hill. It served only one purpose - housing the kingdom’s skyship, the personal craft of the royal family. In ages past, the Arcane Science-powered vessel had been used by previous generations simply to survey the kingdom they led, but those days were far behind it. For over a century, the skyship had been left resting in the hangar. Recent kings had chosen to save it for use in defending the kingdom, even though they prayed such a time would never come to pass. For this reason, engineers and technicians in the employ of the royal family kept it in perfect condition even though it wasn’t being used.

Or at least that was how things were until Fernando VIII decided he wanted to use it.

The count stood alongside his elderly defense minister, clutching the staff containing the glowing orb. A group of the minister’s subordinates were going in and out of the dormant skyship while the pair watched, some bringing supplies into it and others carrying tools to inspect the craft.

“Count Fernando, sir…” the minister quietly said to the young man next to him, “I understand what you said, but I can’t help but ask again… are you really sure about launching it?”

Fernando grinned, but he did not shift his eyes away from overseeing the skyship’s preparation. “Yes. What exactly has you worried about the idea?”

“I’m thinking about our history, to be honest.” The minister missed the sarcasm underpinning Fernando’s seemingly friendly question, so he answered completely seriously. “I worry about the possibility that by launching the skyship, we will cause a series of events that will lead to another civil war and to Regigigas awakening once again.”

“And you fear that like in ancient times, that should Regigigas reawaken, all of La Ciudad Dorada will be destroyed yet again?” Fernando guessed, though he really was just humoring the minister by acting like he didn’t know the answer.

“That’s correct, sir.”

The minister’s naive sincerity left Fernando unable to suppress a laugh, but he quickly apologized. “I’m sorry. I can’t blame you for that concern with Rosalita out there… and it is valid to think that we won’t be able to stop Regigigas from destroying the kingdom completely, given that Rosalita is still out there with Shaymin. That’s how the picture looks to you right now, right?”

“Again, correct, sir,” answered the minister, bowing his head.

This got Fernando to turn to face the old man. “That makes sense considering what you know,” he said, tapping the bottom of his staff against the floor. “But what you don’t know is that with the powers of Arcane Science, I’ve developed a special defense mechanism in my workshop for just that occasion. Should Regigigas return, I will be ready to protect La Ciudad Dorada from its judgment.”

The minister drew in an uncomfortable breath. “I would like to say that your words alleviate all my fears, Count Fernando. Just the possibility of Regigigas awakening worries me, though. Even if we have a defense.”

“Again, I understand what has you nervous. All I can tell you is that once that secret weapon I developed is loaded onto the skyship, it’ll be ready to deploy the second we need it.”

-:-

“Are you alright?”

Eleanor’s question came right as she and Matt entered the fort’s armory. He’d been very reserved since the two groups split up to carry out their search, and it concerned her. Not only that, but he knew he was acting withdrawn, so her words cut him to the bone despite being so simple and direct.

A shiver ran through his body, and as he approached the suits of armor in the room, he said to her, “Look around here carefully. There are a lot of places where a key could be hidden.”

Annoyed by the way Matt completely ignored her question, Eleanor disregarded his instruction and planted herself firmly where she was standing. “I’m not letting you get off that easily!” she snapped, losing control over the volume of her voice for a moment before calming herself. “You’re not okay, I can tell. It’s clear as day.”

Matt paused. “You’re right… I’m sorry.” He placed his hand on the suit of armor he was looking at, but did not turn around. “I’m a fish out of water here. It’s always just been Amanda and I, and that’s all I’ve ever needed. I’m not used to having this much of a group around me.”

“Didn’t you have friends back in Rustboro?”

“A couple,” he replied while he took off the armor’s helmet and examined it. “But none of them were particularly close friends, really. Well, Cassy’s been there a lot, but besides her they haven’t been that close to me. Amanda was always the more social one between us.”

Matt paid no mind to the fact that Eleanor said nothing more, and simply continued to look over
the helmet’s interior. He froze, however, when she stepped up right behind him and wrapped her arms around him.

“If it makes you feel any better,” she said, “I’ve always been an outcast, too. Like I told you last night, there were hundreds of thousands of people around me in Orsay City and I never felt like I could connect with any of them. You’re not alone.”

“I know I’m not. It’s just weird to me.”

“You’ll get used to it,” Eleanor told him, releasing her grip and smiling at him when he turned to face her. She then pointed at the suits of armor behind him, arranged neatly into two rows. “So how about we check them out now?”

“Good idea,” he said, returning her smile.

The pair set about checking the suits of armor, each taking one row. Matt decided to go over the left side of the room, while Eleanor went to the right.

A few minutes passed, and Eleanor had just finished inspecting her second suit of armor before a thought popped into her head. “Hey, Matt?” she called over to him. “What did the clue say about the key again?”

“The body of steel shall awaken only awaken for one who uses the key held by the one who brings forth gratitude,” Matt recalled. “Why did you ask?”

“You’re certain it said ‘held by the one who brings forth gratitude,’ right?”

“The Braille text directly said that, yes,” he explained. “It’s a different form of written language, but the symbols translate into ordinary letters. The ones used here do, at least.”

“So if it’s taken literally, ‘held by the one who brings forth gratitude’ would mean that the key is in the hand of the one we’re looking for,” Eleanor deduced. She glanced down the entire row of armor on her side and observed, “But all of these are just holding swords.”

“Same on my side,” Matt confirmed. “Not only that, they all look the same. I’d say that means we can rule them all out, since if one sword opened that lock they all would.”

“You’re right on that one,” Eleanor said as she made her way toward the back of the armory. She glanced at every single suit of armor she passed, but all of them matched each other. “I feel like we’re in the right place, but-”

A gasp slipped from Eleanor’s mouth when she saw what was right in front of her. She ran straight for it, leaving Matt confused as he tried to catch up.

“Eleanor, what’s wrong?” he asked her, feeling a rising sense of panic. At that point he couldn’t yet see what had so captured her attention, but as soon as he reached the far end of the lengthy room, he spotted it and immediately understood.

Eleanor was there looking closely at a statue on a slightly elevated platform. Though it wasn’t a suit of armor, it was shaped from metal, giving it the appearance of one. The only actual armor on the statue were heavy, broad plates on its shoulders.

“The wanderer who helped found the kingdom,” Matt uttered in surprise.

“Yeah, and remember what the message wanted us to find?” Eleanor pulled her face away from the statue and jabbed a finger into the air. “‘The key held by the one who brings forth gratitude.’ He’s the one who helped bring forth Shaymin, the Gardener of Gratitude.”

“So then…” Matt quickly turned his attention to the statue’s right hand, which was resting on a scabbard attached to its waist. “That’s got to be it. Help me get this out.”

“You got it, chief,” Eleanor replied, playfully saluting.

Matt and Eleanor started working the statue’s hand away from the sword, taking great care to avoid damaging it. As it turned out, the statue’s arm was built with joints at the shoulder and elbow, making their task much easier. They were able to raise it up into the air with little trouble.

“This is probably going to be the hard part,” Matt said as he inspected the sword. “The last thing we want to do is knock it over. Can you hold the statue in place while I get the sword out?”

“Yeah, I got that.”

Eleanor stepped up and braced the statue by pushing against its shoulders. At the same time, Matt firmly gripped the sword’s hilt and carefully pulled on it. Much to his surprise, it came out of the scabbard far more easily than he anticipated, leaving him to stumble and fall backward. The sword dropped to the floor next to him, sending a metallic crash echoing through the room.

Eleanor jumped down from the statue stand and said, “You alright?” She offered a hand to help him up and added, “Looks like we almost had a Matt-kebab there.”

“Don’t joke about that, it was a little too close for comfort.” Matt took Eleanor’s hand, but before he stood up he collected the sword with the other. He held the blade up once he was back on his feet so they both could get a better look at it. Unlike the swords issued to the suits of armor, it was thicker and heavier. “It must have taken a lot of strength to use this, if the replica’s any indication.”

“Who says it’s a replica?” Eleanor pointed out.

“I suppose that’s true,” Matt admitted. “Either way, though, I’m guessing this is our key.”

“I’m sure it is,” Eleanor agreed. “Let’s show it to Rosalita.”

With the sword in hand, Matt and Eleanor made their way back past the suits of armor and exited into the fort’s mezzanine. From over the railing they could see Sheena and Rosalita waiting at the foot of the stairs with Shaymin, seemingly empty handed.

“You guys!” Eleanor called down to them as she walked. “We found something!”

“I hope you did, because we came up empty,” Sheena replied. By that point Matt and Eleanor had reached the stairs and were descending. “Nothing notable except a wardrobe with surprisingly intact clothes. If you call that notable.”

“What’s that?” Rosalita inquired, having noticed the sword in Matt’s hand.

“We found it in the armory,” he explained, showing the blade to Rosalita and Sheena as soon as he left the stairs. “There was a metal statue of the wanderer there, and he had it.”

“‘The key held by the one who brings forth gratitude,’” Rosalita recalled. “That makes perfect sense!”

“You should be the one to use it,” Matt said, offering the sword to Rosalita with both hands. “It’s your trial, after all. Besides, I can’t hold it and record everything at the same time.”

Rosalita started to reach for the weapon, but before she took it, she hesitated. The symbolic weight of the action was not lost on her. Her breathing grew shallow, and she stared at the blade. “Once I commit to this, there really is no going back… everything I’ve known will change. My life will never be the same again once this is over…” The more she thought about the responsibilities she had to take on, however, the more confident she began to feel. “No, I can’t feel sorry for myself! My people need me to lead!”

Having regained her composure, Rosalita accepted the sword from Matt and bowed her head in a modest gesture of gratitude. Shaymin padded up next to her and raised its tiny head into the air, focusing squarely on the princess towering over it.

“You truly understand what it means to lead the kingdom, yes,” the mythical Pokémon said, shaking its head back and forth. “I can tell, yes? That’s how I knew you were the right choice. When you live as long as I have, you often know what’s right, yes.”

“Why doesn’t it surprise me that you’d say that?” Matt sarcastically asked Shaymin.

“Because you know more than you think,” replied the Pokémon. “You are the professor’s grandson, after all, yes? It’s only fitting that you’d understand me, you.”

Matt furrowed his brow, puzzled by Shaymin’s words. “Why would me being Sutter’s grandson make me understand you?”

“And here I am noticing that Land Forme Shaymin just ended a sentence with ‘you’ for some reason,” Eleanor added, flicking her hand open.

“Hey, you’re right,” Rosalita realized. Turning down to Shaymin, she said, “It’s hard for me to remember a time you’ve done that before.”

“I can say whatever I want whenever I want, yes.” Shaymin raised its nose into the air. “That’s my privilege after so many years serving the royal family.”

“Nobody can argue with you there,” Rosalita replied, laughing slightly. “I think I’m about ready to face the trial now. Eleanor, if you please, would you lead the way with Litwick’s light?”

“You got it, Rosa.” Eleanor fetched Litwick’s Poké Ball from her skirt and opened it while pointing it at her shoulder, allowing the candle Pokémon to materialize there. She scratched Litwick’s cheek, earning a squeak of pleasure from her, then asked, “Litwick, would you light the way for me, please?”

“Wick!” the Ghost-and-Fire-type Pokémon happily replied.

With that, Eleanor walked over and entered the tunnel underneath the staircase, Litwick’s flame illuminating the narrow space. Rosalita followed after her, carrying the sword firmly in her grip while Shaymin stayed closely at her side. Matt and Sheena went last, the former with his laptop out and recording everything once again. Before long, the quartet was once again before the wall where the Braille puzzle was left ages ago.

Rosalita stepped forward and, after looking back to make sure Matt was recording, held the sword up. “How fitting,” she said to the others. “There was a great king who once pulled a sword from a stone. Now I’m here putting a sword into a stone. Here goes nothing.”

