Back on the main path, Will, Sanakou, Tenrou, and their companions were getting a bit nervous; Axl wasn't one to joke, and he had run off into the woods a little over 5 minutes ago. They knew he had said to stay put, but that seemed to become less important than finding if he was alright with each passing second. For the next while however, they decided to trust his judgment and stay put. They took a seat down by the side of the path, anxiously waiting for any sign of where he had gone; the sun was beginning to set, and while it didn't get dark too quickly here on the west side of the Coronet mountains, it was still probably a mere half-hour until sunset, and twilight fades surprisingly fast when you're waiting for something- or someone...

Meanwhile, Axl and Terry had scouted even further towards the Windworks facility, watching for what the activity was about. They moved so that they had a vantage of a first-floor window and could peek inside from the foliage without being noticed by the criminals who had shanghaied the place. What they saw was definitely an eye opener; among the swarming activity of the criminals' presence in the building, which looked to number at least one hundred, the stronger of the Galactic recruits, along with their muscle-bound pokémon, such as machoke and hariyama, were hauling some kind of machinery in from the cargo garage, where there must have been some sort of truck that drove it in. They moved it so that it was adjacent to a bank of technical-looking control panels, then headed back to the loading bay in back.

Chapter End Notes:This was pretty fun to write, I must admit. The people in the trees are definitely going to cause wreak havoc once they start doing what they came to do, and it seems that they're waiting on a suspiciously familiar blonde trainer, doesn't it..?

ORIGINALLY POSTED ON JAN 11, 2009:
Well this was pounded out in the spare time I had during the train ride over here, and I feel quite good about it. Funny thing about the songs that came up on my Winamp playlist AFTER I had finished the bulk of the chapter, see the journal I made for today to see what that was (hint: it was near 11:00 PM when it happened)
EDIT FOR AGNPH: This is referring to the journal I posted on my DeviantArt account at the time, which is still there as a deviation, if you're interested in what I'm referring to- it *is* rather ironic...

Well I haven't much else to say right now, since I barely got 3 hours of sleep in between now and then, so I... am exhausted. If there's problems with DA's HTML formatting again, I may just start linking to a word doc... Naw, but really- I'll try to fix 'em before I totally crash here in a few minutes, so sit tight, 'kay?

And finally, yes. I know it's very different in style and pace from the last number of chapters (except maybe chapter 1) but given what's happening, it gives the right sense of anticipation and crescendo. Don't worry, after things calm down a bit it will return to a (mostly) single-POV story again, but if I left out one or more of the different perspectives it would make much less sense until much, much later. Just trust me on this one.

Other than that, insert standard disclaimer here, right? I don't own Pokemon, or any related properties, blah blah. Will, Sanakou, and them are my characters, so don't use without permission; they wouldn't appreciate it.

Disclaimer: All publicly recognizable characters, settings, etc. are the property of their respective owners. The original characters and plot are the property of the author. The author is in no way associated with the owners, creators, or producers of any media franchise. No copyright infringement is intended, and is applicable for all consecutive chapters that follow.