TLC ¤ AFTER CHRONICLES ¤ Year of the Cat Tech Lab One, a pokémon fanfic

First Published Summer 2000
First Published on FFN: 03/23/03
Original FFN #1280256/4

THE LUGIA CHRONICLES

AFTER CHRONICLES

YEAR OF THE CAT

By R. A. Stott

Based on characters by S. E. Nordwall and R. A. Stott
With References to Steve Brunton's "Terminal Solutions"

Chapter Four

Tech Lab One

Six months - Shadowcat stood in Tech Lab One waiting for North's final verdict over the device she had thrown disheveled to his table. If she had known what those six prior months would have held for her, would she have continued in this possibly hollow pursuit? North had promised so much. She thought back to the day she had just watched the video that North had provided her with - a history of Team Rocket - and he had requested her presence at the lab, where he would answer her questions - As many as he could at least. But she had so many...

The shower was warm and pleasant, especially on the sore shoulder where the Taser had struck her three days earlier. No matter, it was just fine.

Having a humanoid body covered in fur sometimes was a pain. Granted, in the winter it made for a way to keep warm that couldn't be beat. But in the summer it was hot. And even though she was part cat, Shadow wasn't going to go the total feline way when it came to bathing. She remembered how her own cat would wash itself, and dreaded the thought. So, like any other human, she would shower. But the fur... oh well... drying all that fur... Sigh...

Sforzie had rigged up a contraption with six blow dryers. It worked, when it didn't blow itself over. And when Shadow would turn it on, the lights would dim in her bedroom. She just hoped it wasn't soaked by the fire extinguishers.

She got out of the shower. The fire sprinkler was off and the water gone... that was odd. The dryer seemed okay, and she flicked the wall switch with a well dried hand, and stood in front of the warm air blast.

A few minutes later, and two near collapses of the dryer stands, she wrapped a towel around herself and headed for what she expected was wet messy bedroom. What she found was a perfectly dry room. Even her mattress was dry. This was strange. Then she saw Bucky.

He was still wet. But he was over in one corner of the room, his PokéBall in his paws, floating over a small puddle of water that was being sucked into the orb. He then went over to a sink in the kitchen area and released the water he had collected. It gushed out in a minor torrent - Very odd.

She decided to go in her dress blacks this time. The white uniform stuck out so, and the blacks helped her sneak about better. She took her two PokéBalls and hung them to her belt and headed for the door.

"Squeak!"

Shadow turned to look behind her. Bucky was spin-drying himself. So much for a dry kitchen...

Looking a bit dizzy, he then tripped and stumbled into the strange PokéBall. It slammed shut, and shot across the room to Shadow's hands.

"Coming along, are we?" Shadow said to the PokéBall. She opened the door to her bedroom and saw a wet hallway. She also found Sforzie there about to knock on the door.

"Where IS that imp!?" she howled. "Where is BUCKY!?"

Shadow quickly placed the PokéBall on her belt. "He's around here somewhere... why?"

"Why? WHY!" she shrieked. "LOOK AT THIS PLACE! This'll be the SECOND TIME he set off the fire extinguishers!"

"Really? My room's dry..."

Shadow left Sforzie staring into her room as she headed for the door.

Outside, she found a Team Rocket black Jeep Cherokee waiting for her, Derek at the wheel, his Vaporeon in the back seat.

"The Silph Company, and step on it!" Shadow said, hopping into the passenger seat.

"Yes, ma'am!" he said putting the vehicle in gear and tearing out of the parking lot.

"I take it Bucky set off the fire sprinklers again," the young man behind the wheel said as they left the Cafe behind.

"Sforzie was saying something about that when I left," Shadow said, pulling the special PokéBall off her belt. It refused to shrink, so sitting with it slung there hurt. "What did he do?"

Derek laughed. "He somehow tripped it the first night we were there when he showed everyone how to flip a bottle cap. Sheared two sprinkler heads clean off. If everyone hadn't been so amazed by just that move, welll..."

Shadow examined the PokéBall. It looked odd.

"Ah, is that him?" Derek said, pulling a holder from the dashboard, and pointing at it. Shadow slipped the ball into it, and it popped open. The small Pikachu peeked out from under the lid.

"You've been naughty again, haven't you?"

Shadow looked at Derek. That wasn't him. She looked behind herself.

"Hello," the Vaporeon said to her.

"Y - you can TALK!" she said surprised by the Pokémon's sudden vocabulary.

"Only when HE'S about," Derek said, pointing at the PokéBall and Bucky. "He's our special little Pokémon."

"Squeak..." he said.

"That's easy for you to say..." the Vaporeon said.

They drove along for a short while, riding in silence. Shadowcat watched the scenery roll by, but really she was deep in thought. What was she getting herself into? She looked over at Derek.

"So, you're Golden R?" she asked him.

Derek kept looking forwards, only glancing slightly over at his passenger. "Yes ma'am," he said.

"That must be... different," she said joining him watching the road.

"We're still part of Team Rocket."

She looked over at him. "Yes, but how much of Team Rocket is the Golden R?"

"Ma'am? What do you mean?"

"Values, Mr. Derek, values. Just how close does the Golden R follow Team Rocket values?"

Derek nodded, as if finally understanding the question. "If you mean, does the Golden R do the same things as Team Rocket regulars like stealing Pokémon and such, no. That's not our job with the Rocket."

She nodded, and continued to watch the road. He glanced over again.

"You did watch the video, right?"

She smiled and shook her head. "Yes... it was very... educational. It sounded like the Golden R was a bit... confrontational... with the upper management of Team Rocket..."

The driver smirked. "Considering the treatment given them by 'upper management', can you blame them? Besides, that tape was made by an outside source..."

Shadow looked back at Derek. "Yes... about that... Who was that woman on the tape? She didn't look..."

Derek shook his head. "I'm sorry, ma'am... that would be something you'll have to ask Professor North."

Well, so much for that information... She looked out the side window.

The Silph Building was to their right.

"Aren't we going up there?" she asked.

"Back entrance," Derek said. "You were due to go on a mission, remember? We wouldn't want Security to see you coming in now, would we?"

The Jeep pulled up along the edge of the road beside a bushy sloping hill. Derek pressed a button on his dashboard.

"All security monitors are clear," a computer chirped over the radio. He pressed another button, and a bush beside the road moved aside, followed by a sizable rock. Derek then eased the Jeep into the cave behind the stone, which replaced itself as soon as they were clear.

The tunnel seemed miles long. It stretched off into the hill that made up the Silph Company's grounds. It had side tunnels that lead this way and that. It even had traffic signals, though there wasn't anyone in the tunnels as far as Shadow could see.

"How long has THIS been down here?" Shadow said aloud. She heard Derek laugh.

"It was here before the building was built," he said as they drove on deeper into the complex.

As they traveled, Shadow noticed some closed off sections of the tunnels with signs on the round bulkheads that shut them off. These were names she recognized as labs and offices of Team Rocket's underground headquarters. The last one said 'Commissary'.

"These tunnels," Shadowcat asked, "are they really running behind the headquarters?"

Derek only nodded.

Shadow laughed to herself. "Does the Boss know of them?"

"Some, but not these that we're in now," Derek replied. "These are shielded and hidden from the rest of Team Rocket. Kind of our special escape route, in case Team Rocket needed to abandon ship, so to say..."