The princess’s first motion was a tentative one. She pointed the sword downward and carefully lowered it toward the opening in the floor. After tapping it against the stones a few times to feel out the best way to proceed, she gathered her strength and jammed it into the opening as far as it would go.

The moment the sword hit the bottom of the slot, bright light burst back out. Rosalita stepped back in surprise and nearly slipped, but Sheena caught her from behind. A line of light traced along the floor from the opening and back up the wall with the Braille on it. It split and filled the wall with an elaborate pattern before the piece with the message pulled back and slid away, revealing a passage heading further underground.

“This is it,” Rosalita cautiously said, taking a Poké Ball out from her cloak.

“You know who you will fight with, yes?” Shaymin asked as it scurried into the passage alongside the humans.

“Of course,” answered the princess. “Adiela and Deivi are well suited for Registeel.”

“You planned this out in advance?”

Rosalita nodded to Sheena. “Every heir must face the trials of the Three Pillars to take the throne. I would be failing my predecessors to not be prepared.”

“I’m proud of you, then,” Sheena said with a warm smile. “You’re more ready to be a leader than I think you realize.”

“Thank you. I feel better hearing that.”

The passage ultimately led to a cavern illuminated by a source none of the group could see. As they fanned out, they found that even though the cave was spacious enough, there were few places they could actually go with any ease. The plateau right in front of them was surrounded by jagged ledges on all sides.

“I don’t think Sally could fly in here,” Matt observed. “The mine was tough enough and this place is even worse.”

“Same for Reyes,” Rosalita concurred. When she glanced back to talk to Matt, though, she spotted a familiar glow in his bag. “Matt, the puzzle box!”

Matt hadn’t noticed the glow, so when Rosalita pointed it out, he fumbled to hand his laptop to Eleanor and retrieve the cube. Its shining only continued to intensify, prompting Eleanor to slip on her goggles and lick her lips in anticipation of the battle to come. Matt and Sheena averted their eyes while Rosalita stared squarely at the light until it erupted into a flash that filled the cave.

Much to the quartet’s surprise, the box immediately ceased glowing afterward.

“What happened?” Sheena wondered.

The answer to the priestess’s question came not from any of her companions, be they human or Pokémon. It instead came in the form of heavy, stomping footsteps and a bizarre robotic gurgling that sounded throughout the cave.

“Prepare yourself,” Shaymin warned Rosalita. “She is here, yes?”

Matt took his laptop back and pointed it in the direction of the stomping, but then paused and said, “She?”

There was no time to address Matt’s confusion, for the bulbous, silver body of Registeel loomed into view on one of the cliffs overlooking their position. It jumped down onto the plateau, flailing its black arms and gurgling all the while. After landing with a great crash, it turned using its cylindrical legs to face Rosalita.

“Registeel, you probably know who I am already.” Rosalita’s body stiffened as her focus from her previous battle returned. “As the crown princess of La Ciudad Dorada, I challenge you!”

“Steel,” it said in its strange voice, accepting the princess’s challenge. It waved its hand towards itself while the seven dots on its face flashed, urging her on.

Registeel’s invitation prompted Rosalita to throw the Poké Ball she had ready. It burst open in an unusual flare of vivid, sparkling light, revealing a Shiftry whose appearance caught Matt, Eleanor and Sheena by surprise. Instead of the green color most Shiftry had, Rosalita’s was red with an off-white mane running across his face and down his back.

“A shiny one?” Matt breathlessly uttered. “I didn’t expect that.”

In response to Deivi’s appearance, Registeel stared at him and repeatedly stuttered the first part of its name while its dots blinked. It then stomped its feet into the ground and unleashed a mechanical roar, causing an intense red aura to surround its body.

“What’s that?” Eleanor inquired.

Sheena didn’t say anything right away. Instead, she clasped her hands together and brought her thoughts into sync with Registeel’s. “It called upon Gaia’s power to strengthen itself for combat,” she revealed. “Makes sense that they could tap into Gaia, since they’re the elements given life.”

“Regirock didn’t do this, though…” Rosalita realized. “This is the second of the Three Pillars. It’s making it tougher for me to pass…” The princess clenched her fist as she regarded the titan with determination in her eyes. “But I won’t be defeated now. Not after coming this far. Deivi, start off with Low Kick!”

The Shiftry ran at his opponent, showing great agility despite having to balance on his narrow, peg-like feet. Registeel flashed its lights and then pulled its arms back to form a Focus Blast between them. However, just as it went to throw the glowing sphere, Deivi dropped into a slide, allowing Registeel’s attack to fly harmlessly over him. His foot collided with Registeel’s leg, causing the legendary Pokémon to fall over.

Deivi leaped away from Registeel while it groaned and pushed itself back onto its feet. Rosalita braced herself, expecting to need a response to Registeel’s next form of offense, but no attack came. Instead, Registeel lurched back, once more pointing its face toward the ceiling. It gurgled and beeped while its dots flashed, then roared with all seven dots turning bright red.

From elsewhere in the cavern, the voice of another Pokémon made itself known. Its owner quickly revealed itself as a Xatu, who glided over the plateau before deftly landing to stand alongside the titan who summoned her.

“An ally Pokémon?” Sheena said, bringing her hand to her mouth. “Now that’s a real surprise.”

“The humans of La Ciudad Dorada live lives based on the gratitude they feel for what they can give each other,” Shaymin told her. “It’s only natural that its Pokémon feel the same way, yes?”

Rosalita, meanwhile regarded this development with a sense of silent tension. She knew Shaymin’s point well, but she hadn’t factored in the possibility of Registeel calling for help from something like a Xatu.

“I’ve got to be careful,” she thought, a bead of sweat rolling down her face. “If I knew a Flying-type would come, I’d have started with Adiela instead. But I can’t feel any doubt now, and besides, this might still work.” Sweeping her hand in front of herself, Rosalita commanded, “Deivi, use Dark Pulse on Xatu!”

The Shiftry brought his leafy hands together, forming a cluster of black energy rings between them. Xatu fearlessly faced the oncoming dark vortex, opting to raise her wings up instead of escaping. At the same time that Dark Pulse threw Xatu back, a gust of wind started to blow from behind her and Registeel. Harnessing this wind, Registeel effortlessly glided at Deivi while its body gleamed with a metallic glow.

“Tailwind!” Rosalita gasped, barely able to react before the impact of Registeel’s Iron Head sent Deivi crashing into a rock. She tensed up, bracing herself by moving her left leg back, then tersely noted, “That’ll make Registeel more agile than Regirock was…”

Xatu was busy, meanwhile. She swayed her wings from side to side and calmly chanted. Her dance caused dark clouds to materialize over the plateau, which soon brought rain. Sheena touched her cheek when the first drop landed on it, then looked at the damp spot on her hand.

“Rain Dance…” she said, blinking. “That’s useful for Registeel’s ally Pokémon to know.”

“You!” As the rain grew steady, Shaymin lunged into Sheena’s arms. “Keep me dry!” it told her while burying itself.

“You’re really in quite the mood today, aren’t you?” joked Eleanor.

“I’m not a plant, yes?!” Shaymin was indignant. Evidently, Eleanor’s attempt at humor hadn’t landed. “I don’t want to get all soggy!”

“It’s fine,” Sheena assured the Pokémon, bringing one of her arms over it. “I’ll keep you dry.”

“Thank you. I like you, yes?”

Sheena didn’t answer, but she didn’t need to. Shaymin knew how she felt from the fact that several flowers sprouted out of its back as it nestled in her arms.

Rosalita, meanwhile, had remained focused on her battle. Deivi and Registeel were rushing each other, the latter able to better match the former’s pace thanks to Tailwind. Low Kick met Iron Head, and both combatants were launched back from each other. Xatu, had been hanging back and gathering up energy, and chose that moment to unleash an orange-and-gold aura that formed the shape of a phoenix around her. When she shot forward and collided with Deivi, the aura exploded, leaving the Shiftry sprawled out unconscious on the ground, covered in burn marks from the intense energy.

“Sky Attack,” Matt said in awe.

“Deivi, I’m sorry,” Rosalita apologized while sending her Shiftry back to the shelter of his Poké Ball. Once he had been recalled, she lowered her head. “I should have known better and prepared for something like this,” she thought. “I can learn from it now, though. Adiela won’t do well in the rain. That means I might need to put Registeel aside for now and focus on Xatu… and I think I know the best way to do that.”

Reaching into her cloak, the princess removed and threw another of her Poké Balls. Her Luxray, Isabel, emerged from the sphere and roared.

Rosalita wasted no time in issuing her next order. “Isabel, Xatu’s your target! Strike with Thunderbolt!”

All three Pokémon on the plateau started moving at the same time. While Isabel’s mane crackled with her electricity, Xatu started gathering energy in preparation for another Sky Attack. Registeel, well aware of Rosalita and Isabel’s intent, called forth its own electrical energy. Isabel’s Thunderbolt and Registeel’s Thunder cast dramatic flash upon the battle as they forked through the rain-filled air. When they met, their respective powers were largely nullified by the resulting explosion. Enough of Thunder remained, however, to continue on and hit Isabel, though it had little effect.

What Registeel had done wasn’t lost on Rosalita. “So it will run interference to protect Xatu,” she said to herself. “If that’s the case, we’ll need to fight up close, Isabel. Go in for a Throat Chop!”

A purple, flame-like aura engulfed Isabel’s front right paw as she darted at Xatu, who met her charge head-on with Sky Attack. Despite the great force of Xatu’s dive, Isabel was able to overwhelm her. With the Psychic-and-Flying-type stunned, Isabel took the opportunity to drive her glowing paw directly into Xatu’s neck.

“Follow that with Thunderbolt!” Rosalita cried out.

Since she was already on top of Xatu, all Isabel had to do was discharge electricity from her body. The strength of her Thunderbolt was such that it propelled her away from Xatu. Registeel’s ally was left lying still on the ground, weakly twitching and unable to continue fighting.

“Perfect!” exclaimed the princess, clapping her hands together. “Now to deal with Registeel…”

Rosalita looked around, then froze. Registeel was nowhere in sight. It was as if the titan had simply vanished into thin air.

“Did any of you see where Registeel went?” Rosalita called to Matt, Eleanor and Sheena. She could feel her skin crawling from how nervous she was.

Before she could get an answer, Registeel’s robotic gurgling emerged from above them. The quartet hastily turned to find the source of the noise, only to discover Registeel lumbering toward the edge of the cliff overlooking Isabel’s position.

“How did it get up there?” Rosalita wondered before shaking her head. “Isabel, get out of there, hurry!”

Before the Luxray could react, Registeel simply stepped over the precipice. The metallic shine of Iron Head surrounded it as it fell, and Isabel was too caught by surprise to react. Registeel plummeted straight into her, landing with a loud crash.

“Isabel! Are you okay?!”

The answer to Rosalita’s plea came in the form of a Thunderbolt that erupted from beneath Registeel as the titan stood back up. It reeled back, making mechanical spitting noises while the shock worked through its body. Isabel emerged from the hole created by Iron Head just as Xatu’s earlier Tailwind petered out.

“Have you got anything left, Isabel?” Before Rosalita even finished asking her question, Isabel had lowered herself and begun growling at Registeel. “Thank you,” the princess said with a smile. “Let’s go all out one last time. Superpower!”

After returning Rosalita’s smile, Isabel tensed all the muscles in her body, giving herself a somewhat swollen appearance. She sprang at Registeel and tackled the titan hard enough to force its heavy iron body back through the dirt. The legendary Pokémon reacted by spinning its left arm in a full circle, allowing a black light to form the shape of a claw around it before crashing it down into Isabel’s head.

