-The Dragon King-

  -Call to Arms: Ch 7-

  “47!”

  Getting the absolute shit kicked out of you tended to be a good motivator.

  “48!”

  I know, I know, it's a crazy thought. If someone is beaten to a pulp, they tend to really not be a fan of the idea of it happening again, and do something about it. That goes on top of being angry about it too, and anger is a great fuel to get yourself moving- Palatine was totally right about that.

  “49!”

  Yoda can say whatever he wants about finding inner peace and anger leading to bad places, but you know what? He died as a hobo in a mildew swamp, Palpy-boi literally crowned himself Emperor of the galaxy as people applauded.

  L plus ratio, frog man.

  “50!”

  Mark shouted as he did one final push up and climbed to his feet. He grabbed a rubber tire off of the stack behind him and with a loud roar of- “BOORAH!” he hurled it as hard as he could, where it slammed down in the dirt near five others he’d thrown.

  There were only a fraction of the number of cars in this world than there were on Earth, but still these things were all over the place in city dumps. He had no idea how that worked, but he wasn’t going to think about it too hard beyond blaming game designers, because it was convenient for him at the moment.

  Mark gasped for breath, wiping the sweat off his face with his already drenched workout shirt, then took off in a jog for another lap around his workout track.

  There was a loud crack and a fwoosh overhead, as something blitzed by fast enough to have leaves dragging in its wake.

  Mark gave a whistle in appreciation, both for the show and for the blast of cool air, causing Noibat to preen and do a loop before continuing with the (admittedly shoddily constructed) flight course he’d set up in the tree branches.

  The fucker was fast and already knew how to use Quick Attack during turns and dives to push her speed even further. Her attack power was lagging, and her general defensive-ish-ness sucked, but Mark could not deny that his bat-dragon-lizard(?) could fucking fly.

  Granted, up to this point he had exclusively been working with Shelgon, who was the equivalent of an armored bowling ball on legs- and even as a Bagon, he’d never been all that fast. So he knew logically that part of this was his brain dealing with comparison whiplash, but still the point stands.

  Noibat is can the zoomies.

  As he ran he passed Shelgon in the process of exploding.

  They had decided take a break from the push towards a proper Dragon Pulse, and instead focus on broadening his move pool. And since they were in the city with the grass gym, that meant fire.

  Shelgon summoned a volley of Ember but held it, forcing the explosive pellets together in his mouth, combining them into a concentrated blast of Fire TE that would spew forth in an unstoppable Flamethrower an-

  BANG

  The move quite literally blew up in his face, leaving Shelgon with a soot stained face, scorch marks on the front of his shell, and rapidly thinning patience.

  “Keep up the good work!” Mark shouted as he passed, and Shelgon gave him an attempt at a salute with his stubby little foreleg.

  He had worried that they would get uppity after any sign of weakness, king of the hill mentality stuff. But contrary to his concerns, watching him get into a fistfight with Maylene and get his jaw broken had actually made his Dragons more obedient and eager to train, for some reason.

  Maybe it was because he had proven what he said about being willing to fight as well? Or the showing he put on was more impressive than he thought it was? He had no clue, they didn’t have a psych-poke-ology class back home.

  Mark rounded a bend in the dirt path and slowed to a stop at a small clearing that had originally been a spot with a perfectly high enough branch for some pull ups, but that had snapped on his last go around, and he hadn’t exactly thought of something else to do here in the meantime.

  Instead he grabbed his water bottle from the spot on a stump, and started rapidly chugging the cold refreshment.

  Mark wiped his mouth, and let out a very civilized belch that he didn’t try to muffle or hide at all, just like the true gentleman he was.

  Spotting a head of purple hair he decided to cure his boredom by wandering over and bugging her.

  “Whatcha up to?” Mark asked as he dumped the rest of his water over his head to cool off. “Am I witnessing the first person to take that life advice to stop and smell the roses?”

  “Close.” Helena said as she gently pruned the flower shrub she was crouched next to with a familiar knife. Hey wait, that was his knife!

  “They’re not actually roses, they’re Azaleas.” She smiled, helping coax upen a blooming pink bud between her fingers.

  “Yeeaah, you’re gonna have to fill me in. I’m a guy, I don’t know shit about flowers. That mean they come in different colors or something?”

  “Azaleas are a lot easier to handle than Roses, they are relatively drought resistant and will bloom well year after year if planted in the right location. They don’t like a lot of sunlight and, if digested, they can cause nausea, vomiting, and even possible seizures.”

  Helena supplied all of that without missing a beat, and it caught Mark off guard. There was a passion to her voice and a spark in her eyes that he hadn’t seen before. The Hex Maniac had, true to form, always seemed like a bit of a walking corpse- physically kind of just floating down the path of least resistance, and never fully in the present mentally. It was an odd reminder that she was, well, alive.

  “Huh.” Mark scratched his chin and looked over the flowers with a more thoughtful expression. “That’s actually kinda neat. Could even be useful in the right situations. I know I’ve joked about it before, but I didn’t actually take you as the kind of girl to be into flowers.”

