Chương 42: 43-Magma

As cliche as she knows it is, Amelia can't help but feel the weight of history every time she stands behind the pokecenter counter. She'd never admit it out loud, but Great Grandma Mimi's stories of her family's history always fascinated her when she was little, and it certainly instilled a deep respect and awareness of the thousand year legacy she'd inherited.

Every time she puts on the uniform, she can't help but remember Mimi's tales in the back of her mind, of Joy clan convoys braving every kind of weather or natural disaster to bring supplies and aid to distant settlements, their symbol being a bastion of safety that cities were built around. Of lone pink haired humans, protected only by their desire to help, walking between a rage maddened 'mon as tall as a building and a cowering trainer.

Their most ancient legends from the very beginning of the Joy clan's history and claimed to be at the beginning of the world itself, where the first Joy met the first Chansey and together they healed the lands, the seas, and the sky, thus in doing so they calmed the world so human and 'mon alike could be safe within it.

"A–a–and I accidentally stepped on Eevee's foot! A–a–and I don't have her pokeball. And now she's limping!" A six year old child sobs, holding up an exasperated looking eevee who says nothing, instead waving her 'injured' paw with a deadpan expression.

All that grand history and tradition, only for moments like this to make her want to laugh with how incongruous it is to what she feels her family is.

Instead, she stifles her laughter and reaches out to grab the 'mon from the human's clearly uncomfortably tight grip.

"Ok, may I see your Pokémon?" She asks, already gently pulling the 'mon away then placing her on the countertop. It's only then that she realizes that, without a pokeball, it's slightly more inconvenient to pretend to heal the 'mon. Especially if she doesn't want to bother her partner, or Chansey.

On autopilot, she begins doing some basic checks on the 'injured' paw and unsurprisingly finds it completely unharmed.

"It doesn't seem like Eevee's injured." She says, performatively doing some more exaggerated checks around the paw and joint.

"How about I–"

"No! She's hurt!" The child yells, stamping her foot with every word.

"You're supposed to fix it! That's the rule!"

…Ah.

Thinking quickly, Amelia ducks beneath the desk and opens the first aid kit. Unrolling a single loop of bandage from the roll and shearing it with the provided scissors, she pops back up with the scrap of white cloth and wraps it around Eevee's ankle, sending an apologetic glance at the unimpressed looking 'mon as she does.

"There we go! Without Eevee's pokeball I had to do it myself." She says with exaggerated cheer before falling into routine.

"Thank you for waiting, your Pokémon is fully healed. We hope to see you again."

Amelia's professional smile stays locked on her face as the child stares suspiciously at the 'mon, the bandage, and the nurse as she smiles back. Her professional expression remains unchanged as the child suspiciously reaches forward and grabs Eevee from her hands, the 'mon releasing an exasperated sigh as the child squints at the bandage with investigative focus.

"... Alright…" She says slowly, then looks back up at Amelia with suspicious focus.

"If this doesn't fix her I'm gonna tell Daddy, and he will not be happy."

Amelia blinks, considering how to respond to that, but before she can decide on what to say the child spins on her heel and starts walking back toward the door, stumbling slightly as Eevee finally wiggles out of her grip and trots ahead.

Watching the duo step out the door, the nurse idly wonders if that child knows where she's going, then concludes that Eevee is probably capable of getting them back wherever they came from.

Amelia kneels down, closes up the first aid kit, and as she stands up she sees her partner stepping out from the back room, wiping her flippers across her front in the way she always does after wearing nitrile gloves.

Chansey glances up and dips her body in a kind of extremely shallow bow, acknowledging her partner.

The trainer nods back.

"You were on cleaning duty?" She asks, locking her arms straight on the countertop and leaning to take weight off her feet.

"Did we miss something?"

"Chan." Chansey shakes her head.

"Chansey chansey chan ch an."

"Oh." Amelia hums, mind flashing back to the logsheet and trying to figure out if she flipped a digit in her head.

"I thought the ultrasonic bath fluid had another month before it had to be swapped?"

