Chương 73: 73-Casualties

Sitting on the back of her recent partner and career gym 'mon, Charizard, Flannery holds tight to his neck as she squints through the wind down at the volcano as they finally gain enough height to look down on it. Of all the things she thought she'd be doing today, this is so far down the list she never would have guessed it. She thought with the gym closed following the earthquake it would be a quiet day of catching up on some of the bureaucracy around dealing with the minor damages the quake caused.

But when her office's old fashioned teletype machine linked to the emergency line to Evergrande spat out a message saying to get ready for an upcoming raid on a potential group of Team Magma members on top of the volcano there's not much else she could do but start getting ready. It's the job after all, the part of the job that her grandfather only had to do a handful of times in his entire career and the part that scares her more than anything, but it's the job.

Because a city's gym leader is the first and sometimes only line of defence when danger too severe for anyone else to handle comes to the town she calls home. But as she started getting ready, barely thirty seconds after receiving the teletype a familiar Swellow was almost breaking her office window with the force he was hitting it, a folded letter in his beak.

Any other time, when she opened that window and read the letter she would have been more cautious, if it had some from any other person the doubt would have had her delay or hesitate. But that teletype and a Joy's signature at the bottom of the letter's messy scrawl had Flannery change her plans and leap into action. It took less than five minutes to grab her Gym's satellite phone and her personal team before she's in the air shooting toward the smoking volcano. She hopes it's not too late.

Finally getting high enough Charizard levels off and as they fly around the volcano searching for the madmen on top it she sees bright flashes near the southern point of the rim and taps the side of Charzard's neck, pointing at them as her partner first looks back to see, then down at the flashes and rumbles in agreement.

Immediately Flannery has to grip her arms and legs around her partner even tighter as he tucks his wings and enters a steep dive just to the east of the apparent fight, flaring his wings at the last minute so the impact when the hit the ground is merely bone rattling instead of bone shattering. The instant they're on the ground the Gym leader throws herself off the 'mon, hands running down the bandoller on her hips, releasing the rest of her team in a staccato burst of light all around her.

Apparently the Joy's partner chansey had gone ahead alone to try and stop them herself and Charizard landed them just far enough to be out of sight but not out of earshot of the fight as explosions still crack over the wind. She needs to be quick.

"Remeber! It's like a double battle! Keep an eye out for your teammates and don't be afraid to back off!" She shouts, wincing as a massive explosion erupts from in front of them accompanied by the sound of ripping metal and shattering rock.

"Charizard, height! Arcanine, Rapidash, go!" Her three fastest 'mon launch ahead over land and air as she charges the distance herself, keeping pace with the remainder of her partners as the others speed off ahead, moving through a gap in the boulder field and into the clearing. She takes in the sight before her at a glance, feels her brain stutter, then looks around again. … A chansey did this?

There's a lot of Magma people here, about half of them and their partners staring at a large hole in the nearby rock before looking towards her with alarmed shock. Unconscious 'mon and blackened craters litter the area, near the volcano there's a lump of twisted metal that she's reasonably sure was the machine the letter warned of across from what she realizes actually looks like the ruined doors of a bunker, but the machine certainly isn't doing anything right now.

Then her mind filters that out and realizes two things; one, that there are humans laying around in the rock and rubble just like the pokemon, and two, of the Magma members still standing, a few are turning to look at her in a way she recognises as preparing to fight her team as they rocket into the clearing. Flannery locks eyes with them, and realizes she's not really sure what to say in this situation.

"I… er– Hands up!" She improvises, the order amplified by Charzard's shadow and Arcanine's barking growl.

"Dont move! You've already lost!" She winces internally at that last one, but before she's even finished speaking almost every single one of the remaining humans are already raising their hands in surrender. Of course not everyone surrenders immediately, out the corner of her eye she sees one guy partially hiding behind a rock trying to make a run for it.

"Arcanine!" She shouts, pointing at the attempted runner and her partner doesn't need clarification, running past the man before spinning around in his path and snarling.

"Arc! Anine!" The 'mon barks and the man immediately stumbles back the way he came, seeming more alarmed than she'd expect. With the attempted runner caught, Flannery realizes quite suddenly that a good portion of the humans laying on the ground just aren't moving, which –while fine for pokemon– is very not good for humans.

Keeping her eye on everyone, she takes a step closer to one of those people and, thankfully, he actually is conscious, just pretty badly burned on his right side and with a funny looking slope in that shoulder. Now that her heartbeat is no longer thundering in her ears she can hear the area is full of groans, interspersed with hoarse shouts of pain.

Flannery looks away after confirming he's breathing and looking back at her, then reaches into her pocket, removes her league satellite phone, and after a bit of fumbling figures out how to get the thing's autodialer to call Evergrande. She presses the phone against her ear and as it rings she waves at the still standing criminals insistantly.

"Just– Get over here! No wait! Retrieve any pokemon, put down any pokeballs, then go stand over there!" She shouts, pointing at a spot where she'll be able to keep a close eye on them. She's reassured when she sees the rest of her team start to spread to enforce the command as the phone connects with the strange electronic choppy distortion all non-landline phones have.

