Chapter 39: Joining the Guardians
I dreamt of flipping the table.
That was all I could imagine as I sat around the small rectangle table as Tiffany methodically went through what Im sure was a lovely tea ceremony.
I could feel the weight of social expectations on my shoulders to remain where I was, but it sat poorly. Moments like this where people demanded manners seemed like the most annoying aspects of life. Id faced enough of it in my past life to recognise it. Id also taken more than a little pleasure in flipping tables back then as well. After the recent ambush test I was way too amped to be sitting around drinking tea. My blood was running hot in ways that demanded action. Something I knew I wasnt going to get here and now.
And so, I longed to flip the table.
Koga didnt even react as I practically vibrated in place. Agatha stared at me with a raised brow in challenge that made it harder to relax. Karen Karen inspired different reactions but I couldnt be certain if that was by design or just how she was. Her choice of dress left little to the imagination. Her top clung to her chest while the jeans she wore would have to be peeled off her.
I gritted my teeth and inhaled through my nose before releasing it. This, I decided, was just another method of control set up by Agatha. She seemed to be the leader. Or at least the face of the organisation. Id have to keep my eyes open for more clues into their structure, but right now keeping my eyes open was likely to cause different parts of me to pay attention than I wanted.
Tiffany leaned over me to pour the tea. The weight of her breasts saw them brush against my thigh and it was all I could do to stare at Agatha's craggy face that I didnt instantly harden like a Metapod. Agathas expression twisted into something mockingly cruel as I knew that she knew how my body wanted to react.
Tiffany, it turned out, was the Shrine maiden that had escorted me to the manor. The manor that I still had no idea who owned, but left partly collapsed. Tiffany was a classical beauty under her veil. She could turn heads and hearts wherever she walked I had no doubt. She had a wonderfully trim body with a large chest that was now stretching her maidens robes. I was certain that she had not worn something that tight when wed walked up the path together. She had to have changed.
That thought led to me imagining her opening the front of her I killed that thought ruthlessly as Tiffany leaned back. Her eyes searching my face before slipping to my pants helped me to verify what her game was. In another setting without the old man and woman in the room Id be much bolder and shameless. The older part of me wanted to shrug it off while my feelings wanted to cringe and curl in for how my body was reacting to the feel of a beauty so close.
Instead of doing either I openly drew out a few pebbles from my pocket and turned my attention to them. The soft clatter of rocks pulled the womens attention away from my lower region. I turned the pebbles over without any pattern in mind. Todays rocks contained a few with some quartz in them that sometimes caught the light. The steady swelling of my own energy at the mnemonic trick caused my body to relax more and more.
I started turning the thoughts over in my mind. Each thought rose to the top eventually. Some of them should have alarmed me but Id practised meditating enough that I was able to keep my thoughts tumbling and loose. Like happy little rocks rolling down the side of a hill or being carried along in a stream. Or like a child playing with some pebbles with innocent joy.
Huh, Ive never thought of Rock energy as anything so relaxing and free, said Karen.
I considered Karen. She was no longer looking at my hands but rather at me as a whole. Agatha looked more relaxed, instead of goading. Tiffany had a startled expression but I could also see a flash of heat in her eyes just as I could feel the warmth of her body.
It washed over me, but not only as part of the room, not a flame that I had to pay attention to. When I remembered Koga was in the room I looked over to see him lifting his cup of tea to drink without commenting. He nodded seemingly at the taste but yet again I wondered if he was not in some way encouraging me like he had during our fight.
Multifaceted youve certainly contemplated the nature of your energy quite a bit, havent you Brock? asked Agatha as she raised her own cup.
I hummed consideringly before leaning back on my hands to shrug.
It wasnt a safe position to be in by any means. In fact, there were a number of blaring red flags such as not keeping my pokemon near me while we talked. Was the tea something I wanted to drink or was it potentially some poison that I hadn't heard of? Suddenly I was reminded that I was a small guy playing with much bigger stakes.