Chansey purses her lips slightly, an apparently subconscious tick she does when trying to figure out how to say something tactfully.

"Chansey…" She starts, gesturing as if indicating the absent Aunty Vee.

"Chansey chan cha an ansey."

Amelia giggles despite herself at her partner firmly trying to dance around the fact that Aunty Vee got the 'mon to do it because of her weird aversion to dirty water. Oddly enough she's perfectly fine with helping 'mon without thumbs get urine samples for some reason, but her aunt can't even touch used sink water, even with gloves.

Amelia almost asked about the seeming contradiction, but quickly suppressed the urge as she realized that calling attention to it might, instead of making her Aunt feel alright touching sink water, work in the opposite direction.

She clamps down on the giggles as she sees someone pass by the doors out the corner of her eye, but when she sees that they're not coming in, her attention is drawn to the TV playing quietly on the opposite side of the room in the upper corner. Commercials cutting away just as…

"Wait…" Amelia says, squinting at the tiny figures on the small screen across the room.

"... isnt that the rude boy–"

"Chan." Her partner confirms, the 'mon's gaze locked on the TV with fiery intensity.

But as they watch Wattson begin to say something, only to be cut off by the boy shouting something back, the doors to the pokecenter slide open, admitting a group of three trainers of similar age, and Amelia's attention is forced back to reality as they each start loudly arguing and shouldering each other to be the first to the desk, and thus the first to be healed.

Amelia glares behind her professional smile as they finally start trying to sort out a hierarchy, reaching for their pokeballs several times only to remember the state of their partners a fraction of a second later.

Amusingly, their fighting means it takes longer for all of them to be healed than they would if they'd formed an orderly line like they shouldhave.

Not amusing to her right now, but… in an abstract sort of way.

She'snot an eighty five year old woman, and these people aren't doing anything wrong, aside from being a minor nuisance, to herspecifically.

Eventually they shove themselves into a line and Amelia runs though them with mechanical precision, all behind a perfect professional mask that doesn't break even after they leave.

The nurse in training takes a slightly longer breath, pushing the feelings she'd certainlyinherited from Mimi into a little mental box at the lack of 'respect' for the pokecenter.

If they treated going to a pokecenter like it was something special then herfamily isn't doing a good enough job at helping people as best they can. The fact that they see her and the pokecenter as something completely unworthy of note or respect, despite their thousand year history, means they're doing a good jo– Amelia scrunches her eyes with an irritated grunt.

She's not an old woman, and they're not the weird ones here!

Glancing back at the TV, she realizes to her dismay that the battle is already over, Wattson handing a badge over to an ecstatic Owen while Combusken looks mortally offended at the both of them in the background, stomping forward slightly before pointing aggressively at Wattson, then pointing back at the trainers box with a crowing screech.

But just as both humans turn to look at the 'mon they cut to commercial The nurse in training huffs in amusement at Combusken's behavior, making a mental note to watch the fight later online to study how both trainer and 'mon act in battle.

A second later she realizes she could also watch his first gym fight for more data to dissect, adding that to her list of things she needs to do tonight, before they lose access to the internet and communication tomorro– Wait.

Amelia flinches, eyes daring across her memory as she desperately searches for…

"Chansey?" The human asks slowly, looking over to her partner, now at eye level with her.

"Did I call my mom yesterday?"

Chansey blinks, then tilts her head in thought.

"... chan." She half answers hesitantly.

At the confirmation, Amelia presses her palms against her eyes and groans.

Her mom's going to make such a big deal out of this, she just knows it.

—-- –_– —-- Walking back toward Aunt Vee's apartment complex, Amelia is surprised to see Sylveon exiting the ground floor door and stepping out onto the street.

Before they'd left their morning shift, Aunt Vee had told them that today is grocery shopping day, and asked for them to help Sylveon carry the groceries home before doing anything else. She'd accepted obviously but, since she didn't know what grocery store Sylveon would be going to, she'd assumed they'd be meeting at the apartment.

