“Galaxy Team?” Lucas said guilelessly, and I felt my heart freeze. “Aren’t they like ancient history?”

  Mars laughed, but I could tell it was fake.

  “Oh, anything but!” She said, “Please, come in.”

  With the doors open, the four of us filed inside, looking around.

  The interior of the building looked… Well, it looked like any office building’s entrance. Bland, corporate, and absolutely devoid of any personality at all. The only thing that separated it from any other office was the Galaxy Team’s logo, mounted in gold on one of the walls.

  Somehow, even that looked bland.

  “I’m sorry,” I said, finally regaining my voice. “We don’t mean to intrude, I thought the building was still open.”

  Her smile, fake as it was, froze on her face for a second. “It’s not a problem at all. To tell you the truth, we’re actually in the middle of shuttering our operations here.”

  Suspicion flared in my gut. “Really?”

  “Yes. You see, this is the Galaxy Team headquarters. It was originally founded in Jubilife Village, but we moved our center of operations to Veilstone City about five years ago.”

  Was that how long Cyrus has been in charge?

  “Wasn’t the Galaxy Team meant to survey ancient Sinnoh though?” Lucas said. “Why are you still in business?”

  “We still do some survey work, actually, but most of our operations are focused on preserving the history of the original Galaxy Team members and educating the public.”

  “Really?” I said, voice a little tight. “Just surveying and education?”

  Mars looked at me from the corner of her eye. “Are you okay? Would you like some water?”

  “No, I’m good.” I coughed. “It’s the cold weather. What kind of survey work do you do, if you don’t mind me asking.”

  Her stare hardened for a second. “I’m afraid I can’t speak to that, we’re not in the habit of disclosing confidential information.”

  “Of course, my apologies.”

  I bet good money that it involved the Lakes, however.

  She stared me down for another second or two, before returning her gaze to Lucas.

  “But yes, we’re starting to close down most of our operations. The top floors are our offices and archives, while the bottom floor served as a museum, showing off some of the artifacts of the original Galaxy Team.”

  “Served as in past tense?” Lucas asked.

  “Unfortunately yes. As the building is closing, we’re moving all of our artifacts and records to a storage facility.”

  “So you don’t plan on reopening the museum to the public?”

  “Not at this time, no.”

  “May I ask what caused the change?” I cut in. “After all, Team Galactic is an important part of Sinnoh history.”

  Mars’ brown eyes turned to iron. “Team Galactic? I’m not sure what that is, unless you mean the Galaxy Team. No offense, but I can tell by your accent that you’re not from Sinnoh, so please, get it right, since we are such an important part of Sinnoh’s history.”

  “Of course. Just a slip of my tongue.”

  “Hm. Make sure it stays that way.”

  “It won’t come back up. You were telling us why you were shutting down?”

  “Was I?”

  “You were.”

  Silence fell between us for a long second.

  “Our current CEO has decided that, due to the changes in the political landscape, it’s become untenable for us to continue operations in Sinnoh for the time being.”

  Ted coughed, and I mentally thanked him as her iron gaze switched to him, softening for a second. “I didn’t realize surveying and education were so reliant on the political climate.”

  “Yes, well, with the recent attacks by Teams Aqua and Magma in Hoenn, as well as this “Team Flare” business in Kalos, our CEO is worried that the historic value of the Galaxy Team might be targeted next.”

  “I thought all of the terrorists were being taken care of.”

  “It’s better to be safe than sorry.”

  I’m sure it is.

  “I hope that answered your questions.” Mars said with her fake smile. “If there’s nothing else, I’m sorry, but I do need to get back to work. There’s still a lot to be done.”

  I could feel the other three’s eyes staring at me, but I didn’t dare take my gaze off of Mars.

  “Of course.” I said, with just as much sincerity as she had. “Our apologies for interrupting your work.”

  We made our way out of the front doors, and the click of the lock securing the building was obvious even from the outside.

  “Come on,” Ted said. “Let’s go grab a coffee.”

  We were two blocks away from the building when I kicked at a loose branch, sending it skittering to the side of the sidewalk.

  “Damnit!” I swore. “They’re just going to get away with it, aren’t they?”

