A Study in Mega Evolution

Chapter Eleven

Corina clung to her seat in the helicopter and avoided looking out the window at all costs, while Eda did her best to comfort her trainer. Mairin helped occupy Corina's thoughts by describing her travels with Alain. Alain acted like he never had time for Mairin, but Corina and Steven were charmed by her clumsiness and exuberance. Corina kept glancing over at her old friend, wondering what could have happened to make him so serious suddenly.

They finally reached Rustboro City and landed on the rooftop of the Devon Corporation headquarters. The doors opened, and Corina was the first off, thankful to be back on solid ground. She was so wrapped up in her fascination of meeting Steven and seeing Alain again that she made the mistake of stepping inside of a helicopter.

"Wow! What a view!" Mairin and Chespie raced off towards the edge of the building, their eyes sparkling in amazement. Corina smiled and walked up behind them, admiring the city below them. It was incredible.

"This is the Devon Corporation. It's Steven's father's company." Corina explained. "I always dreamed of coming here to visit. But never once did I imagine Steven himself would be showing me around."

"I'm going on," Alain called from behind them and turned to enter the building, not bothering to wait up for Corina or Mairin. Mairin rushed after him, chastising him. Corina's eyebrows furrowed, and her shoulders sagged. In every way she'd imagined their reunion, she would never have thought that Alain would have changed so drastically.

Steven set them all up in a huge conference room with a gigantic flatscreen to display the data. He opened up a video feed and a call with who Corina recognized as Lysandre from Lysandre Labs in the Kalos Region. She picked up that Alain had been working for Lysandre for a while. She wondered how long since he never mentioned it to the Professor in any of his calls. Back when he was calling.

"This is the ocean located approximately a hundred miles from Rustboro City," Steven announced, calling Corina's attention away from her own thoughts.

"Take a look at this, too." Lysandre pulled up two videos of something moving over the water.

"What is that moving object?" Alain asked.

"We believe it's the continent pokemon, Groudon."

"Stunning." Alain breathed.

"I can't believe it...but why would Groudon suddenly surface like this?" Corina asked.

"The pokemon said to have expanded the continents."

"Is that really a pokemon?" Mairin asked, rushing back over to the screen to take a look.

"Yes. Now take a look at this." Lysandre zoomed in on the video to get a closer look. They could see that the details on Groudon's face and back were glowing gold.

"Could it be primal reversion?" Steven asked.

"Indeed."

"What is that?" Alain looked over at Steven.

"From what I've found in my research, it's when a pokemon takes back its true form and its original powers," Corina replied.

"That's a theory." Steven nodded, approving of her explanation. "If it's Groudon, then where's the other pokemon?" He wondered aloud.

"So, there's another pokemon too?" Mairin asked.

"I told you not to get in the way!" Alain scolded.