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In the year that Tristen had taken part in the academy, he stayed pretty well busy. His endeavors in the academics brought forth new opportunities and Tristen would be getting what he pretty much wanted the entire time. To find out what the world was out there and learn about it. And…well…to do so without threat of death in some regard or another. While Tristen wasn’t exactly valedictorian material, he did hang around the top of his class for the most part, albeit with a rough start in the non-academic studies like the Languages, Home Ec, and Art classes for example. But he persevered.

When not in studies, he did have his own adventures in one regard or another in the school, though nothing Snagem level threat mind. Paldea was practically a whole world in and of itself to explore on the weekends when he could. Matteo, Fela, Nemona, Penny…even B and E all had something to contribute. And as he grew socially and academy, so did he and his Pokémon. Tristen had trained here and there, and at one point, even figured to see about getting a new set of heavier clothes to help train himself and learn a trick or two in his hybrid arsenal. And as far as his Pokémon, the Pokémon he wanted to focus on actually managed to raise managed to getting them to evolve or learn new tricks in the arsenal that Paldea could provide. As he mentioned to Matteo one day, he didn’t exactly to fully rest on his laurels while he tried to bear down on his studies. Training expeditions with Matteo followed by battles with a fair number of students, apart from Nemona that is, allowed his Pokémon to flourish in less than stressful settings. There even came a point where it did look like Tristen was going to beat Nemona for real in a Pokémon battle, managing to actually stand up to her Quaquaval a heck of a lot better than his first foray. But alas, Nemona was still that unachievable pinnacle…for the time being that is.

As celebrations went on in the expansive library hall, Tristen would be near by Fela and Camp, enjoying their company and celebrating just as any other student has this day. They went through a year and pushed through everything that the teachers had to throw at them. At least for this year at least. Though as Fela spoke up to the Manectric hybrid, he took a look around the hall. “They did. In fact, apparently the whole Team was supposed to come…” Tristen would take his SNAG out again, seeing it still showing offline, which he found completely strange. It had been out for a good chunk of the day. He noticed it when he was on his laptop on his dorm, but when he tried to check with GRAY on his SNAG, he found the SNAG not connecting to anything either. “…though I haven’t been able to get in touch with anyone, let alone them, today. I wonder what’s going on…?”

-----
Meanwhile, the trip to the academy for Freth and I was sort of quick. They had to make concessions to allow an Abra to take Looker, Agent WHITE, Freth and I off to the academy to meet with Tristen, namely as an agreement with Sub to turn GRAY over to them. Once we arrived and made their way to the top of the steps, Looker would once again warn the two of us about the collars on us and don’t bother trying to run. They would stand by to give us our distance, but overall it would be safe to assume they would be keeping track of us rather easily. We would walk off without a word, the two SWIPE agents escorting the two of us towards the door and allowing us through the door. They would stay outside as we made our way in.

Once we got through the door, we took a look around, seeing the various people in the in the large hall. The various students, teachers, parents, and anyone in between were all over the place. As we went on the hunt for the Manectric hybrid, I would end up speaking up to Freth. “So…any ideas, because I still haven’t gotten anything.”

“Nothing.” She said. “He’s going to have questions, you know.”

“Oh, most definitely.” I said to him. “And we’re going to have to tell him. I don’t want him involved at all, but now that Looker is here, he’s going to be looking for that opportunity. I just wish I knew what Sub is planning in all of this.”

“Well, he managed to get us out of the headquarters to get here.” Freth said. “He’s probably trusting us to get something done. Something he probably knows Looker is not going to be able to control, regardless of what Agent WHITE is able to do or not. We’re on our own, regardless.”

“One step at a time, then.” I said. I then took notice to something, and gave a tap on Freth’s shoulder to get her attention. “Found him.” I told her. The two of us would start walking over towards Tristen and the friends they were with.

Tristen would look back for a second. “There they are! Blizz! Freth!” Tristen shouted to the two of us with a wave. It would only take a few more seconds of weaving around the people to get to him and I immediately put him in a rather large hug.

“How’s it going, Tristen?” I said to him as I held him. Once I let him go, he went over towards Tristen and Freth playfully rubbed Tristen’s head. “Hey, Fela, Camp. I don’t think I need to tell you two who these are.” He told his two friends. “Blizz, Freth, this is Fela and Camp.”

“Please, stop…you don’t need to do that with us.” I said to Fela as she tried to treat me at least mildly like royalty. Though…Noble Hybrid? Ugh, that is never going away, isn’t it? Freth and I would take Camp’s hand for a shake. “Anyways, nice to see you, too. Tristen has told us a bit about you all over this past year. You…Fela…are the one that helped Tristen early on with the Vivillion project, right? And…Camp…bug aficionado. Yea, I do have one. A pretty loyal Scizor, actually.” I said to him.

As I went on to try to play things okay, Freth took note close by. Her eyes veering away for a second.

“He is not going to give you the time of day if he could help it.” Eris said in that instant.

