School, Dating, and Saving the World

Incoming Call

Crystal was in the lab, cataloging new Pokemon. With the discovery of even more new species in Galar, she had been working extra hours. It was quite enjoyable, almost calming to sort through the dozens of pokeballs, each one holding a Pokemon she had never seen before.

That was her day. Nice, relaxing. Peaceful, dare she say.

Of course, it couldn't last.

The sound of her Pokegear vibrating shook Crystal out of her concentration. She went over to pick it up, glancing at the call screen.

Super Handsome ❤

Yeah, she never should've left Gold with her device. Now all her contact names were changed to things like Grumpy or even Too Much Glitter. It was too much of a hassle to go around and change them all. As long as she could tell who was calling, that was good enough.

Crystal answered the call. "What did you do?"

"Nothing! I can't call my super lovely, beautiful girlfriend for no reason?" Gold let out what seemed like a very forced laugh.

No. No, he couldn't. Over half the calls Gold had made to her since they started dating were something along the lines of, Silver's missing again! or I might've misplaced a very important research sample that I shouldn't even have in the first place!, and Crystal was starting to expect disaster whenever she answered her Pokegear.

Crystal let her silence speak for her. Gold made a coughing sound before speaking again.

"So, uh, Crystal." His voice was a bit tense. "You're good with legal stuff, right?"

"Yes ... " She didn't like where this was going.

"So this friend of mine, he might've ... sorta ... set a building on fire. In Sinnoh. A very important building." Gold let out a hacking cough.

Crystal became aware of the faint sound of screaming in the background of Gold's call.

"What did you do."

"Nothing! Except ... "

"Except?"

"I might be trapped in the basement of said building without my Pokemon? Gah, it sounds worse when I say it out loud."

Crystal dropped her Pokegear. She bent down and picked it back up as fast as she could.

Sinnoh. Gold said he was in Sinnoh. Why was he in Sinnoh? Crystal hadn't known that he's gone to Sinnoh.

She took a deep breath. Panicking a couple regions away was not going to help. Using common sense and sound advice (things Gold quite obviously lacked) would. She had to stay calm.

"How do you get trapped in a basement without your Pokemon?!" she yelled. Her mind tried to come up with some sort of solution.

"Okay, funny story, but you know Pearl? Funny guy, has a fire starter. See, he invited me over to Jubilife City, and we were inside the TV Station, which is pretty nice. Anyway-" Gold paused. "The building's shaking."

Gold's voice was starting to get wheezy. Crystal worried about how much oxygen was left. There was sound of stones falling, or maybe cement cracking.

"Sorry, SSG, gotta hang up. I'll talk to you later."

"Wait, Gold, don't-"

All Crystal heard was the dial tone. She stared at her Pokegear with a mix of disbelief and worry.

That feeling turned into righteous anger.

Ten hours later, Crystal found herself in Sinnoh. It had been expensive and had required mild threatening, but she had made it to Sinnoh as fast as possible. She had made it to Jubilife City.

If Gold wasn't dead, she was going to kill him.

The city was pretty large, and quite a bit similar to Goldenrod. It wasn't hard to find someone to give her directions to the TV Station.

A nice Bug Catcher told her the way, though he did mention that, "I wouldn't go there, miss. It's closed while they fix the rubble."

Crystal took a few streets until she walked as close as she could to the station. She had been expecting worse.

The outer shell of the building was fine. A little smoky, but still intact. From through the window, she could see that the entire first floor had caved into the ground.

"Senior Crystal! Senior Crystal, is that you?!"

Crystal turned. There was that blond kid, Pearl, if she remembered correctly. Gold had mentioned him.

"Senior Crys-"

"What happened?" she asked, getting straight to business.

Pearl froze. For once, he seemed to deflate. "I ... Ah, you see, I brought Senior Gold here so we could show the amazingness of the move Blast Burn, together on live TV. Senior Gold kept saying that he wanted to be on televsion, so it seemed like a good idea."

"You used Blast Burn, an extremely destrective fire type move, inside of an enclosed TV studio." That explained the floor.

"Apparently, the floors are made of wood." Seeing Crystal's face, Pearl started talking faster. "But we did find out that they weren't following proper safety procedures! Now they'll have to remake the station up to code. It could have been worse, I mean, imagine if this had never happened and then there had been an earthquake-"

"Where's Gold." It wasn't a question. It was a demand. She sounded like Silver.

"In the hospital. N-No one died or was badly injured, but he inhaled a lot of smoke ..."

"You'll take me to him. Now."

×+×+×

"Hey, SSG," Gold said from where he lay on the hospital bed. He smiled, which didn't match his surroundings or singed hair at all.

Crystal smacked him.

"Ow! Ow, ow, ow! I'm sorry, I'm sorry!"

"You should be." Crystal sniffled. "You ever hang up on me like that again, and I'll bury you alive myself, understand?"

"Got it. Sorry." Gold had the decency yo look ashamed.

"Good." Crystal leaned down and kissed his forehead. She sat on the side of the bed, holding Gold. She thought she had lost him. No matter how annoying he was, the thought of living without him terrified her.

For a moment, it seemed like the world was only the two of them. Crystal was glad.

Then she remembered.

Crystal was up on her feet in a moment.

"Kris?" Gold asked.

"Excuse me for one moment. I need to talk to Pearl about safety and ... other things." Crystal marched toward the door, knowing that the blond comedian was just outside.

She shouldn't focus her anger on him. But the point stood that Gold never would have been in Sinnoh, in that station, if Pearl hadn't called him over.

They were going to have words.