But I didnt start freaking out. I was no longer heart-thumpingly tense. Now, I was calm. And the truth was that I was small, like a pebble. I always had been. I could try to be a mountain, but in the end, everything was small in one sense or another. I didnt need to try to be more. I simply was. My mind was calm now. It wasnt so much a move as a state of being.
The way of rock perhaps?
Hmpf! Not going to drink your tea Brock? Agatha prodded. I gave it a glance before shaking my head.
Nah, not really a fan of green tea. Tiffany slumped a little. The pout she levelled at me would make others want to drink simply to spare her feelings. I ignored her. Erika would have asked what I wanted and had a host of options available with her lunch box. Tiffany fell short in that regard.
Agatha sniffed. Truly youre acting more and more like a young brute. If I didnt know any better I would have thought Bruno was sitting across from me.
I tilted my head. Im honestly surprised hes not here. He seems strong enough and I have no doubt he has access to Aura. There was a question to my words that I opened to the room at large.
Koga set down his cup. Bruno is careless with his words and too open. He does not have an appreciation for the subtle need to keep some threats unspoken. He is too brash. He is also too invested in the League.
Sounds like a story there? I put a pin in the question of what they had seen of me that didnt inspire the same reactions.
Agatha tapped the table before speaking, More of a history in truth. She shifted for a moment and waved Tiffany to a cushion to the side of the room. It will take a while to explain so I should get comfortable. This among other things needs to be told for you to have a better understanding of our purpose.
Agatha shifted about on the cushion and I copied her as I got as comfortable as I could. I would have preferred an actual chair but alas Agatha had decided on a more traditional meeting place with hardwood floors. I could just feel my buttcheeks aching already.
The war with Johto is something that most educational texts like to brush over quickly these days. That had me perking up. The reasons for the war are never explored in the books, only that the war was a great catastrophe. Agathas face crinkled in disgust. Revisionism at its finest. As if people will merely never go to war if they dont know the causes. When she looked up from the floor her eyes blazed.
The war was over territory, but also the supposed capture of a Legendary pokemon when it was weak Most blame a region known as Sinnoh, but there was also a Johto trainer claiming that they had captured a Legendary cat by the name of Entei We never learnt the truth of that claim but it was enough to make a fragile situation where too many people were posturing. A Blackthorn Lady attacked in Hoenn is commonly thought to be the spark that lit the flame, but the kindling had already been set before that incident
As it is known, the war ended just twenty-five years ago. While the history books of our own region like to discuss the conflict in a regional setting, but it was in fact a war that spanned much of the world. There are regions that entered the war only to find their trainers severely lacking. This resulted in them being wiped out from engagements.
Thousands of trainers entered the world stage only to fall short. The towns and people they left behind were thus weakened and exposed to both human enemies and nature itself! She glared into the night.
While wild pokemon were known to become more agitated from constantly being surrounded by battle, even when they themselves didnt participate, wed never had information on how they would react to an all-out war. Pokemon that had long slumbered awoke due to the turmoil. First in ones and twos which led people into not understanding how much of a threat they could be. It was a price some paid more heavily than others.
Agatha gestured to herself. Thats not even accounting for the issue of pokemon and people dying. How many experts do you think there were of the Ghost type before the war?
... a handful every city? I glanced towards Tiffany.
Agatha shook her head. There were less than two or three in each city in truth. Ways of life were different back then. Culture had degraded, and there was a push to modernise and drop the old ways. This caused other issues with pollution. She nodded towards Koga.
Koga set down his tea cup. Cities need to closely monitor their waste production, or else they cause a swarm of poison types to arise. This is well known, but was yet another factor that was overlooked during the war. He raised his cup at that, and I wondered if he was going to say anything else. I felt there was a lot more that he could say. Perhaps I had to fill in the blanks myself though.
Agatha took over, To this day some regions are still lost, either destroyed from the fighting, or still hidden away. She sniffed, Or they might still be dealing with the issues that arose for them during the wars. The wild pokemon were not easy to tame. Some areas around Kanto saw giant pokemon like that scam of a tourist trap pokemon island likes to show off! During the war we had giants like that appearing almost monthly!
