Indigo Coliseum - Level 27 - 1154 hours local time - Day 111 of Ash Ketchum's Journey
The thing about armor was that it was both useful and useless at the same time. Chainmail was all but sword and knife-proof, but couldn't stop things like maces or clubs from hurting the wearer. Plate armor added protection against that sort of thing when added to chainmail, but arrows could still go through the exposed points like the joints and neck. Scale armor was arrow and sword-proof, but had the same weakness as chainmail when it came to blunt things slamming into you.
Cipher's Peons wore plate armor, reinforced to stop the most common bullets and lower-tier moves from killing them, while it could cripple them at their knees and elbows. The helmets protected their heads from the same. But they skimped on protecting their faces and upper legs, as proven when Bruno used his hand to break the thigh of a Peon before putting a palm-strike to his chin, breaking the jaw and knocking the helmet off. Bruno followed through by snapping his neck.
"Orre breeds the easily indoctrinated." the Fighting master said as Lorelei broke the neck of another one using a silk-covered steel wire, using his body as a shield as she fired at them with her pistol, rounds plinking off the armor of the Peons.
"Lance, I could use a hand here!" she yelled before a massive bang nearly blew out their eardrums. One of the Peon's had a massive hole in his helmet, falling back with the back of his helmet suffering a MASSIVE dent.
The Peon beside him was shocked enough to pause before he too took a round to the head, the helmet having another hole punched through it.
Bruno and Lorelei looked behind them, seeing a blue-haired young woman with a massive revolver in her hands, modified with a stock to keep it from flying out of her hands.
"I believe someone once said…" Erika said as she fired again, this time aiming for some poor Peon's crotch. "Walk softly and carry a big fucking gun."
Lance looked at the massive weapon in Erika's admittedly dainty hands before she fired, the insane recoil forcing her a bit back as the Peon was hit in the one place no man wants to get hit. "Why do you have a ridiculously large Unovan revolver?" he asked as the poor Peon went into shock, the sheer amount of pain being too much for him to handle.
"Because I had to learn my cousin was rescued from Team Plasma AFTER I started cleaning up my act." Erika snapped, almost falling victim to her condition before she was affected by an Exeggcute using confusion on her to force her awake. "Where is your cousin?"
"OH SWEET YVELTAL, NO!" cried a squad down a hallway. There was a 'thump', followed by an explosion and a great deal of screaming.
"Never mind. I was hoping to see her before all this was over," she said, her smile being less then wholesome.
"It's always the quiet ones…" Gaffery muttered before his Natu pointed at a Peon that was still half-alive. The old man put a round in his head. "I fucking hate Cipher."
Elsewhere on the Plateau
A team of Cipher Peons were making their way towards the local Pernon Group office. The industrial powerhouse had plenty of advanced tech, which Cipher wanted to get its hands on.
Unfortunately, they wouldn't get the chance.
A missile landed in the middle of the team, and took them all out in a massive explosion.
A short distance away, the launching rack for said missile folded back into a MASSIVE left arm, part of a huge, cobalt blue mechanical titan.
The right arm opened up, revealing a 27mm cannon barrel as it pointed at a Shadow Blastoise, and fired.
"Well, you got the 'carry a big fucking gun' part right," Rin quipped over the radio as the Shadow water-type collapsed, the only reason it wasn't dead being the fact they were walking tanks. "The Elite Four have them contained at the stadium, but there's so many of the bastards that the spectators are forced to fight, too. And guess who Miror B is after?"
"Ketchum," Kyril replied from inside the titan - which was a heavy combat add-on for his Marauder Armor specifically designed to deal with Evolved Shadow Pokemon. He wasn't sure if it could handle pseudo-legendaries, or even proper legendaries, but it would put up a significant fight. "Why isn't he DEAD yet?"
"Who, Mirror B or Ketchum?" his aide asked.
"Both. Ketchum's up against Miror B, who, insane or not, is a match for the basic suit." he replied, the Blastoise groaning in pain as it tried to breathe. Hard to do when your ribcage is shattered and diaphragm punctured. "And Miror B was around 90 years ago, during Cipher's golden age. He should be in a nursing home eating mashed prunes, not kick-boxing."
"You know what happens when Chansey get pushed to their healing limits," she replied, scowling.