“No…he’s not.” Freth said. “But we’re going to need to try something.” Before any conversation would get full swing between me, Tristen, or the first friends he introduced us to. Freth would then start to act.

“Oh, uh, that was pretty much the start of it, and while I was good even then, a lot of our experience and strength came from Team Snagem, actually. It’d be a heck of a thing though, I was already kinda a wall to get through in the gym circuit anyways…”

“Hey, Blizzard.” Freth then spoke up.

“Yea…I know.” I said to her. “Hey, uh, I don’t mind to break you off from Tristen right at the moment, but do you two mind that we take a few minutes with him? It’s not going to take long or anything. Tristen, you mind?” I said, tilting my head away towards what looked like a vacant spot in the library.

“Yea, sure…hey, we’ll be right back.” Tristen said to Camp and Fela. As the three of us broke off from Camp and Fela, we walked off towards the vacant spot towards the back of the library, me grabbing a soda to drink on the way back there to keep up appearances for the time being. Though something Tristen noticed something on the way back.

“Hey, Freth? Blizz? That’s that thing around your neck?” He then asked, staring in confusion.

“Yeaaah…that’s what we need to talk to you about…” Freth said, giving a cordial wave to a random passerby.

“Is…it why the SNAGs have been down all day?” Tristen asked.

“Yea…and the reason why none of the other Snagems are here to see you. Keep up appearances, don’t flinch, don’t react. Alright? HQ’s been compromised.” I said to him.

Tristen would cross his arms, listening to the two of us. “I’ve been gone only a year and it goes south already?” Tristen asked.

“Yea, not exactly our finest hour. Remember last days in Kalos? Worse than that.” Freth said to Tristen. “The collars on us are suppressing our hybrid power so we can’t do any hybrid attacks or things of that nature. We could try to brute strength them off with our own two hands, but these things are rigged to kill us if we try to tamper with it and we don’t know if we can get them off fast enough before they kill us. Never mind they could just do it anyways with a push of a button.” Freth said.

“And before we ended up over here with our escorts who are just outside, they cut off any sort of communication to the outside and they just had managed to get in GRAY’s server room before they triggered something that got GRAY and everything with him out of the HQ. So they’re not in the best of moods right now either. They only agreed to do this under agreement that Sub will hand over any secrets that we might still have as soon as we’re done.” I said.

“So much for Phobos then…” Tristen said.

“Phobos?” I asked.

“The laptop Sub got me, the one I asked for. Remember? There was a program on it that I was told to only use in an emergency. I was under the assumption for something that would happen here that would require Snagems get here as fast as possible.” Tristen said.

I took a look over towards Freth as she did back at me. Wait…was that the reason? It was a gamble. But it was all we had. “Where’s your laptop?” I asked him.

“Uh, back in my dorm. Why?”

“How fast can you get there?” Freth then asked him.

“Uh, no more than two minutes tops. Just an elevator and a couple of halls to go down and I’m there.” Tristen said.

“We’ll stay down here and mingle, try to keep our captors placated at the moment.” I said to him. “Do whatever you got to do to work that Phobos thing. Act like you need to rush off real quick like you got something to show us…right now. Go.”

Tristen would step back. “Okay! Uh, I’ll be right back.” Tristen said, gesturing a bit. “Let me go take care of that…” he said, taking a skipping turnaround then made his way off to the elevator to get on.

Tristen did look like there was nothing up and Freth and I would give each other a shrug to each other to keep up appearances, followed up with me sipping a sip of the soda that I had. “Bah…this soda had been out a little while…the ice watered it down…” I said as an aside.

Tristen would make his way to a nearby elevator, quickly moving his way in and closes the doors behind him. He would hit the button to get up to the dormitories and then quickly he couldn’t help but to sigh out. Part of him felt that it was far too good to last. It left him to question just who or what got the better of Snagem so thoroughly. Much to his chagrin, he was once again a Snagem on duty. As soon as the elevators door opened, he started to make his way off to his dorm at a fast-walking pace, effectively making a beeline for it.

Tristen would make it to his dorm in short order, unlocking his door, slipping inside, then quickly closing it behind him and locking it. He took a look at his dorm for about two seconds, which as he looked at it was a far cry from how it was a year ago. Where once it was barren as a new student trying to make his start turned into effectively a home away from home. Pictures on his walls, knickknacks and bric-a-brac, all which told a story of his time over the past year here at Uva-Naranja academy. It dawned on Tristen just now he was about to lose this for a while. And there was no telling when he was coming back, or if he would be able to. At least there was a chance. If something got the better of Snagems and compromised the headquarters so thoroughly, then not acting was probably going to bring the academy to ruins as well just because he was here. He didn’t want to put his friends and teachers in jeopardy. Just knowing all of this didn’t take the sting out of having to dive headlong into action on his ceremony night, a night he worked so hard to earn, however.

