True to his word, Looker did in fact show up in a singular minute. Ethan had been gently using his foot to hold back the ‘kick’em while they’re down!’ attitude of Lotad, who was currently clapping his beak and attempting to charge forward his downed prey.


    Ethan noticed the blip of Teleports from near his home, as he was waiting for them. Shortly after, a speed walking Looker and some others came into view. Alongside Looker, four menacing looking men in full black suits, with customary ‘Men in Black’ sunglasses, scanned the area with intense focus and alertness.


    Ethan didn’t bother with a greeting, as he just pointed at the downed form of Officer Jenny and her Espurr. Darkrai was long gone, disappearing without a trace. It was obvious he didn’t want to be around when Looker showed up, but weirdly, Officer Jenny''s pokeballs were still covered in a hue of Psychic energy.


    “She just kinda showed up. Sneaked up behind me and wanted to stick around after I told her to leave. We didn’t even make any plans yet.” Ethan rambled as the four men in suits each took a cardinal direction around himself and Looker, who was kneeling down and checking the officer over.


    After his inspection, Looker sighed and sadly shook his head as he rose. “Jennifer Jenny. You should have listened.” He snapped his fingers, which fluidly called one of the suited men over to restrain Jennifer. The other three suits quickly shifted from a square lookout to a triangular pattern.


    Ethan, wholly out of his depth, continued his rambling. “She signed up for a tutoring session, even though I didn’t know it was her. We hadn’t even made any plans yet, just kinda talked about it. I told her that I already had a customer and that she needed to leave. She didn’t want too. Then, all the pokemon around must have felt my mood. Things got… spooky. She decided a battle was in store, but I had Dar—A pokemon put her to sleep. Also, watch your step. The Oddish are eyeing you.”


    Ethan shooed the Oddish, who were very impressively pretending to be weeds mere inches from Looker and Jennifer. The masquerading bundle of leaves each cracked open an eye, and slightly grumbled to his signal. They uprooted themselves then waddled into formation. Gloom crawled out of the nearby taller grasses, his form not well built to blend in.


    Looker stiffened when the Oddish moved, but gave them a nod as they put some distance between one another. “You’re not in trouble Mr. Reed.” Looker stuck a hand into his trenchcoat and pulled out a pack of cigarettes, before effortlessly flicking one into his mouth. With practiced motions, he sparked a fancy lighter and lit it.


    After a smooth drag, he nodded down at the Jenny, who was still unconscious sporting a frightened grimace. “She, on the other hand… She is in a massive amount of trouble.”


    The suit who bound Jenny laid her flat on her back, then grabbed one of the pokeballs near her waist and recalled the sleeping Espurr. As soon as Espurr was inside its ball, another pinkish purple hue of Psychic covered it. The suit looked around, tilting his sunglasses down to get a better look, but couldn’t find who was responsible.


    “She was warned not to look into you, by me personally. She decided to take matters into her own hands. I apologize for this morning''s event, Ethan. I was aware she had made plans to come here. I just… didn’t think she’d just come over within a few days.” Looker took another drag of his cigarette, then looked to Ethan in askance.


    He waved the offer away. “Why is she looking into me? I didn’t do anything wrong.”


    “Well.” Looker took a puff. “She lucked into it. She’s an investigator, a skilled one as a matter of fact. The case she was working on had to do with a woman known as Sird. A probable member of Galactic, but a known Rocket—Not that she knew that at the time. She was working with the information you provided us, but wasn’t told who gave the information to the department in the first place—A very uncommon procedure.” He exhaled, blowing acrid smelling smoke forward in a single breath. “Then, after Sird was fit to be released due to lack of evidence, she moved onto a small time graffiti spree. Someone’s been plastering Galactic’s insignia across buildings in orange paint. Your Smeargle showed up on a search because of his orange tail. She tried to look into your file, was stopped from restricted access, I got notified, and we had a talk… Now we’re here.”


    After a long sigh, he finished with. “She isn''t as bad as she seems. From her point of view, she''d been stopped by her superiors for the past few months on her Sird case and then was stopped again. She assumed corruption. Truly, an unlucky event. We knew she made plans to come and visit, but we didn’t know it was going to be so soon.” He ground out.


    Ethan watched as the one Alakazam Looker’s group teleported here with strolled forward down the meadow toward Jennifer. Ethan nodded towards her. “What’s going to happen to her?”


    “Well, she’s fired. That’s for sure. Her family will sweep most of it under the rug, but she’s not working as an investigator anymore. When you’re told by Interpol to stop doing something and don’t listen… Bad things happen.” Looker replied.


    While he didn’t feel too bad about her losing her job over this, he didn’t want someone who thought they had a lead to rot in prison just for looking into him. “She’s not going to rot in a cell or anything? No psychic mind wipe or something?”


    Looker simply shrugged. “Not my jurisdiction. Nonetheless, I am sorry for the disturbance… but, while I’m here… Do you happen to know a Sird Saque? You know, from your time back home?”


    Enjoying this book? Seek out the original to ensure the author gets credit.


    “The name doesn''t immediately ring any bells.” Ethan paused, “What do they look like? Anything else you can give me other than a name?”


    “Tall, five-eleven. Female. Sharp, fierce, murderous gray eyes, purple hair, has a Banette, Persian, Staryu, and Darkrai. Worked as the commander for Team Rocket Three-Beasts alongside Carr Chakra and Orm Oka under Giovanni.”


    The suits surrounding them slowly turned their heads towards both him and Looker, judgment evident in their eyes. It seemed that these suits were out of the loop, surprised by the information he was receiving. He ignored them as he answered. “I have never heard of any of them, other than Giovanni of course. Never heard of the Three-Beasts, or about anyone else with a Darkrai. Sorry, but I’m of no help here.”