"Gym Leader, where are you!?" Her league contact shouts angrily over the phone.

"We're having an existential crisis over here! You can't just drop off the–""I'm sorry! I just– I'm on the volcano right now and I–"" What!?"

"–I found the Team Magma members and I think I found the machine too." She continues overtop the shocked exclamation.

"But if it is the machine it's very broken, also lot's of injured people, unconscious pokemon but humans too and I'm getting worried about how little they're moving. There's also some kinda… bunker or tunnel or something that's up here too." She adds. There's a few seconds of silence on the other end of the line.

"... You already disabled the machine?"

"No sir." Flannery shakes her head as the Team Magma members who can walk or limp are slowly herded by her team into one spot.

"It was all like this when I got here, but I'm only seeing Magma members, I think the 'mon that did this is still in the bunker." The letter was slightly vague about what partner went off on their own up the volcano, and Flannery is struggling to believe a chansey could have caused this. There's another few seconds of silence, but this time there's the sound of muffled talking on the other end of the line before the voice returns.

"Ok, new orders from the National Defence Coordination Group; stay right there and make sure no one can run off or tamper with the machine at any cost, people are already on their way."

"Wait, what about the…" Flannery trails off as she realizes she's speaking to a dial tone. She looks at the darkened hole in the rock, framed by shattered fragments of painted plaster and twisted metal. Then she sees that, while most of the Magma members are slowly making their way to the center, a pair of people near the destroyed bunker doors aren't. If you come across this story on Amazon, be aware that it has been stolen from Royal Road. Please report it.

One is laying flat on the ground while the other is kneeling over him, trying to do something that's obscured by his body. Flannery squints and starts walking closer. She is not comfortable with people being so close to a potential way of escape.

"Hey! If he needs help you can help him away from the– hrk!" Walking closer lets her get a good look at the guy on the ground, and Flannery retches at the sight. That's a lot of blood. Immediately she rushes closer, kneeling down next to the man holding a completely soaked hood against the wound along his side and just as quickly realizes she doesn't have anything to help. She looks over her shoulder desperately at the other standing Magma members.

"Take off your hoods! We need to stop the bleeding!" She shouts, getting up and running over to grab the red cloth before running back and throwing it at the man keeping pressure. Then she takes a serious look at the rest of the unmoving humans all around her, and realizes she has no idea how bad things are, and no matter how bad they actually are, these people need help now and she's in no way equipped to offer it.

For a moment she reaches for the satellite phone again, but realizes that they're already sending people as fast as possible. But it might not be fast enough. After a second of deliberation she grabs her short range radio.

"Hey! Can anyone hear me!?" She shouts into the radio. After a few seconds she hears some vaguely human sounding crackles, not good, but hopefully they can hear her better with their big receivers in the valley.

"Ok! This is Flannery! There's some people up here in critical condition! They need help now!" She shouts, stepping closer to the ridge of the mountain for a possibly better signal.

"I can't really hear you, but it's bad! Get help up here as soon as possible!" Releasing the button on the walkie talkie, she looks around again, taking in the desperate and haggard looks every human is giving her and the concerned unsure looks her team is casting around the entire scene. Only now does she realize that, for all the groans of pain and the frightened stares they're giving to her and her team, they've not spoken once. Then Blaziken's head snaps to look at the bunker.

"Blaz." She says with certainty, pointing into the dark.

"Blaziken." More injured people!? Flannery feels a scream rising up in her throat as the overwhelming scope and seriousness of all this threatens to drown out her ability to think. Then she blinks, and any hesitation is burned away by her fire.

"Keep guard." She says with a wave at her team, glancing up to confirm Charizard is still circling calmly above, then points to Blaziken.

"We're getting them out." Her teammate nods sharply and falls in line right beside her as they step into the settling dust and dark of this bunker. Taking a second for her eyes to adjust, she realizes she's in what was once some kind of large garage or workshop area, complicated looking machines lining all the walls not opposite what was once the door. That wall is just a pile of metal and shattered concrete.

Flannery glances up at the heavily cracked ceiling and walls before she can finally hear the labored breathing and agonized groans deeper in and she pushes forward, a flame appearing in her partner's hand to light the way. Stepping through a jagged hole in the left wall, she sees what at first looks like a pile of rubble, then realizes that there are limbs in that pile. … Oh, arms are not supposed to bend that way.

She starts removing the rubble with her bare hands, and without prompting Blaziken starts to help, dragging the injured person the rest of the way out of the rubble before Flannery takes over, feeling how agonizingly long it takes as she carefully drags the limp body out of the bunker and into the light. That really doesn't look good. But she doesn't know how to help other than to get him out of immediate danger! And she's not even sure this is a good idea!

She runs back in, passing by her partner as the 'mon slowly drags another human, though for the 'mon it's more to avoid jostling the human than a lack of strength. In the dim red dark, she finds another pair of shoulders and starts dragging, ignoring how sticky her hands feel. She has to believe she's helping, that these people can be helped. But as she gets into the light again, she hears Charizard let out a warning roar and looks up to see– The Swellow! Dodging a breath of flame with some brown loop in his claws.