"True enough," Kyril replied. "Think you could give Ketchum some long-ranged support? I doubt I'll be able to get there quickly, given how widespread the attack is." Meanwhile, Rin's armor was designed as a support suit, so she had plenty of long-range combat options, including several hardpoints for sniper rifles. Get her in a centralized point, she could provide either fire support or area denial for at least 5 kilometers.
"He's in the building: I'd have to get the railgun to deal with him and… well, I am not paying for the damage THAT would cause," she said, chuckling nervously.
Seeing as that would hack through the building and probably kill everyone inside… bad idea.
"We're gonna have to rely on him to save himself," Pernon was forced to admit. Then again, he survived everything Team Rocket threw at him.
He could survive this.
Indigo Coliseum - Level 8 - 1159 Hours Local time
Another round hit the wall Ash ducked behind, Mirror B trying VERY hard to close the gap.
"Ya can't hid foreva!" Miror B yelled as he fired again, the second shot being a click as he ran out. "Damn, why can't they gimme something that big bang I love and with more bullets?!"
"Maybe you should get rid of that thing!" Ash retorted, really sick of being shot at as he tried to make it back to the stands. Charizard, Pikachu or someone would deal with Miror B and he could relax, maybe even salvage this conference.
He actually wanted to FINISH his first League. Sue him.
As he ran back out to where the Colosseum was… Ash was… admittedly not expecting the sight he was witnessing.
The Jaws theme blaring in stereo, as a proverbial army of Gibles, Gabites and Garchomps - lead by his own Garchomp - assaulting the Peon's from below. All while it seemed his own Pokemon were… quite frankly, dominating the battlefield.
All was not good news, though, as he saw the crumpled form of Serena, her left arm a sickening red and purple with two massive tooth marks in them, a sprawled out Arbok giving him hints as to who bit her.
"Sev." 'So, you're the boy we're watching over?' Ash jumped when he heard the voice of a snake he hadn't heard since the end of his journey in Sinnoh, a large black, yellow and purple viper with massive fangs. Jessie's Seviper.
'...When did she get-never mind, not important.' Ash thought. "That Arbok your trainer's?" he asked.
"Viper." 'Nope.' he said, turning his head towards another Arbok coiling around and trying to poison a Shadow Tropius. "Seviper." 'He evolved a couple days ago. About time.'
A bullet narrowly missed Ash's shoulder, making him duck behind a mass of ruined chairs, Miror B running out of the stairwell. "DAMn, boy, do you move!" the afro-man declared, seemingly out of breath. "Time's up!"
Suddenly something landed in front of Miror B, throwing up debris and dust. Out of the smoke rose a tall, winged, very angry red figure.
Miror blanched. "Oh fuck."
Charizard roared, letting loose a Flamethrower that threatened to roast the afro man alive. Miror dove back down the way he came, narrowly missing the wave of flame, though Ash did catch a glimpse of his afro catching some flames.
"Shitshitshit!" Miror shouted, tumbling back down the stairs. He collapsed at the bottom and struggled to get back up.
Then the sun was eclipsed as the Flame Pokemon reared in the doorway.
"CHAR!" 'AND WHERE DO YOU THINK YOU'RE GOING?!' The enraged starter roared as he charged a Flame Burst in his mouth.
"FUCK!" The Cipher Admin swore, scrambling to his feet.
Charizard fired and was briefly backlit by fire as the move exploded in the stairwell.
Ash numbly stared as Charizard seemingly killed the Cipher disco man, but returned his attention to Serena, who looked very, very sick.
"Vip." 'Jessie's mate is getting the anti-venom.' Seviper said, trying to allay Ash's worries.
"They are going to pay for this." Ash growled, looking around and seeing the bodies of those that weren't able to get out in time, shot, burned or worse.
He saw Iris, her wool sweater caked with blood a few hundred feet away, blood running down her forehead, her Axew and his Dratini protecting her from anyone that got close to her, as an Excadrill, her VERY pissed off and very recently evolved Excadrill, went on a rampage.
Misty was passed out on a set of stairs, not moving at all, her Starmie and Psyduck struggling to keep all the Shadow Pokemon away.
Anabel… he couldn't even SEE Anabel.
"Natu." 'She's fine.' Ash looked up to see Anabel's male Natu on his head, not nesting on his hat, only to give a message to him. "Tu." 'We teleported her to the safest place we could find. Kyoji and your weird spawn are inside with the army of land sharks.'
