Rosaline had decided to head to the library for more information so that she could work on the Legendary Dragon Duo case. She is currently at the Old News section, pouring over back issues of The PAL Times (one of the newspapers in PAL), trying to figure out what exactly are the Dragon Prince and Princess real names, so she may get a lead, and find out more about their background. Or maybe she can find out what they look like, and match their faces to the citizens in PAL.
Imagine her surprise and disappointment, when she found the article about two people being crowned the Dragon Prince and Princess, but the Prince and Princess had their eyes covered by their fringe, which is impossible to determine their appearance, and this sentence: The Dragon Prince has requested that their real names are to be kept secret, for their, especially the Dragon Princess', safety.
'But why would the Dragon Prince feel that the Dragon Princess needs her identity to be protected? Was she in danger?' Rosaline thought. She looked at the picture of the Duo again. The person who crowned them was Ken, the current announcer for the Pokémon World Championship.
'Maybe he knows something.' Rosaline thought. 'But he's not allowed to say anything. They even offered money that were up to six figures, but he still refused to talk, since he's not the type to sell his life story. I doubt he would help me in my case either. Gosh, this is one of the hardest cases I've ever seen!'
"Why don't you use your mind reading powers on Ken?" Espeon suggested.
"Espeon, you know I like the fun of solving the case without using psychic powers." Rosaline told her. "What fun is it when I only depend on my powers to solve cases?"
"True." Espeon nodded.
Rosaline sipped the strawberry smoothie she bought from the library café, and looked at the picture of the Duo. There wasn't much to look at since half their faces were mostly covered by the fringe.
"Look, what I know is that the Dragon Princess is still alive." Rosaline said to Espeon. "I don't know about the Dragon Prince though."
"You mean the time you saw the Dragon Princess flying on her Dragonite that one time, and you tried to follow but she disappeared via teleportation?" Espeon asked.
"That's the one" Rosaline nodded. "The Dragon Princess is pretty evasive."
She looked at the picture again reflectively. 'Could they have been people on the run before they became the Legendary Dragon Duo? Is that why they do not wish to disclose their real names to everyone but Ken?' Rosaline thought. That is a possibility. But the question is, what, or who, are they running away from? All the five evil teams have been shut down by Ash already, which earned him the nickname Silent Hero.
'Could the Princess have foreseen that the five bosses and their guards escaped? Is that why she was trying so hard to hide?' Rosaline wondered. The Duo, in addition to being Dragon masters, were also strong psychics themselves. Their psychic abilities are said to far exceed hers, and that's saying something, considering she is one of the strongest psychics in PAL, and she is talented enough to be accepted in the PAL Elite.
"Alright, according to the information we got, Jude's a Water/Dark, Rosaline's a Fire/Psychic, Phillip's an Electric/Steel, Pakura's a Fairy/Ice, and the Champion doesn't have any favoured type, right?" Trip consulted the notes he had taken down from the computer.
"That's right." said Cilan, looking at May and Dawn uneasily, since they were fuming from the information they read from Pakura's profile about being the number one Contest Star of PAL as she was a highly accomplished Coordinator, and Pakura never mentioned it. They bet they could beat her in a contest blindfolded, especially Dawn, since she did beat her mother, a Top Coordinator in a Contest battle before. Sure, it was an illusion caused by Mismagius, but still….
"Hey, aren't you sulking a bit too much?" Misty tried to pacify them.
"NO!" May and Dawn both shouted, causing those near them to ask them to keep quiet.
"Sorry…" They muttered insincerely.
"Anyway, which Pokémon of yours are missing again?" Cilan asked.
"My Blaziken, Skitty, and Glaceon." May spat.
"My Corsola." Misty added.
"My Pachirisu, Buneary, and Piplup." Dawn grumbled.
"My Emolga and Axew too." Iris replied.
Cilan nodded, and wrote it down. "Alright, assuming that each of them goes to the respective Elites with their type specialty, Blaziken would go to Rosaline, Glaceon would go to Pakura, Emolga and Pachirisu would go to Phillip, Piplup and Corsola would go to Jude, and the rest is probably with the Champion."
"But my Skitty is with that Pakura bitch." May cried.
"It could be because Skitty is either used for Contest purposes, or kept as a pet. Skitty is a popular pet Pokémon among trainers, after all." Cilan deduced. "She probably used her weakest Pokémon to combat you and Whitney, since I doubt she think you're worth her full strength."
"What did you say?!" May leapt up to strangle Cilan, but was restrained by Dawn, Max and Misty.
"Chill May. He's right. The PAL Elites are one of the most powerful trainers in existence. I don't think they'll use their full strength from the beginning." Misty said.
"But just to double confirm, I say we still try to keep an eye on those elusive Elites." Max suggested.
The others nodded assent.
"Hey, is that Rosaline over there?" Iris pointed to a figure at the Old News section a distance away.
"Alright, I found my target." said Max, starting to head towards Rosaline.
"Be careful, Max." May warned.
"I will." He said, following Rosaline as she left the library.