"But, if the tunnels are known only to the Golden R, how would Team Rocket be able to use them in an emergency?"

Derek stifled a snicker. "Believe me, when those bulkheads drop, any Team Rocket member that didn't understand what a gaping hole like those would produce was for DESERVES being captured!"

The Jeep turned a corner and headed down a slight slope. It pulled off onto a short landing. Shadow looked down the tunnel.

"How do you keep THIS all a secret?" she said, seeing no end to it all.

"The walls are impregnated with a special metal alloy that prevents even psychic Pokémon from finding them," Derek said as he looked up at the ceiling through the windshield. "A teleport move would reflect away - and it's been tried. The same metal prevents any of Team Rocket's diggers from coming in here as well... It's as safe a hole in the ground as we possibly could make it." He unbuckled himself, and got out of the Jeep. Shadow watched him.

"We're here," he said.

"Squeak!" Bucky added. He climbed out of the PokéBall, closed it and sat on it. Then he and the ball floated out Derek's open door.

"Show off!" the Vaporeon said, climbing out her door.

Shadow quickly released herself from the belt and headed out her door to follow Derek. He was heading for a steel door along the wall they had parked next to. He took a PokéBall from his belt and inserted the beam emitter into a hole in the wall beside the door frame. He gave it a twist then pushed. Shadow was surprised to see a large round seam form around the door, which slid inwards a few inches. Then he pulled on both the doorknob and PokéBall, and the wall began to swing away. What had looked like a simple steel door, turned out to be a 30" thick bulkhead door, which swung out into the passageway.

More ominous than that to Shadow, was the fact that as soon as the door cleared its entryway, steam started to flow out of it. Lights were flashing and a slight industrial sound has coming from the room on the other side of the wall.

"Ah," Derek said, looking in on the fun going on in the room. "The mad scientist is at it again!" He winked at Shadow then beckoned her to go in. She peeked in, but was startled by Bucky as he casually flew into the steam. The Vaporeon followed. Shadow looked at Derek with a cautious eye.

"You first," she said.

"Sorry, I've got to close the door," he answered, moving to the inside of the massive door, and placing the PokéBall emitter into another hole and twisting. "There's nothing to be nervous about..."

"I'm not nervous," Shadow lied.

"Yes, you are..." Derek said back at her. She gave him a nasty look.

"It's your ears. They're laying flat against your head - The sign of nervousness."

Shadow gave her ears a wishful look. Blasted big cat ears... Can't play a Poker Face with these... Shoot...

Shadow turned to the dark room and entered the steam - which was cold... very cold.

It was a large cavernous room - The ceiling seemed miles away, as did most of the walls. It was probably only the light playing tricks on her she thought. A set of stairs ran up the wall across from her. They were extremely long... They landed at some sort of work station.

But, on the floor of the room was the source of the steam. It was from two pods - A large and small pair which sat at 45º angles to the floor. There was a litany of mechanical and electrical devices streaming into the apparatuses.

"T-Minus-78 days and 6 hours," a computerized voice said, "until event conclusion... all systems nominal... fluid transfers in 5 - 4 - 3 - 2 - 1 - Mark... Fluid transfers complete... setting refresh containment systems to 6 point 7 - 3 - 0. Cryogenic experiment now entering eighteen thousandth two hundred first day - Subjects respiration nominal."

Shadow looked at the machinery. She came close to the small pod. She found a window to look into.

"A Flareon..." she said, seeing what looked like a sleeping Pokémon within the capsule.

"The legacy of Hikiru Sakaki," a voice said from above. "Welcome, Miss Shadowcat."

She turned around, and looked up. A figure appeared over the edge of the work station high above her. In front of her, a screen flickered to life. The face of Professor North came up.

"I am glad you accepted my invitation. Please, why don't you come up and join me?"

A series of lights illuminated the stairs. Shadow moved towards them.

"Legacy of Hikiru Sakaki? What do you mean? What are these?" she asked, climbing the steps.

"Remember the video? Just over 20 years ago, Hijishima Sakaki attempted to terminate all of his father's Cryogenics experiments. This is the last surviving pair."

Shadow stopped half way up the stairs and looked down on the equipment. She could see the frosted outline of a body in the larger pod.

"What was all that 'T-Minus-stuff?"

North sighed and looked down on the equipment as well. "That experiment is ending soon. That was just my computer telling me the details. In just over seventy-eight day, our travelers from just about fifty years ago will awaken."

Shadow watched the machinery for a moment. Then she saw Bucky beside the larger pod. She could have sworn she saw him come out the side of the unit.

"How's she looking Bucky?" North asked from above.

"Squeak!" he said in response, showing a victory sign.

Shadow continued up the stairs. Below, she could see Derek and his Vaporeon checking some systems, then head out another door on the other side of the room.

She continued to look at the machinery as she ascended the stairs. It was straight out of some science fiction movie. It intrigued her.

She snapped out of her staring walk as she felt her hand touch another hand. She turned and found North holding her free hand and smiling at her.

"I'm glad you came," he said. "Please, come in." He waved over to another massive vault door behind the work station.

Shadow continued to examine where she was as she slowly walked through the second vault door. She left the room of the massive scientific apparatus, and entered a machine shop, or the scientist's equivalent of one. There were bits and pieces all over this second large room, which was obviously above ground again as there were slit windows high near the roof line letting in sun light, or at least a little sun light, as there was so much stuff hung from the ceiling that it was hard to tell what was roof and what was scientific novelty.

To her right was a PokéBall Transfer Unit and scientific test beds. To her left was a wall full of shelves, junked items, and some strange sheet of fabric stretched between two poles that shimmered. In front of her was more work stations, some sort of control board, and a number of crates. Far across the room was a large refrigerator. Sitting on top of the fridge was a Persian, all primped and sitting rather regally - Odd. Then she noticed the paw on the beast.

It was wrapped in a gauze bandage. This was Giovanni's Persian that had been burned the other day in the lab attack!

"Please excuse the clutter," North said, swinging the door shut. "It's a bit of a bachelor's pad in here..."

"Isn't that the Boss'...?"

North looked over at Shadow's pointing finger, and at what it was pointing at.

"Ah... Ziggy... Don't worry about him. He enjoys that refrigerator. It's the only one large enough for a cat his size to get up on... what it is with cats and ice boxes..." North walked over to the Persian.

"Come on... it's time to change your bandage..." he told the cat, turning his back to the refrigerator. Ziggy gave North a slightly disgusted look. He shook his head, and stepped off the box onto his shoulders. The rather interesting balancing act moved over to a table, where North bent down, and let the cat off. Shadow watched a bit amused.

"Sorry... he can't get down on his own right now with that foot..." he said, attending the Persian's paw. "You worked in the Nanomi Zoo, didn't you?"

Shadowcat looked at North with a bit of surprise. The Nanomi, named for Giovanni's Grandmother, was a secret holding zoo for Team Rocket's captured Pokémon. She had been given work there during the times the Boss hadn't had her off on some assignment. She had found that she was a natural as a Keeper, but few had known that she had been there as she had worked mostly in the background. She hadn't enjoyed the times when children would think she was one of the exhibits, and some of her fellow Rockets would add to the insult by egging then on. Fortunately, the head keeper was aware of her talents, and would quickly put a stop to the horseplay. Maybe it was her cat form, but Pokémon calmed quicker with her around. They seemed to trust her more than the others. Then again, the others were more inclined to get whips and cattle-prods to handle tense situations.