  “It was an old hobby.” Helena muttered, her tone suddenly frosty.

  “Hobbies are great! Everyone needs a hobby. Do you do anything with plants still?”

  “Not anymore.” She cut him off, killing the topic.

  Mark frowned and wanted to press her on it, but held himself back. He had his secrets that he wasn’t going to share, he wouldn’t pry into hers unless they were actively dangerous to his health.

  “Alright, well, uh, conversation topic shit: what do you think about that tournament I told you about, eh?”

  “I think you’ll do fine as long as you don’t run across the ring and punch the other trainer.”

  “Don’t be condescending with me, Purple. That’s my thing, and I’m very protective of my role as the group asshole.”

  “And what’s with that!?”

  “With what?”

  “That! That nickname!” Helena stood up and crossed her arms with a pout. “It’s not even clever!”

  “Oh come on, color names are at the core of Pokémon. There’s Red, and Blue, and Green as main characters, and even Gold, Silver, and Crystal.”

  “I have never heard of anyone named after a color.”

  “Then you clearly haven’t been in a plot important place before. What, do you want me to change it?”

  Helena narrowed her eyes at him, in a way that was probably supposed to be intimidating, but with the bags under her eyes and her messy hair it just made her look like she was missing her glasses or something.

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  “I’m not sure if I trust what you’d come up with.”

  “Ghasty Gal! We can shorten it to GG!”

  “Absolutely not.”

  “C’mon! Double Gs! It fits you perfectly!” Mark nudged her with his elbow and wagged his eyebrows at the way her massive heavy honkers swayed from it.

  “I will skin you.”

  “Ugh. You used to be so meek, Hell, you still are with everyone else. How come you can't muster the guts to talk to a stranger, but you’re willing to be all prickly with me? Can’t you taek your woes out on someone else?”

  “Because I realized it’s the best way to get through your thick skull, and that you get more upset at people trying to fake being nice to you than if they’re just grumpy.”

  Mark wished he had a comeback, but he didn’t so he gave up and just shrugged instead.

  “Fair. Anyway, I hope you take advantage of that same smoldering, tired, half-reluctant, inner fire of yours, and harness it for your battles in the tournament later, because you’re competing as well.”

  “Wh-What? No!”

  Aaand she was back to being shy, looking up at him with wide panicked eyes. How cute. It made him want to throw her in an elevator with a bunch of extroverts and hit all the floor buttons.

  “Yeeup. I already signed you up and talked to the owner about having your fee waived. The more people we have in the running, the higher the odds of winning the grand prize.”

  “But there will be so many people in the stands! Half of the reason I never completed the gym circuit was because of how the crowds grow larger the more badges you have!”

  “Eh, you have plenty of attitude, you’ll be fine.”

  “No, I- Gak!” Hellena let out a choked shout of surprise as Mark hooked an arm around her neck, dragged her into a half chokehold, and started walking towards the city with her in tow.

  “Come on, Purple, glorious profit awaits us!”

  …

  Well, after a short pit stop.

  -The Dragon King-

  Have you ever known you were going to be disappointed, so you mentally prepare yourself to be disappointed so that you won’t be bothered, but then whatever it is finally arrives, and it still manages to disappoint you?

  This might be dejavu, but that was the exact feeling that Mark felt when he looked out across the 15 men and women that made up the lineup of his new recruits.

  “What am I looking at here?”

  “It’s a line, sir!” The girl wearing an old Magma uniform shouted.

  “This is a terrible line.” Mark said bluntly as he scanned the 13 wannabe recruits in front of him. “At least last time you had the excuse of not actually trying to make one, this is just sad.”

  That prompted the 10 people with a smidgem of potential to do anything in life to start shuffling around and orient into a better line.

  Mark watched them all with a completely unimpressed face and the 7-

  No, stop. There were 15, he needed to stop mentally discarding the people he wasn’t impressed with. They had, whether he liked it or not, actually managed to complete his intro test.

  (And also because if he kept doing it he would eventually wind up checking all of them off in his head.)

  “Reporting for duty, sir! Here are all the Shinx that we were told to hand over” John Pokemon, still with a black eye, saluted and held out a bag to Mark.

  Mark took the bag and opened it to see 15 pokeballs piled on top of each other.

  Obviously Shinx weren’t the rarest Pokemon, or even the strongest, but they were a Sinnoh exclusive. Team Rocket was a Kanto based team, and while even then Shinx wouldn’t be anything crazy to them, it would be an exotic Pokemon with a high growth ceiling.

  It wouldn’t be a fortune but he was sure it would be enough pocket change to get his employees hungry for bigger (and more risky) game.

  Also he literally hadn’t had to lift a finger, and would get to skim off the top. Such was the whole appeal of having people work for you.

  “Well done. All of you, I have to admit I am surprised and impressed. I didn’t expect most of you to manage to do anything, let alone all of you to catch three different Pokemon in a week, but you did it, and for that I applaud you.”