Ash looked at the Gibles attacking Cipher's forces. "I… didn't think there would be that many Gibles." he said. "I never saw them in Kanto or Johto."
"Natu." 'They live pretty far underground. Most humans don't go down that deep.' the bird explained. "Natu." 'They use the deeper parts of Diglett tunnels to make their homes. Trainers have to go to the only places they like to live nearer the surface to get them. And there aren't a lot of geothermal caves in Kanto or Johto.'
Ash looked up to see that a blimp was gone and another almost completely engulfed in flames and falling. As he watched, Moltres made another pass, ripping into the underside. A pair of explosions erupted from the manned compartment and the blimp started falling faster. Moltres screeched as gunfire pelted his side from the other airship, which was starting to move away.
A high pitched scream drew Ash's attention back to the ground as what he, Kyoji and just about everyone were calling the Gible theme intensified. A squad of Peons was being swarmed by a school of Gibles, who were gnawing at their armor and were not discriminate in what they tore off their bodies.
"Fall back!" a red-armored Peon yelled. "Get to higher ground: Admin Lovrina's ordered a general retreat!"
The burning airship was still flying, Cipher water-types putting out the flames, Moltres backing off, content to let them go.
"CAT!" 'KILL!' yelled a Pokemon as it tried to jump at Ash, a purple and white cat roaring as it rushed at the Pallet Town trainer.
Level 27 - same time
"Lance, we're running out of ammo and those assholes are guarding the armory." Lorelei said as they peeked around a corner, seeing two Peons trying to set explosives on the armory door while five others stood guard.
"They're trying to take us down with them." Gaffery said, seeing that the amount of bombs strapped to the door was… excessive. "They're dead and they know it."
"It's almost as if their attack was very poorly planned…" Lance muttered, glancing between them. "So… ideas?"
"Well, there's that explosive launcher of yours…" Lorelei said to Gaffery, who shook his head.
"Too risky. We risk setting off the detonator and there goes five stories of the building AND us." the old man replied.
"Grenades?" Blaine asked before he thought better of it and shook his head. "No, they're in that armory. We need to up the security around here."
"Security was as good as it could get." Lance said. Cynthia glaring at the ceiling, unhappy that it was so low, otherwise she could unleash Garchomp and be done with it. But Garchomp were usually twice the height of a normal human, so… "They probably snuck in a few sleeper agents just to screw with us. Damn zealots."
The Peons looked down another adjoining corridor, raising their weapons before a VERY familiar gun report rang off. Most of the bullets pinged off their armor, but a few found a nice new home in the more exposed areas.
"…who the hell…?" Lance muttered, before a red-headed figure slammed a heavy metal ballistic shield against one of the Peons - unloading a M712 into another and roundhouse kicked a third. "…oh. Her…"
The red hair was enough to identify her, given she wasn't wearing her old Rocket Admin uniform. "Heard you needed help." said Ariana, reloading her Rocket-issue weapon.
"What the hell are you doing here?" Erika demanded, looking at her sidearm. "Let alone armed?"
Ariana pulled the bolt back to finish loading the weapon. "I might have surrendered, but I have my ways of getting my things back." she said, chuckling briefly before getting serious. "In all honesty, you need my help. There's a small army of Gibles outside dealing with the Peons that they left behind."
"They left?" Gaffery asked, even as Bruno removed the charges from the door. "That makes no sense."
"It's Cipher: you honestly think that death cult makes any sense?" the red-headed ex-admin replied.
"True." the old man admitted. Cipher made no sense a lot of the time back during the war. "Any objections to putting these madmen down?"
Lance scoffed. "Leave at least one of the ones with a bigger hat alive." the champion ordered. "I want to know what we're dealing with and Sabrina can rip it from his head. Speaking of which, where IS she?"
Moments after asking, there was a loud, terrified scream that seemed to come from a few floors below. "Ah… that's probably her." He nodded.
"Psychics, man…" Erika muttered.
"Half the reason why the Team didn't attack Silph until she was out of action…" Ariana muttered before picking up the discarded tactical shield. "Well, might as well get to work. You all need a new Elite Four Member for Johto, yes?"
"You're not serious-" Lorelei started, incredulous that this Rocket wetch would suggest it.
"I am. The Team is dead. The Boss is not coming back and whatever Patel has is no match for your rampaging reunification machine." the former admin said. "And really, you need all the help you can get."