Pakura was walking along the edge of the forest, on the way back to Aquamarine's Style, where she was supposed to meet Wallace and Fantina so that they can prepare together as judges of the PAL Contest. She had a lot of thought in her mind.
When she first met that Dawn girl in Aquamarine's Style, her first impression is that she looked exactly like Princess Salvia. She knew Princess Salvia, since as PAL's "Princess", she had been invited to Arrowroot Town Palace for dinner a few times. However, Dawn's personality is so different from her. And not to mention, Dawn's a bitch. How did those two have the exact same appearance, she'll never know.
Speaking of which, she wondered why they couldn't just call her by her name instead of "Princess".
"Let go….help…." A faint voice interrupted her thoughts. It was coming from the direction of the forest and it seemed distant as well, as if the source of the voice is far away from her, but Pakura managed to pick it up with her excellent hearing. Pakura narrowed her eyes. It sounded feminine, so she thought the Pokémon must be female.
"I'm going to check it out." Pakura said. Her Pokémon nodded, and they went to the forest, with Sylveon and Skitty. Thanks to her superior speed (despite the fact that all Elite has enhanced speed, she is still faster than the other Elites), she managed to reach where she thought the voice was from.
She heard voices from her left, and headed for that direction.
"You see, Mike, this Eevee is rare and worth a lot! I mean, it's the only Pokémon that can evolve into eight different forms!" A man which stunk of cigarette smoke and had a bushy beard was holding on to a feebly struggling Eevee.
"Yeah, you may be right, Leon, PAL sure has loads of rare Pokémon, and we can just take them and sell them for money!" Mike commented. "Maybe we can catch another Legendary Pokémon before we go. It's so worth it sneaking abroad that ship to PAL!"
"Is it, really?" Pakura asked in a cold voice.
The two men turned, surprised to see a girl standing before them, and a beautiful one, at that.
Mike whistled, looking Pakura up and down. "Look what we have here! A hot chick! Come on baby, let's go back to my place and have some real fun!"
"Your clothing would look great on my bedroom floor, if you know what I mean." Leon winked. Pakura held back the urge to roll her eyes. She got that all the time from men, especially ones that are more than twice her age.
"Yuck." Sylveon was disgusted at how men always hit on her trainer. Skitty looked like she wanted nothing more than to barf on the poachers.
Mike approached her. "Come on, babe, let's-" Before he could say anything else, his throat was slit. The last thing he saw was Pakura with her hand covered in an icicle which is shaped like a sword. The sword was dripping with blood- his blood.
Leon panicked when his partner fell to the ground dead, and sent out a Pokémon. "Trubbish, use Sludge Bomb!"
"Skitty, Assist." Pakura countered calmly. Assist turned out to be Psychic, and Skitty threw Trubbish against the wall. It fainted easily.
'Weak.' Pakura thought, disdain clearly shown on her features.
Leon started to run, but Pakura shot an icicle out of her hand. It pierced through his heart from his back.
"You're….not…human…" Leon gasped, before he too fell dead.
Pakura picked up the near unconscious Eevee, and examined her. Her tiny body was full of bruises and bleeding cuts from struggling against the poachers, and burns from electrical traps. Pakura grimly noted that if her injuries are not treated in time, she might succumb to them eventually, but it's no problem for her. Pakura closed her eyes, and Eevee glowed in a blue aura, and slowly, the bruises and burns disappeared and the cuts stopped bleeding, and the cuts started to close. Very soon, Eevee was healed up completely.
"Thank you!" Eevee wagged her tail and looked at Pakura happily.
Pakura said nothing; instead, she carried Eevee to a part of PAL's natural paradise. It was a garden with clean water at the lake, and plenty of berries growing in bushes and trees. It was also filled with flowers of all kinds. There are several wild Pokémon playing in the garden. Eevee would be safe here, and be fed and watered for the rest of her life, and have plenty of playmates.
She put Eevee down, and while Eevee was distracted looking around at the beautiful place, she left without saying goodbye, and before Eevee could notice.
"Why didn't you ask Eevee if she wanted to come along with you?" Sylveon asked. "And why didn't you say goodbye?"
"She'll be better off there. Besides, that garden is the best place for her. I mean, she is free to roam around, and have fellow Pokémon to play with, and she won't starve or be thirsty, as opposed to training hard for battles or contests if she's with me. As for why I didn't say goodbye, it's because I doubt she'll stay if I didn't."
"You're a nice person, aren't you?" Skitty remarked.
Pakura hummed thoughtfully. "I wonder…" Is killing without hesitation for the sake of Pokémon considered nice? Some may call it inhumane, for one to take another's life, but what if the person's life that is taken did a crime that is unforgivable to PAL- Poaching Pokémon?
"You're….not…human…"
And ironically, she didn't regret it one bit.
"We're here." said Sylveon.
Pakura reached Aquamarine's Style, pushed open the doors and went in.
Unbeknownst to them, the same Eevee that Pakura left in the garden snuck through the doors before they closed.