"Could you start taking this off, while I get his stuff?" North asked, heading over to a cabinet next to the refrigerator. Shadow cocked her head with a 'why not' look, and attended the paw. She removed a pair of metal clips holding the end of the wrap...

THUD!

All went black for a moment. When Shadow opened her eyes again, she saw the face of Ziggy at extreme close range, purring loudly. He was rubbing his forehead against hers with a simple smile running across his face.

"Ziggy! What are you trying to do? Give her a concussion? That jewel on you forehead isn't soft you know!"

"Meowrrrl, sorry North..." he said. Shadow looked at him with a bit of shock then remembered the way the Vaporeon spoke earlier. She looked over at North, and saw him giving the cat an odd look.

"He's not supposed to speak?" she asked North.

"No, he can speak... I just didn't expect him to do so NOW!"

"I thought... the Pikachu..."

North looked at her then covered his face with his hand. "Hydron spoke while near Bucky?" Shadow nodded.

"Things are going a bit too fast?" Ziggy asked. North glared at him.

"I had asked Shadow to come here so I could answer some of HER questions, and she could answer some of MINE, not ADD TO THEM!" the scientist grumbled.

Shadow stood back, watching the bickering. It was a bit much, and she was beginning to doubt the reasons for coming. She watched North put his hands up in a 'clam down' move.

"Okay... let's try this again..." he said, placing a tray of medical supplies down in front of the cat. Shadow, even though cautious worry ran through her, returned to unwrapping the paw. She found that cat's head against hers again. She laughed.

North ran another of those odd rods over the paw that Bucky had waved in front of her earlier. "What is that?" she asked the scientist.

"This is a scanning rod," he said, reading a small box that was attached to it by a cord. "Well, fuzzball, you won't need the bandages after this treatment." North took another odd device and illuminated the stubby fur of the burnt paw. Shadow watched the fur return to a normal look.

"Humm," North said looking over at her. "Let's see that shoulder..." he said. Before she could say anything, he had run the same device over where the Taser had shot her the other day. The pain instantly vanished.

"Better?"

She rubbed her shoulder, silently nodding at him. He smiled, and returned the device to its holder. "Wound healer," he noted as he returned the tray of goodies to the cabinet. "Never leave home without one!"

Her emotions finally boiled over. "North... who are you?" she asked.

He closed the cabinet. "Depends on who you ask," he said as he held the door shut with his hand. "Some here call me the Gadget Guru... some call me 'That wacko down in Tech Lab One.'" He laughed. He looked over at her, a slightly sad look on his face and smiled at her.

"Personally, I would wish you would consider me a friend... and fellow traveler, Stacey..."

Her own name... she hadn't heard her own name since... ever since Giovanni had found her five years ago... She stepped back, taking a defensive stance.

"Who ARE you..." she hissed as she bared her claws.

He leaned on his workbench and fiddled with his glasses with a cloth rag. "My name is Robert North, and like you, I am a writer and artist from Earth - OUR Earth... not this PokéWorld – I am just like you."

Shadow cocked her head. "What? What are you talking about? What, do you mean you're…"

"Oh, I can prove I'm from your world..." he said. He looked at some sawdust covering a section of the table. He reached down and wrote something with his finger in the dust. He then turned and pointed at a box across the room from them. It instantly squished down into a little ball.

"I believe this is what you tried to do the other day?" he said.

Shadow looked at what North had written. She saw "CONSTRICT" written in the dust. She then looked at the box, and how he had squished it into a little ball of tin, much like she had wanted to the other day in the Slice and Dice lab when Jessebelle had attacked them.

"But... but I thought... the aliens..." she stammered. "I thought I was given these powers when I was abducted… by the aliens…"

North shook his head. "Nope... not the 'aliens'... 'Memory Alter' as you call it would come naturally to people from our Earth if they were to come here. Think about it... Where did we come from? We are IN a world of Pocket Monsters, or Pokémon, correct?"

"Okay," she cautiously answered as she tried to comprehend what he was stating. She was still in a defensive posture, but not as hard as before.

"And exactly what were Pokémon back home? We CAME from a world where all of this is just a game, a story and a television show..."

Shadow's eyes flew wide. The memory... she had forgotten about where she had first seen and heard of Pokémon. She then heard a 'ding' and looked down at a device North was handing her.

"Remember this?" he asked her. "They don't have these here, do they?"

It was kiwi-colored.

"Oh my god, it's a GameBoy... I had a grape one..." she said as she dropped her stance and took the device. She turned it over - Pokémon Yellow was in it.

"It would probably blow everyone's minds if they saw that thing," the Professor said with a laugh. "I'm surprised though, that you need to write what you want..."

Shadow looked at him, confused. "What do you mean?" she asked.

"Your 'Reality Alter' attack… you see it's our creative minds that allow us to do what we do," he said, tapping his head. He held his hand out flat. An apple appeared. "Simply think about it... try it..."

Shadow looked at the apple. She held out her hand, and thought. An apple appeared, though it looked a bit odd - Slightly collage-like.

"Ah... an abstract artist..." he said as he pulled out his scanner to check it. "Nice... 'Hope its edible..." He looked at the readings and tapped the box attached to the rod. "Different... it's edible, though you'd probably find it tastes like... a banana?"

Shadow shook her head. "How did we get here then? Why am I a cat-person?"

North shook his head, while taking a bite from his apple. "Well, I know how I came here... a dimensional portal was opened by a massive explosion within the trans-dimensional zone of sub-space. I drove my car right into it. It dropped me here twenty years ago." He sat down and looked at her.

"But YOU..." he said, pointing at Shadow, "you're a mystery. We know it has something to do with the Daedalus Gate..."

Shadow remembered the tape. "The Daedalus Gate? - err, WE?"

North nodded. "I guess the whole story is needed." He reached over to his console behind Ziggy and punched a switch. A bank of monitors rolled out of the wall.

"Computer, seal the room please... no visitors..." he said to no one she could see.

"Acknowledged," a voice said. A series of clunks and thuds rumbled through the room.

North moved to the front of his console and threw a few more switches. The monitor bank opened further, revealing a single large screen to one side. A picture appeared on it of an auto accident.

The scientist gestured towards the screen. "What had happen twenty years ago was when I got zapped through the barrier, the road I was on became a section of the Viridian Forest. Forty-five miles per hour isn't something I would recommend to anyone in a road-less tree filled forest. And I was driving my classic old '67 Chevy, which only had a lap belt. I collapsed the steering wheel nicely."

"It's amazing that you survived it," Shadow said, watching the monitor.

"That's for sure," he said. "But I was also fortunate by another quirk of fate. I arrived on the night Hijishima Sakaki started to send the TS out to purge the Golden R from Team Rocket. A nearby base 'somehow' had exploded. The survivors of the 'accident' were moving to a new location when the event that brought me here happened. They managed to get me away and to their new base in time, obviously... as I'm still quite here..."

"Are you sure?" Ziggy interjected. North scowled at him.

"As I recovered, I found that I had entered this strange looking world. I'm sure you noticed it too, how things look... different..."

"Cartoony?" Shadow suggested.

North nodded. "Exactly... Anime actually... proves a theory I always had too..."

"And that was?" Shadow asked, leaning on a hand as she sat down beside North on a stool.

