When Haru and Lusamine reappeared in front of Lana and Wicke, they were already dressed in fresh clothes.
As for Lana... she had scrubbed her face clean several times over in the most thorough way possible.
Even so, her skin still prickled with goosebumps, as if there were some lingering filth she couldn't wash away.
Of course, she knew full well that it wasn't her body that had been tainted— it was her heart.
After everything that had happened today...
"I know better than anyone just how painful it is to take a Flare Blitz head-on."
But now wasn't the time to dwell on that.
There was still a Pokémon in critical condition in the emergency room— saving it had to take priority over everything else.
Once that was done... that guy... what was she going to do to him again?
Even though she was deeply anxious, the girl hadn't forgotten her original mission. The moment Lusamine reappeared, she immediately began explaining the situation with the Dratini.
Wicke, too, didn't press Lusamine to explain what had just happened between her and Haru; instead, she supplemented Lana's account with what she had observed.
Their thoughts were aligned— now that the earlier chaos had subsided, what mattered most was the Dratini's safety.
As for Lusamine and Lillie's situation, Wicke would have to ask about that later.
At the very least, she needed to know whether Lillie was aware of what had been going on.
Suppressing their lingering unease, the two women gave a quick but clear report of the situation.
"What? This kind of thing happened?"
Still a bit flushed after changing her clothes, Lusamine couldn't sit still upon hearing their account.
She might have been a little... eccentric, but her love for Pokémon was genuine. With a life hanging by a thread right here in Aether Paradise, there was no way she could turn a blind eye.
Haru had no objections either. He might not have shown it openly, but he truly did love Pokémon.
Gardevoir, Greedent, Tsareena, Lurantis, Alcremie... he liked them all.
And since this Dratini had been brought here by Lana, of course he had to come see for himself.
Under Wicke's lead, the group quickly arrived at the emergency room where the Dratini was being treated.
The room looked more like a laboratory than an emergency ward— white counters were littered with precision instruments and test tubes.
Several researchers in lab coats were hunched over equipment, sweat beading on their brows— clearly, they were extremely tense.
Inside a large glass container filled with nutrient solution floated the Dratini, its life barely sustained by the fluid. But this method wouldn't keep it stable for long.
Proper treatment was urgently needed, or the Dratini would die.
Dratini were rare, but extremely fragile Pokémon— in the games, their base stats were barely 300.
But this wasn't something like a Spinda or a Kricketune— it actually had further evolutions to look forward to.
Dratini had a three-stage evolution line. The first stage, the tiny and adorable Dratini, resembled a little water serpent and could only survive by feeding on sediment in water.
It would eventually evolve into Dragonair, which still bore a resemblance to Dratini but was more slender and had gained the ability to fly— plus, its base stats comfortably surpassed those of Kricketune.
But even that wasn't the limit of its potential. Deep within, this line of Pokémon harbored tremendous latent power.
Not that it would ever run for Prime Minister or anything, but when a Dragonair gathered enough strength, it would grow wings and limbs, evolving into the pseudo-legendary Dragonite with a base stat total of 600.
Of course, that was a matter for the future. Right now, the Dratini before Haru was still a fragile little baby.
That said, this particular Dratini was special— it was pink.
A normal Dratini had sky-blue skin. A pink Dratini meant this one was a shiny.
But none of them had time to marvel over that— its life was the only thing that mattered.
The moment they entered the emergency room, everyone hurriedly questioned the lab-coated researchers:
"How is it? Any progress?"
"Not that we haven't made progress, but this is an extremely tricky case."
The researcher in charge, a middle-aged man with a very receding hairline and bloodshot eyes, looked utterly exhausted— it seemed he hadn't slept for days even before this emergency.
"We've run a full diagnostic and found no external injuries. But there's some sort of energy inside its body... very similar to Z-Power."
"On its own, this energy isn't harmful to Pokémon. But the Dratini is too weak— it can't process it."
"If it could evolve into Dragonite instantly, the problem would vanish. But clearly, that's impossible."
The man looked deeply troubled.
They'd treated many Pokémon before, but this was the first time they'd encountered something like this.
"Z-Power?"
Haru frowned slightly.
Z-Power was the energy Pokémon used to perform Z-Moves, a type of "natural energy." It also had mysterious ties to the Light Pokémon of Alola, the Legendary Necrozma.
Which begged the question— why was this Dratini harboring Z-Power?
But if that was the case... maybe there was a way to handle it.
Just then, a soft, gentle voice came from outside the emergency room:
"Mother, so you were here. I've been looking for you for ages."
The next moment, a delicate, blonde young lady walked into the room holding her Cosmog.
But... something felt off.
Why was everyone staring at her with such strange expressions? Even Haru was giving her that look.
It was as if something shocking had happened, and she was the only one who didn't know.
That couldn't be, right? Hadn't the staff said Haru and the others were busy treating a Dratini?
"What's going on?"
Perplexed, Lillie tilted her head in confusion.