  “Get away with what?” Kevin said, exasperation clear in his voice. “They haven’t done anything yet as far as I can tell! Was she a little Smeargley? Yeah, but it seems like they’re just a regular business.”

  “Well they haven’t- wait, a little what?”

  “Smeargley means suspicious.” Ted said softly. “Smeargle first outline their paintings before filling them in, but they’re often interrupted before they can finish them. If you mess up a painting before it's finished, they’ll try and get back at you, so it’s a superstition to not mess with the outlines.”

  “Oh. Like sketchy.”

  “I guess?”

  I shook my head. “Wait, this isn’t the point! They’re still going to get away scot-free!”

  “Who’s Scot-” Kevin was interrupted with a shake of Lucas’ head.

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  “Alina, they haven’t done anything yet. I don’t know about this Team Galactic from your timeline, but here? They haven’t done anything.”

  “Your timeli-” A hand slapped over Kevin’s mouth.

  My frustration bubbled up to the surface, and I wanted to go back and pound on the doors until Mars let me in again.

  Team Galactic had tried to rewrite the entirety of the universe. Or, they would try to do so. And they very nearly would have gotten away with it too, if not for Ash and Friends.

  And now… They were just going to be seen as an unfortunate victim of circumstance.

  I shook my head. No. I would find something on them.

  Turning on my heel, I started to walk away from the group.

  “Where are you going?” Ted called.

  “To the library!” I shouted back. “They have computers there!”

  “Oh for the love of Arceus- The library is the other way!”

  Face blazing, I turned back and stomped towards the group.

  “Thanks.” I muttered, then continued on my way.

  /^\

  Three hours later, I was still stewing.

  The library had free computers for the public to access, and although the internet wasn’t as easy to access as I remembered, with the help of some friendly librarians I had managed to figure out the interface.

  Unfortunately for me, Kevin and the others were right. There was nothing on Team Galactic. Every search I’d done simply redirected to their cover as the Galaxy Team.

  What I had found on the Galaxy Team was interesting, but ultimately not very helpful. There was the basic history that I knew about; how they arrived in old Hisui and helped establish Jubilife and the modern Sinnoh that I was in today. After a couple decades of helping Hisui be established the Galaxy Team faded away into relative obscurity, their mission fulfilled.

  About fifty years ago or so a couple descendants of the original team re-established the organization as a museum, and got back into the surveying game. It was seen as a quaint renewal, and although some people decried the original Galaxy Team as an imperialist effort to forcibly colonize the native Hisuians, the modern incarnation mostly just served to try and record the history of Sinnoh as a whole.

  And then ten years ago, after decades of money problems, they were bought out by a third party; Cyrus.

  He himself was a fairly interesting topic of research that I had sunk almost an hour of time into, trying to figure out what was going on.

  Cyrus was a fairly successful businessman despite his age, only being twenty-six years old. In fact, he had topped the “Thirty Before Thirty” list of the Sinnoh Financial Times, a list of the most impressive young professionals in the field. He had been a hard-working student, if a little withdrawn, but had poured a lot of his profits into supporting historical buildings and libraries.

  There were a lot of questions about exactly how he had made his money, but most people chalked it up to his rich parents.

  A figure slumped into the chair next to me.

  He had even helped fund the Veilstone City Public Library’s renovation three years ago.

  When Cyrus had helped buy out the Galaxy Team ten years ago - at the ripe young age of sixteen it had made national news. His explanation was that the Galaxy Team was an “important part of Sinnoh’s history” and that “it wouldn’t do to let such a historic institution fade away due to money problems.”

  The press and public had lauded him for the move, and ever since then he had continued to be a staple of the Sinnoh business sphere.

  But there was nothing regarding his personal life, nor his beliefs. As a businessman, his achievements were notable, but as a person? He was a veritable black hole. Any interview questions had been deftly redirected, and most people seemed to think he was a fairly normal, if secluded young billionaire.

  There was no record, none at all, of his wishes to completely rewrite the universe.

  Which meant that I only had my memories from my old world to go off of, and that wouldn’t stand up in a court of law.

  I had nothing on Cyrus, nor on Team Galactic.

  “It’s tough, isn’t it?” The man next to me said.

  I startled, hand dropping down to the Poké Balls on my belt.

  “Oh, don’t be like that.” He said. “It’s just me, your friendly neighborhood police officer.”