"That to every story, vision, idea that has been put to paper, film, or just into one's mind, there's a world where it's actually happening somewhere. It's a weird theory, and considering the things that have been thought out over the millennia, there would be some real strange worlds indeed - but the discovery of the dimensional levels has proven much of it true."

Shadow looked at North confused. "Dimensional levels?" she asked.

North nodded. "They were once called alternate dimensions... mirror universes. An alternate reality to the one we knew. But it was discovered that they are vastly larger than first thought, and much more diverse."

North pulled a pile of books and pamphlets up from under the console and placed them before Shadow. "Consider this stack of stuff as the dimensional levels. They are layered, sandwiched one on top of another, some no thicker than a hair, others wide as a house. They have sub levels, and multiple realities. And they all are interlinked with the flow of time."

He typed a code into the console. The large screen showed a line with the months and years listed. "This is our current Time-Line..." he said. He then keyed a few more things into his console. The image drew back, showing more lines. "...And these are other Time-Lines from other dimensional levels... Here's our level... our Earth."

Shadow stood up, looking at the graphs and lines. She saw the lines move back in time, to when she arrived on this world. Then, as to prove itself, a line was drawn between the higher line and the lower line.

"Is this when I came here?" she asked North.

He nodded. "It gets a bit more interesting... According to your dossier, you said that you arrived here when the aliens' ship broke a dimensional barrier... right?"

Shadow nodded, and also gave North a slightly nasty look. What was HE doing with HER dossier? North handed her a file.

"Your dossier... you may want to read this later..." he said. "Anyway, when we checked on this," he added, pointing back at the screen, "we found your energy signature entering a void in space. Whether they meant to fly into this void, we're not sure yet."

Shadow shook her head. "We... Who are WE?"

North smiled and lowered his head. "Sorry – By 'we' I mean my fellow scientists and researchers. We make up three separate but interactive groups. The first is of course the Golden R, with whom I deal with here. The second is the Stratus League, of which you should remember from the video I sent you. The third is another group I am affiliated with, the Observer Corps, of which those ships mentioned in the video are with. We have been keeping an eye on you for a while now, sometimes keeping you safe as well..."

"What?" she yelled as she was starting to get that creepy feeling again. She watched the scientist walk about as his picked up some sort of electronic PADD readout and started to page through it.

"Well now, let's see... the last time we helped you waaaas... ah, here it is..." North said, fiddling with some controls on his board. One of the small monitors flickered to life, and Shadow saw herself pop up. The action seemed familiar... hauntingly familiar...

"The Steigler Mission!" she gasped. There she saw herself running for all she was worth with guards and Arcanines in hot pursuit. Her cover had been blown by what had turned out to be a double-agent.

As she ran, one of the guards used a launcher to fire a PokéBall ahead of her. It ejected its contents of a Scyther, which leapt into a tree. Shadow avoided this trap by jumping into another tree nearby. But as she climbed, the Scyther sliced a branch that stretched over to the tree she had launched herself into. The massive branch whipped through the smaller tree, striking Shadow as she scrambled through the limbs. She fell behind it as the guards and beast arrived. But as they went around the trunk and removed the large branch, they found nothing.

"I woke up in some bushes..." Shadow said quietly, the memory of the event coming back to her. "I thought I would have broken something..."

"Well, let's back up a bit, and rotate the picture to see just what did happen..." North said, spinning a track-ball and reversing the image. The guards and hounds ran comically backwards, and the branch returned to the tree. Then the view spun around the tree, still in freeze frame. Shadow couldn't believe the imaging she was seeing.

"Okay, at this point, the branch was about to hit you..." he said, advancing the image slowly. "Now, the automatic safety system we set up for your protection was triggered when you get hit HERE..."

Shadow winced in pain, watching herself get walloped by the heavy branch. But then she saw something that made her jaw drop.

As she fell through the branches she dematerialized!

"WHAT!?" she yelled as she stood up in a start. Ziggy jumped at the reaction startled.

"You were transmatted here," North said. "I'll tell you, you do your stuff late at night, don't you! 3:30 in the morning, and I had to make sure you were still breathing!"

"Well, I'm sorry if I put you off!" she said looking over at North.

"Hey, I'm just pulling your tail, kiddo... But I did wait until those thugs were gone before I transmatted you back to that bush you found yourself in."

Shadow watched the screen to see herself reappear in a set of bushes off to the right of the screen. She tromped up to the monitor and started to gesture at the bank of screens.

"How... How did you do that? How did you get these pictures? How?"

Before she could ask any more questions, she found herself trying to catch a flat round disc that North had tossed to her.

"What's this?" she asked as she finally able to gather up the metal thing. It looked like a simple steel slug, roughly the size and shape of a blank large coin.

"That is how we can see what we saw on the monitors. That is a scanning disc." North picked up another he had stacked beside him and placed it on the console. He then took a scanning rod, twisted the ball-like hand grip end and ran it over the disc.

"And, when you charge them..." he said. The disc vanished. Shadow's eyes widened.

"Where did it go?" she asked, touching the area that it had been and feeling nothing there.

"Oh, it's still there. It's the metal - Dytrillium Alloy. It is a very strange material indeed. It has a highly charged structure that allows it to act like a recording device, or even a transmitter, if you know what you're looking for. And the weirdest part of it all is that it contains no parts - just the metal. And, it is also the hardest known alloy in existence. It can be made only one way... by using a transmat - which is why it is known as a T-metal...

"As for the transmat, well, they've been around this planet for some time now. The PokéBall transfer units are transmat powered. So, it was relatively easy for me to modify my unit to transport non-PokéBall subjects. Including myself... don't think I used you as a guinea pig here... I've had this beastie working for me for some time now."

North switched the large monitor to an even longer time-line chart. "Getting back to the how's and whys to our presence here, your story gets more interesting. As I said, the 'aliens' entered a void here, just outside the Earth's orbit. Why, we're not sure. From the telemetry we acquired, we would say they weren't trying for this warp-hole, or if they were, they entered it badly."

The trajectory of some ship was plotted across the screen. The ship dove into the line that it had shown prior as Shadow's own trip to this world. But it then stopped towards the end of the line.

"At this point, you and I meet up..."

Shadow looked at North. "What?"

"You and I share the same basic reason for being here. And it happens right here," North said, pointing at where the ship stopped. "From what we have scanned and recorded, it looks as if something happened to the ship... they seemed to have dumped their power core for some reason. As it was, it exploded within this corridor of sub-space."

Shadow looked at the screen as it dawned on her. "The explosion in sub-space - Your trip here!"

"Exactly," North said as he moved in front of the large screen as he started to used its graph image to demonstrate what he was describing. "When your ship detonated its core in sub-space, it blew a hole open that traveled back the route the ship had taken and struck the Earth directly in front of my car. Now as for why I wound up 20 years in the past, and you wound up here only 5 years ago is because of the differences that we got here in the first place.

"You were on a ship that had lost all power. Therefore, technically, it would have simply dropped out of sub-space and back into real space. But because it was within the event zones of the void, of which the other end was the Daedalus Gate, and since it was over this planet at the time, this is where you landed.