He quickly stepped over towards his desk and flopped right into his chair, opening up and turning on his laptop. It was quick to turn on and Tristen was quick to log in. Tristen would quickly select the Phobos icon then saw the prompt show up on the screen. “I gave you this glutton…?” Tristen silently asked himself. GRAY never told him about that or what he would have expected once he loaded the program. He was only told that it was only meant for extreme emergencies. Was it a password? What…glutton did Sub give Tristen? Wait a second…there was only one in his entire entourage, and it was primarily for electricity. One that nearly drained him dry in more than one occasion, in fact.

Tristen would type in the prompt. Galvantula

----
As Tristen attempted to activate Phobos, Freth and I tried to keep our cool in the main hall, remaining patient and hoping that this gamble with that Phobos thing. Before we knew it, Ms. Raifort would start approaching the two of us. “Ms. Raifort, hello.” Freth would be the first to speak up to the teacher as she shook her hand upon arrival.

“Hello.” I’d casually say to the history teacher.

“Tristen has been keeping in touch with us over the past year about the classes and its good to know that he has took all of these classes seriously. At least yours, most of all.”

“Well considering how you were with history with Tristen…” I commented to Freth.

“Oh, well, I know what I like at least.” Freth said. “But yea, we’ve…oh…been having a little rough go at it here and there. Nothing that I don’t think we wouldn’t be able to overcome, but that’s just par for the course for us.”

“Yea, but nothing that we wouldn’t try to basically tear heaven and earth asunder to just see Tristen getting through at least his first year here.” I said to her. “I suppose that was the goal for us both.”

A thought then occurred to Freth just then and she wondered if he couldn’t coax the history teacher into spilling a few things. Get more context about what went on, her mind still fresh of the interrogation she went through just then. “So, anything more happen on your end with the world of Heath and the Scarlet and Violet books, by chance? Any new discoveries or anything like that? Try as I might have, there wasn’t really anything much else I could have done; not since Area Zero at least. I feel as if there’s more of a mystery there than what’s on the surface.” I looked over towards Freth, not commenting on that and deciding to let her work. She did mention to me that Area Zero was one of those things she ended up being questioned about in her interrogation. There was perhaps the chance that SWIPE picked up on something since Freth’s excursion into Area Zero.

Tristen stared in confusion when the screen went black. This…didn’t seem like any sort of emergency thing the more he went in, until the laptop started to react. Tristen jumped when the laptop then started to show it had one other hidden compartment to it, staring in confusion. When he then looked at the screen, he went completely wide-eyed. A warp panel? Evacuation in ten seconds? This was a means for Tristen to escape? Not to get Snagems here? Tristen practically double-taked around the room. As the timer went down, he instantly realized there was no way in the world he’d be able to get this back to his parents in less than ten seconds. In that instant, Tristen recalled the conversation between him and his adoptive parents…the two Articuno hybrids were here as an agreement with Sub and this unknown faction that compromised the headquarters. It was apparently something that Sub arranged to happen. The contingency that GRAY briefly mentioned as passing roughly a year ago. Sub was counting on Tristen to bail them out.

There wasn’t much time to think about it. He would remain in contact with the warp panel, grimacing a bit. He wasn’t all too thrilled, but apparently Sub was having faith in the Manectric hybrid. He hoped that this was going to end well…

----
“So Paldea is still trying to keep Area Zero under wraps.” Freth said. That did fall in line with what was said during the interrogation, Freth thought. “Though I am left to wonder how much longer they’re going to be able to keep people out. Oh well…”

“Well, more enlightening topics, you wouldn’t happen to know by chance how Tristen adjusted overall here at the academy? I know that it was rough for him at the start of things and he just pretty much focused more on school work and such. You know, what about working with other people and teachers, like yourself? I have to admit that I wasn’t exactly…the best for that.” I asked. Though I was speaking up only to bide time here and keep up appearances as if nothing was wrong.

“Well, I did tell you that we needed to do something sooner.” Freth commented. “Though better late than never.”

“I know, I know…” I said.

"Huh...apparently he's made worlds difference here." I said. "At least your mind can be at ease then about that."

"I suppose I can. After everything, Trist-" Freth and I would perk up, each of our respective senses would go off in their own ways. Freth would get cut off when Raifort brought to attention to someone that was effectively trying to butt into the conversation. While we didn't recognize the face, we recognized the voice and a wave of disdain came over us. I glanced over towards the window, trying to hold my tongue and making any manner of scene that would put the people here into jepoardy. God, we literally just got here and we're already being dragged off. Probably just as well. "...does he now." Freth said.

"You might have to excuse us, Ms. Raifort, we might have to see what is going on with this." I then told her.

"But hey, we'll catch up some more. I'd like to see if we couldn't arrange a Herba deep-dive as to their origins and things like that." Freth said, still trying to keep up appearances.

"You two will probably have a field day." I then said, the two of us getting escorted back out of the building. Once we found our way to the door and making our way through, I looked back to make sure of us not being tailed then back towards the female. "You people never really had any intention on us sticking around for this...typical." I said, rather deadpan.

"Or its the matter of exact words. Yes, we went, but didn't state for how long." Freth then said.