August smiled, pulling a cigarette out from within his coat. "Take a chill pill boys, didn't you hear the lady she's a ranger." The quad squad deflated, seemingly relieved that they did not actually have to fight anyone. Especially since the stranger's companion was a pikachu, they would have been fried within seconds. August raised a lighter to his cigarette, calmly lighting it while maintaining eye contact with the stranger.

He exhaled as he put his lighter away, smoke emanating into the air. August chuckled as he rubbed the back of his neck, "Forgive my mooks here, they got a crackerjack sense of duty but no manners. Bless their little hearts." The squirtles had already stopped paying attention, instead taking to the grass to see who among them could perform the best somersault. August crossed his arms, balancing his cigarette between two of his knuckles.

"Name's August, August Colgan. I'm a reporter for HNN, on the hunt for the very missing people you speak of." August finally reached out and grabbed the flyers, holding them up with one hand to examine them closely. He did not recognize anyone depicted, but it did not stop him from taking a closer look at their faces.

"It's a peculiar case, isn't it? Half the region disappears overnight, without a trace. What's your take ranger? Any theories?"

Genevieve Cromwell

August raised his eyebrows, calmly jotting down highlights of Mister Devlin's answers. He had not heard about the first Silph Cup at all, likely due to the very event he had described. That had overshadowed most news across the world, it was not surprising that something as athletically festive as a race might have been lost among the chaos.

What did surprise him was his comment about the aquatic races being unpopular. That detail would help develop his next question. "Color me elated, I'll have to catch the other circuit races for sure to get the full story." He probably would not, more likely he would attach cameras to his squirtles and watch the highlights of their recordings later. Would they be allowed into stadiums without supervision? A question for another time.

August leaned forward, "Tell me Josh, can I call you Josh? Why do you think the aquatic races are normally unpopular, and what has caused this one to break that trend?"

Josh Devlin

Ah he agreed. Of course he agreed, who could resist having their brain picked by the media. August smiled coyly, reaching into his coat to pull out a notepad that had a pencil resting within the binding. Now, he had very little knowledge of how the race had actually gone due to zoning out. It was imperative that he did not let Josh catch on to this, yet he would need to use this interview to gather enough details about the race to write a full article.

Easy as pie.

He pulled the pencil out of the binding and flipped to the middle of the notepad, bobbing quietly upon his excited squirtles. He tapped the pad twice for good lucky before finally starting the interview. "This is the second Silph Cup, correct? How do you think this one pan out in comparison to the last one?"

Josh Devlin

The woods seemed a little cliche for a missing persons case. If someone were to go missing, the first place most people checked would probably be the deep dark woods next door. Not in this case though; with half the damn region disappearing Petalburg Woods was only glanced over. Everyone figured that with so many missing people they would be pretty obvious to spot, even in a forest as thick as this one. So when nobody was found everyone quickly moved on to other areas.

Not August though, in his experience the least likely place was usually where the most interesting stuff went down. With everyone else turning elsewhere, he had free reign to wander the woods in search of clues. Today August was doing a casual stroll through the center path, smoking a cigarette as he pondered the possible hiding places of the missing population. His four squirtle helpers were gallivanting ahead of him, searching every nook and cranny for someone to save--no matter how impractical.

"The most likely place would be underground. How do you get that many people underground? Cave systems maybe. No caves in the woods. Maybe digging? Would have found the holes by now. Maybe the filled in the holes. That would take a lot of skill. And time. Skilled and timely, what a horrific combination. No wonder these kidnappers have been at large for so long, their experts at managing their schedules."

August stopped as he lightly bumped into his squirtles. They had formed a protective barrier in front of him against an unknown threat, which August would only notice several blinks later. Of course, what his squirtles thought to be a threat was only another pedestrian. August smiled at the stranger, "Well hey there. Fine day for a stroll, am I right?"

Genevieve Cromwell

'There are a lot of clouds in the sky today. Was it going to rain? No these were white clouds, rain comes from dark clouds. Well now let's not be prejudice, white clouds could probably provide rain just as well as dark clouds can. Right? Was it raining right now? Shit we did not bring an umbrella.'

The sound of a loud horn caused August to flinch harshly. He looked around for the sign of some sort of attack, but found nothing except revelry and joy. What his mind had thought to be rain was the roaring of the crowds around him, cheering in chorus as the Silph Cup got underway. As August came back to his senses, he slowly pulled out a cigarette and carefully lit it. He was not a crowd person, which had caused a spike in his already tumultuous anxiety.

It did not help that he was not feeling well, then again that is what happens when you eat three corndogs and drink four lattes on your way to your seat. Shit what was he thinking? At least the Quad Squad was having a good time: August's four squirtles cheered along with the crowd as they chomped down on a pantry's worth of snacks. It was nice of HNN to pay for their seats, last time August covered a sporting event he had to stack them in one seat and that ended up being a mess.

August looked out over the water, waiting patiently for the race to begin. His thoughts were psyching him up as he watched the waves, 'Alright now Auggie you have got to focus. What are your readers going to think if you don't know anything about what happened at the race? Which race? This race? Was this the right race? Of course it was don't be ridiculous. Wait no I'm supposed to be in Fortree! Ah, that was last year. I think. Gosh the water is so blue today. Did they dye it? Can you dye the ocean? How much dye would it take to dye the entire ocean? Can I hypothetically get eighty gallons of food coloring and make the ocean red? Nah, might hurt the environment. Gotta wait another ten years, then the ocean will be too polluted to save and we can have our way with it. Red is a dumb color to dye the ocean too, what do I want it to look bloody? Am I crazy? Now purple, that's a respectable color for the ocean. I've always thought the ocean would look great in purple.'

Another horn sound jolted August, and as he regained his bearings he would slowly come to a startling realization. The race was over, he had missed the entire thing. Damn, this is why he didn't cover sports. Too much down time. The racers were coming back to shore, and August would leap to his feet. "Alright squad." He said as he threw his cigarette butt upon the pile of empty snack packages. "Time to roll out. Look lively, we're on the clock." His lethargic squirtles groaned, they were far too full of sweets to do anything productive. Nevertheless, they would jump to their feet and waddle behind their boss as he made his way to the ground level.

Other reporters were waiting for the racers, but they had made the mistake of being polite. August was not going to wait for the racers to come to him, instead he kept walking across the dock and toward the water. His squad ran ahead of him, diving into the water to form a small raft for him to stand on. A seamlessly fell upon the raft, standing with debonair flare as his squirtles began swimming out to the racers. August scanned the possible marks before laying his eyes on the man himself: Josh Devlin. Who better to interview than the organizer of the race? August tapped his foot toward Josh, and the squirtles would start swimming in that direction.

As they grew close, August would provide a greeting. "Mister Devlin! I'm August Colgan of HNN, would you be available for a post-race interview?"

Josh Devlin