Indigo Colosseum stands - 1218 hours local time
A Pokeball bounced off the skull of the Delcatty, transforming it into energy and sucking it in, catching the Shadow Pokemon.
"Remind me… never to do that again." Ash panted, his shirt and jacket in ruins after the Delcatty decided he was the biggest threat.
"Ash… Ash!" Ash glanced around, spotting Kyoji as he ran up towards him. "Holy shit, are you alright dude?!"
Ash nodded. "I'll be fine." he said, even as he looked at the cuts. Most of them were shallow, but that thing wanted to rip his throat out. "I'll need a new shirt, though."
"And a new jacket… and new pants…" Kyoji said before looking up, seeing something on the horizon. "… Other than Yveltal, are there any pitch black flying types?"
Ash looked where he was looking, seeing a black speck coming closer and closer. It wasn't a legendary though.
"That's my mom." he said.
"Your mom's a-oh, right. One of her Pokemon." the shinobi said before the massive bird circled overhead, Delia Ketchum glaring at the surviving Cipher Peons that the Gibles hadn't dealt with, who promptly threw down whatever weapons they had and raised their hands in surrender.
"Uh… that one I don't know." Kyoji said as he looked at the armored bird.
"Corviknight. He's from Galar," Ash said before more Pokemon and people were teleported in. He recognized Bugsy and Falkner, so he guessed all the Johto Gym Leaders were there, too.
The Ranseian, though, just kept looking at the bird. "…I want one." he finally said.
"Go to Galar then," Ash shrugged. "It's the only place that has them, as far as I know."
At least this battle was over.
Cipher airship Pyrite's Shine - nearing the summit of Mount Silver - 1229 hours local time
The rigid airship's escape route was to take them north, circle Mount Silver's peak and then turn south-southwest towards the Sea of Gyarados… and return to Orre.
"This was a fuckin' disaster!" Miror B said, covered in gel to get rid of the burns that Charizard gave him. A Peon had 'kindly' used an Abra to teleport him to the ship. "The ship's screwed, the attack was screwed, we lost dozens of Peons! And I didn't get to dance to ma tune!"
"Be quiet, Miror B." said Nascour, Cipher's official leader over the vid-comm. "The purpose of the attack was a statement. We are Cipher. We are legion. They couldn't kill us by turning our own tools against us. It only made us stronger."
"Still, we… could have planned that attack better," Lovrina chimed in. "I mean… we came in with giant Zeppelins, not exactly stealthy… plus, in hindsight maybe attacking while Moltres was perched above the stadium was a bad idea…"
The Moltres was excusable. They didn't see it until they were in visual range. But they should've turned around the second they saw it.
"They needed to see that we lived. We had agents in the building. We could have decapitated Kanto's leaders at a stroke!" Nascour snapped, the old man clearly not having all his marbles. "We will have to try again later."
"There won't BE a later!" Lovrina said. "They all hate us and want any excuse to destroy Orre! They'll invade!"
"One region might." Nascour replied. "Nihon is fractured, broken. Lance will never get the resources for an invasion to occupy the homeland."
"If it were just Lance, perhaps…" Lovrina muttered, "But there is one problem with that… Ash Ketchum. If anyone could unite the Nihon regions together against us… the crown prince of Rota would be that person."
"Then he will die," Nascour stated. "All who stand in the way of Orre's rise will burn!"
Lovrina nodded… but didn't believe. She only spent time with people from Orre. Talking to even one person outside and getting their perspective… were Cipher in the right? They wanted to stop Cyrus.
Why didn't anyone see that if they wouldn't let Cipher in, they couldn't deal with the bigger threat?
Viridian City - 1456 Hours Local Time - Day 112
Numbers on a sheet. It was easier to process numbers on a sheet of paper. Lance read them all the time. Reports of dead Pokemon and trainers. Just… numbers.
It was harder to deal with those numbers when you put faces and names to them.
"Fifteen thousand attendees," Lance said. "Out of those 15000, 1303 died by burning, gunshot or Pokemon attack. 4351 were injured by the same. The rest… traumatized." Hard to put the shape of human suffering out of his mind.
"Cipher screwed the pooch. It could have been worse," Ariana said, looking at the reports with cold detachment. "They had agents in the building: we found dead guards and maintenance personnel that don't show signs of putting up a fight. That Moltres was half the reason Kanto isn't descending into pure chaos."
"And what's the other half?" Lorelei demanded, the other redhead shrugging.