Isabel didn’t faint from the blow, but she did stumble away from Registeel. Rosalita already had the Luxray’s Poké Ball ready to recall her, and pointed it at Isabel as the two Pokémon separated. “That was good, Isabel,” Rosalita thanked her once she was pulled back into the sphere. Before she could move on to her next combatant, the rain tapered off and the clouds hanging over the cave cleared up. “I lost track of that…” the princess thought to herself. “I don’t know if I’m confident enough to send Adiela in just yet, though, even with the rain gone. I think I need to work it down a little more first…”

Rosalita had her hand on one Poké Ball within her cloak, but moved away from it and threw another instead. Her Leavanny, Elena, materialized from it and yawned.

As soon as he saw the Bug-and-Grass-type Pokémon, Matt shivered. Even with her attention safely diverted in battle, his memories of the way Elena had strung him, Eleanor and Sheena up at the mine sent a subconscious chill down his spine.

Shaymin noticed his reaction. Poking its head out from Sheena’s arms, it said to him, “Rosalita knows what she’s doing with Leavanny, yes? I think you’ve experienced that yourself.”

“Stop reminding me,” Matt sighed, tightening his grip on his laptop.

“Elena,” Rosalita said to her Pokémon, “we’re just weakening Registeel up a bit, alright? There’s not much we need to do.”

“Va,” replied Elena.

“Glad to hear it!” Rosalita exclaimed. She snapped her fingers, pointed at Registeel and said, “Hit it with Throat Chop!”

The same flaming purple aura that surrounded Isabel’s paw earlier flared to life around Elena’s leafy arms. Moving deftly on her spindly legs, she closed the distance between herself and Registeel in the blink of an eye and struck the titan squarely in the face. Registeel shuddered and beeped, its dots flashing rhythmically. It tried to grab Elena, but she slipped between its arms, flipped over its head, and delivered another chop directly to its back.

By that point, Registeel’s beeping and gurgling had turned plainly angry and its movements became wild and aggressive. Instead of trying to aim for Elena, it spun around in place, wildly flailing its arms. One of its Shadow Claw attacks caught Elena in the cheek, knocking her down and stunning her. Registeel then lumbered over and picked her up. Trapped in the titan’s grip, Elena thrashed around but couldn’t get away from the Focus Blast Registeel formed around her. The pulsating orb exploded almost instantly upon taking shape, throwing Elena through the air toward her trainer.

“This is getting to be rougher than I expected,” Rosalita fretted as she watched her Leavanny stand back up. “Elena, I’m sorry. Can you use String Shot to hold Registeel down?”

Registeel already had its arms pulled back and a new Focus Blast forming between them. Just when it pulled back in preparation to fling the orb, however, Elena spit several wads of sticky silk at it. One of them hit Registeel in the face, while two more caught its arms, adhering them to the ground. The air in the cave filled with the sounds of Registeel gurgling and grunting angrily while it struggled against its bonds, which had it held leaning back at an awkward angle.

“Well done, Elena. You can rest now.”

Rosalita held up a Poké Ball, allowing a red beam of light emerged from it and contacted Elena, pulling her back into the sphere. Right before transforming back into energy, she exhaled and relaxed.

“You’re almost there,” Sheena said in encouragement, earning a tired but glowing smile from the princess. “You can do this.”

“I can do this,” Rosalita repeated. She gazed at her reflection in the surface of the new Poké Ball in her hand, fidgeting it around instead of throwing it. “After this, only Regice remains, she reminded herself. “Then we’re free from what this has caused… I’ll endure anything if it means I can get those days back again.”

Having firmed up her resolve, Rosalita finally pulled her arm back and tossed the ball toward the still-struggling Registeel. When it burst open, the lithe, majestic form of a Rapidash appeared from within. She pawed at the ground and neighed fiercely, the flames on her head, back and legs blazing in a magnificent display of power.

“Wow, impressive,” Matt said, making sure to focus his laptop’s camera at the equine Pokémon. “I’ve seen plenty of Rapidash before, but this one… it stands out.”

“That the Adiela you mentioned before?” Eleanor asked.

“She is,” Rosalita proudly told the others. “My very first Pokémon…” Turning back to Registeel, who was still struggling against the binding effect of String Shot, the princess added, “But I’ll have to tell you about her another time. Adiela, let’s pass this trial. Use Flame Charge!”

Adiela neighed again and lowered her head, pointing her horn in Registeel’s direction. While she galloped at the titan, her flames fused together to form a cloak of fire around her body. Registeel groaned loudly when she collided with it, but that groan swiftly morphed into a vicious growl as electricity sparked around it. Adiela was unable to escape the Thunder attack it soon unleashed.

“Adiela, I know it’s rough but I also know you can handle it!” Rosalita told her Rapidash, who was bucking around and snorting while the electricity coursed through her body. Hearing these words of confidence calmed the Fire-type, and the confident grace she initially projected returned. Rosalita happily said to Adiela, “Very good. We’re close now, so keep using Flame Charge again and again.”

Every time Adiela’s flame-cloaked form made contact with Registeel, her subsequent movements grew faster. This didn’t matter much when it came to her reaching the still-bound titan. Where it made a difference was instead in Adiela’s ability to evade the Thunder attacks Registeel countered with. Bolt after bolt split the air, but Adiela deftly danced around them until she saw an opening for her next strike.

While Rosalita watched her Rapidash’s lithe motions, she found herself falling into a memory from her childhood.

It was the day their parents had taken Rosalita and Fernando out of the palace to see their city up close for the first time. The royal family possessed a personal carriage for their trips into La Ciudad Dorada, pulled by a pair of Rapidash that their servants trained. Rosalita, then only a few years old, fell in love with them at first sight. She admired the serene yet powerful beauty they projected. By the time she was in the carriage with her parents and brother, her heart was already set on having a Rapidash of her own, a wish soon fulfilled when Sophia gifted her a Ponyta she named Adiela.

A bolt of electricity shot close by Rosalita, snapping her back to the present as a gust blew through her billowing hair. Adiela was literally running rings around Registeel, who kept fruitlessly lashing out with Thunder. Its growling had grown weak, and the flashing of its dots dramatically slowed.

“Adiela, use Flame Charge one more time,” she called out, “but aim for the strings!”

As soon as Registeel’s electric barrage ceased, Adiela moved in once more. The opening was brief, but it was more than enough for her to ignite the threads Elena left behind. Registeel, trapped at the center of the inferno, could do nothing but groan and flail once the string burned away.

Adiela backed away and warily observed Registeel’s actions. Behind her, Rosalita, Matt, Eleanor and Sheena did the same. The titan’s thrashing eventually did dispel the flames, but it could only take one step forward before gurgling out its name a final time before falling face-first into the dirt.

“We did it!” Rosalita beamed. She couldn’t stop herself from jumping into the air before running to embrace Adiela, who whinnied proudly. When she heard the others approaching her, though, her face flushed. “I mean, that’s the second one down…”

“Just because you’re a crown princess doesn’t mean you have to always act like one,” Sheena said with a smile. “Feel free to let yourself enjoy things.”

Sheena’s encouragement was all Rosalita needed to relax and embrace her Rapidash again. Meanwhile, from its place in Sheena’s arms, Shaymin indignantly piped up, “I’m the one who’s guiding the princess, yes? Don’t try to make me obsolete!”

“Don’t worry, Shaymin, nobody can replace you,” Sheena told it while stroking its back.

“That’s right, yes,” it replied, snuggling back into Sheena’s arms and sprouting several flowers.

“Did you get all of that?” Rosalita asked Matt, gesturing to his laptop.

“Every second. Don’t you worry, I’m making sure I get as complete a record as possible.”

“Thank you.” The princess put her hand on her heart and curtsied. “It’s very important to me that this custom be recorded. One of my goals for when I am queen is to help the world better understand us. They can’t truly know without seeing for themselves.”

“I hear you on that,” Matt agreed. “I think that was what drove Sutter, too. He had a thirst for learning about other cultures. I’m sure that’s why he came here.” Turning to Sheena, he added, “That’s why he studied the Tenganists, too.”

“You’re gonna be a great queen, Rosa,” Eleanor cheerfully said, throwing her arm around the princess’s shoulder. “Don’t forget about me when you make it.”

“I won’t forget any of you,” promised Rosalita. “You’ve stood by me this far, and that’s already more than I could ever have asked for.”

“Ah, look at that!” Sheena intervened, pointing the others’ attention over to Registeel.
The titan was emitting a gentle golden light, and right as Matt pointed his laptop at it, the puzzle box emerged from his bag and floated into the air. “It’s like what happened with Regirock,” he realized as the rays of light joined Registeel and the box together.

“A body of steel.” Much like what had happened in the mine, an unfamiliar voice addressed the group, speaking into their minds like it was coming from everywhere at once. This one was feminine and youthful but authoritative, lacking the rough edge that defined the voice they heard before. “To summon the king, such a thing must be obtained.”

“So that’s why Shaymin called Registeel a she.” Matt turned his head back and forth as if he was searching for the source of the voice, even as he knew very well he wasn’t going to find it. His focus returned to Registeel just in time for him to see it dissolve away and the puzzle box fall to the ground.

“Did it change?” Rosalita asked him as he picked the cube up. Instead of answering, he held the box up and turned it, revealing that the sides marked with Registeel’s dot patterns were now glowing as well. “That seals it, then. Two down, and only Regice to go.”

“But if you recall, we never solved the third clue,” Eleanor pointed out.

“That’s true,” Matt realized. “We never got beyond it talking about a hidden message and showing a symbol that looked like Shaymin’s flower.”

“Surely you can solve that riddle, yes?” Shaymin said, leaping out of Sheena’s arms. “You have the professor’s blood in you, after all.”

“That doesn’t mean I know all the things he knew.”

“I don’t know if you need to worry about it, actually…” Eleanor interjected. She was staring off in the direction where Registeel had been, and removed her goggles so she could squint at something she spotted on the stone wall at the far end of the plateau. “I think I found that hidden message.”

The engineer made her way across Registeel’s battlefield, and her friends followed. Her vision hadn’t failed her. By the time the group clustered around the wall, they all could see that it was covered in Braille, but not only that, there was a familiar symbol on it.

“There’s that mark again,” Sheena pointed out, running her hand over the featureless caricature of Shaymin’s flower. “You’re right, Eleanor. This must be what that third clue was referring to.”

“I knew you would solve the riddle, yes,” Shaymin remarked, proudly strutting up behind the humans.

“You said Matt would solve it,” Eleanor said to the Pokémon, “not me.”

“But Shaymin also didn’t say there was only one riddle.” Matt’s eyes were locked on to the writing before him, but the longer he examined it, the more visibly confused he grew. “This doesn’t make any sense. The text is all garbled.”

“What do you mean?” Rosalita asked him.

“It’s just a jumble of letters,” he elaborated, “a big incoherent mess. It’s not accidental, though. Whoever created this message clearly intended to write exactly these characters.”

Sheena turned to Rosalita and said, “Didn’t you say you saw the symbol in a book your parents showed you?”

“I did, but like I said, I don’t really get what it means.”

“I have an idea,” Matt declared. While hastily typing commands into his laptop, he explained, “There’s a possibility this might be some kind of code, and if that’s the case, perhaps the book you remember is the key to breaking it. I’m going to call Cassy and see if she’s found it.” He set his laptop down on a nearby stone and reached into his bag, fetching a pair of small, transparent bottles. Each one contained an herb with gnarled green leaves floating in liquid. “Give these to the Pokémon who battled Registeel,” he instructed Rosalita as he handed the bottles over to her. “They’re bitter but there’s not much out there that revitalizes Pokémon better.”

“Revival Herbs…” she said, recognizing the plants. “You carry them around everywhere?”