"I, on the other hand, was a moving target. I entered the tear in sub-space here, dropping me through the Trans-Dimensional Barrier Zone, a route between time, space and dimensional levels. And, since I too was within the event zone of the energy field that your ship created, therefore it had a 'memory' - that is, it mimicked the length of the void you had traveled through, it promptly dropped me onto the same planet it dropped you off on. The only difference was, I went through the TDBZ to get here, thus putting me back in time, while you used the Daedalus Gate, dropping you here practically at the same time you left our Earth and wound up here on the PokéWorld Earth Level Prime."

Shadow watched a line segment off her line, representing North's travels. "Wow..." she said.

"Oddly, it's a good thing it happened when it did. 5 years ago, the Daedalus was overhead this planet. If it had happened today, you would have been ejected into deep space. Also, since your dossier says that you were found by this tree we see here in my photo," he noted as he leaned over at the smaller monitor showing the auto he had been in wrapped around the oak, "appearing at the same time would not have been a good thing for you."

Shadow stared at the screens. "Who were they?" she asked.

North looked at her. "They? You mean the 'aliens' that abducted you? Well, technically, to you they were aliens..."

She looked at North as he punched a few buttons on the board. He pointed at the screen and she saw something she would never forgot.

"Is that what you saw?" North asked, pointing at the large monitor. It showed a glowing disc like ship.

"Oh my..." She looked at North, who was holding his head down, shaking it.

"I will assume that it is..." North said, anger growing in his voice. He punched another switch, and the ship was replaced by a schematic.

'GORT' - the ship was named 'GORT'.

"Right... so now we know what sort of explosion it was... the detonation of an anti-matter core..."

"You... you KNOW this ship?" Shadow asked.

North slammed his fist against the board. Ziggy jumped again, this time moving to the workbench beside them to stay out of North's range. North reached over and spun a dial. The lower corner of the screen enlarged to show the plan specs.

'DESIGNER - ROBERT NORTH' glared over the screen.

"I'm my own grandpa..." North said, reciting a line from an old novelty song. "Well... How about that... responsible for my... OUR being here... If I hadn't built that damn ship, we wouldn't be here."

North found himself in the grasp of a rather angry Shadow. "WHY!?" she snarled. The pain she had endured overwhelmed her as she dug her claws into his shoulders.

Oddly, he only looked at her with no signs of pain on his face. He knew what he had done. It was rather obvious. He dropped his head, and shook it.

"Giovanni..." he said.

She pushed him away - That creep again.

"When I first arrived," North explained, "and once I was brought into the Golden R's influences, the first thing I wanted to do was get back home. I had found that being here in this dimension had increased my technical knowledge, and I found I could design and build all sorts of instruments. Having been told about the Daedalus Gate, I decided that this must have been the reason why I was here. I decided that I would find a way... MAKE a way to investigate this gate. I designed GORT to take a crew to it. But I needed help to build it.

"The Golden R wasn't sure that the design would work, and denied the project. But that was about the time I was introduced to Giovanni... He was about the same age as I was... we soon became good friends..."

"FRIENDS!?" Shadow shouted. She quickly settled down by the glaring look she received from North.

"Mistake number one, okay?" he growled back. "Mistake number two was allowing him to see some of my plans... I had not known about his family's history yet - about his grandmother's attempt to get to the gate - about the government fiasco over Team Rocket... The whole shooting match... at that time I was only interested in getting home. When he saw the plans for GORT, he said he would help build it. He had the backing, the financing... he could do it... so I agreed...

"He set me up in here with Tech Lab One... It took 2 years to build the ship, test the equipment and get a proper power system working... nearly blew up the planet doing it too... 'Was the only time I've had to eject something into outer space - But we got GORT built and working...

"On the night of the first trial run, I was in here, preparing for my second ride of a lifetime... Giovanni and I were to fly out to the mid-ocean base that GORT had been assembled at. But before the flight, I had some prep work to do, so I was working here. I had visitors that night. A very unique pair of visitors..."

"Professor North?"

"I looked behind myself. He was a strange creature. I had become accustomed to the appearance of Pokémon, but this obviously wasn't one of them. He stood only 4 to 5 feet tall, and had the most remarkable head. He wore a uniform I had never seen before, and had no signs of an 'R' anywhere on it, red or gold."

"Professor, my name is Elb Kinza. I am here today representing the Stratus League of Pokémon Trainers and Breeders. I bring you greetings and warnings..."

"He seemed sincere in what he told me, even though my younger head didn't believe most of it. He spoke of treachery and deceit by Giovanni. At first, I was skeptical; I had been told by friends in the Golden R not to trust Gio any further than I could throw him... I had not believe them either. But when Kinza brought out his travel partner... well, I had a hard time not listening then.

"His companion was me. Older, graying on the temples, a bit weather-beaten - come to think about it, probably close to my age now, since I haven't gone back to see myself yet..."

"And you DIDN'T TELL YOURSELF about the FUTURE!?" Shadow yelped as she was taken aback by the possible lost opportunity.

North shook his head. "Temporal physics would have prevented that. Besides, the moment I saw my older self, I knew there was trouble with the ship. If my plan had worked, I would be home... Why else would I see an older self if it hadn't worked?"

Shadow thought about it for a moment. That was true... She looked at the ship up on the screen again. It was displaying schematics of sections of the ship as the scientist continued.

"Well now," I told myself, "I didn't expect to see you..."

"Well, sorry to say, I was..." my older self told me. "As you probably surmised by seeing me, you realize that you aren't going on that ship. I suggest that you take a 'go with the flow' attitude with Team Rocket and Giovanni... otherwise, you'll never survive."

Shadow looked at North. "You told yourself THAT?"

North cocked his head, and gave a wry smile. "Believe me, when you get a message like that from YOURSELF, it wakes you up." He laughed slightly. But he did tell more..."

"I suggest you remain with the Golden R... secretly... And when confronted with Giovanni's requests, give him what he wants, but in a non-destructive or harmful way... the operative word is placate... Keep him happy.

"Keep a watch on your fellow scientists here in Team Rocket Headquarters. Some of their experiments would be considered unethical, to say the least. Help those, again secretly, that you can. Use your resources. They will be your foundation, your anchor. And one day, you will be rewarded."

"Rewarded?" Shadow asked. "A bit presumptuous, don't you think?"

North laughed slightly. "I always did lean towards the dramatic in my writings... I told him that it sounded like he was putting me into a nasty position - The Lone Scientist off to do noble deeds in the name of the Golden R."

"Possibly," he told me, "but you are not alone."

North reached over, and placed a hand on top of Shadow's.

"He said," North continued, "one day you will find someone from home. Help her, as you must help all those who the Team Rocket scientists harm as well."

Shadow looked at the hand on hers. He sat back, removing his hand, and returned to his story.

"Soon after they left, Giovanni arrived with news of a disaster. Somehow, the ship had taken off. A build up of energy in the power units somehow caused the ship to vanish. This I knew was a lie... and this is why..."

North reached down and pulled a box out from under the workbench. It was orange, with the words "AUTHORIZED PERSONNEL ONLY - DO NOT OPEN" stenciled across the top.

"This is GORT's flight data recorder... or at least the flight data recorder that was supposed to go into GORT. I designed it that without this in place, GORT would not work - would not 'build up power' as Gio had said - would not leave without me."

"But GORT did leave without you..." Shadow said.

