Responsibility

While flying on her pidgeot Crimson over the ocean toward Cinnabar Island, Leaf reflects on the profound changes in her life. Following the revelation of the ninja renegades, she has published the truth about their hidden clans on her blog. Anticipating retaliation, she now teleports to an unmarked apartment in Unova every night to sleep, taking comfort in the vast geographical distance between her and the Kanto underworld. The journey also provides time to process her ongoing desensitization therapy. After years of dreaming of a world without trainer battles, she has begun preparing her mind for them—a slow, grueling process she feels is necessary after realizing how powerless she would be against prepared renegades.

Stopping at an island outpost, Leaf sits with her wigglytuff and mourns the anniversary of Aiko's death. She recalls the solemn public ceremony in Vermilion City and the private picnic where she and her friends shared stories of grief and survival. But sitting alone on the beach, Leaf realizes her current melancholy is fueled by a different kind of loss: she feels she is slowly losing Red to the war. During his recent birthday, he was distant and subdued, devoid of his old dreams, leading Leaf and Laura to tearfully accept their powerlessness as Red slowly sacrifices his identity to fight Team Rocket.

Leaf arrives at the Cinnabar Laboratory for the Study of Ancient Pokemon. The facility has expanded to include a massive, rapidly-constructed glass dome housing fifty-seven wild unown. Artem, Red's former research partner, guides her inside the dome, where the swarm's chaotic, alien murmurs fill the air. Red is waiting on the observation deck, and the sight of him gives Leaf a pang of sorrow—he is dressed in stark red and black, looking like a dangerous Hunter. He carries a new abra in a custom back-sling for instantaneous teleportation, having given it the punny name "Backra" to add some levity to its stressful job. Red has brought his helix fossil in hopes that the unown might spontaneously revive ancient Pokémon, testing the hypothesis that they are responsible for modern fossil regeneration.

Seeking privacy from Red's ever-present security detail, they step outside. Red releases his newly evolved charizard, which has grown significantly leaner, sharper, and far more predatory. As the dragon devours a trough of meat, Red finally opens up to Leaf about the bizarre, suffocating reality of his life. He is constantly supported by a team of Hunters and Interpol agents who procure Elite-level Pokémon and custom tactical gear for him, treating him as a vital asset rather than a thirteen-year-old boy.

More pressingly, Red admits he is cracking under the pressure. The psychic network he created has led to him receiving messages from isolated psychics across the world. While they are supportive, he feels a crushing responsibility for their well-being. He recounts a recent session with Dr. Seward, where he broke down after a Pallet engineer casually mentioned finishing the new Pokédex version. Dr. Seward identified his state as true burnout: not merely exhaustion from overwork, but the prolonged, soul-crushing imbalance of feeling totally responsible for preventing failures without the autonomy to solve them his own way. Red fears what will happen if Rocket starts killing people again and he fails to stop them. When he wonders how to square "Heroic Responsibility" with his deteriorating mental health, Leaf reluctantly suggests he speak to Giovanni—the only other person they know who carries massive, world-spanning responsibility.

Leaf then reveals her own secret: she is undergoing therapy so she can actively participate in trainer battles and fight renegades alongside them. Though Red briefly protests, he accepts her decision, noting with a wry smile that she is giving up the ability to feel morally superior about avoiding battles.

Their quiet moment ends when Blue lands on his own pidgeot Zephyr. He is eager to scout new island locations for their tracking network, rapidly listing off a canyon, grottos, and an abandoned mansion situated over a sinkhole on the volcano's cliffs. The description instantly triggers Leaf's memory of Dr. Fuji's story notes regarding the secret lab where the psychic hybrid was created. Heart pounding, she asks Blue to investigate the mansion first and insists they bring Red along, terrified that they are about to stumble onto something far more dangerous than ninja renegades.