“They stay good for a long time if you buy them from people who properly preserve them,” Matt explained. “I learned that they’re good to have on my trips with my grandfather, when a Pokémon Center isn’t always nearby.”

“Good idea, and a lucky one considering we don’t have a Pokémon Center in La Ciudad Dorada.” Rosalita stashed the bottles away in her cloak, freeing up her hands so she could get the Poké Balls containing Deivi, Isabel, Elena and Adiela out. The four Pokémon materialized before her in flashes of light, Deivi’s a bit more dazzling than the others. “Matt gave me some Revival Herbs for you all,” she told them as she retrieved the bottles.

Matt, Eleanor and Sheena, meanwhile, clustered around his laptop. One window on its screen contained the camera footage of the message on the wall, while a second window showed a rotating wheel against a flat gray background. That image soon disappeared to make room for a direct video link to Cassy in Lingote Palace’s archive.

“Did something happen?” she immediately asked Matt, skipping past any sort of greeting. “What went wrong?”

“Nothing went wrong,” he replied, “there’s nothing for you to worry about.” Cassy visibly relaxed, and Matt continued, “We’ve found two of the three points on the road to the Golden City, but neither Rosalita or I can solve the third clue.”

“Neither Rosalita or I? Is that why he warned me that Fernando was the dangerous one?” Cassy stiffened again but did not otherwise let on that she’d caught Matt’s mention of Fernando’s sister. “What exactly is stopping you from solving it?” she asked instead.

“Here, have a look.” With the click of a few keys, Matt brought the image of the message up so Cassy could see it.

“It’s Braille,” she said, furrowing her brow. “I’m not the one who can read it, you are.”

“The problem is that it doesn’t form anything coherent. It’s just a mess of random letters.”

“I’m not sure what you’re asking me to do.” Cassy leaned over, propping her head up with her hand.

“I want you to see this symbol.” More taps on the keyboard made the camera zoom in on the flowery shape. “Rosalita says she saw this in a book her parents showed her, but she can’t remember what its meaning was. Have you-”

“I did!” Cassy exclaimed, her bored manner giving way to the more passionate side that knowledge often brought out in her. She moved out of sight for a moment, and the only sign of what she was doing was the sound of her fumbling with the books that surrounded her. When she returned, she held one particular tome in her hand. She held it up to the camera, showing off that it had the same symbol on its red, leathery cover.

“That’s the book!” Rosalita said, having returned to the group after giving her Pokémon the Revival Herbs.

Cassy pulled the volume away and started flipping through it. “It’s a history of the kingdom’s military. I noticed while I was reading it that there are a lot of similarities between Pokémon that have served here over the centuries and the types that attacked the garden. Probopass, Electivire, Magmortar… have you seen any others?”

Matt could feel his heart sinking. He instantly knew what Cassy was suggesting. “We ran into the Pokémon hunters who controlled those Pokémon. They had Yanmega, Togekiss, Honchkrow, Lickilicky…”

“They’re all here,” Cassy ominously revealed. “The only one I haven’t seen is Heatran… but if the attackers are mimicking the kingdom’s military history, I did find one other Pokémon…”

“Please don’t say Dragonite,” Matt practically begged her.

When Cassy went silent, that was all Matt needed to confirm his worst fears. He stood up and stepped away from the computer, removed his glasses, and ran his hand down his face. Rosalita hurried after him and grabbed his shoulder to get his attention.

“I-”

“Your brother killed my grandfather,” he said, cutting her off. “I’m certain of it now. Noel and Leon are just his stooges, they aren’t consciously following La Ciudad Dorada’s history. They didn’t even know Shaymin had another form. There’s only one person who would go to that length, who would have access to those collars.”

“I-I’m sorry…” Rosalita’s grip loosened, and her hand fell off his shoulder. “I didn’t know. I didn’t know about the Pokémon they were using mimicking our military. If Fernando set this up, he kept it a secret from everyone. I didn’t know he had any Pokémon…”

“But Shaymin should have known about the military of the past!” Matt fumed, spinning around on his heel to confront the tiny Pokémon. “Why didn’t you tell me when you saw what they were using?”

“I couldn’t let you fall to the same fate as the professor, yes?” Shaymin revealed. “If you knew the truth you would have thrown caution to the wind and gone to fight Fernando yourself. Should he get possession of the Three Pillars’ puzzle box, he would be able to work things out for himself without you, even if it would be harder than using you. I did it to protect you, yes.”

Much to Shaymin’s surprise, it was Rosalita instead of Matt who came over and picked it up. It squeaked, but the harsh anger on Rosalita’s face didn’t change at all. “I don’t care if you’ve served my family for seven hundred years or not. What you did was wrong. Matt had every right to know that Fernando was the one who killed Sutter. I had every right to know Fernando was the one who killed Sutter. This is why I believe we need to stop being so secretive about our traditions. When I am queen, that is going to change. Now apologize.”

Rosalita’s outburst left Shaymin completely stunned. Never in its centuries of life had anyone, let alone a member of the royal family, spoken to it in such a way. Such a display of insolence would normally provoke a stern response. Yet, Rosalita’s demand for an apology only made Shaymin recall what the wanderer had tasked it with doing so long ago. “You are the one who must keep them on the path of righteousness and wisdom,” his words echoed in its head. It had always thought it was doing that, but looking into Rosalita’s eyes and seeing the sheer hurt in them made it question whether it had actually been tricking them instead of guiding them all along. It had felt those doubts about that after the first civil war, too, but was able to settle itself once settling on the story about the king’s ambitious brother. Now, though, all those doubts had come roaring back.

“I apologize… to both of you,” it finally said. “All this time I’ve been doing what I thought was right to keep your family and the people you lead on the path of gratitude, Rosalita. Now I see that I didn’t have faith in you to be able to do it yourselves, yes… I sanitized history to keep the peace and that led to this, did it not?”

“I’d be lying if I said I didn’t think so,” Matt interjected. “The saying goes, ‘those who do not learn from history are doomed to repeat it.’ If you don’t know the truth about history you can’t learn from it.”

“I apologize for hiding the professor’s killer from you, too, but I want to hear the answer from Rosalita, yes.”

“Matt has a point,” Rosalita said, turning the sternness Shaymin ordinarily would have displayed against it. “Things are going to have to change in La Ciudad Dorada. But first, we must stop Fernando and save him.”

“Save him?!” Matt couldn’t believe what he was hearing. “Even now?!”

“He took my parents from me the same way he took your grandfather from you and Amanda,” the princess said, her voice icy and flat. “That’s not Shaymin’s fault, that’s Fernando’s and no one else’s. But at the same time, he’s my brother. He has to be stopped, but I still believe that once the truth about our history is revealed, he will return to being the person he used to be. In fact, I believe that now more than ever. His crimes are his to be punished for, but it was all the secrecy that convinced him there was a greater truth to find. The secrecy was what warped him.”

“I will never forgive him for what he did to Sutter,” Matt firmly reiterated, “but if the best way to ensure he gets punished for it is for me to support you, then that’s what I’m going to do. I’m in your corner now, one hundred percent.”

“Thank you.” As Rosalita put Shaymin down and turned around, Matt thought to himself that just a day earlier she probably would have been emotional in her gratitude. Yet there she was in front of him, her manner as hard as Registeel’s iron. He wasn’t sure if he was pleased or worried to see her so determined. It reminded him of Fernando. “Come on, let’s go solve that message,” she told him, snapping him out of his daze.

“I guess I have to take things as they are now,” he decided. “Shaymin was right when it said I’d go after Fernando, but now… I won’t abandon Rosalita or any of them.”

“I will give you the answer, yes,” Shaymin remorsefully offered, padding along after Matt and Rosalita on their way back to Sheena and Eleanor.

“No, we’ll do it on our own,” Rosalita said. “There has to still be some meaning in something. If I have to be the first leader in however much time to walk this trail with a clear mind, I-” For a moment, Rosalita’s resolve wavered. “I will carry that burden.”

Neither Matt nor Shaymin could say anything more.

“What was all that about?” Cassy questioned Matt when she saw him return to her sight.

“If the culprit behind all of this is imitating the history of the Doradan military as you suggested, it could only be Fernando.” Matt ran his hand down his face before quietly adding, “He must be Sutter’s killer, too. He’s got those hunters following me, but Cassy, as long as you’re in Lingote Palace, you’re in danger. It might already be too late for you to get away.”

Much to Matt’s surprise, Cassy had barely any visible reaction. “No, you’re looking at it wrong. He can’t do a thing to me. As long as I’m here, he can use me as leverage to pull your strings.”

“Are you really fine with that?” Sheena interjected, caught off guard by Cassy’s indifference to her situation.

Cassy grit her teeth, but hid it by pressing her lips together. “I’m perfectly fine with that. Besides, you’re all going to see the search for the Golden City to the end, right? If I’m here and Fernando thinks I’m an asset, he won’t hurt either of us since he’ll see you doing what he wants.”

“I guess you have a point…” Despite agreeing with her, Matt still held deep reservations about Cassy’s plan. “The board could be upended at any time, though. If he decides he no longer needs us, you won’t be safe anymore.”

“Relax, there’s nothing for you to worry about,” Cassy said with a dismissive wave of her hand. “You want to know what else I found in that book?”

“Tell us,” Rosalita insisted.

“I was talking to Matt…” Cassy was barely able to mask the irritated sigh that slipped from her mouth. “...but alright. I found a page in it that also bears the symbol and has nothing to do with the military. Here.”

Cassy held the book up so Matt and the others could see it. The page in question was covered in Braille marks, with the flower symbol stamped on the corner. As soon as he saw it, Matt covered his chin and mouth in thought.

“What is it?” Sheena asked him.

“This is a standard Braille alphabet, no doubt about it. I’d recognize it anywhere.” Matt pointed at one of the characters, which had the letter ‘G’ written below it. It was the only one to have a letter tied to it. “But this… this is wrong. That’s not ‘G,’ that one’s ‘D.’ Why would they have a Braille alphabet that’s so clearly wrong?”

“I’d say it’s a deliberate choice by whoever did it,” Eleanor reasoned. “All the other Braille has made sense so far.”

“I agree with you,” Rosalita concurred.

“Wait…” A realization struck Matt’s mind, and he lashed his head around toward Eleanor so quickly that it shook his hair. “What did you just say?”

“That it was deliberate?” Matt’s sustained look of inquisitiveness prompted Eleanor to continue. “All the Braille we’ve seen until this point has made perfect sense.”

“All the Braille to this point.” Matt raised a finger into the air. “What have we got here now? A garbled, incoherent message and an alphabet that mistranslates the Braille. But what if it’s not mistranslated?”

“A cipher,” Rosalita recognized.

“And its key.” Matt started typing furiously, saying while he did so, “That’s why everything related to this message had the symbol on it. We were meant to connect them all together. And I’d bet that’s exactly why you were meant to be shown that book by your parents, Rosalita. One day you were meant to arrive here, discover the cipher, and crack it with the key from that book.”

“There’s the Matt I want to see,” Cassy proudly said from behind the book.

“What’s the secret of the key?” asked Sheena.

“If I’m right, each character is three letters away from what it should be. Like the one in the book? That one showed the character for ‘D’ marked as ‘G.’ It goes ‘E,’ ‘F,’ ‘G.’ If we assume that all the characters in this message are displaced in the same way, then…” Matt interrupted his own thought to exclaim, “I got it!”

“You finished it?”

“Yes, Rosalita!” he enthusiastically said, pushing his laptop toward the others. “Have a look.”

Matt’s work had produced a duplicate of the carving on the laptop’s screen. He had adjusted it to correct the Braille in accordance with his theory on the key, then translated it into familiar letters.

