Changing Seasons [Ethos Prompt]

The loss of the battle still weighed heavily on his heart, sure he did win a few, and as he looked at his pokemon, he narrowed his gaze in thought. Aeson couldn’t let himself lose again, they’d need to train and get stronger, but he wouldn’t overwork them either, they were too precious for that. With a sigh, he stood up from where he was, and moved his hand through his dual colored hair, his green eyes showing a bit of sadness on his face. He would need to be heading out soon, the message from the Ethos branch had reached him. He was sure that others were also called in, he wasn’t sure what this meeting was about, but he was hoping no one was going to be chewed out for losing the battle. That’s not usually how upping the morale of comrades and things worked.

“Alright you three, are you ready to take a little trip? We’re going to be heading into Grovehart, which means you three will need to go up in your pokeballs until we get there at least, then I’ll let you out.” He paused in his speech, and pulled out the pokeballs, holding each one out individually. “We’ll go and see what our leader has to say to us and what our next course of action may be. I know what we will be doing.” 

Knight was hesitant, he didn’t like leaving his trainer’s side for anything, most of the time they were always near one another, but he also understood the reasoning. He was quick to boop his nose against the button, allowing the red light to take him into the pokeball. Lil King seemed to be angry with the idea, as Queen walked up to the pokeball and booped it, easily going within it. After some hesitation from Lil King, he finally poked the pokeball unhappily and went into his pokeball as well.

With all three of them put up, Aeson grasped their pokeballs and clipped them to his belt loop for the time being, he grabbed the small bag of supplies he was taking with him, mostly it was just a bottle or two of water, as he didn’t really need anything else, but he had his miscellaneous items within it as well. With everything packed up, he exited his home in the upper portion of Brookfell, and walked away from it, at times he would glance back, seeing some of the buildings become smaller with the distance he made. He knew he would be taking a hovercraft to Grovehart after all.

He got into the hovercraft once he reached it, instead of it being a silent trip all the way to Grovehart, the two of them had quite the conversation going from the lonely weather to other things, as well as thoughts on the two teams and the battles that plagued Brookfell. It helped give him some insight, as the driver seemed to be honest, but he also knew to take any opinions with a grain of salt, as they were just that, opinions. Their conversations lasted until the hovercraft parked in Grovehart, the beautiful luscious trees, the smell of fresh flowers, and just the naturesque theme of the area was quite refreshing and a stark contrast to Groveharts scenery and structures.

Aeson always found himself taking in the sights before he moved or did anything else, quickly sending the money to the drive, he allowed his three pokemon out of their pokeballs. All three of them stretched out their legs, yawned, and seemed to look around at their surroundings. They were in Grovehart now, the pokemon noticed, and Queen walked off to sniff some of the nearby flowers. While Lil King seemed to roll his eyes, preferring to be in Grovehart. Knight had sneezed from the fresh scents that attacked his nose, but he was fine otherwise and stood by Aeson without moving. 

Once the pokemon seemed accustomed to everything, the four of them started walking, there were no knights to help escort him, there was no one waiting for them. It was a little hard to find the main building, but Aeson had been there before. He walked to a tunnel that seemed to lead down into the underground. There was only one way to get into the building, and so he flashed his badge for it to authenticate and open the  large glass double doors. One could see through it into the building, seeing the ‘front’ desk like area, and the directory right there, that would help people find their way. Aeson entered into the building, Queen, Lil King, and Knight all quick at his heel and looking at the directory immediately. Aeson did speak with the one behind the counter briefly, to let them know why he was there, and everything. He even flashed his badge so they wouldn’t be too suspicious that he wasn’t an Ethos member.

The receptionist seemed nice enough and spoke with Aeson, telling him the rough area that their leader should be in, he thanked her for her services and whistled for his three pokemon. As he looked up towards the ceiling, seeing the large skybox that projected the time of day as the outside world on the surface, the artificial light helped give the building a bit more visibility, and so Aeson started to walk in the direction of the room. He walked down some of the pristine looking white staircases heading toward the bottom floor of the facility. At the bottom floor was large lush vegetation, going from small trees to shrubs, to flowers and the likes.

It was truly beautiful inside of the building, and Aeson always found himself venturing to look at the items that were there. Queen was already investigating, smelling any flowers that were among their walking path, and playing in some of the bushes without damaging them. Lil King seemed to snort at her hyper antics, and soon started to chase her around in circles, dashing in and out of bushes, and between the walking steps of Aeson.

Aeson didn’t usually mind them playing, as the two pokemon were still childish and seemed to have a lot of energy, but right now he didn’t need the distraction. Knowing this, Knight looked at both of the pokemon and barked in their direction. The tone behind the bark was firm and strict, Queen and Lil King seeming to listen to what Knight said to them, and they stopped running around Aeson too much, giving the male room to walk and move more freely. 

Aeson traveled around half of the bottom floor, but he sighed more to himself, he was tired and it was time to take a small break from all the walking. He found a nice spot near the center of the ground floor, where the large pool was formed and maintained. The water sparkling under the fake light, as some of the members’ pokemon played in the water and swam around in it. He looked over toward his own, Queen already steppling her toes into it as curious as she was. While Lil King seemed to refuse to get close to the water at all and instead attached himself to Aeson. Knight chuckled at them, as he laid down beside his partner, letting his blue eyes close and his ears remaining straight up. THey’d find the leader soon, if only he had something of the manes. 

“Guess we’ll just have to keep searching for them after our light break. I could have swore that we would run into more doing the same thing we are. But perhaps they’ve already met?” He asked himself, uncapping his water to take a few sips out of it. He soon did the favor to his pokemon, holding it for each one of them so they could take some drinks individually. He knew the water bottle would be empty, and so he stood up to toss it in the recycling bin for it to be recycled.

“Though sometimes I think I just want to take in this scenery here, it's not everyday you see such beautiful untainted water and vegetation,” Aeson hummed out loud. 

That was the thing, as he looked at the water and followed some of the ripples and shadows, he thought he saw someone he hadn’t met yet, they seemed to hold an air about them, and this could be his chance.

Aeson stood up from his position, startling his pokemon and the three quickly followed after him as he approached the mysterious stranger. 

“Hey, who are you?” 

Would this be them….?

Word Count: 1436