Adventures Beyond!

Chapter 48: Broil Between Besties!

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Sapphire Town, Sinnoh

A familiar Rockruff, covered in bandages, dirt, and bruises walked into his home as the sun began to set over Sapphire town once again. It had been another long and tiring day training. While Miles was extremely exhausted from training, he was just as excited to train some more the next day.

As he closed the door behind him, he let out an exhausted exhale and closed his eyes for a moment. When he opened them again, he noticed a figure standing in front of him.

"You!"

It was Akari, who was pointing an accusative paw at her best friend.

"How long have you been waiting behind the door for me to get home?" Miles asked, a bit confused.

"I ummm... Anyways, where have you been?"

Miles was lucky he had already decided on a lie to tell her, "I went to go help Ms. Bea with some of her flowers like usual."

"I went to Ms. Bea's place a few hours ago and she said you weren't there today, or ever."

The Rockruff began sweating.

"That's a shame for you because Ms. Bea's flowers were beautiful!" Akari shouted at him, "Where were you?"

Miles quickly shook his head and ran to his room, shutting the door behind him. This left Akari on her own once again in silence

Akari pouted softly, "I'm gonna figure you out for sure."

———

The light from the rising sun peeked into Miles' messy and unkempt room, illuminating every corner as the Rockruff's nose began to softly twitch. His eyelids raised, uncovering his ocean blue eyes. Miles looked around, taking note of the familiar surroundings. His eyes soon sparkled with excitement.

It was a new day.

The Rockruff immediately jumped up from beneath his covers, his tail wagging erratically. Miles had always found it easy to wake up in the morning. There was always something in store for him, always something new to do.

He could go outside and play most days, read comics with Akari, and...

Wait, Akari!

Miles stumbled off of his bed, loudly slamming into the floor. He stood up as quickly as he could, hoping that he didn't wake anybody in the house with the noise he made. He had to check on Akari to make sure she was still asleep so he could have a clean exit out of the house without being questioned.

Miles soon walked over to his door, occasionally stumbling over items that had been left scattered around the room. He knew that one of his parents would eventually see the mess in his room and force him to stay indoors until he cleaned it. He had to leave as quickly as possible to make sure that the day for cleaning wouldn't be today.

His room wasn't that messy after all...

The Rockruff opened the door, questioning the appearance of his room. He took a long hard look at every inch of his room. Yeah, everything was where it was supposed to be. He nodded to himself, soon leaving the room.

Miles quietly trotted over to his best friend's room, soon opening her door. Similar to Miles' room, her room was also a bit messy.

He carefully maneuvered around various items in her room, slowly making his way to Akari's bed, where the Zorua seemed to be asleep. She seemed to be more peaceful, though.

Miles smiled softly at her sleeping face, gently patting her head, "I'll keep you safe, I'll keep everyone safe."

As he left the room, Akari's eyes twitched faintly. They soon opened, revealing a devious twinkle in her cyan-colored eyes. A toothy smirk soon formed on her face as she sat up, looking towards her door.

"Let's do this thing."

After talking with Carla and getting the go-ahead, Miles was soon heading out the door with the alibi of going to pick some berries nearby.

Akari cracked her door open slightly before transforming into a Pikachu, notably with a male-form's lightning bolt-shaped tail. She closed her door before running over to her bed and putting a few items under her blankets to make it appear as though she was sleeping in again. Once the job was complete, she looked over to her open window and jumped out of it.

Slamming onto the ground outside of the house, Akari took a moment to dust herself off and look around for her best friend. As she rubbed a bit of dirt out of her right eye, she spotted a familiar Rockruff walking away.

The– as of now, Pikachu, chased after him while trying her best to keep herself from being seen. Miles seemed to be just as inconspicuous with what he was doing, and rounded various corners on his way to where he was headed.

Akari had trouble following him through the twists and turns through Sapphire Town. While they both went outside frequently, Miles always seemed to have a better sense of direction from her, who just went with the flow to get wherever she needed to go.

Soon, the Rockruff began walking towards the plains area, and Akari knew that she wouldn't be able to hide the fact that she was following him. The decoy Pikachu soon ran towards a small building and began climbing upwards. Once at the top, she thought for a while before seeing a Joltik crawling nearby.

The phony Pikachu smirked as she jumped at the Joltik, catching the small creature's attention. It let out a terrified squeak before trying to run away. Akari was too fast, however, and managed to grab and pick up the Joltik.

The Joltik quivered in Akari's paws, awaiting a horrible and gruesome fate. When nothing came, the Joltik only looked up at the mock Pikachu with confusion. Akari only gave it a smile.

"Thank you for letting me touch you, little guy..." She put it down and watched the small Pokémon scurry away.