    “Shame.” Looker finished his cigarette, stuffed the butt back into the package, then pulled out another. After lighting it, he asked another question. “But you’ve heard of Red?”


    “Red? Like, the guy up on Mt. Silver?” Ethan questioned back, earning a stilling of the hand from Looker. His mouth was parted, aiming for a puff, but he had paused.


    “Elaborate.” Looker commanded, voice firm.


    The suits surrounding them were no longer hiding their eavesdropping, and Ethan was feeling the pressure. “Uhh. In the… thing on my phone.” Looker nodded in understanding and hurriedly motioned for him to continue. “He’s up on Mt. Silver. Been up there for a long time or something. After you, uh, beat everyone, he is the final challenge up there. He has all three Kanto starters and a Pikachu. I forgot his other two pokemon…”


    “That is very valuable information, Mr. Reed. Thank you for sharing. What about the Moltres?” Looker asked, cigarette ignored.


    “Moltres? There’s a Moltres on Mt. Silver?” Ethan blinked owlishly in confusion.


    “Hmm. Forget I asked,” Looker seemed to have mentally restarted, as he continued smoking. “Seems like we didn’t get everything during that help you offered when we first met. We didn’t get any of that Red information.”


    Ethan just shrugged as he used his foot to slide Lotad, who was inching towards Looker’s shoes with curiosity, away. “Not like I’d know what you got and what you didn’t. You didn’t get the friendship evolution thing either. I found that out the hard way.”


    “Ahh.” Looker smirked and laughed. “Joyce wasn’t happy about that was she?”


    “No. She was most definitely not.” Ethan laughed back, the worries about the morning''s event fading away slightly with time and conversation.


    “I’ll let you get back to your day, Ethan. I’d say it was nice to see you again, but I just finished up with all the Galactic work and now you’ve given me more work with the information about Red. Next time, just invite me over for a drink.” Looker stashed his finished cigarette into its pack and snapped his fingers, causing the suits to gather up around the Alakazam.


    Ethan warmly waved at the smarty psychic, earning a simple nod of acknowledgement in response before the group blinked away with their prisoner.


    Now, alone once more, Ethan dropped to the ground and laid there on the ground. His eyes staring at the blue sky above as his breath hitched and lips quivered. His sweat slicked back, covered up by the splash of water he’d been doused in beforehand, collected the grime of the ground in seconds. Ethan’s nervous smile collapsed away, revealing the worried and scared visage of a man who hadn’t wanted any of this to happen.


    It was one of those days. The bad ones.


    The lively sounds of his ranch hadn’t returned. None of the pokemon around felt like making any sound, opting to be quiet in the wash of his feelings. He felt bad because they knew. It felt bad to feel bad and have others know when you didn’t want them too.


    “Tad?”


    Turning his head, Ethan came face to face with the small dopey lilypad. Lotad’s eyes, which normally were lopsided and googly, had centered and were staring at him with concern.


    “Looooooo.” Lotad crooned, voice sorrowful and confused.


    “Go for a swim, Lotad. Best not to get too close.” Ethan whispered, before turning to look back at the sky.


    There’d been some bad days here on the ranch. Like when Ralts had found his old wallet and brought out the photo of his mom. That had been one of them but, most of them didn’t end up with what felt like a fight for his life being sprung upon him out of nowhere. Maybe the situation where that first group of customers came by and one of them had the smart idea to catch the Teddiursa, but this was violence directed towards him. That Jenny was prepared to throw down. A full on pokemon battle out of the blue because he had simply asked her to leave.


    Battling was still something he didn’t want to do, but for his pokemon he’d do it. He was making baby steps towards that goal, training with his pokemon every once in a while and making sure that they were happy and stimulated. But a real battle? A battle that wasn’t for sport?


    He wasn’t ready for that.


    As he watched the clouds go by for a few minutes, he processed his morning as best he could. Ever so slowly, the murmurs and goings of the ranch came back. The Starlys began chirping, the sounds of rocking waves ensued from behind as the water pokemon swam about, and Ursaring stopped her protective over-watch from her cave, re-entering it to be with her kids.


    Alongside the re-happenings of his ranch, the gentle steps of ruffled grass grew louder and louder. Eventually, the bright pink hair and white frills of Jocelyn Joy entered his view. She smothered down her skirt and quietly sat down beside him. “You okay?”


    He shrugged, too emotionally drained to manage a fake response. “Which one told you?” He asked.


    “Chatot and Meowth. Mostly Meowth. Chatot needs to work on her own words.” Jocelyn replied calmly, non judgmental. She turned her body to look towards the extended pond, but didn’t make any remarks about it and simply sat beside him.


    After another minute of silence, Ethan couldn’t stand the stifling atmosphere. He sat up and began to stand, which must have been the signal Jocelyn had been waiting for. “Joyce told me things before she left.” Ethan sighed and closed his eyes as she finished. “I’ve been filled in.”


    “Good for you. Soon, the world will know. It’s just a matter of time it seems like.” Ethan gestured off towards the smooshed grass where Jennifer Jenny had laid. “I wonder how many reporters and crazies will show up once they learn about me.”


    “Is that something you worry about?” Jocelyn asked.


    Ethan turned to look at the young Joy, finding that she was genuinely curious yet kept a professional air about her when asking. “Not really.”


    She got up and gently dusted off her uniform before walking ahead, towards the exit of the meadow. “Walk with me. Let’s go to the Pokemon Center.”


    Jocelyn didn’t wait for a response and kept on walking through the grass. Ethan took a moment to wave goodbye to the water pokemon—especially Lapras, the Oddish, and Gloom---before following after her.