I nodded, keeping my thoughts to myself. There had been that episode where Ash and crew destroyed pokemon island accidentally after the St. Anne tragedy, but there had also been something to do with ruins and giant pokemon hadnt there? I hadnt recalled that little factoid until Agatha mentioned it. But that was interesting and potentially concerning.
The information on the precise time frame of the war was also interesting to discover. Twenty-five years and the world was still reeling. It might seem like a short period of time to lose access to people but it wasnt in truth. Nature could reclaim areas of land much faster in this world due to grass pokemon. Water types could ruin trade lanes, and with Dragons and Flying types flight became much tougher. Psychic teleports over distances of entire regions was beyond rare. I knew of only one person that could achieve it, and she never did it back to back. She made it look easy but that was merely a testament to her prowess.
Agatha shifted. Our own region was heavily impacted of course. At the time it was expected that trainers would have a one in four chance to survive to their twentieth birthday. I, among others, lost many friends and family. I was one of the strongest to emerge for Kanto. The others were people like Samuel, Koga, and Blaine. Together we formed the first iteration of Guardians.
Oak was part of the Guardians? I said. Id surmised as much from his earlier comments but it was good to have confirmation.
Agatha bobbed her head. Indeed, Oak ended up being instrumental in giving us a fighting chance. We hadnt had anything like the clans of Blackthorn. We lacked the Dragons natural predators with ice types, which were their own allies. Oak however was able to raise a Dragonite and demonstrate that Dragons were weak to themselves. He fought them to such a standstill they had to back off.
She smiled fondly at that before scoffing, Then he did something stupid enough to gain their respect.
I tilted my head in question. What did he do?
He learned that Raikou had grown enraged and attacked the town of New Bark. The fool didnt even stop to gather the rest of us. Instead, he took off and fought with the beast for over an hour until others arrived. Then he stuck around and helped them get back on their feet!
Agatha stared into the distance. It didnt make any sense to anyone at the time. That was a town that was positioned to be a threat to us, most of all Pallet! But Oak still saved them In doing so he brought Johto to the negotiating table. From there he stopped the war and our own headlong rush into annihilation. Agatha stared off into the distance.
He could have named himself a king of Kanto back then, and made it stand. The government, such as it was at the time, had all but collapsed and we were working more as city-states that identified as a Kanto League. So the Government back then was mostly ignored. People didnt follow their orders but instead looked to their local strongest. Agatha took another sip of her tea.
A more aggressive man would have taken what was in front of him, but not Oak. Instead, he formed the initial framework for the League with the Elite Four. From there the League grew from administrative support for strengthening trainers and redeveloping our two states until we became Indigo. Then they snuck themselves into governance. Samuels dream took many years where he travelled far around Kanto and Johto, he won people over and had them let go of their anger. I served as his third back then, along with Pryce and Arthur. Eventually, people pushed for a higher position that hed held for Kanto in truth.
Agatha got a pleased look on her face at this and I wondered for a moment if people included her. Oak fought some contenders and then faced challenges from his fellow Elites. When he won he was crowned Champion with history recording his tenure as starting from when he took the Kanto Championship and through the war until he retired out of respect. He had everything at his fingertips back then!
Again he remained light with his authority. Agatha sniffed at this last point. He did elevate Blaine however.
You think he should have done more? I asked as she took a sip of her tea.
Being Agathas apprentice has perks like that, yes. I wondered if she wasnt going to say daughter or Granddaughter. I decided not to voice the thought, it didnt really matter right now. It was worth remembering when discussions like this occurred in future.
Honestly its rather impressive how a trainer as young as yourself has such a strong foundation. She tilted her head, How old are you?
Sixteen. I avoided saying that I would soon be seventeen as I knew that to be more child-like.
Oh Her eyes swept over me before grimacing. Thats surprising.