North nodded in agreement, watching the changing specs on the screen. "I guess I made the recorder too easy for them to duplicate. But since I had already seen my older self, I simply agreed with Giovanni's word that GORT had flown the coop, so to say. I never told him about the Data recorder's function, though I would assume that they put another one in its place, as they would have had to rebuild major components to replace some of the recorder's functions. Though I can't for the life of me figure where they found a recorder that had the telemetry data transducer that would accept the data being fed to it... Shadow? Shadow?"

Shadow was looking straight ahead, the odd words North had said about 'data transducer' were pounding in her head. She saw a blurry image flash before her eyes - a memory? She seemed to be lying down. Everything looked as if seen through gauze - Aliens slowly walking in silhouette within the veil of Vaseline. A furry hand reached up within her vision. It rubbed her head. It was her OWN hand – No - The memory of her first encounter with what she had become - and the panic that was ensuing around her.

"SHADOW!" she heard herself yell, but not in her voice... someone else's voice... a younger, less feline voice. "WHERE'S MY SHADOW!?" Why was she calling her own name?

Not HER name... her CAT'S name! Shadow was her pet cat!

"Systems malfunction... Systems malfunction..." a computer was moaning in the background while the aliens moved about.

"...daaaaataaaaa trrrraaaaannnnssssduuuucccerrrr - daaataaa trrraaannnsssduuucccerrr - daataa trraannssduuccerr - data transducer - data transducer" slurred and rang within her head. Then, it fit into place.

An alien had entered the room she was laying in with the largest alien looking down at her. "Sir! The data transducer has failed! It's feeding the information it's suppose to read back into the power buffers! We have a core breech in progress, sir!"

"Eject the core! NOW!" the large alien said.

"Eject! EEjjeectt! EEEjjeeecttt! EEEEjjjjeeeectttt!"

"WHERE'S MY SHADOW! SHHHAAAADOWWWW! SHHHHAAAAAADOWWWWWWW!"

"SHADOW!" North called out as he shook her shoulder, scanning her with a rod.

"Huuuuh!" she said, waking up inhaling the air that she felt had left her briefly. Her eyes were wide and wet. They locked on North, who was examining her with his own worried look on his face.

"Shadow... where's my Shadow?" she whispered to him. She then grabbed North and sobbed on his shoulder.

Ziggy came over and rubbed his head against Shadow's back in concern. North looked at him and shrugged.

"Why is she asking where her Shadow is?" Ziggy asked North quietly.

North shook his head. "I think she's referring to her pet cat, Shadow, who was abducted along with herself, per her report..."

Shadow nodded. "I remember... the Data Transducer failed... They said something about the energy being sent back into the power buffers..."

She suddenly found herself being kissed on the forehead by North. "Shadsie, you're beautiful! That's perfect! That explains WHY they dumped the core! They had a poor copy of my Flight Data Recorder, and the Data Transducer couldn't handle the information being fed into it! Perfect!"

She looked up at North, a tired look on her face, and smiled.

"Let's take 10...you look like you need a break..."

She must have. The next thing Shadow saw was the ceiling of an apartment. She was laying back in a recliner. She checked a small watch-bob she kept on her waist. She had nodded off for about an hour and a half. Ummm... the chair felt good. She stretched, rubbing her forehead with the back of her hand. Then she noticed something.

Her claws - Normally, they were silver white like her cat's. She examined them closely and found them reddish brown. Dried blood?

Then it hit her... had she injured North earlier? She had been extremely agitated when she had grabbed him by the shoulders. Looking about, she saw the door out of the slightly messy apartment (a definite bachelor's pad). She got up and headed for the door. She found herself on the landing of an apartment overlooking the floor of the lab. Down below, North was sitting beside his workbench with his lab coat and shirt off.

But beside him, holding that strange device he had used on her earlier to relieve the pain of the Taser was Ziggy, standing upright like a human.

"Hey!" she said.

Ziggy and North looked up at the landing.

"I told you she'd get up as soon as I did this!" Ziggy said, returning to his work.

"Just hurry up...you can't do that long remember," North told the Persian.

"She got you pretty deep with this one..." Ziggy said ignoring North's comment. "This one's at least a quarter inch deep."

"There's one on this side that feels about the same," North added.

Shadow came down the steps listening to this banter, keeping her eyes glued on the upright Persian. He was busy continuing his work on North's shoulders. But then, he winced in pain and dropped the device.

"Change back! Change back! I can get the rest," North urged Ziggy.

"Sorry North," the Persian said, painfully dropping to all fours. Shadow watched in amazement as fingers retracted into paws, and an upright human form morph back into the slender feline body. The expression on his face told her that this had been extremely uncomfortable for himself. The change must have exhausted him, as he sat down with a thud. He looked up at her, a sad look on his face.

North placed a pair of bars on the floor on either side of Ziggy, telling him, "Come on... let's get you back up on the fridge..."

Ziggy struggled to his feet. Energy bands snapped between the bars. North connected a series of cables to the bar ends which reached to the ceiling to a track run winch. North lifted Ziggy gently off the floor in what turned out to be a belly hoist, and moved him over to the top of the refrigerator. There, he dropped him off and removed the bars.

"Computer, engage manual override. Turn on the refrigerator's compressor," North spoke to the air.

"Affirmative," a computerized voice said back to him. The compressor vibrated on with a whir and a buzz.

"Ahhh!" Ziggy said, as he collapsed onto the surface of the fridge. North scratched him behind the ear. Ziggy rolled over and took in the vibration.

"Thanks buddy," North told the cat.

"Merrrowlr!" Ziggy said sounding more like the Persian he was.

"What... what was that?" Shadow asked.

North continued to soothe the Persian, now standing on a step stool to be able to rub the animal's back.

"Ziggy was part of an experiment run over in the Splice and Dice labs… I'm sure you may have heard of it, since you yourself were put through some of it's later 'tests' - Project: Anthropomorphic - where they tried to splice human DNA to Pokémon DNA. They were trying to make Super Pokémon... almost destroyed the entire animal stock in the Nanomi doing it..."

"North saved some of us," Ziggy said in a raspy voice. "He made it look like some of us had died, then he cured us... reverted us as far as he could back to our original form."

"Ziggy here sometimes likes to show off to me though, don't ya buddy?" North added, applying a heavy rub to the cat's sore back. "He saw I had been injured and transformed when I wasn't looking. 'Guess you wanted to play doctor, didn't you?"

"Murrrowlrrr..." Ziggy mumbled.

"Is that what happen to me?" Shadow asked, looking up at North on his stool.

North looked down at the cat-lady. "No, what happened during the GORT events and Project: Anthropomorphic were two completely different situations," he explained as he finished with Ziggy. "You can change into a Persian, correct?"

"Yes," she replied, "though I thought it was from what they did to me after I arrived…"

North held his hand up and rocked it side to side. "Yes and no… Our scans show that they attempted to add Persian DNA to what you already had, yes… but your body promptly rejected it, as you know from how sick you became afterwards."

She growled slightly remembering how much she hated those so-called doctors who 'treated' her 'cat-flu' they had called it. "How come you didn't save me then?" she remarked. She was surprised when she saw it was Ziggy facing her after that outburst – granted he was upside-down, but he was still glaring at her.

"He did save you!" he growled. "If he hadn't sent in his own team of doctors in secret to stabilize you, you wouldn't be here today to complain about it!"

Shadowcat stepped back and looked at her hands. "Then why can I change into a Persian?" she asked. Her answer came in the shape of another apple in the Professor's hand.

"You've got to love that Reality Alter," he said. "Have you ever tried to change into another Pokémon?"