  Mark smiled at them and gave them a few seconds to feel good about themselves before stomping down on it.

  “But don’t get too far ahead of yourselves. You caught two house cats and a hamster. That’s nothing in the grand scheme of things. Nothing in comparison to what we’re going to accomplish in the future.”

  He glared down at them, making sure to meet the eyes of each recruit as he went down the line.

  "Look at you. First batch of the brave, the dumb, or the both. That’s good. That’s the core of what makes us Human! Hold that tight, because that hunger for more will take you far, but it’s just as likely to get you killed. That’s why I’m here, because you need someone to help you mold it, refine it into a point that you can use as a weapon.

  This isn’t just a contract gig with fancy gear. This is the last place you’ll ever have to prove yourself to anyone. It's a line in the dirt between you and a world that will always try to take everything you’ve got. I’ve seen it, I’ve lived it! It will take and take and take from you until you don’t have anything left.

  So what do you do? You stop it! You fight back! You build something it can’t break!

  That’s what I’m gonna build you into, and trust me when I say it’s not gonna be easy.

  You want someone to hold your hand? Go back to your mommy. You want a nine-to-five with dental? Get the fuck out. But if you’re ready to grow without anyone holding you back, and to be rewarded with what you deserve, then you’re in the right place.

  This is a strict fucking Meritocracy, what you get is directly proportional to what you’re willing to contribute.

  You do well, and you will be rewarded generously with more money than you could ever make betting on battles and twiddling your thumbs.

  You do poorly, and I will spit on you, I will insult you, I will kick you while you're down and encourage everyone else to do the same. Your training will increase and will be pushed to your limit until you either break or you get angry enough to grab success by the throat and earn a place at the victory table for yourself and we will feast like fucking KINGS together!

  Think about every single person who has ever doubted you. Think about all the people who think they’re better than you. Think of all the people more successful than you, luckier than you, more talented than you, who look down on you. This right here, right now, is your chance, your opportunity to grab them by the ankle and pull yourself above them!

  This is where you prove all of them wrong. Out there, you’re told to wait your turn and be polite about being better than others because they’re trying their best. Here? You go as far as you possibly can, and you gloat as much as you fucking want about it, or you fail trying.

  I’m not going to coddle failure, there will be no handouts, but that’s because I’m going to reward the everyliving fuck out of success.

  You will follow orders here. You will show up every day, forged harder, sharper, hungrier than yesterday. And make no mistake- you’ll suffer for it. You’ll have to earn every inch.

  But when that moment comes? When you’ve made it to the top, when you’re some of the best trainers in the region, and you’re sitting on top of a pile of money that you earned through your hard work?”

  Mark stopped pacing and gave them a wide toothy grin.

  “You’ll feel like you’re on top of the fucking world.”

  He paused, having just realized he’d forgotten something very obvious and very important.

  He didn’t have a name yet.

  Ah, fuck it, he was never great at putting a lot of thought into namings, he’d just go with something from the gut.

  “Welcome to Ironclad Solutions Incorporated.” He gave them a proud salute. “Patent pending.”

  -The Dragon King-

  Terra was practically bouncing after the speech.

  Back in Hoenn she’d had a large group she could always fall back to, and plenty of friends and companions she could rely on. They gave her a stable income, and shelter, and free food, and if she ever got herself into a problem she could always count on them to back her up and get her out of trouble.

  Then… well… her family, Team Magma, was gone now, and she had fled to Sinnoh- the only major region that refused to comply with Hoenn’s demond to deport all members of Magma and Aqua. Sure it was just because Sinnoh’s international policy was to put criminals arrested on Sinnoh soil on trial in Sinnoh’s court of law, and not because of any sympathy, but they also weren’t actively hunting her down like an animal.

  She had been… lonely, since coming here. And since she wasn’t brave enough to put her name and ID on the registration of any official business that had to send employee records to the government every year for taxes, she had been hoping this could be a safer way to get money to eat.

  Low and behold she found not just that, but also the start of a new group to call a family! Ironclad Solutions, didn’t that just have a nice ring to it?

  Okay she may have been a bit easily swept away by charismatic speeches from impassioned leaders, but so what?

  Oh, she was so excited! Magma had never had much in the way of vertical movement, there was the Leader, the three Admins, and if you weren’t lucky enough to be one of those four, you were one of the grunts. Sure, if you were good enough you could be assigned as the captain of a mission, but that was temporary, and you were still just a grunt.

  Would there technically even be “grunts” considering Ironclad Solutions was a company, not a Team? Maybe she could be an Admin? Would she get a cape like The Commander? When would they be getting uniforms? If she was an Admin, could she get hers highlighted red?

  Ugh, she was getting ahead of herself.

  Before any of that, she had to complete her first official mission.

  All members were to apply for the tournament The Commander told them about, show him what they could do, fill up as many of the top slots as possible, and take as many of the rewards home as possible for the company.

  It was playing dirty, but then again, she had been loyal to Team Magma for years ever since they helped get her out of debt.

  She approved.

  -End Chapter-

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