Staggering her steps to avoid a trolley before crossing the street, the nurse in training waves to the 'mon and calls out.

"Hey Sylveon!"

The 'mon looks over at her with a slightly irritated expression.

"Syl?" He grunts.

Amelia quickly abandons trying to process that with context clues and continues.

"I guess Aunt Vee didn't tell you, but she asked us to help out!" She says with a friendly smile.

At this, Sylveon stares at the two of them for a long moment, then lets out a sigh.

"... syl." He mutters, then flicks for them to follow with his ribbons.

"Veon, veon!"

But as Amelia makes to follow, she remembers the other reason she needed to go to the apartment, because Taillow decided he wanted to figure out how to do an air slash instead of waiting around in his ball, so he's still in the apartment.

Looking up and counting the floors with her eyes, she sees, thankfully, that the window that she'd left open for Taillow this morning hasn't been shut, so she cups her hands around her mouth and shouts at the opening.

"Tailow! C'mere!"

There's a long pause, but just as she starts to inhale again, the 'mon pokes his head out the window.

"... Tai?" He whistles back.

"Over here! fly down!" Amelia shouts, waving him down then holding out an arm as the bird leaps from the twelfth floor and glides smoothly to perch on the offered limb.

"Ansey, chan ch." Her partner comments, and Amelia nods.

"Yea! Excellent speed control with the tail too." She agrees, causing Taillow to literally puff up in pride, but as they get going and pass underneath a lightly buzzing transformer he retreats into his pokeball.

Amalia grimaces internally at the reaction.

That fear of electricity is probably going to be a pain to get rid of, but it's necessary. Thankfully it's a common problem, so there are guides.

Trotting to catch up to Sylveon, they follow him a short distance downtown crossing streets until they get to a grocery store close to the local university. From there shopping is a boring affair, Sylveon walking down the rows with a clear mental list of what they need, ribbons flying up and down the aisle, tossing foodstuff into the shopping trolley as Amelia pushes it along behind him. In no time at all they're watching a middle aged man scan items while a blaziken efficiently tosses them in paper bags.

But as they leave the store –Amelia and Chansey carrying three bags while Sylveon carries two– the trainer and Sylveon suddenly flinch as the sound of an explosion erupts across the space.

Wh– Amelia looks around wildly, searching all around for the source of the sound with a growing feeling of confused alarm. A half second later, she sees a pillar of flameerupting high enough she could see it over the buildings between her and the university.

Stolen novel; please report.

Behind her, someone shouts to call the fire department. But Amelia's attention is drawn to the crashing sound of shattering glass and tearing paper beneath her, looking down to see two broken bags of groceries leaking onto the sidewalk and a blur of pink shooting across the road toward the blaze.

"Sylveon! Wait!" Amelia shouts after him, dropping her own groceries and charging after him as the 'mon speeds around a corner.

"Where are you going!?"

Unfortunately the 'mon is much faster than the human, and she quickly loses sight of him again as he sprints through the gates to the university, Amelia following shortly behind.

But as she rounds the corner through the open gates, she stops dead at the sight before her.

Thankfully the building does not appear to actually be on fire, as it's a construction made of concrete, the large carved stone sign on the lawn in front of it informing her that it's the volcanology lab.

But, despite the lack of true flames, an ominous smoke is flowing from half of the second story windows and from somewhere to the back of the building where Amelia can't see. In front, people stare up in shock as others jog away from the building to a safe distance, a trickle still jogging out of the front door with their shirts covering their mouths.

Then there's another plumeof fire from behind the building, followed by the unmistakable sounds of a pokemon roaring a challenge, accompanied by the sound of crashing and breaking glass.

At the sound one of the soot-covered people, an older man wearing a lab coat, leaps to his feet and tries to charge back into the building, only to be stopped by the person next to him grabbing his arm.

"No! Let go of me!" He screams, tugging at his arm.

"Those gangsters are destroying the research! We have to stop them!"