Shadow shrugged. "I was always told that my transformation would be as a Persian, so that's all I ever tried to do."

North nodded. "Well, what they thought they had given you, you already had all along, again because of where you came from and where you are now. But that doesn't mean that something hasn't happened to your DNA. What we've scanned I shouldn't be able to."

North got down from his stool and grabbed his shirt and slung it on. He then picked up the wound healer that Ziggy had dropped and continued on his left arm where the Persian had left off. As he worked on it, he sat at his console and punched up some new data. Shadow watched the GORT information vanish and an outline of a human body appear. Next to it, the outline of a Persian was added.

"In the case of Project: Anthropomorphic, they literally took DNA from a human, and grafted it to the DNA of a Pokémon. In Ziggy's case, the operation nearly worked. He could become a humanoid/Pokémon. But the process nearly always broke down to which would be the dominate DNA, and rejection would begin to occur. Again, in Ziggy's case, I extracted as much of the human DNA as I could. Some of it is still there, but that's the best I could do. He now lives on anti-rejection drugs and the vibrations of my refrigerator."

"Ummmm... don't knock it until you've tried it!" Ziggy said, massaging his back with the buzzing machine.

North shook his head and switched the outline images on the screen. The one became a female human, the other a simple cat.

"Now, in your case," he told Shadow, "our scans are showing strange unnatural grafting. Where we would see a chromosome here and there exchanged for that of a new chromosome, as in a typical grafting, in your case, we see where the chromosomes are literally placed on top of one another, human and cat."

Shadow shook her head as she sat back down on the stool beside North. "Isn't that impossible?"

North nodded. "Normally, I'd say you bet it is, except, there is a way to do it. If we look closer at the chromosomes, we see this..."

The picture showed the two chromosomes side by side. It zoomed in to show that the two different chromosomes were together, with no signs of a seam splitting them apart, save the color enhancement the computer gave them.

"These chromosomes were fused together," North pointed out. "There's only one way to do that - Transmat."

For some reason she didn't understand, Shadow looked at the ceiling as if she expected to be yanked through it. "Transmat? You mean transporters? Like the way you showed me how you saved me before?"

"Beam me up Scotty, you bet," North said as he held up his hand in the Vulcan salute. "Ever see that episode where the captain was split into two by their transporter? Interesting trick, if you could survive it that is… And then they slammed him together again. Great idea, save one little problem..."

Shadow blinked at him. "And that is?"

North laughed a bit. "You'd have a small nuclear explosion, that's all... It's a simple mass to mass conversion here. First, they somehow created mass by making two of him, which, oddly enough, is quite possible. Then, just for kicks, they took two-one hundred percent mass quantities of a subject, and slap them together again. Just where did that extra hundred mass go? I'll tell you where... BOOMIE!" He made the shape of a mushroom cloud with his hands as an added effect.

Shadow shook her head at the Professor's antics. "Just what does that have to do with me then?" she asked.

North looked at her. "Oddly, it would seem the same principal took place in your situation. Somehow, they took your cat Shadow, and simply beamed it into your body. That should not be able to be done. Granted, your cat wasn't the same mass as you, but still, there would still be an unbalanced mass conversion. You should be reading a one-hundred plus percentage to your atomic structure, but you're not. Where did that extra mass go?"

Shadow looked at her hands. She hadn't lost her cat, she become one with it.

"What about the needles, the injections?" she asked. "I remember being used as a pin-cushion I seem to remember."

North rubbed the back of his neck at the thought. "Some may have been injections... but I would assume that many were actually samplings... The drawing of blood and such..."

Shadow glared at him.

"Hey, one can't experiment without knowing what they are experimenting on… besides, they didn't have one of these to use," he added as he waved his little scanning rod in the air. "But even the most ruthless scientist needs to know that the creature they may create won't just shrivel up and die the moment they zap them with something. Also in this case, I would think to prevent shock a mussel relaxant would have been given to you prior to any trans-molecule slamming experiment. Besides, transmats are freaky enough awake."

"I wouldn't know... seems I haven't been awake to see one in action," Shadow smirked.

North was about to say something, but then thought she was right and shrugged it off.

She crossed her legs and leaned back against the table she was seated on as she considered her next question carefully. "I remember being moved about by my captors – they seemed to have paralyzed my cat and I when we were brought on board… But I could still see, barely."

The scientist nodded. "That would be the typical reaction to a stasis field," he said.

"A stasis field?" Shadow asked. "What is a stasis field?"

North reached over to the PokéBall transmat and flicked a trigger. A blue energy field surrounded the red and white sphere that was seated in a holder. "That is a stasis field, again used in transmats to keep the subject being transmatted from feeling the shock of having their molecules wrenched apart at over a couple of thousand degrees. Transmats are anything but gentle!"

"Wonderful news," she grimaced. "So, why did my captors looking like MewTwos?"

North looked at Shadow with a confused expression. "What?"

"Oh, wasn't that in the dossier?" she said with a bit of sarcasm in her voice as she began to thumb through the file he had given her. "The aliens all looked like MewTwo."

North walked about and thought for a moment. "That would have happen long before they knew of MewTwo... Did you ever mention this to anyone?"

She shrugged. "I don't remember…" she replied.

"Umm, probably not, since it isn't mentioned in your dossier," he commented as he continued to think about her statement. "Did the aliens look LIKE MewTwo, or look just NEARLY like him?"

She sat up. "Nearly like HIM? You make it sound like you've met…"

"Yes, yes, nice guy – doesn't like to be bothered by nonsensicals and nonsense and plays one hell of a game of chess…" he drummed. "But did the alien look LIKE him or NEARLY like him?"

Shadow sat back at that question. Visions of the creatures that had taken her were always blurred and confusing. They did look like MewTwo, but she couldn't be sure. Then something did reveal itself to her.

"Colors..."

North cocked his head. "Ea? Colors?"

Shadow nodded. "MewTwo is gray, with a purplish belly and tail, right? But I can remember seeing some color on the heads of these aliens."

"Ah!" North said as he shook his head then punched at his console again. "Computer, bring up Storage Shunt 0-1-8-7-2-S, please?"

The floor shook for a moment, and Shadow watched a disk on the table beside her vibrate and skitter a bit. Then a door in the floor behind her opened, and a large black monolith slid up and out. North walked over to it and split the box apart in the middle, swinging the one half around to show her its contents.

Shadow looked at the stored item. It was a space suit of sorts, the helmet angled and squarish with a hose leading from the back of it to a dumpy lower section. A blue stripe ran over the top of the helmet.

She shook her head and squinted at the suit. "Possibly... I'm not sure. Where's the tail?"

North looked at the suit. "Well, there is an optional ship hook up hose that's not here, but considering the chemicals and relaxants they put into you, I'm surprised you didn't see Foghorn Leghorn in with them!"

"Who?"

North looked at Shadow over his glasses. "Never mind... Anyway, this would have been the space suit they would have worn aboard ship. I wouldn't be surprised to find that they hadn't modified them slightly, just to hide the fact to you that they were anything but true and blue aliens... It would explain why they were wondering about UFO reports in our world and what we thought of them..." He slid the case shut again and sent it descending back into its storage shunt.

He stood back as he turned towards her. "Now then… this brings us around to our next question - WHO was it that did this to you? And I have my suspicions on just who that might be..."

