The Legend Thief - Part 5: The Cure

Chapter 3: The Instinct Base

Even if she told herself that she wouldn't get hurt, fear would still flutter viciously inside her. But Shell smothered her fear at the bottom of her heart, but wisps of it still remained. It won't kill you, she thought, you won't get hurt, you'll be---

"COME ON!" Raichu yelled as he pushed the unwilling shell in and went after.

She landed on a giant cushion that broke her fall. She quickly climbed out, and wobbly walked over to her friends. They were standing on a metal balcony, overlooking the Instinct base. Shelly grabbed the fencing, and nearly tripped at what she saw.

She had forgotten that the Instinct base was so... tall on the inside. Stairs and elevators were practically the only use of transportation. Balconies lined the walls, some small, others as long as hallways. After the recent fall, Shelly was not looking forward to such heights so soon.

"Isn't your room that one?" Pichu pointed to a door on the left.

"Yes. And it's my office," Raichu said. Shelly laughed under her breath.

The friends quickly went down some metal stairs, and as they did so, an Instinct member approached them. He had black hair, and wore an orange hoodie. He appeared to be the same age as them.

"Raichu Human!" The Instinct member said, "We've received news on the legendaries..."

"What?" Raichu asked. "Quickly, Wonton, we're on a tight schedule."

"Uh, we have intel that Cobalion and Terrakion have been captured," Wonton said. "That means The Guy is going to capture Virizion next."

"Tell some Instincts to try and protect the area wherever Virizion's rumored to live," Raichu ordered, "He'll show up there, so try to keep him at bay."

"Yes O Great Fidget Spinner!" Wonton quickly left to carry out Raichu's command.

" 'O Great Fidget Spinner'?" Ravisu laughed.

"It's tradition!" Raichu explained. "My dad was called 'The Grand Bottle Flipper.' And my grandmother was called 'Mistress of the Rainbow Loom!'"

"Instincts..." Bell sighed, and laughed quietly. The seven came to Raichu's "office."

Pokeballs lined the left wall (most of them with the Instinct logo on them). There were computers on the right wall. In the back, there was a single desk for doing homework. Under the desk, there was a little basket of papers.

"Here it is," Raichu said, putting the basket of papers on the desk. He gave everyone a stack of papers to look through.

Shelly skimmed through her stack of papers. Some of them were maps of sacred pokemon places throughout the world (like where to find Cresselia and Darkrai). Others, were of data, like which rainbow loom was the stretchiest, or the official bottle-flipping world record--

"YAS!!!" Rudia shouted. Everyone rushed over. "A MAP TO THE BIGGEST SQUIRTLE SPAWN IN THE WORLD!!!" Shelly shook her head, and sighed.

"Rudiia!" Bell said, exasperated, "No one cares about that!"

"I do!" Rudia said indignantly. Shell tried to ignore their squabble, and went back to work. She shifted aside a paper of music notes, with the title Meloetta's Song. She would look into that later.

Shelly recognized one of the papers as the map to the Pokemon Sanctuary. There were architectural plans of the team bases being constructed, and history on the creation of the universe.

As Shelly brushed aside the blueprints of a pokeball, she found a folded paper. She opened it, to reveal a world atlas.

"Look at this guys," Shelly said, tracing her hands over the delicate paper. Certain locations were marked with magenta dots. She scanned the map for razzberries.

"Woah!" Pichu gasped. "This is amazing!"

"Look!" Quinci commented, pointing at a dot in the U.S. "That's the Pokemon Sanctuary!"

"The original razzberries were found in Africa," Ravisu said. "Who knew?"

Shelly spotted what she was looking for, "GMO razzberries were invented in India."

"And look!" Bell added, pointing to a dot not far from it. "The only cure is to find OMG razzberries, or blooberries. And blooberries are found right there! In an Oasis in China's Gobi desert!!!"

"YAY!!!" Quinci cheered. "NOW LETZ GET MOVIN'!!!"

***

Zapdos snuck into the Instinct Base using a secret passage he had built that lead straight to Raichu's office. He climbed into a small hole and the peak of the mountain and dove down. He landed in Raichu's office and saw papers strewn everywhere.

"So disorganized," Zapdos grumbled, straightening up the papers. He couldn't even find the world map! But Zapdos finally found what he was looking for and flew off, a paper clamped in his beak.

The key to capturing Mew and Mewtwo.