But before Amelia can process any of that, she sees Sylveon again, covered in soot as he hurriedly leads a human out of the entrance, wrapping an arm in his ribbons so thoroughly she can't see any skin.

At the sight she runs toward him.

"Sylveon!" She calls, coming to a stop.

"Are you ok!?"

The 'mon doesn't respond, continuing to guide the human further away from the burning building, but as she tries to follow she's stopped by a voice calling out to her side.

"Um… Nurse Joy?"

She turns, halfway though opening her mouth to deny the assertion, but then her mouth clicks shut as she processes what she's seeing.

A man, somewhere between twenty and twenty five, stares down at her with a face twisted in pain, the sleeve of his shirt burned away, replaced by red welts from the shoulder to his elbow.

He offers a strained smile.

"Could you help me? Please?"

Staring at the wound, Amelia finds herself at a loss for words, trying desperately to figure out what she can do.

Her eyes flick back to the fire, then over to the twenty-odd other soot stained people standing or sitting in the grass with unknown injuries themselves and she doesn't have a first aid kit, but Chansey can deal with that.

Then she realizes that there could be other people inside the building and she has no idea how to help them and because she cant help more people could get hurtunless she can figure it out and he's still just looking at her like she can help him but she can't because she can't heal and she has no idea what to–

"Ansey." Chansey says in a calm voice as she thuds to the ground at her side, instantly stopping her steady but sluggish bounding run and arriving only now, then immediately reaches out to the injured man with a flipper engulfed in green sparkles.

"Chan."

Amelia twitches as the panicked sound of the ocean recedes, taking a deep breath as she tries to follow Chansey's command to focus.

Break down the problems.

She can't run into a burning building, especially with what are apparently gangsters inside, trying anything like that will most likely just make the professional rescue workers job harder. She also can't heal, but she can…

"Sylveon stop!" She calls, grabbing a ribbon as the 'mon tries to run back into the building.

"You can't go in there!"

The 'mon stares at her in rage, ripping the ribbon out of her hand with a yank."

Syl!

Syl veon!"

Amelia grabs the ribbon again.

'No! You don't even know if there's anyone still in there!" She shouts back, pointing at the soot stained people around her.

"I'll find out if there's still people in the building and where. You help find people with injuries for Chansey to heal."

Sylveon doesn't move for a second, staring at her, but Amelia doesn't have time to keep arguing, so she grabs her second pokeball from her hip.

Assuming the majority of people got out of the building, she'd guess there were around twenty five people inside, unless a pocket is trapped somewhere.

If there is a trapped group they'd probably be on the second floor.

"Taillow!" She calls, grabbing the 'mon's attention as he appears and confused blinks turn to a squawk of alarm at the fire.

"Fly up to the second floor windows and see if there's anyone inside.

Go!"

The 'mon flies off at her instruction and Amelia turns back to the first person, now rubbing his freshly healed arm.

"Thank–"

"Do you know how many people were in the building?" Amelia interrupts as Chansey finishes healing another person and runs toward Sylveon's call.

"Do you not see anyone out here, or did you see anyone trapped on your way out?"

Out of the corner of her eye, she sees Sylveon rushing past almost everyone after giving them a quick check, only calling for Chansey every one in five people, and most of those injuries aren't even burns, rather minor scrapes and bruises, presumably from the rush to escape the smoke filled building.

At her questioning, the man appears caught off guard for a moment, then starts stammering a response.

And as she listens, Amelia has to try extremely hard to hear it over the thudding of her own heartbeat.

–_– Tanya hurriedly shoves a heal pulse into another injured human, this one showing obvious concussion-like symptoms along with a heavily bleeding cut just above the hairline above the ear. At her heal the human's slightly too wide pupils abruptly constrict to normal, then just as quickly widen again when the heal pulses adrenal side effect kicks in.

But just as soon as Tanya lifts her arm Sylveon's ribbons wrap around the man's shoulders and seem to almost become more real for a single instant before his alarmed flailing stops before it can really begin.