“The king must face both the heat of the peoples’ eye and the cold burden of their position,” Rosalita read aloud. “Yes, having gone through the earth, whoever shall wear the crown must now travel to the end of the realm. The body of ice awaits in the land consumed by what dispels gratitude, at the site where king first turned on king.”

“Something’s a little bit odd about how that one’s written,” Matt thought to himself. He kept his concerns quiet, however, and instead asked Rosalita, “Where king first turned on king?”

“It’s referring to the place where the civil war began,” the princess explained, “and I know where that is. Let me see the map.”

Matt complied with Rosalita’s request, manipulating the data on his laptop in order to bring up the picture of the map from the archive. The windows containing the Braille messages disappeared, while Cassy’s video feed shrank into the corner.

“It’s here,” Rosalita pointed out, placing her finger on a location at the far side of the mountain range. “The body of ice awaits in the land consumed by what dispels gratitude, at the site where king first turned on king. That location is where the first battle of the civil war was fought, and it’s frequently snowing there. The cold is what dispels gratitude, ask Shaymin.”

The mythical Pokémon didn’t wait for any of its human companions to say anything. “I really don’t like the cold, yes?” it whimpered. “In fact, it’s hard for me to even keep my other form when it gets too cold. I like staying in the palace instead.”

“There’s not a single one of us who wouldn’t rather live in a palace,” Eleanor teased it, “I’d bet money on that.”

“I’m happy with my home in Michina,” Sheena said. “I’ve never needed a lot in life. But it sounds like a dream of yours, Eleanor.”

“Won’t deny it.” Eleanor shut her eyes and smiled dreamily. “If I could be reincarnated in a future life, I would want to be the royal engineer of La Ciudad Dorada. Just a few days here has already made me want to stay.”

“You do realize you don’t need to be reincarnated for that to happen, right?” Rosalita pointed out.

Eleanor froze. It took a moment for the offer implicit in Rosalita’s words to sink in. “Aha, don’t joke like that, Rosa,” she dismissively said. “I’m nobody. I don’t deserve a place in actual nobility.”

“I might not be able to just confer a title upon you, but I’m not joking,” insisted the princess. “It’s within my power to give you a job in the palace once I’m queen. I-”

Rosalita couldn’t finish before Eleanor tightly embraced her. “Thank you so much, Rosa! I-I mean it… I’ve felt so comfortable hanging out with you guys, and La Ciudad Dorada’s a town that speaks to me, you know?”

“Don’t worry about it at all,” Rosalita soothingly said, her words accompanied by a comforting pat on the head. “You might all be foreigners, but when you’re in La Ciudad Dorada, you’re a part of it. That makes it my responsibility to do right by you.”

Watching the scene from nearby, Shaymin said to no one in particular, “That’s the gratitude I want to see!” It couldn’t help but shake its body as multiple flowers erupted from its back.

“I don’t want to bring you down,” Matt said to Eleanor and Rosalita, “but we can’t do anything about that until we stop Fernando.”

Rosalita hesitated, but after looking to Eleanor and Sheena, she nodded. “You’re correct. We’d best be off to find Regice right away. Eleanor, you can get us there, right?”

“It would be my pleasure, Rosa,” Eleanor replied, holding the sides of her dress and curtsying. She froze mid-gesture, looked up and playfully corrected, “Excuse me, Queen. Queen Rosa.”

Rosalita couldn’t even get her hand up to her mouth before she started laughing. “Yes… that was just what I needed today. Thank you.”

Satisfied that his companions were ready to move on, Matt turned his attention to his laptop. “And thanks for helping us out, Cassy. I couldn’t have figured that one out without you.”

“That’s why I stayed here, after all. But…” Cassy’s expression hardened. “I found something else while I was reading.”

“What?” Matt could tell Cassy’s new discovery was of some importance from his demeanor, and the way he momentarily lost control of the volume of his voice attracted the attention of the others just as quickly. “What are you talking about?”

Cassy reached out of the view of the camera, then held the photograph of Sutter up to it. “What’s the deal here?”

Nobody noticed Rosalita freeze up the instant she saw the photograph. “Oh no… I can’t deal with this now…”[/i] she thought, sharing a nervous, knowing glance with Shaymin. “I’m terrible… I talk about revealing secrets and yet here I am not telling him what really happened… I just can’t right now, not after what we just learned…”

“I-” Finding himself at a loss for words, Matt covered his mouth with his hand. All he could eventually say was, “It doesn’t make sense…”

“That’s Sutter Chiaki,” Sheena quietly observed, but who are the others? They look familiar.”

“The old man’s Fernando VI,” Cassy revealed. “I know. I went right up to the so-called statue of him and compared… it’s definitely him. The younger one? I don’t know for sure, but I have to assume that’s Fernando VII.”

Sheena peered over to Matt, who was still fixated on the image of his grandfather with the puzzle box, the king and the prince. “Well, he came to La Ciudad Dorada during Fernando VI’s reign to search for the Golden City, no? Given how respected a man Professor Chiaki was, it’s not surprising that the royal family would keep something from that visit.”

“You’re wrong,” Matt weakly replied, “This can’t be from then.”

“You see it too, right?” Cassy ventured.

“Yeah, I do…” He brought his finger to the screen to help manipulate the photo for the others, shifting and zooming in on the bronze arches before pointing a shaking finger at the image. “Sheena, Eleanor, look right there. Recognize that?” Matt didn’t give time for them to reply. “It’s the museum in Lingote Palace… as it was when we saw it. Completed.”

“And you said Sutter came to La Ciudad Dorada during the time Godey was designing and building it,” Sheena realized.

“Surely there’s an answer in the archive somewhere,” Rosalita emphatically told the others. The thought of blurting the truth out flickered across the princess’ mind, only for the stress of revealing the truth behind the photograph to prove too much and force her to gulp down her words. Turning her back on them, she shook her head and before tersely suggesting, “Keep searching in there. Maybe you’ll find something.”

“Wait, don’t you kn-”

It wasn’t that Rosalita ignored Cassy’s plea. She certainly heard it, but the only acknowledgement she was willing to give was to clenching her teeth, and with her back turned none of the others could see it. She walked off without another word, heading for the stairs back out of Registeel’s cave with Shaymin nipping at her heels.

“Cassy, thanks again. I’ll call you again soon.”

Matt dismissed the video call, leaving a confused Cassy to vanish from the screen, then closed his laptop and tucked it back into his bag. He stumbled after Rosalita, and Eleanor and Sheena followed.

“Hey, you know what?” Eleanor said to Sheena as they walked. “I’d bet you dollars to doughnuts there’s something we don’t know about going on here.”

“Oh, definitely,” Sheena agreed. “That’s an understatement if I’ve ever heard one. Thing is, I don’t know if we’ve got the time to worry about it now.”

“True.”


By the time Matt, Eleanor and Sheena surfaced in the entrance hall of the fort, Rosalita was nearly back to the exit outside. The three quickened their pace to catch up with her.

“Rosalita, slow down…”

Instead of just slowing when Matt suggested it, Rosalita stopped. “That was the Cassy you mentioned earlier, correct?” she asked, forcing a smile even as she faced away from him. “She seems quite smart. I’m confident she’ll determine the answer behind that photograph.”

“She is, but…” Matt’s agreement with the princess’s praise of Cassy was all he could manage. Anything further he could have said died off long before it reached his lips.

Eleanor and Sheena, meanwhile, shared a glance as the group started moving again. The engineer then started to say, “You know, I’m starting to think-”

Whatever was on Eleanor’s mind would never get a chance to be said, as it was not only the sun that greeted them when they got outside. The moment they passed through the doorway of the fort, a Tangrowth crashed down in front of them. Matt slipped and nearly fell thanks to how quickly he jumped back, while Sheena put her arm up to protect her face, but Eleanor and Rosalita were much more restrained. Eleanor simply pulled her goggles back over her eyes, and Rosalita braced herself, knowing right away that Registeel would not be the only test she faced that day.

“Yo, Tangrowth!” Though the group could not yet see him, they immediately recognized the voice as Leon’s. “Use Block to seal ’em in!”

Tangrowth’s collar, which he was wearing like a belt, lit up upon Leon’s command. The Grass-type Pokémon spread his arms out, allowing thick vines to sprout out of them. His reach was effectively extended, allowing him to form a wide semicircle around the group.

It was at that time Noel and Leon finally appeared, flying over the courtyard on their wingpacks.

“Judgment day is here, Princess!” Noel said to Rosalita, her voice dripping with impatience and anger. “That was a dirty trick you played on us back in that mine, so now it’s our turn to fight dirty. I’m done playin’ games with you, so I’ll make this short and sweet: The box and Shaymin. Hand ’em over, now.”

“You are implying this was a game to start with,” Rosalita shot back, jabbing a finger in the hunters’ direction. Shaymin timidly stepped behind her leg to hide. “Leave this place at once and cease your interference with our customs.”

“There you go again, talkin’ down to us just ’cause you got money…” Noel’s anger was consuming her, transforming her words into a guttural growl. “You ain’t nothin’ just ’cause you live in that castle. Everything you got, you were born into. You don’t know anything ’bout the way guys like Bro and I gotta live, fightin’ for every scrap out there!”

“You know what?” Rosalita paused. She hadn’t intended to be dramatic, but for Matt, Sheena and Eleanor, that was exactly what it was. “You’re right,” she finally admitted, visibly surprising Noel. “Most of my life, I’ve been in Lingote Palace. I’ve never wanted for anything, nor have I needed to… but I have to learn. I know that I must if I’m going to lead. My brother doesn’t understand that, so I don’t know why you’re taking orders from him.”

“Finally you’re talkin’ some sense,” Leon said, shrugging. “You’re right about your little creep brother, too. We don’t need nobody like him.”

Rosalita tilted her head. “What do you mean?”

“You wanna tell her, Sis?”

“Yeah, Bro,” Noel replied before turning her attention back to Rosalita. “Listen good, Princess. Sure, it was your brother who sent us on this mission, but we got to thinkin’, and we realized something. A guy like him is the type who’d take all our hard work and rip us off for it. But if we take that little Shaymin and your city of gold, and we sell ’em ourselves, that’ll put us right on easy street for a lifetime. We’re fightin’ for ourselves now, and nobody, not you or your little creep brother, is gonna deny us our freedom. Now, hand the box and Shaymin over. Last time I’m gonna ask.”

Rosalita backed up and whispered to Matt, “Shaymin and I can handle this. Go hide in the fort so they can’t get the box.”

“Are you really-”

“We can handle it,” she repeated. “Just go!”

At Rosalita’s insistent urging, Matt turned around and tapped both Eleanor and Sheena on their shoulders so they would follow him. The trio barely moved before a pile of sand with a red shovel sticking out suddenly materialized in front of the door, blocking their path. Three tower-like shapes rose up to form the shape of a sandcastle, with the creature’s eyes and mouth formed from the central tower while the side ones acted as her arms. Unlike Tangrowth and most of the other Pokémon the siblings commanded, she did not have a collar.

“Palossand, Iron Defense!” Leon called out after catching the Poké Ball he threw to send her out.

Palossand responded by stretching her arm towers up higher, covering more of the fort’s entrance. She issued a warning to her trainer’s enemies by growling at them, and her body’s sand hardened into a solid lump with a metallic sheen.

“No!” Sheena exclaimed.

“I thought I already told you, we ain’t playin’ games anymore.” Noel’s anger hadn’t lessened, but it had changed into a colder, more focused fury. She removed one of the clockwork Poké Balls from her jacket, sharply telling the group, “We ain’t leavin’ here without the keys to our future!” before throwing the sphere.

A Pokémon unlike anything Matt had ever seen before erupted from the device and crashed onto the roof of the fortress. He was easily at least eight feet tall, and as the Pokémon stomped forth and roared at the sky, they got a clear look at his lithe yet muscular gray body and the yellow-edged scales that covered it like armor. One of the collars was affixed around his neck.