Turning back into a Zorua, Akari began walking towards the side of the building furthest to Miles, breathing softly. She gulped softly as she shook off her fur, as well as all of the doubts that she had in her mind. With a soft grunt, Akari began running towards Miles.

Taking one last step, she jumped off towards Miles.

While in the air, Akari turned into a Joltik herself. She braced for impact as the wind pushing against her slowed her descent. Using the slowed descent, Akari managed to land right on Miles' soft back.

Breathing heavily, Akari let her small body rest on her best friend's back. Finally, she had an opportunity to allow herself to rest. She rolled onto her small feet and looked around. Miles was currently walking through the plains, occasionally looking around and behind him.

Whenever Miles would look back, she would have to hide within Miles' seemingly large fur coat. Akari would have to make sure not to touch his bare skin, however, as he would feel her legs on his back and try to shake her out.

Akari gasped for air as she peeked out of Miles' fur once again. She looked around confusedly and could see nothing but grass on all sides of her and Miles.

The phony Joltik let out a silent groan, "This is gonna take a while..."

Meanwhile

Oliver and Jacob were in the commons of the base, discussing possible strategies for fighting the two Pokémon that had been looming over them as a threat throughout their stay in Sapphire Town.

Jacob wondered if either of them had a weak point that they could aim for, but Oliver knew that this situation wasn't like some kind of fair game with a possible way to win. With their current manpower and resources, every single Pokémon would have to play their part to the best of their abilities.

"What do you think Logan and Sophie would say?" Jacob asked the Oshawott, "Where even are those two, anyways?"

Oliver sighed, "Sophie's doing some research and Logan's training again... I haven't seen either for a few hours, actually."

"Speaking of training, shouldn't we get to doing some?" The Pikachu jumped up from his seat, "After creating Meteor Strike, I've been itching to see what else I could do with this power."

"You guys are gonna train?" A familiar voice interrupted them, "Can I help?"

Oliver smiled as he turned around, "Hey, Miles."

"You're just in time, buddy!" Jacob exclaimed, "Sure you can help."

Akari, still a small Joltik in Miles' fur, was entirely baffled. Training? Training for what? And why?

Mark suddenly walked into the room, making Akari let out a squeak in fear. She couldn't recognize the Garchomp as the one who saved her a while prior, as the combination between the new height difference caused her to reel back in fear.

"If you three want to train again, please don't tell me you were going to the plains again..."

Miles nodded, "We were."

Jacob and Oliver covered Miles' mouth, sweating profusely.

"What's so bad about going to the plains...?" The fake Joltik raised an eyebrow.

"Of course..." Mark rolled his eyes, "There's a training area in the base. It's just on a lower floor."

"There's another floor!?" Miles asked loudly.

Jacob grinned, "This place keeps getting better and better!"

Before Mark could say anything else, Jacob and Miles, with Akari in tow, headed to look for the stairs. Oliver only looked at the Garchomp with an exasperated smile.

"Where exactly are the stairs to the second floor?"

With Sophie

"Ugh..." A soft groan could be heard from a familiar Snivy as she raised her head from a desk littered with different books.

Sophie had been studying different things about odd phenomena in the Pokémon world, but couldn't get any further than the Theory of Improvement. There seemed to be nothing about Pokémon learning attacks outside of their typing, it seemed almost unheard of.

But here she was, defying all of logic and having nothing to explain it.

The Snivy got out of her seat, walking down the small aisles that the Pokémon on Mark's team have collected over time. She had noticed that Mark's team seemed to have books that weren't even sold in Forest Grotto. Were they illegal? Discontinued series?

Her hand traced each and every spine of the books as she walked, hoping that at least one of them could provide some kind of answer, some kind of lead. Any type of lead. Suddenly, she hand knocked over a book that seemed to be poking out of the bookshelves too much for normal.

Sophie looked inside of the area the book was originally put in, and could see a small notebook sitting there. Grabbing it and pulling it out, the Snivy dusted off the lint and dust that had been collected on the book's cover.

She slowly read over the words on the cover. There was just a date on it. A date that really didn't hold much significance to her.

"This is a log from thirteen years ago..."

As Sophie opened the notebook, she could see that various pages had been torn out, a lot of words had been scratched out. But she kept seeing the same few numbers.

"82... 45... 6... 23..."

According to the log she was reading, those were the four most frequently reported numbers. Within these numbers, there seemed to be a purpose. Sophie sat down at the desk from earlier, and kept reading. It seemed as though crypted information had been written in code.

"It seems as though the most promising has taken quite a liking towards the young. It has adapted a motherly role towards those who can't function on their own properly yet."

Leaving a large space below the writing, was a strange phrase.

"Right below the top floor, lies the second. Over your head lies the top. Think about the future that was stolen from you between those floors. Floors one through three."