Tanya quickly moves on, bounding over to the next person she'd been directed to, an older man with greying hair in a lab coat who's struggling against two younger men holding his arms.

"Let go of me! There's still time!" He shouts.

"We can't let them get away with this! I– hng!" He grunts, wincing as he tries to use a leg with an already swelling ankle to pull harder and almost falls into the grass before looking back up at his distressed looking captors.

"Y–You're in on this aren't you? Well I swear, you'll never work in a research laboratory again if it's the last thing I–"

"Sit.

Down." Tanya says calmly, picking the man up by the waist and using a combination of physical strength and telekinesis to lay him on the ground, shoving his chest back down as he tries to rise.

"You're only making this worse."

Poking at the injured ankle, she determines that, while originally he'd probably just rolled it, further stress on the injury seems to have knocked something loose, and now the joint isn't fitting right. Halfway to a dislocation.

"You." She says, pointing at one of the men who were keeping the man from running into the building.

"Give me your labcoat."

She needs to keep the ankle in its proper place while she's healing it or the ligaments can heal too loose.

The man hesitantly points to himself after a second.

"Me? I–I'm not hurt?"

"No your labcoa–

" Tanya emphasises before cutting herself off at the realization of the language barrier, then her eyes begin to glow purple in preparation to just take it–

"Slyveon, help Chansey, ribbons on the ankle!" Amelia calls from a short distance away, the 'mon looking up from tending to a distressed looking human and sprinting over.

Tanya blinks, adjusting her plan quickly.

"I'll move the ankle into the proper position, hold it there." She says, ignoring a muffled hiss of pain though clenched teeth from the patient, followed by a much longer hiss when the ribbons wrap around the joint and squeeze.

Then her arms sparkle green and the man starts to thrash about with new vigor, Tanya holding down the injured leg until she can feel the love saturate the body and stop attacking the injuries.

"He's healed." She says, lifting her arms and scanning for the next marked target.

As she works, the 'mon keeps an eye on the building as it starts to catch fire in ernest, a window on the second floor bursting from the inside and letting out a long tongue of flame that reaches into the sky.

Soon enough, the last person is healed, and almost immediately after Amelia jogs over as the soot stained people form into a crowd while a few run off to find a phone in the nearby buildings.

"Ok, as far as anyone can tell everyone from the lab made it out." She says, glancing at the building as yet another window bursts.

"Apparently five people in a group called Team Magma broke in and started setting things on fire..." She trails off, staring at the blaze as it grows hotter.

"... do you think they're alri–?"

She's interrupted by the sight of five heavily soot-covered people in gas masks and goggles running out the front door, and as they step into the clear air, they remove their masks one after the other before one immediately points an accusative finger at another to his left.

"I told you it was a left turn at the stairs!" He shouts, throwing the gas mask to the ground.

"It was literally three doors and a hallway! How did you get us lost!?"

The accused yelps indignantly and points back."

This wasn't the plan! We agreed to start fires after we grab everything! But you and Pat just had–"

"Hey!" Shouts a third, roughly shoving the second man.

"No real names!"

The argument continues, and as it devolves Tanya keeps scanning over the criminals, looking for the reason they're so confident.

They're standing in the open, no obvious weapons on their person aside from two pokeballs on each of their hips. That might be enough to inspire confidence considering the fact that none of the students or researchers seem to have pokeballs, Amelia certainly seems unnerved. But they don't have any 'mon currently out, so they're probably assuming Tanya and her partner will conclude it's a bad bet to…

The 'mon blinks at her train of thought.

…that is of course assuming they plan on attacking the criminals, which she isn't, that is the role of police and first responders. Interfering would only add confusion and break the understood rules when interacting with situations like this."

Shut up!

All of you!" Shouts a more mature sounding man, interrupting the bickering trio and holding a metal briefcase.

"Extract now! Argue later! Before–" As if summoned by her thoughts, Tanya hears the quiet sound of sirens rapidly grow louder before a small fire truck the size of an ambulance speeds around the corner into the university proper and plows though the grassy quad toward them.