“What is that?!” Matt gasped in shock.

“A Kommo-o…” Rosalita’s reaction was one of muted awe. “One of our kingdom’s greatest knights used one… but this one’s much bigger than normal.”

“Bigger and badder,” Noel scoffed before jabbing her finger forward. “Have a taste for yourselves! Kommo-o, Clanging Scales!”

Urged on by both Noel’s verbal command and the directive entered into her gauntlet, Kommo-o smashed his fists together to make his scales vibrate. They started glowing, and he pointed his claws towards Matt’s group, releasing a horrible screech that manifested as solid soundwaves. These waves hit the earth in the quartet’s midst and exploded, throwing Matt and Eleanor in one direction while Rosalita and Sheena went in the other.

The chorus of yelling that broke out beneath her was like music to Noel’s ears. Flashing a twisted, excited grin, she scornfully mocked them, “Ain’t so fun when you’re the ones on the receivin’ end of the dirty tricks, is it? Welcome to our lives!”

Kommo-o viciously roared and leapt from the roof, landing in front of Palossand and kicking up a cloud of dirt. Matt, having shielded Eleanor and gotten the grit thrown in his face, coughed as he fumbled in his bag for Anton’s Poké Ball. He released his Rhyperior as soon as his hand found the sphere. Shaymin, caught between the two Pokémon that could easily crush it, squeaked in fear and ran to Rosalita, climbing up and hiding under the princess’s cloak.

“It’s a Dragon-and-Fighting type!” Rosalita yelled to him. “You’re sending your Rhyperior into an impossible battle!”

Matt gasped and looked back at the two Pokémon, but he couldn’t act before the reason for Rosalita’s warning made itself plain. Kommo-o drove his fist into Anton’s chin, and the force of his Sky Uppercut pulled both Pokémon into the air despite their tremendous weights.

It was then that Matt got an idea. “Anton, get yourself together and use Avalanche!”

Matt’s words threw a switch in Anton’s head. He gathered his strength and pushed Kommo-o away, then growled and swung his arm in the dragon’s direction. Boulders of ice formed around him and fell, bombarding both Kommo-o and Palossand.

With Noel and Leon’s Pokémon immobilized and the hunters’ attention diverted, Rosalita sensed an opportunity. She stood up, retrieved Adiela’s Poké Ball and threw it straight at Tangrowth.

“Megahorn!” she cried out.

Adiela erupted from the ball a few feet away from Tangrowth, her head lowered and legs set to hit the ground running. She drove her horn into the Grass-type right below his concealed eyes, and he groaned as he stumbled back. The vines he’d extended to wall off the group’s escape broke from his body and withered away.

“Meet us on the other side!” Rosalita told Matt and Eleanor, pointing back and forth before pulling Sheena behind one of the courtyard’s stones.

“You get what she meant?” Eleanor whispered to him.

“Yeah, I think so…” With Kommo-o and Palossand trapped by the remnants of Anton’s Avalanche, Matt took the opportunity to recall him to his Poké Ball. He then ran to hide behind one of the nearby outcroppings, and Eleanor wasted no time in joining him. “I’ve got the box, she’s got Shaymin,” he quietly explained. “If we go in separate directions, we split up the opposition.”

“Oh yeah, I’m hearing you on that one.” Eleanor pulled her goggles back down over her eyes and took Persian’s Poké Ball in her hand. “Once we’re out of here, I can get us away from those two, no problem.”

“I wish I shared your optimism,” Matt replied, “but it’s not going to be easy fighting our way through all th-”

Matt couldn’t even finish making his point before Kommo-o made it for him by smashing their stony shield. He and Eleanor scuttled back away as the Dragon-and-Fighting-type Pokémon rose back up from breaking the rock with Iron Head. Luckily enough, Matt happened to have his hand in his bag and near Sally’s Poké Ball already, so he was able to quickly dispatch his Salamence to protect them. Sally materialized directly in Kommo-o’s face and immediately collided with him, using Dragon Rush to smash him into the wall of the fortress.

“That was close…” Eleanor said between deep breaths.

“Come on.” Matt stood up, pulling Eleanor with him by the hand. “We have to go. Now.”

“You don’t have to tell me twice,” she answered, stealing a glance back at Sally leaving Kommo-o behind in the wall.

Hand in hand, Matt and Eleanor started running to the nearest chunk of rock they could reach. The maze-like layout of the ruined courtyard proved to be a good thing in the end. It didn’t do much to hide them from an airborne enemy, but it provided cover, and that was enough. Sally flew after them, but before they could get far, the collared Lickilicky and Electivire appeared before them, accompanied by Noel’s oil-slicked Muk.

“Where do you think you’re going?” the sister half of the sibling hunter duo taunted them. They could see that she was hovering overhead by herself - evidently their plan to split Noel and Leon up had worked. “Don’t bother answering that, ’cause I don’t care! Lickilicky, Blizzard!”

“Sally, block it with Flamethrower!”

The gusts of ice and fire spat by the two Pokémon met between their trainers, creating a wall of steam that separated the sides. Matt had to shield his eyes from the blowback of the collision, but Eleanor’s goggles kept her protected.

As he recovered, Matt took notice of how the steam kept Noel and her Pokémon from seeing him and sensed an opportunity. He quietly reached in his bag for two more Poké Balls and opened them, releasing his Aggron and Ambipom. Only once they were out did he even consider that Noel could use the cloud to her advantage too, a lesson he became very aware of when a bolt of lightning and a burst of fire came through the smoky veil. They were obviously blind stabs on Noel’s part and missed Matt’s Pokémon by a wide margin, but came dangerously close to him.

“Are you alright?” Eleanor asked him. She came to his side with Persian accompanying her.

“Yeah, I’m fine,” he replied, wiping his brow before refocusing on the dissolving cloud. “We have to deal with that, though.”

Enough of the steam had lifted to reveal Electivire and Muk as their attackers. They were still giving off sparks and breathing embers, respectively. On Noel’s part, the cloud’s dissolution showed her for the first time that she was against not one but four Pokémon.

The hunter tightly balled her fists and growled, “I’m so sick of dealin’ with you people… been doin’ it my whole life and I’m just done with it. Lickilicky,” she paused to enter a command into her gauntlet, “Dragon Tail! Electivire, take Lickilicky flyin’ with Magnet Rise!”

Purple light forged the shape of a pointed tail around Lickilicky’s own, but she otherwise stood still and waited for Electivire to stomp over. The Electric-type Pokémon wrapped her in a tight embrace from the front before using electromagnetic force to propel them both into the air. Their sudden synergy caught both Sally and Matt off guard, and all either could manage was a surprised grunt from the former. Electivire swung Lickilicky around, using her like a blunt weapon to batter Sally with Dragon Tail. The single hit left a dark mark squarely atop Sally’s head and forced her to the earth.

Just when it seemed like Noel’s charges had struck a strong blow, Eleanor’s Persian intervened. The feline Pokémon vaulted onto Sally’s back and then sprang at Electivire and Lickilicky, who were still locked in their embrace. They had started to fall back down themselves, and with her Foul Play, Persian turned that momentum into force strong enough to pitch them into the earth.

Noel was only growing angrier by the minute, but her fury was starting to give her a new sense of focus. “Take ’em out one by one. One by one,” she repeated like a mantra. “One by one. The dragon first. Muk, nail that Salamence with Gunk Shot!”

Sally’s descent placed her squarely in the sights of Noel’s Muk, and the wallop she’d taken from Lickilicky’s Dragon Tail left her too dazed to defend herself. She got a faceful of the sludge Muk coughed up, enough to not only cover her head but splatter all over her neck as far back as her wings.

“Sally!” Matt shouted in dismay as he watched her shake her head back and forth fruitlessly, roaring in pain all the while. Seeing that making her continue to fight would only hurt them both, he recalled her to her Poké Ball. “Tony,” he said to his Aggron, “Head Smash!”

A rumbling cry rose out of the Aggron’s throat. He slowly lowered his head, pointing his sharp horns at the Poison-and-Dark-type that had crippled his companion.

“Muk, Fire Blast ’em again!” Noel hurriedly ordered her partner Pokémon, plainly seeing the threat Tony posed.

Muk saw it too, and he didn’t hesitate to choke up a ball of flame whose size rivalled that of his earlier Gunk Shot. One thing neither Muk nor Noel realized, though, was that behind the Aggron’s bulky facade lurked shocking athleticism. Their anticipation of a lumbering charge crumbled when Tony sprang like a rocket at Muk from all fours, surrounded by a light that gave his body a monochromatic appearance. He smashed cleanly through the oncoming fireball, and at that point, Noel and Muk both felt their perception of time slow to a halt. The few seconds before Tony collided with Muk seemed like forever to them both, and all they could do was watch the looming theropod Pokémon in wide-eyed horror.

When the inevitable collision came, all of Tony’s momentum transferred itself to Muk in the impact. The Poison-and-Dark-type bulleted past Electivire and Lickilicky as they recovered, only stopping when he hit a stone that crumbled from the force.

Seeing Muk crash into the rock pulled the cork on a torrent of rage in Noel’s heart. “Enough!” she screamed at Matt and Eleanor, coming close to going into convulsions. “You ain’t gettin’ away with treatin’ my boy Muk like that! Electivire, put your Earthquake right into that Aggron!”

Electivire’s collar flashed as the device re-energized its wearer. She propelled herself into the sky with Magnet Rise, spun around and pulled back her fist, aiming squarely at Tony’s back in her descent.

“Persian, hurry and use Swift!”

Noel had lost track of Eleanor’s Persian after the Dark-type struck Electivire and Lickilicky down earlier. The feline Pokémon’s reappearance caught her completely by surprise, and she had no response when Persian battered Electivire away from Tony with a stream of glowing stars. It fell to Lickilicky, whose collar had revitalized her while Electivire’s collar did the same to its wearer, to act on the basic directives given to her. She trudged up on Persian’s side and swung her head back while allowing her tongue to stretch even further out of her mouth.

Matt, seeing the Power Whip heading for Persian, tried to repay the favor Eleanor had done for him. “Agnetha,” he urgently said to his Ambipom while pointing at Lickilicky, “Seed Bomb!”

“Bi!” the two-tailed simian answered. She spit seeds at Lickilicky, though they failed to reach their target before Persian got swatted by Power Whip and hissed in pain. Lickilicky, too distracted with Persian to see Agnetha’s oncoming assault, ended up taking the full brunt of the barrage. Each seed exploded on contact with the Normal-type’s rubbery skin, making her wail and fall to one knee.

“Why do you two care so much?” Matt and Eleanor assumed Noel was speaking hypothetically, but they were wrong. She was completely serious. “You and Princess, you got everything you need. People like you, you’re always lookin’ down on those without, but you don’t want us climbin’ out, either. What does it matter to you if Bro and I escape this life?”

“Because you’re doing it in a way that’s only causing harm!” Matt yelled up at her. “Look at what you’ve done. Look at what you’ve always done. This isn’t all that different from stealing and selling Pokémon back in Orre, Noel! This time, though, you’re taking something that the Doradan people built their civilization around. You’re robbing them of who they are if you do this!”

“You intellectual snobs, always lecturin’ us like we’re stupid…” Noel didn’t notice Matt frown. He had hoped that he could get through to her, as unlikely as it was. “Live in your little bubbles if you want. Bro and I, we live in the real world, and-”

“So do we, you just-”

“You don’t know anything about the real world!” Noel roared over Matt’s interruption. “Bro and me and our crew, we did what we needed to survive, and there ain’t nothing different now. I don’t care if those people lose their precious city, get it through your thick skull. They never reached out to help us, and they still got everything they need.”

