Pokémon: Out of the Woods | A Galar, Unova & Sinnoh Fanfiction

Chapter 31: Child

Workers were evacuated and the mine cordoned off by local police. Their officers on Corviknight searched from above. Triton searched the mine itself. The attack happened after he left, but he still felt terribly guilty that he wasn't there to prevent it. Sam led the local officers in Hulbury, hammering on doors and turning restaurants, fast food joints and a cinema upside down. Olive went with Mirabelle to search the Motostoke Outskirts. She called her Gym Trainers to help. They gradually cordoned off the entirety of the Motostoke Outskirts. The cameras on the nearby motorway saw no-one taking off from the mine, so the attacker must have fled on foot. They couldn't escape through the outskirts. Wherever they went, a Gym Trainer would see them, as they would in Hulbury. Ace's Gym Trainers guarded every exit.

Since using Heather's radio could expose her, Reira promised to only use it in an emergency. That was an emergency.

'Forget the disguise! Search the area on Garchomp!'

Heather hesitated. In the long run, dropping her fake identity would only harm the investigation. She would come to regret it, in case those few minutes might have given her time to catch the killer then, but she rushed into a boutique. There was a long queue. She stole a slouchy beanie and shoved her hair into it. She pulled her ragged old cloak from her bag and pulled it around herself. She hid her eyes with sunglasses. Only then did she take off.

She couldn't see anyone who appeared to be running, cycling or riding a Pokémon away from the scene. She landed at the city's most notorious pub, The Thirsty Thievul, instead. She tossed Sleep Powder on the bartender before he even spotted her. Her Pokémon rushed into the corridor leading to the rooms where criminals, including Cipher members, often stayed. With the bartender asleep, no-one could have warned any guests of their arrival. The Pokémon burst in faster than anyone could run. Regardless, they found every room empty.

Garchomp took off again. This time, Heather took out the thermal imaging scanner that Reira gave her. She was looking for people in places they shouldn't have been, like dumpsters, trunks and lorries, but she only found a homeless man. An hour had already passed. The attacker was probably long gone, but how? They didn't escape by air or any road leading to Motostoke or Hulbury.

Cipher like their underground things. Maybe there's a tunnel? I don't know why they'd want a tunnel to a mine, but...

Triton was sitting on the grass by the time she returned to the mine. He had given up. Heather ducked under the police tape. A local officer tried to stop her, assuming she was a random civilian, but he backed off when Triton followed.

'Where are you going? There's no-one in there...'

'There must be a tunnel. How else did they escape?'

'They probably left through the Hulbury entrance, like, immediately... the first camera is at the Captain's Table, so... they could easily have escaped undetected...'

'Do they know exactly when the kid died yet? How long was it until someone called the cops?'

'It was probably only a minute... but the killer must've escaped in that minute...'

The wild Pokémon would have known if there was a tunnel. None of them thought there was. A Binacle and Shellos did, however, tell Triton they were knocked out from behind. When they woke up, the police were there.

'They got away, Heather... we're just gonna have to take the info we can get...'

Allister and Bede sent their Gym Trainers to guard every entrance to Stow-on-Side and Ballonlea, where they suspected Team Plasma or Cipher could be hiding. Local police joined them. Allister raided that suspicious apartment himself. He found nothing. It was vacated after it was searched. No-one suspicious attempted to enter either town. Bede searched Glimwood Tangle, but the only people in there were regular lost travellers and a few runners, blissfully unaware that anything was wrong beyond the woods.