  I stared harder at the man. He was thoroughly non-descript, with the most distinguishing feature being that his hair was a little more on the blue side than black.

  His clothes didn’t help either, he was wearing a rumpled business-casual suit, and a brown overcoat thrown on top.

  “...Looker?”

  The man blinked at me. “Wha- no. But I am very interested in how you know that name. My name's Booker, I’m the InterPol agent assigned to Veilstone City.”

  He bowed slightly, then fished in his coat pocket until he pulled out a metal tin, which he flicked open to reveal several rows of cigarettes. Pulling one out, he popped it in his mouth, then after a pause Booker extended the case over to me.

  My nose wrinkled, and I shook my head.

  “Can you even be smoking here?” I hissed.

  He shrugged and pulled out a lighter. “Why not? It’s not illegal.”

  “This is a library.”

  That made Booker pause, and he looked around the room as if noticing for the first time where he was.

  He sighed, closed the lighter, and put the cigarette in his mouth back into the case.

  “Fine.” He grumbled. “Goody-two-shoes.”

  I stared at him, aghast. “Aren’t you a cop?”

  “I’m a detective.” He said, stressing the last word. “We get more leeway on these things. Besides, I’m not a Sinnoh police officer, I’m actually from Unova.”

  “And that makes it better?”

  Booker paused to think for a moment. “No, probably not, all things told. Anyways, I see you’ve been digging into Team Galactic?”

  My blood ran cold.

  “What do you mean?” I stammered.

  He waved a hand at the computer. “We have a couple of Porygon keeping an eye out whenever somebody looks up important things. Things like potential terrorist organizations and the like. Oh don’t look so worried, you’re not in trouble.”

  “I’m not?”

  “Nope.” He said, popping the ‘p”. “You logged in to the computers with your Trainer ID. That’s not great security, by the way. Anyways, our Porygon noticed your searches, but your account already has some green flags on it so they didn’t consider it to be too dangerous. Still, I decided to come over and see what the fuss was all about.”

  I swallowed, a little less nervous but still on-guard. “And?”

  Booker shrugged.

  “And what? There’s nothing we can do about you. Looking up things about Team Galactic isn’t illegal, even if we would really like to know how you learned about them?”

  He raised his eyebrows, but I kept quiet.

  “Fine, be that way. Regardless of how you know about them, I’m guessing you didn’t find anything.”

  It wasn’t a question.

  I sighed. “Yeah. Nothing at all. I know they exist, or at least I’m pretty sure they do, but… there’s nothing on them.”

  Booker clicked his tongue. “Damn. I was hoping a new set of eyes would be able to help spot something we’ve missed. As far as we know, they were just a standard history operation ten years ago, then took a quiet turn onto Extremist Avenue. Then, about a month or so ago, they started shuttering their operations.”

  A lightbulb went off in my head, and my heart sank.

  For the most part, everything had been going in the same way as the Pokémon games, up until I’d arrived here in Sinnoh. Then Archie and Maxie had been arrested, and Lysandre had been revealed - it was a bad time to be a villainous team in the Pokémon World.

  Cyrus had obviously taken notice, and must have decided that discretion was the better part of valor.

  “So, what now?”

  Booker shrugged again. “Now? We wait for Cyrus or Team Galactic to poke their heads back up. Wait for them to slip so we can prosecute them through the courts. Unless you have anything that could help with that?” He said leadingly.

  I searched through my memories for anything that could help. Unfortunately, Team Galactic didn’t have many hideouts. There was the one here in Veilstone, which was already shutting down. The one in Eterna City had been wiped out by Archie’s landslide. The rest of the time, the player normally came across the Team in the middle of their villainous endeavors.

  Nothing that could help.

  Mutely, I shook my head.

  “Damn. Well, it was worth a try. Well, don’t worry, InterPol will keep an eye out. And if you do remember something-”

  He fished in his pocket and pulled out a slightly bent business card.

  “Make sure to give me a call.”

  Booker nodded, then stood up and sauntered out of the library without another word.

  I stared down at the business card, but wasn’t really seeing it.

  It wasn’t really a loss that Team Galactic was going into hiding. Delaying their plans, even by a little bit, was still a worthwhile endeavor.

  Still, it felt like I had failed once again.