Matt spread his arms as if he were pleading with Noel. “But if you give this up and just as-”

“Don’t bother,” Eleanor whispered in his ear, having sidled up next to him. “She won’t stop. She can’t.”

“You’re right,” Matt admitted, sighing in defeat. He wanted to do something to help Noel, but watching her army reorganize itself, he knew he had to accept reality. “Eleanor said it. Noel’s just too far gone… I can’t blame her for fighting a world that’s always turned its back on her, but…”

Matt sighed again, resigning himself to the fact that the battle would just rage on.

Meanwhile, on the other side of the courtyard, Leon wasn’t faring as well against his own adversary. He had pitted his Dusknoir, Roserade and Honchkrow against Rosalita and Sheena, but the princess was easily holding them off with her own Pokémon. Dusknoir flew behind Roserade to catch the Grass-and-Poison-type when Adiela flung her back using Flame Charge. Rosalita’s Rapidash bounded back to the side of her Luxray and Shiftry, where she neighed and pawed the ground while dispelling the remaining embers from around her body.

“Deivi, Dark Pulse!” Rosalita cried, pointing at the trio of collared Pokémon. “Isabel, give him a boost with Helping Hand!”

Isabel the Luxray firmly planted her foot in the soft, muddy soil and roared. A golden aura erupted around her and cut through the air, infusing itself into the body of her companion Shiftry. Deivi then crossed his leafy arms and aimed a beam of glowing, black-and-purple rings at Roserade and Dusknoir. He was able to easily double the usual intensity of his Dark Pulse thanks to Helping Hand empowering him.

“Dusknoir, get out of there!” Leon said in a panic. “Ally Switch!”

The blue light on Dusknoir’s collar blinked, and he dropped Roserade to the ground before teleporting away. Honchkrow materialized in his place, just in time to weather Deivi’s assault.

“He’s got some clever tactics of his own…” Rosalita noted. “I shouldn’t be surprised, if Fernando really did prepare these Pokémon.”

“You know him better than any of us,” Sheena said to her, “so you should have insight into how he would think.”

“You’re right. I’m feeling pretty confident in that now.” Rosalita swiftly crossed and uncrossed her arms, sending both her hair and her cloak fluttering behind her. “Isabel, send Helping Hand over to Adiela! Adiela, you strike that Honchkrow with Wild Charge!”

Once Isabel’s golden aura merged with Adiela, the Rapidash lowered her head and galloped at Honchkrow, her body cloaked by sparking, yellow electricity. Her increased agility from use of Flame Charge allowed her to ram Honchkrow with such speed that Leon couldn’t react until she was already on her way back. Honchkrow, on his part, was left twitching on the ground from the electricity still flowing through him. He hadn’t quite fainted, but Adiela badly injured him.

“Sis, you wanna come over here and give me a little help?” Leon helplessly called out to Noel. No response came. “Those other guys are givin’ you a hard time, Sis?” he muttered in disbelief.

“Have you had enough yet?” Rosalita planted her hands firmly on her hips, causing her elbows to poke out of her cloak. Her eyebrows twitched, caught in her mentally teetering between anger and exasperation with the situation. “Think for a minute, there’s no way my brother is letting you leave here. Whether you give him what he wants or not, you’re only loose ends to him!”

Shaymin climbed out of the princess’s cloak and perched on her shoulder. “Listen to Rosalita, yes? Fernando already killed the king, the queen and the professor.” Turning its nose up, Shaymin huffed and added, “Realize you have no value to him, yes.”

“How dare-” Leon’s intent to yell at Shaymin ceased when he realized where the Pokémon was. He had always considered himself the muscle and his sister the brain of their duo, and he was more than happy to play that role. But when he spotted Shaymin on Rosalita’s shoulder, he saw an opportunity. “Sis’ll love it if I get you first. Roserade, blow ’em away with a Hyper Beam at their feet!”

Having heard Leon’s order, Rosalita instinctively turned and reached out to shield Sheena. She didn’t even have enough time to do that before the pulsating orange laser Roserade fired from her blue bouquet exploded right in front of them. The princess and the priestess got thrown into the grimy terrain, the muck soiling Sheena’s coat and Rosalita’s hair. Both screamed, but their voices were overrun by Shaymin shrieking as it tumbled over itself in the air. It splattered into the mud and shrilled even louder at the state it found itself in.

“No, no, no!” It lashed its head back and forth in a desperate attempt to get the dirt off. “I hate this, yes! Someone get me up!”

“I’ll be happy to.”

Shaymin felt a pair of powerful hands seize it and immediately regretted what it had said. With Rosalita and Sheena still several feet away, Leon took the opportunity to land and grab his target. The tiny Pokémon writhed in his grip, trying with all its might to escape, but his hold was too strong.

“You let go of me right now, yes!” Shaymin sputtered. “How dare you put your hands on me!”

“Sorry,” Leon said with a sarcastic shake of his head, “you ain’t goin’ nowhere until there’s a nice fat pile of cash takin’ your place.”

“Rosalita, look!” Sheena had realized Shaymin’s predicament and yelled to get Rosalita to do the same.

The princess gasped and angrily jabbed her finger toward the hunter. “Adiela, Deivi, Isabel,” she commanded, “get Shaymin back!”

All three Pokémon acted in unison with their trainer’s order. A purple aura surrounded Isabel’s leg, and she bound into the air while Deivi spit a stream of seeds at Leon. Adiela’s fire shot up from her back and surrounded her body in preparation for Flame Charge.

“I don’t think so!” Leon pulled Shaymin away, hiding it against his body. “Dusknoir, hold ‘em up with Will-O-Wisp!”

The thick-bodied phantom floated up higher, hauntingly moaning while clenching the mouth on his stomach. He conjured numerous globes of blue flame around himself, then rained them down on his foes by pulling back and opening his stomach mouth as far as it could go. Deivi and Isabel halted their advances, knowing well what would happen if they let themselves come in contact with the spectral fire. Adiela, on the other hand, had no such concerns. Thanks to being a Fire-type herself, she carelessly sprinted straight through the onslaught.

“Nope, sorry!” Recognizing that continuing to engage Rosalita was an unneeded risk, Leon used his wingpack to ascend into the air with Shaymin still in his clutches.

That was the point where he had made a fatal miscalculation.

Shaymin went still in his hands, sick of trying to squirm its way out. He didn’t realize until it was far too late that the mythical Pokémon wasn’t surrendering. Far from it. Instead, it tightened its muscles and focused its mind, pulling the mud and dirt stuck on it into its body. Such grime wasn’t as powerful a fuel as the plumes of smoke in the mine, but it would suffice. There was nothing Leon could do to stop Shaymin from exploding with Seed Flare, simultaneously freeing itself and flinging its captor back to the ground.

Across the courtyard, the bright explosion and Leon’s accompanying shout finally caught Noel’s attention. Her perception of time slowed to a near halt, and watching her brother fall made her feel like her entire world was collapsing.

All her anger melted away, and Noel cried out in panic, “Bro!” She flew away from her own battle and her Pokémon followed, both the army and its master disregarding Matt and Eleanor.

“Should we go after her?” Matt wondered.

“Nah,” Eleanor replied with a shrug, “not yet anyway. Rosa can handle it for a little bit. Let’s go get our ride started, then we’ll get them and beat it.”

“Makes enough sense. Let’s do it.”

Without Noel impeding them, Matt and Eleanor were able to make their way to the outer wall of the courtyard in no time. They stopped with only about a dozen feet separating them from the gateway out of the area to allow their Pokémon to catch up. Agnetha and Persian arrived mere moments later, but it took Tony a little more time to join them. Just as the Aggron arrived, Matt and Eleanor could hear an explosion on the other side of the wall. They pressed themselves up against the stone barrier to hide from whatever had caused the noise, whose source they couldn’t see.

For the next minute or so, Matt and Eleanor remained still. The sounds of Noel and Leon fighting with Rosalita still reached their ears, but there was nothing more from outside the courtyard. They edged their way closer to the gate, but before they reached it, Matt stopped.

“I’ve got a bad feeling about this,” he quietly warned Eleanor. He took off his bag and thrust it into the engineer’s hands. “This is probably going to be an ambush, so hold on to that and keep it away from them if something happens.”

“Aye, captain.” Once again, Eleanor playfully saluted.

With his bag and thus the puzzle box securely with Eleanor, Matt shuffled closer to the gate. He hesitated at the very edge of the threshold, taking a deep breath before stepping around the corner.

Standing right there, literally on top of him, was Heatran. He froze, realizing that the explosion signified Heatran’s arrival but unable to run away until the legendary Pokémon had already opened her giant mouth. That delay proved catastrophic. Heatran belched a plume of fire, and Matt wasn’t all the way back behind the wall. It caught him on the left side of his face and torso.

In an instant, the world around him disappeared. Nothing remained but an infinite white void. He screamed but it stayed trapped in his mind, nothing coming out of his mouth at all. He reached forward as he fell backward to the ground, and when he hit the earth, that was when the pain came. Searing, incomprehensible pain that consumed every function his brain was capable of. He finally was able to scream as he rolled around on the dirt in a desperate but fruitless attempt to do something, anything to stop his agony.

“Matt!!” Eleanor shrieked. Agnetha, Tony and Persian all rushed past her and tackled Heatran, pushing the Pokémon away from Matt.

Over on the other side of the courtyard, Noel had helped Leon back into the air and joined her team of Pokémon with his. Rosalita fearlessly faced them after recovering Shaymin, but before the two sides could clash, the noise of the chaos at the gate reached them.

“Huh?” Noel glanced over her shoulder just in time to see Agnetha, Tony and Persian battering Heatran with Seed Bomb, Aqua Tail and Dark Pulse. She came close to shrugging off the confrontation thanks to her confidence in Heatran, but when she saw Matt’s state, the truth finally dawned on her. Flying into a state of panic, she frantically entered commands into her gauntlet’s projection, sputtering, “Heatran, what’re you doin’? Stop that right now!”

“Sis, what’s-”

“Heatran almost killed that guy!” Noel interrupted Leon. “That ain’t the deal! That ain’t ever been the deal!”

“Almost… killed?” Sheena uttered, blinking in shock. She focused her hearing and took notice of the anguished screaming coming from nearby. “Matt!” she realized.

“What did you two do?!” Rosalita didn’t wait for an answer to her furious question. She stormed past the Pokémon without a single care for the risk they posed to her, strode under Noel and Leon, and discovered the terrible sight at the gate. “No… not you too,” she said, her anger turning into something bordering on despair. The princess dropped to her knees at the side of her new friend. He’d managed to snuff out the flames but blacked out from the pain soon after. Rosalita tenderly ran her fingers down his charred clothing while Shaymin poked his head with its nose.

“He’s still alive…” Sheena said. She’d clasped her hands to use her power and connect with Matt’s mind. “I can sense his life energy, but it’s badly weakened. He needs help, now.”

“I can do that, yes,” Shaymin informed Rosalita. Even the long-lived mythical Pokémon seemed rattled, speaking in a flat tone. “My Aromatherapy can stabilize the Gaia energy within him. Heal him to a stable state, yes.”

“Do it then, please,” urged the princess.

Shaymin tried to climb up onto Matt’s head, but its diminutive size and stubby legs left it needing a boost from Rosalita. A pleasant floral scent wafted from the flowers on its back, and waves of green light passed through its body into Matt’s. His breathing soon grew more stable and relaxed, as if he were enjoying a peaceful sleep instead. While Shaymin worked, Rosalita pulled the charred remnants of his coat and shirt away.