The Joy Swellow!

"Charizard! Let them through!" She shouts and the fire breath cuts out instantly allowing the new 'mon to drop the rest of the way down to the ground. As he lands Flannery realizes the brown thing she saw was a bandoleer, full of pokeballs, and the instant they touch the ground one ball opens to reveal a chansey.

Appearing in the flash of light, the 'mon looks around with quickly widening eyes at what she sees around her, before instantly grabbing the bandoller at her feet and tapping each button one after the other, releasing chansey after chansey. Then Blaziken appears at her side again, releasing her grip on another injured human and Flannery remembers what she needs to do, so she turns around back into the bunker.

Pulling more rubble off of the pile now seems to be replaced with just as much from the large crack in the wall, but handful by handful she helps get another person free. This one's conscious, so she throws his arm over her shoulder and helps him walk back out.

He freezes when he sees the swarm of chansey outside, wheezing and pulling against her grip despite struggling to stand or even breathe, but she overpowers him and half drags him out to a chansey that was directed to meet them by a single syllable and a gesture from the slightly smaller 'mon that seems to be commanding the pack.

In the short time Flannery has been away things have gotten noticeably better, almost all the unconscious 'mon have disappeared, more people are standing and most of the ones that aren't are at least sitting up. But there are still a handful that aren't. Flannery turns around and heads back in as her partner drags another out. When she gets back to the rubble she can't see anyone trapped anymore and attempting to dig further in doesn't work even if there is.

She's done all she can do, and people who can do more are on their way. Then she looks up, deeper into the bunker lit by red emergency lights and a shrill echoing alarm, and sees a smaller pile of rubble deeper inside, next to what looks like it used to be a doorway. There's not a question in her mind when she pushes further in, looking for more.

Moving in a running crouch up to the pile, she glances down what she assumed to be a corridor only to see what she thought would be a hall or a room or something is just a small alcove backed by a wall with two dimly glowing purple lights. Suddenly those eyes flare much brighter, and Flannery feels weightless for a moment. Then the back of her head hits the wall behind her with a crack and gravity returns with her slumping down to the floor. Ow.

Flannery blinks rapidly to clear the stars from her eyes and holds up her hands in surrender.

"Gh– Wait! I'm not– I'm not Magma!" She coughs, the pain of what just happened to her rapidly climbing.

"I'm here to stop them!" The gym leader groans from her position on the floor as she can already feel the eye on the side that got hit swelling up and a kind of shooting bone deep pain from where the back of her head hit the concrete. She glances up at the long crack her head left in the wall then at the chansey she'd confused with a wall, and Flannery's almost taken aback by the expression of pure shock clear on her face.

The Gym leader slowly starts pushing herself off the ground, helped by Blaziken who appears at her side in a sudden blur of heat.

"Aziken?" The 'mon asks her trainer before looking over at the chansey.

"Blaz az ken–""I'm fine." Flannery interrupts waving her partner away before looking up at the wall of a 'mon.

"Is there anyone else in this place?" For a moment the chansey doesn't move before, slowly, she shakes her head, both sides of her body sliding against the concrete as she does.

"An." Flannery nods.

"Ok. Let's get out of here, more people will be here to help any minute." She says, wobbling slightly on her first step before recovering and leading the group back out of the bunker. The first thing the Gym leader notices when she steps through the hole and into the large entrance room is that more help has finally arrived. Five humans with accompanying Dragonite, clothed in green camouflage and a red plus on their helmets are now among the crowd of injured Magma members.

As she continues to walk toward the exit the thud of the chansey's footsteps behind her stutters, looking back and with the daylight, it's clear that the 'mon is deeply exhausted. Despite no visible injuries she lacks that almost intangible glow, an effect of heavy energy depletion. But despite looking like she's struggling to find the energy to walk, the 'mon is staring at the scene in front of her with an even more shocked expression than before.

Following the 'mon's gaze, Flannery sees that the 'mon is looking at one of the more heavily injured Magma guys getting CPR while one of the chansey pushes healing energy into the guy who was bleeding next to the door who is now sitting up, pale, but conscious. Then one of the Magma members looks toward her and makes a choked noise of raw panic, followed by several more humans and 'mon looking over.

Almost immediately Flannery hears a pokeball recalling behind her, then the clatter of a ball clattering to the ground right at her feet. The pain in her head is quickly developing into an extremely severe headache, so when Flannery reflexively picks up the ball with a wobble and steps into the light as someone waves her over, she's only half listening as the man quickly admonishes her for going into the bunker, then moves on to talking about how they're going to all these Magma guys down the mountain safely.

She suspects even without the mind fogging headache a lot of this would be going over her head, so as she tries to listen for what she needs to do she's looking around, watching as several people continue to receive chest compressions as they're loaded onto foldable stretchers and the sound of a helicopter begins to echo up from the valley. And her thoughts are consumed by a single question. How could this happen?