I looked to Koga who had so far been the most neutral if tightlipped of the group. Something about the way he suddenly loomed over the conversation gave off the impression he would be speaking next. How he did that without moving a muscle I had no idea. It is a wonderful accomplishment to have some control over your aura at such an age. That you have deep pools is impressive.
I blinked again in surprise. And how can you tell that?
Sensory abilities with aura are something that can be developed beyond the traditional channelling skills. You will eventually be able to feel sources around you depending on your training. I had to wonder if that didnt mean Id be able to stop him sneaking up on me.
He gave me a look as if knowing where my thoughts were going. His lips twitched upwards into a smirk that almost seemed challenging before it vanished making me wonder if it hadnt been a trick of the light.
You will be given some primers on expelling aura from your body and retaining control over it. This will form most of the moves you can learn and is the next step for you as an Aura wielder. From there you will have many different choices but know that it is not advised to try for all of the paths. Each path will take a long time to master and it is not advisable for you to attempt using them in actual situations unless you have mastery. Such sloppiness in the past has led to injuries or deaths in the past.
I nodded my head at that. The mystical source of energy having drawbacks made sense, otherwise, it would be more commonplace.
You have Dark-type and Rock-Type energy Brock? Agatha asked.
Yes, Ive attuned myself to Titan more than anyone else so I ended up with a dual typing you could say.
It will be harder for you to advance but your early start will perhaps offset this. With most of the pokemon you spend time with being Rock typed, that should be the easier aura type to train up.
I tilted my head at that, I hadnt found that to be an issue. Sometimes it felt like Dark type aura came easier to me. Karen narrowed her eyes but Agatha didnt notice my confused expression and instead barreled on with the conversation. If you decide to develop the bond between your pokemon further, make sure you only channel the type of energy they have within them into the bond.
What would that serve to do? I played ignorant even as I considered the possible applications. Was this what Mega-evolutions, Z type moves and gigantamax might require? Didnt the anime show that you needed an item for both yourself and the pokemon? Was this a method to do it without either? Or was it something different? I had spent a lot of time frequenting jewelers during my travels or at crystal sellers, just in case such a strange rock fell into my lap.
Agatha frowned at me. With you pushing energy into your pokemon they can be empowered beyond their current level to something stronger. They will hit harder, be able to endure more and be stronger in general. They will also be able to use what some texts refer to as signature moves.
That sounds pretty damn good.
Dont think it wont be hard work, Agatha said seriously.
I didnt get where I am from laying around. Ive been lucky, of that I have no doubt, but Ive still worked hard. This was true but probably undersold how lucky I was. Who could say theyd been granted another life with a general idea of what was going to happen and how to navigate the system? No one that I knew of.
Agatha nodded her head pleased. Well then Brock I would like to formally invite you to join us. I will warn that once you join, you may be called on in the event of a Legendary going out of control. This is something of a heavier responsibility than is currently expected of gym leaders with the focus not being just your area, but the entire Kanto region.
Koga stared at me. You will also not advertise or tell others of us without our approval. It would require us discrediting you to protect ourselves along with making us distrustful of anything you were to do or say going forwards. He bowed his head towards me with a small incline of his head. Just so you are aware of the stick such as it were. If you are discovered through no fault of your own we will take measures to protect you as required.
I nodded tightly at that.
Agatha leaned forward. You will be asked to continue training any apprentices you take in leading them towards Aura awareness. This will allow for stronger trainers in general. If we ask, you will train a select trainer for us, this will not be an outright apprenticeship unless you wish it to be, and the person is open to the idea. Certain trainers have floundered in the past without someone to act as a support for them. We in turn will take any trainers you have for us into the same arrangement. You will be allowed access to our resources to better learn. The best of which is access to current aura wielders and to a library specifically for this.
I nodded, extremely curious as to what I would find in the library and who would serve to teach me. I forced my eyes not to flicker hopefully to Karen. If my choices were an old woman, an old ninja and a beauty like her I knew who I was hoping for even as my mind pushed me for a different choice.
How do you support yourselves? Financial and such? I asked, interested.