“Oh, that’s a relief,” she sighed when she saw that his burns had already been healed into scars. She took Elena’s Poké Ball out of her cloak and opened it, allowing the Leavanny to materialize next to her. When Elena saw what had happened to Matt, she brought one of her leafy arms to her mouth and murmured in worry. “Don’t worry, Elena, he’ll be fine… I’m sure. For now, can you use your silk to make him bandages?”

“Van,” Elena replied, nodding.

Meanwhile, Noel and Leon just stood by, watching the scene unfold while they were gripped by a sense of distressed alarm. Their Pokémon, including Heatran, were gathered around them but checked by Noel’s command not to act.

“This ain’t right,” Noel said to her brother, “none of this is right at all.”

“You said it, Sis.” Not knowing what else to do, Leon took out his comb and shakily ran it through his hair. “Muggin’ dudes in the desert was one thing, but we never left ’em to die… we took their Pokémon but that was it. But if this is what’s gonna happen if we go for the gold…”

“This ain’t us…” Noel lowered her head, and her hair cast a shadow over her face. “If we went this far to get what we want, we ain’t… we ain’t ever coming back once we cross this line. It’s about survival, not… not…”

“This is all your fault!” Eleanor’s angry outburst broke the siblings from their stupor, and they looked just in time to see her pull Matt’s laptop out of his bag. “The answer to the last clue is in here,” she warned them, raising the computer into the air. “You make one move and I’ll destroy it! The box and Shaymin won’t have any use to you without the clue!”

“I could tell you to hand it over too,” Noel replied, “but my brain’s tellin’ me you ain’t gonna do that. So a stalemate it is.”

“No, not a stalemate,” Rosalita declared, rising to her feet. In the blink of an eye, her Bibarel and Staraptor were released from their Poké Balls to join her Rapidash, Luxray and Shiftry. She gestured with her head toward Noel and Leon, and her five Pokémon immediately surrounded the hunters.

“What is…”

Leon’s words cut off when his sister jabbed him in the side with her elbow. A quick look at the quintet of Pokémon around them led him to exactly why she did it. Their angry, intense expressions sent a chill down his spine that told him that they were not to be trifled with.

Rosalita smoothed out her cloak to appear more presentable, then warned the siblings, “Those five have helped me defeat Regirock and Registeel already. Challenge them at your own risk.” Once she saw that Noel and Leon wouldn’t take her up on her challenge, she glanced over her shoulder and said to Sheena, “Please go get one of those coats we saw in the fort earlier. He’ll need something to wear instead of his burned clothes.”

“Right.” With that, Sheena turned and strode back toward the fortress.

Shifting her attention squarely to the hunter siblings, Rosalita firmly stepped toward them and brought her hand up to her chest before clenching it into a fist. “I may not have formally been crowned queen yet,” she told the pair while approaching them, “but if you go against the kingdom, I am the one you will deal with.”

“What makes you think I wanna talk to you?” Noel crossed her arms and flashed her typical sour scowl, but it barely masked how shaken she was. The fire in Rosalita’s eyes didn’t help her nerves at all.

“I think you want to talk because deep down inside, you want a way out of this. You could have easily fled when Matt got hurt. You didn’t.”

“Don’t you judge my motives,” Noel shot back, defensively. “I’m doin’ what Bro and I need. Nothing more.”

“I know you’re doing all this for your brother. That I understand.” Much to Noel’s surprise, Rosalita warmly smiled. Her expression soon faded, however. “You two are on the same side. My brother and I… aren’t. That’s why I’m offering you a deal. I can see that you’re someone lashing out at the world because it’s hurt you. I get that. But my brother doesn’t. All he sees you as are tools to be used and discarded.”

“Uh, that’s why we ditched him, remember?” Leon sarcastically interrupted.

“My point is that he surely planned for that possibility,” asserted the princess. “Once he has Shaymin and the Golden City, he will dispose of you like he disposed of our parents and Sutter Chiaki. Whether you did it for him or not, you have no place in the kingdom he envisions.”

“We’ve never had a pl-” When the true meaning of Rosalita’s words dawned on her, Noel froze.

“Sis?”

“We’ve never had a place where we belonged,” she thought. “We came all the way here and our lot in life’s still the same. I’ve been lyin’ to myself all along, and I’ve been lyin’ to Bro too… It ain’t ever gonna change like this, no matter how much money we make, is it?” Though she failed to notice it, Noel was shaking. All she could do was repeat the question, “It ain’t ever gonna change like this, no matter how much money we make… is it?”

“You’re finally starting to understand…” Rosalita’s warm smile returned, and this time it stayed. “You two have done some very bad things in your lives, and I can’t forgive you for those crimes, that much is true. What I can do is try to appeal to your better selves, to the people who want to turn over a new leaf. If I can do something that will stop your crimes and also benefit the kingdom, it is my duty to make that decision. Help me stop my brother.”

Noel and Leon shared a look at each other. Both of them found Rosalita’s offer tempting.

“You’re the brain, Sis,” Leon said. “Up to you.”

For the second time in minutes, Noel lowered her head. “Now I gotta make the right choice here… this isn’t just for me, I gotta do what’s right for Bro, too. If I screw this up…” A sudden thought hit her, leading Noel to point at Rosalita and bitterly demand, “How do I know you aren’t messin’ with me just like the little prince was? It’s our fault what happened to him.” She gestured toward Matt, whose wounds and damaged clothing were being tended to by Elena, with her head. “You’re just gonna use us up and then stab us in the back to get your revenge for that, aren’t you?!”

At this, Rosalita closed her eyes and took a deep breath. When she opened them again, the fire was back. “Did you order Heatran to do it?” she flatly questioned.

“No!” Noel adamantly denied, stomping her foot on the ground. “Well, uh… I told Heatran to guard the way out. That’s it! I never wanted it to go this far!”

“We already told you, Princess, we ain’t killers,” Leon rushed to add. “We just wanna survive. Like we keep sayin’, this job was supposed to be our ticket outta this life. What good is that if we go and fry someone?”

“You know what I see, then?” Rosalita shut her eyes again. When she didn’t immediately continue, both Noel and Leon started to shift uncomfortably out of worry over what she would say. “I see that you abandoned your attack on us as soon as you noticed what Heatran did, and you haven’t continued it even though doing so would be easy. That tells me that you really did not want this to happen. It backs up what you’re telling me. That’s why I’m not going to use you. I understand that society has treated you poorly your entire lives, so it may be hard for you to believe, but I want to give you a fair deal and I’m not lying.”

Noel crossed her arms and frowned. “What’re your terms, then, Princess?”

“You will cooperate with everything I tell you to do,” Rosalita firmly explained. “I will not give you the Golden City or Shaymin in exchange, but what I will do is give you a comfortable enough life in La Ciudad Dorada once I’m queen. Just be advised that if you try to betray me, I know about your history in Orre. I’ll turn you over to the International Police if you try anything.”

“This girl is scary, Sis,” Leon grumbled, taking a step back away from the princess. “She ain’t nothin’ like what that prince told us.”

“Fine!” Noel spat. “Fine, we agree. What do you want from us?”

“First, you’re going to tell me exactly what my brother told you when he gave you this mission.”

“That little creep said we’d probably run into you when we went lookin’ for the Golden City,” Noel said, never uncrossing her arms. “That’s one thing. He never told us you were such a hardened fighter, that’s for sure. Nothing ’bout those Pokémon of yours or anything.”

“That doesn’t surprise me,” Rosalita replied, putting her hands on her hips. “He surely already suspected you’d betray him at some point. Telling you the truth about me would only make that more likely. How many Pokémon did he give you, and what did he tell you to do with them?”

“There were eleven of ’em in those clockwork Poké Balls,” revealed the hunter. “He told u-”

“Wait, that doesn’t add up. Eleven?” Rosalita began to count on her fingers and named off, “Electivire, Magmortar, Probopass, Lickilicky, Togekiss, Yanmega, Muk-”

“No,” Noel interrupted, “Muk and Palossand are ours. They ain’t ones that he gave us. Heatran ain’t in one of those things, either. He told us it would just be followin’ us around.”

Leon stepped forward and added, “He kept one back from us when he gave us the other eleven. That’s why the number’s so weird.”

“I suspect I know which Pokémon he saved for himself,” Rosalita noted. “Why do I see twelve of the clockwork Poké Balls on you, then?”

“The last one was supposed to be for catchin’ Shaymin with,” answered Noel. “He told us to stage the attack on your castle, grab that magic box off glasses guy over there, catch Shaymin, and then bring it all to him.”

“Hand it over. You aren’t going to be capturing Shaymin with anything anymore.” Noel obeyed Rosalita’s order, taking the empty ball off her jacket and handing it to the princess. She promptly dropped it on the ground and stomped on it, the sound of it cracking making both Noel and Leon jump. “So it really is what we thought, everything that’s happened was a setup. Frame me for murdering our parents and then allying with a group of outsiders to exchange our treasures for the throne.” Rosalita clenched her fist, using the pain of her fingernails cutting into her palm as a distracted from the tears welling up in her eyes. “Why did he have to resort to this… I don’t want to admit it, but the Fernando I knew… he might really be gone.”

“We have to continue, though,” Sheena reminded Rosalita, having approached during the conversation after dropping off the coat with Eleanor. “You’ve already passed two of the trials. That has to mean something.”

“I-It does,” replied the princess, her voice shaky. “You’re right, we must keep going. That’s the only way this will stop. How is Matt doing…?”

“He hasn’t woken up yet, but he’s completely stable now. He’ll be scarred, but otherwise fine.”

“Good.” Turning back to Noel and Leon, Rosalita said, “I have another question. Do you know how he kept Heatran under control?”

“He showed us some weird machine he’s got running,” Leon clarified. “It’s got some electro… electromag… it’s doin’ somethin’ to a rock inside of it.”

“The Magma Stone,” Sheena said, inhaling sharply when she recognized the description. “It’s a special stone that’s found in volcanoes where Heatran lives. They say that it’s able to control and even seal Heatran.”

“Another thing we’re going to have to deal with…” Rosalita sighed. “That can wait. For now, we have a deal. You two cooperate with us and you have nothing to worry about. Betray us, get sent back to Orre and face justice. Those are the terms.”

“Fine, we’ll take it,” Noel agreed. “You really drive a hard bargain, Princess.”

“I have to. But I also have a responsibility to those who don’t have the luxuries I do. You’ve suffered enough, so prove you can change and I’ll give you the help you’ve always wanted.” Turning to Sheena, Rosalita said, “Please go get the laptop from Eleanor. We’ll share the clue.”







END of CHAPTER 4

Yes, you have a good grasp on the escalation factor. Based on the Titans' connections to Gaia, they can do things using it like getting the power boost like a Totem Pokemon. There's a bit more along that thread to be revealed in the future that I think you will find interesting.



I'll get back to Fernando's reveal later, but for now, I want to focus on Shaymin. Shaymin's actually going to be seeing some pressure and making mistakes for itself, which I've been told is something that doesn't happen very often. I think that's probably pretty true. Shaymin has a unique perspective on everything that has taken place before and during the story, so pushing its experiences to the forefront is something I want to do.



Fair and fair. I want both sides of the argument to have at least some point, even if one of them is really going about it very wrongly.



It's coming.



Yeah, that's a core part of this version of Eleanor. She's always felt out of place, disconnected from her surroundings and the people around her.



I'm sorry that it was presented in a confusing manner. I tried to keep the two sides separate and defined but it would seem that I didn't pull it off well enough. Please forgive me.



In this case, I could have split the Registeel and Fernando part into a standalone chapter quite easily, but I don't think the siblings battle could have stood on its own. I don't think it would have been substantial enough. Looking at what my choices are, I think I probably did the best of my options.



I think you'll have some new content not too far from now. I certainly hope so, anyway. It'll be more focused on a central theme than this chapter was.

Thank you for your kind review!