"Who else? The Ketchum boy." the former Admin said. "He knew something would happen. I doubt he has any real reason to work with them, plus he's had zero contact out of… the incident at Pallet Town 8 years ago."
"Of course…" Lorelei sighed, shaking her head. "…what about the other Leagues? How bad is the fallout?"
"Not good." Bruno said. "Karen and Will have informed me that many of the Johto citystates are starting to question the authority of the fragile government."
"Hoenn is not pleased." Steven said, looking at a faxed paper. "I'm being flooded with demands from both the Elite Four and the Gym Leaders to do something before we're inundated with more Shadow nonsense. The citizens are also not pleased. The older ones want to put Orre to the torch. I'm trying to figure out a way to avoid drawing us into another war."
"You can forget it, at least from Sinnoh," Cynthia spat. "There was a vote: twelve-nothing. The second they heard about the attack, the top eight of my Gym Leaders and the Elite Four wanted me to convince you all to make that place deader than it already is."
Ariana cackled. "Great! So let's get started!" she said, grinning.
"It isn't that simple." Steven said, sighing. "Hoenn inherited most of the URN Navy. Sinnoh can easily put that equipment they have from the Army to work. But what about Johto and Kanto? They were most biased towards the Air Force. What little ground equipment they DO have is light-weight at best. Then there's the command structure: who would lead this coalition?"
It would be less of a problem if they were a single government again, but 60 years was enough for each region to start branching off with their own thing. Kanto was turning into a new hub for tech development, Johto was sliding back into traditionalist bullshit, Hoenn was trying to maintain a balance between land and sea and Sinnoh… well, Cynthia claimed they were 'almost as bad as Johto'.
With all those problems, they simply didn't have the coordination or the equipment for war. Sure they had the Gym Leaders, Elite Four, and the Champions, but they were only so many. Gym Leaders had to defend their towns from Team threats and Shadow attacks, the Elites had to help run their countries, and the Champions were only half a dozen people. Each worth an army on their own, but six people could not take and hold a country.
There was also the problem of Cipher sleeper agents, troop deployments… the people had the will.
Their leaders simply lacked the means to bring that will to fight to Orre's shores.
Pallet Town - 1500 hours local time
Ash looked at the girls laying in their own separate cots. All of them were in a coma as a result of the Cipher attack due to wounds inflicted on them by Shadow Pokemon or Cipher Peons.
If the Gibles hadn't dealt with them, he'd kill the ones responsible. That was his first reaction. That was before he calmed down.
Then he thought about the TRio. For seven years, SEVEN YEARS, they hounded him. Chased him from region to region to region. Because he didn't consider them a threat. A minor annoyance up until Unova and even then, they had just become a fact of life. Routine.
Cipher's attack could've worked. If it weren't for him being overly paranoid about something happening during his and Ritchie's match, it would have been MUCH worse. They could have died.
Ash did not want Cipher to become routine. He wasn't going to make the same mistake twice. This time, he would take the fight to them. But he had to make sure everyone was safe.
"Don't you fucking dare." Ash jumped a bit, as Kyoji stood behind him.
"Fuck, you're quiet…" Ash cursed.
"I may not dress in dark blue robes, but I was trained by Shinobi." Kyoji smirked - which dropped as he looked at him. "I repeat - don't you fucking dare."
"…I didn't even-"
"You're thinking this is all somehow your fault, that you got them in danger, and 'oh, if only I didn't invite them to this event where thousands of other people go to every single year'." He said, rolling his eyes. "And now, you're probably thinking of going on a nice, one-man crusade with no one but yourself and your Pokemon, and leave behind all of these girls… just because they might get hurt… correct me if I am wrong, but didn't we have this talk a few weeks ago?"
Ash stood up, not letting go of Misty's hand. "I wasn't thinking about that," he said. "I was thinking of a way to keep them safe. And I was thinking about Orre and Cipher. And how I don't want them to be… routine."
"Routine?" Kyoji said, raising an eyebrow. "What the hell is that supposed to mean?"
"You know how the TRio's been following me for years?" Ash elaborated. "That they just kept coming after me, region after region?"
"Well yeah, but now they're out of a job and honestly, look like they're more willing to help you." Kyoji said, before he blinked. "…you're comparing Cipher to the TRio?"