"Boss!" One of the arguing trio shouts an alarm, pointing at the fire truck as it skids to a stop and four people in full fire suits jump out the vehicle.

"It's the fire department!"

Everyone flinches in unison at the proclamation, but their leader recovers first, pointing at three gangsters in a wave, "You three, slow them down!" He shouts as firefighters break into a run toward them, reaching for pokeballs on their hips.

The three who were ordered to stay hesitate, glancing at their leader as he runs in the opposite direction with a person who's yet to remove their gas mask, but as two of the firefighters send out a swampert each, they likewise grab pokeballs and flick them open.

"Alright you puffed up buzzkills, lets see how you like– glk!" One starts as a slugma appears in a flash of light, but he's interrupted when one of the swampert open their mouth and release a torrent of water, knocking both 'mon and human back and onto the ground.

It doesn't go much better for the other two, but Tanya's attention is drawn to the two as they run in the opposite direction, too far for her to easily get a telekinetic grip on them… if she were to try and catch them, which she isn't. Regardless, they're likely going to get away.

"They're getting away." Amelia mutters, unintentionally mirroring her partner's thoughts.

"Taillow, keep a safe distance, but follow the–" She stops as both criminals freeze where they stand at the strengthening sound of a rumbling engine from the direction they were running."

Crap.

The leader grunts, tightening his grip on the briefcase before pointing at his remaining subordinate as he turns to run down a nearby gap between buildings.

"Stall her! I need thirty seconds!"

As soon as the words leave his mouth, a green haired woman in a police uniform slides around a corner just before he's out of sight, a growlithe leaping out the side car before it's even stopped and sprinting for the magma member still in his gas mask as he releases a camerupt from a pokeball.

"Fire blast!" He shouts, muffled through the mask, but neither Growlithe nor her partner slow down as the 'mon opens his mouth wide to inhale. Instead Growlithe speeds up, shooting past the 'mon as the officer rips a small object from her belt and sprays a stream of liquid into the open mouth.

The criminal takes a startled step back as Growlithe continues charging toward him and reaches for his second pokeball, but Growlithe catches the arm in his teeth with a leap before the man has a chance and drags him to the ground while the criminal's 'mon staggers for a second before falling over with a snore.

The officer gives a sharp whistle the instant the man hits the ground, getting her partner's attention and pointing down the alley.

"Runner!" She calls, pulling a pair of handcuffs and roughly pulling the man onto his stomach as Growlithe sprints in the direction she pointed.

But before Growlithe can even get to the intersection, Tanya's head snaps to the sky as an orange blur shoots into the– Is that a dragon?

After a moment of shocked disbelief, she recalls some promotional material with artist's renditions of a similar creature. With a bit more mental digging she remembers that it's just a non-native 'mon she'd not studied, something that starts with a 'c' if she remembers correctly.

Tracking the dragon across the sky, she slowly pulls her egg back in her pouch, only realizing now that she'd taken it out in the first place. Looking down, she sees the police officer looking up from where she's kneeling on the magma member's back and speaking into a walkie talkie.

Looking around as the officer grabs Camerupt's pokeball and recalls the sleeping 'mon, Tanya realizes Amelia had moved from beside her and is now talking to one of the firefighters, gesturing to Taillow then to the second floor windows. The firefighter nods seriously before waving for another to follow and marching toward the fire, pulling down his clear breathing mask and twisting a valve on the back of his tank as he does.

In short order, all four members of team magma who were caught are brought to one spot by the green haired officer, assisted by four more of various ages and genders who arrived shortly afterward, and as the swampert spray water through flaming windows dousing the fire, Amelia trots over to one of the officers and gestures at the criminals.

A second later she waves Tanya over from where she's trying not to get in the way of any of the professionals, then points at the battered looking humans as they sit in a line.

"Could you heal them?" She asks.

Tanya hesitates for a moment, glancing at her partner with a mildly inquisitive expression, so the human shrugs and continues.

"Everyone needs healing." The nurse in training says simply.