The war was good and bad. Agatha watched me closely. During this time I supported a number of people but I realised this was untenable. I eventually developed a network to get things where they needed such as supplies and mail. Dont worry about financials or having to contribute there. I took care of the Guardians for this many, many years ago.
I decided to let that issue rest for now. Have you extended the offer to Sabrina yet? I watched them closely. Agathas lips tugged into a smile. Karens lips pinched slightly and Koga remained impassive.
Agatha inclined her head. Shes strong.
Karen turned her head away and pouted, apparently annoyed at what had been said. Agatha clicked her tongue at the younger woman. Dont deny it. She is. She has all of us beat in her potential. Her use of Psychic energies is something that would be a massive boon for us all. It has sadly made her less developed in areas we would require.
Shes a brat! Karen spat.
I glanced from Karen to Agatha with a raised eyebrow. Agatha smirked. Karen waltzed into the gym expecting to face her father and trounce him during her own journey, only to come face to face with a young Sabrina. She expected to crush the girl and tried taking it easy on her only to be flattened in turn despite the type advantage.
She did not flatten me! hissed Karen, her hair rising up as dark tendrils whipped around her. I bit my lips at the oddly childish reaction.
How many attempts did you have at the badge? Agatha said haughtily.
Karen clicked her tongue. I won against her best team! Agatha chose not to say anything and merely signalled to a giggling Tiffany for more tea. When Agatha had her refill she turned back to me.
Shes shown remarkable development in her weaker areas of late. She also has shown greater finesse with her skills. Her pokemon roster is obviously strong, but there is still room for growth. It is understood she has not yet retained a pokemon from the Ralts line for example. We have long considered her, but you were judged to be the better offer. We typically make sure to only take in a few people at most a year. We space things out to help you acclimatise to how we operate. Too many too fast makes for things falling through the cracks and friction that doesnt need to be there. Were already very busy people.
Some of us busier than others, snarked Karen towards Agatha.
My retirement will be well earned, yes, Agatha replied as if she wasnt saying it just to ignore Karens needling.
I hummed to myself. The calmness of Rock still holding me in a very clear state of mind let me recognise that it wasnt just for my benefit but also for the groups beyond the obvious. It was a method of controlling the culture. By teaching their methods they made sure things didnt change too quickly or for groups to form from the new inductees. It wasnt a secret these days that I was friendly with Sabrina after all.
There was also the possibility that they didnt have such an easy hook. I needed training for my dual typings. Sabrina was extremely advanced already. If anything theyd be coming to her asking for favours instead of the opposite. Id have to watch how things progressed.
Shed be perfect for being a strength within Kanto though. You should probably still make the offer, I said, putting the choice in their hands.
Koga and Agatha nodded, Karen slumped, grumbled something into her lap but then nodded. I got the impression she resented that she had to respect Sabrina.
Yes, yes we will be approaching her in the future Brock, dont worry for her. Agatha waved me off. Do you have any other questions? I shook my head. Good. Now, do you accept our offer?
I glanced around. No old roll of parchment with a blood quill? Koga snorted while Agatha laughed. Karen rolled her eyes.
A verbal agreement is best. Words might be wind, but for us, it is more than enough. We will tell our people you have joined us and people will introduce themselves or be introduced to you. Nothing official is written down lest sloppiness results in more people knowing than we desire.
I considered everything I had learned tonight. I wanted to grow stronger. I so far didnt have anything glaringly of concern but that didnt mean I would forget how this night started.
When you make your offer to people do you do that to all inductees? I doubted many would be able to stand against two, if not three Elite Four members.
Again, it was a test for new potential Elite trainers within our organisation Brock. We needed to know you had the ability to walk the walk. You cant avoid tossing people into the deep end sometimes in life. I huffed at her.
Going to do the same to Sabrina?
Karen leaned forward. Of course.
Ill look forward to her destroying you then, I said with a smirk that made her bare her teeth. Definitely, a rivalry there although I had no doubt Sabrina didnt even remember Karen. That would be amusing.
I accept.