"Am I wrong to?" Ash asked. "I didn't destroy their organization last time. I didn't do ANYTHING except maybe ruin an operation or two. I let them continue existing. And I got them on my ass for nearly seven years. I don't want Cipher to be the next Team Rocket."
"No, you're entirely right to want Cipher to get squashed like a bug," Kyoji nodded, "And so would a lot of the other Leagues and nations that are just fed-up with Cipher's bullshit… though with you, Team Rocket sounded more… cartoonish in your reality than it is here. I mean… you told me how they had all these absurd robots they'd send after you that had literally no function outside of capturing the 'new' pokemon of the day that you happened to encounter,"
Ash chuckled. "My point is… Miror B went straight after me." he said. "He homed in on me. I'm not going to make the same mistake twice. So I'm going to Orre."
"Sweet. I'll pack up and-"
"I want you here to protect the girls." Ash said, making Kyoji glare at him. "Don't. I'm not pushing them away. I intend to come right back after I deal with them. But I need to know they're safe. And other then Janine, you're the only one I can trust to DO that!"
"…one problem with that, Ketchum," Kyoji sighed.
"That being?"
"You know for a damn good fact that the very second they know you've gone to Orre, they will track your ass down." Kyoji deadpanned. "And even if I had the military support of the entire army and navy of Ransei, I could not stop them from accomplishing that."
"And I know that. But they're going to need to recover from this." Ash said. "And I'd rather have them rested and in good health then one foot in the grave. I am asking you to let me be the diversion. I know they're after me: they sent an Admin after me! If I draw their attention to me, it'll give them time to recover. I just don't want some Cipher assassin killing them when they're after me."
Kyoji thought about it. "…You raise a good point." he finally admitted. "This is why I call you selfish and selfless: you want to keep them safe and make them happy because you like it that way. You know I can't stop them."
Ash nodded. "I know. But if they're coming after me… I want them recovered." he said, looking at Serena's Arbok bite mark, still purple from the venom. "You understand, right?"
"…I can't guarantee I can keep them down for long," Kyoji sighed. "…and if they kill me for trying to stop them, I swear to Arceus I will become a Ghost-type Pokemon and haunt your ass."
Ash chuckled. "Just long enough so they don't exhaust themselves into… well…" he trailed off, losing any trace of humor.
"Yeah… I got the idea." Kyoji said. "I'll slow them down. Can't make any more promises then that."
"That's all I need." Ash said as Pikachu woke up, who had been sleeping on Janine's lap.
"Pika?" 'Wha?' he asked before yawning. "Pikapi?" 'What's going on?'
"We're going to Orre." Ash said, picking up his starter. "I might not know where it is… but I think I know who knows."
He did save his ship, after all. He would find out tomorrow.
Viridian City - Pernon Group building - 1125 hours local time - Day 112
"And the League is requesting an update on when we can get their headquarters back up and operational." Rin said, looking at a report. "The Cipher strike's got them on edge."
"Them, us and everyone else on the planet." Kyril said. "Desert cockroaches. Nothing you have can kill them."
"Contrary to popular belief, a cockroach is just as easy to kill as a human when it comes to a nuke," Rin said, smirking. "They'll last a bit longer, but that's about it."
"Right," Kyril said with a nod. He paused in thought for a moment. "…The Shadow-Buster worked well for its intended purpose. Though I still don't know about just how much it can properly handle. And if we're going to be dealing with Cipher more frequently… I want to make a Shadow-Buster for you, as well. It'll still maintain your focus on ranged support, but I want to make sure you have an extra punch. Any weapons you want for it?"
A buzz interrupted them, making the Pernon head jump before they heard the receptionist speak through the intercom. "Sir… Ash Ketchum is here to see you." she said, almost bewildered.
"What in the hell is HE doing here?" Rin demanded.
"Send him in." Kyril said, giving Rin the 'hide everything' look. His girlfriend groaned before collecting the papers for the Marauder designs and stuffing them in a briefcase before Ash Ketchum walked through the door, wearing a red jacket akin to his old blue one, his Pikachu on his shoulder as always.
"Hello, Mr. Ketchum," Kyril greeted. "Or do you want me to call you Ash?"
"Ash is fine." Ash said. "I came here to ask a favor, Mr. Pernon."
"Call me Kyril," Kyril said. "So, what's the favor?"
"Well, you can help me by either putting me on a ship to Orre or showing my Pidgeot the way." Ash said. "I have a team to disband."