Equilibrium

*****Interlude I: Free Radical*****

Thrice happy he who by some shady grove,

Far from the clamorous world; doth live his own;

Though solitary, who is not alone,

But doth converse with that eternal love.

— William Drummond, “Thrice Happy He Who By Some Shady Grove”

*****

Far above the desert floor, Salamence beat its wings and screeched.

The little shapes moving about near the base of the mountain hurried away, terrified.  Salamence turned over in the air and banked hard for the flat mountaintop where they rested.

There were several of them there, deep friends all.  A Machamp and Feraligatr wrestled near a crude lean-to set near the center of the plateau.  A Gardevoir sat alone near the mountain's edge, psychically hurling rocks off the mountainside.  An Absol playfully hunted a Dusknoir that always stayed just out of her sight.

Salamence roared again and landed, skidding across the rocks and losing its balance before stopping in front of the lean-to.  Inside sat a man with a great shock of silver hair, his eyes darting between a kettle near boiling and the dragon.  Burns marred some of the skin on the back of his neck, stretching down and out of sight under his shirt.

“What is it, boy?” he asked, scratching Salamence behind his ear.  His massive leg began to shake, making the whole mountain shudder.  The Absol gave up her search and darted to the edge of the mountain, where the Dusknoir and Gardevoir joined her. “See something?”

He nodded and rolled away so the man could look.  He took a pair of binoculars from his stash of supplies and joined his Pokémon, looking down at whatever had made Salamence bellow.

“Looks like one of the golems,” he said, eyes trained on the Regirock lumbering away. “What's it doing here, I wonder...”

He traced their path backwards and saw the scorch marks in the outcropping, fading with the light.  They were close to a footpath, the one he knew well.  To be sure he followed the path up, sure enough leading to a small flat area set into the side of Firestone Mountain, one with a roughly carved tunnel leading down to its caverns.

“Looking for something?” he asked himself. “Shall we take a look?”