Swanna Girl and Braivary Man 3: The Rogue Hero

Chapter 11: The Underground Bandit

"You know, I hate to admit it, but I'm really digging the black suit," Hilda complimented as the four of us landed on the ground.

I turned to look at her as I returned Braviary into his Poké Ball. Swanna would need to stay out in order for Lethe's plan to work. Even though Swanna had more experience me, I could see the poor Pokémon shaking a bit.

It didn't help that Hilda, Hilbert, and Lethe looked quite threatening in their new outfits. Or, at least, Hilbert and Lethe looked threatening in their disguises. Hilda, on the other hand, looked more out of place. Most of her hair was tucked under a hat, making her look more like a boy. She wore a heavy leather jacket and kept her Serperior out by her side. Had I not known that Hilda was one of the sweetest people ever, I might have pulled back in horror. Unfortunately, I wasn't convinced as Hilda was still her bubbly self. If I wasn't buying it, I was afraid the other people wouldn't which would blow our cover.

Hilbert moaned in protest. He was in a similar outfit as Hilda, only he wore shades over his face and gelled his brown hair back so that it wasn't sticking in every direction. Like Hilda, I was so used to seeing him in a hat, but he didn't wear one as it turned out Hilbert had really bad hat hair. The moment the hat touched his head, it was as if the gel had magically disappeared.

"Hilda, keep it down," Hilbert hushed. "This place isn't called the Underground Bandit for nothing. If people start noticing you're acting like a ditzy teenager, our cover will be blown."

"Hey! I'm older than you are, thank you very much!" Hilda whispered very loudly.

I ignored their arguing as I turned to look at the building. From the outside, it didn't look like much. The windows were blocked off with planks of wood. Old red paint started to chip off, showing the old brown that the building used to be. There were even holes in the wall that made it seem like a few people tried breaking in it before.

The Underground Bandit. It was a place I had never heard about until Gila brought it up one night long ago. Back when I first joined, I found myself in places I would've never thought I'd step into before. When Gila figured that out, she told me of a place in Unova where criminals would gather. She fed me horror stories about that place. Had I not sworn an oath to help her, I would've flown here as fast as I could to shut it down. That was what Rudi would've wanted to do if he was still around, but there was something very frightening about the Underground Bandit. Even as I looked at it, I could feel my stomach climbing up to my throat as my feet wanted to run the other direction.

There was only one rule at the Underground Bandit. No matter how notorious a criminal was, you couldn't turn him or her in for money. Other than that, anything was fair game. While these criminals couldn't turn in another criminal, there were public fights that would happen. Pokémon versus Pokémon. People versus Pokémon. People versus people.

These fights were always to the death.

What made things worse was that these fights were usually brought in by people who had a rare Pokémon. They would take them and force them into a ring, not letting them out until blood was spilt. Gila and the rest of Team Miamsa told me so many stories about this place. One story was of a Charizard who was beaten up by a mere Pikachu. Another story she told me was when a Parasect killed a Graninja, despite being infected with a terminal disease. How these people got ahold of these Pokémon were beyond me, but it made me sick knowing they would just let them fight like that.

Fights to the death weren't even the worst of it. My hand grabbed the silver chain that wrapped around my neck and tucked it under the suit. If someone found out about that, I would face a fate that was worse than a duel to the death. I didn't even want to imagine what some of the criminals would do to me if they laid a finger on me.