She leaned forwards. "You know who did this to me?" she asked while pulling at her fur. "And to my Shadow?"

North snorted. "I have a good idea... I suspect that it was the same person responsible for what happened to Ziggy as well, and many other experiments done in the name of Team Rocket... Edward Malcolm Dixon Manley, so called scientist and general quack. For the life of me, I can't figure who gave him a degree in anything... He's what most scientists call a Bam Jockey... just dive in, don't watch what you're doing - just go for results. He has caused more damage over the years than common rot. When I first ran into him, he was into transmat morphing... does that sound familiar?"

Shadow's eyes were slits, her ears flat, and her hair was on end. Ziggy saw this look, and quickly spun over and took a defensive position.

"I guess it does..." North said when he saw her reaction. "But, if he was on GORT, that would mean that he escaped the outcome of the flight as well, since I know he is still about doing whatever he calls progress. I wonder though... Computer - of my original flight crew of GORT how many are still alive?"

"Working..." the computer answered. "On file, of the original flight crew of GORT, only Professor Robert North and co-pilot Vince Charles are still alive."

The scientist shook his head. "Oh, we can do better than that, computer. Tie into the Observer's data system and cross reference with historical information on the flight crew and any augmented members added without my knowledge. Then switch to planetary scanners and use the on-file DNA cross-referencing and try that list again..."

"Working..." the computer said again.

There was a long silence as the computer complied with the requested job.

"I take it this Edward Malcolm Dixon Manley wasn't a member of your crew?" Shadow asked, waiting the computer's answer.

North glanced at her. "Why would I want some yo-yo from Slice and Dice anywhere NEAR my ship?" he said. "The answer was and is a definite NO. Therefore, if he was on board, the flight was definitely meant to get foreign DNA, and to continue some sort of strange cloning or splicing experiment."

"Ready..." the computer squawked. The large screen now showed a global map of the PokéWorld. 20 lights popped up across it.

"Well, I'll be... North to Golden R Base One..."

"Yes sir!" a voice answered back.

"George, I'm sending down a map with locations of personnel from the GORT mission. They're all supposed to be dead... Could you have someone check on the health of these folks please?"

"GORT? Good grief, Rob... Isn't that a bit old? How'd you come up with this little goodie?"

"A little kitty told me," he said with a smile and a wink. "Just check on them and get their past histories since the GORT project, okay? I want verification to how they were hidden from us."

"No direct contact?" George asked.

"No direct contact," North answered. "You are authorized to use the Observer's file service if needed."

"Right. I'll do it personally."

"Thanks George... North out."

Shadow looked at the Professor. "It sounds like you have a rather efficient organization there... Rob?"

North laughed. "The Golden R isn't the size of Team Rocket, but what we lack in mass we counter with science and knowledge."

Shadow looked at the map. "So, these people were on the ship with me, and got off as well..."

North nodded. "So it would seem... which leaves yet another question..."

Shadow looked at him, a question in her eyes. "Which is?"

"Where is GORT?" North asked. "The escape system was transmats and escape pods... Computer, scan for GORT style escape pods, or fragments thereof..."

"Working..." it replied.

The com system then keyed up again. "George to North..."

North punched a switch. "Go ahead..."

"Rob... are you sure about all those readings?"

North looked at Shadow and she at him. "You'd have to ask the computer, George... Why?"

"Well, I crossed referenced the locations of your scans... 17 of these people can be located fine... the last 3 though... Rob, they're IN zoos..."

North and Shadow stared at the monitor as three lights turned from red to green.

"George... is that one at the Nanomi?" North asked as he pointed at a light that seemed extremely close to their own position.

"Sure is... pen 24 of the Cat section," he replied. Shadow held her breath.

"Ready..." the computer interrupted.

"Okay George... Get those dossiers up to date... North out... Go computer..."

The map on the screen was overlaid in more spots. "Location of GORT escape pods located." it reported.

"Look at that... 17 escape pods... and all near a red spot on the map..." North said.

"And the three green spots... no escape pods..." Shadow added.

North sat back. "How much do you want to bet they were transmatted?"

Shadow looked at North, her eyes wide. "The lost energy!" she exclaimed.

North nodded. "It was probably still in the pattern buffers when emergency transmat took place, including yours... since they already had the pattern set for you, it was probably a simple transmat... But for these others..."

Shadow looked at the blinking green lights. Those others... Just like those others...

Half an hour later, Derek was driving them north from the lab through the tunnels. Shadow was beginning to wonder if the entire planet had these snaking underneath them.

"Nanomi Zoo, haven't been there in years," he said to his silent passengers.

North sat in the back seat quietly scratching Hydron's ear. Shadow sat in the front seat quietly stroking Bucky.

"Yup... years..." Derek said. The conversation was going to be brisk on this trip.

He pulled up to a lift. He pressed a button on the dash.

"Area above is clear," the computer said again over the radio.

The Jeep was hoisted up. Shadow found them entering a garage in the back of the Zoo near the workers parking lot.

North and Shadow got out. Derek started, but North closed his door.

"Just us, Derek - You too Bucky. We're going into the cat section, and I don't want them getting excited over you."

"Squeak!" the Pikachu said as it floated back into the car.

Shadow looked over the Jeep at North. "Won't we need him to translate for us?"

North shook his head. "We're not dealing with a Pokémon here... Bucky won't work here."

North patted Derek on the shoulder. "Keep the engine running, and listen in to G-R radio for George's reports. We'll be right back."

North and Shadow first headed for the Office of Animal Care.

"Normally at this time, most of the personnel are out on duty... we shouldn't have any problems," Shadow said.

"Just as long as you know where the file for Pen 24 is," North said.

Shadow twisted the doorknob - Locked.

"Locked?" she said. "Since when do they lock THIS door?"

North reached into his lab coat pocket. He pulled out a long pen-like device and pointed it at the doorknob in Shadow's hand. She could feel it buzz and shake. It suddenly turned with ease.

"A friend gave this to me... I must remember to get him something..."

Shadow was in and out with the file before North even got in the door. He gave her a double take and shrugged. He re-locked the door and closed it.

He reached into his deep lab coat pockets and pulled out a clipboard. Taking the file, he quickly inserted it under the bar. He sat down on a park bench and looked the file over. Shadow stood about, nervous that someone might see them.

"Shadow, you're making me nervous. Sit down." North said while looking over his glasses at her again.

"But, the file... what if someone sees..."

"They'll see the head of Tech Lab One looking over a file, that's all. Why wouldn't I be looking over a file? Besides, I've already had the computer send false images over the security cameras around here. They'll never know we were here... Look at this..."

Shadow sat down and looked at the file. Most of it looked like gibberish.

"The creature was discovered within the park itself, attempting to break into the larder - five years ago... Its type has been listed as felinus homosolus... I don't think so..."

"What does that mean?" Shadow asked.

"Felinus Homosolus... Feline Human - Single... Let's go see the Lieutenant..."

Shadow looked at North a bit confused. Then he showed her a printout he was carrying with him.

"This is the DNA file that the computer matched. Our subject is Lieutenant Shaun Bennett... I remember him... crack engineer..." He stood up and looked about. Shadow pointed the way over to the Cat Pens.

"Let's take your route," North told her. "I'm sure you have a back way..."

"Service tunnels are this way," she said leading them to a stairwell down. Then they came to a problem.

A keypad on the wall was the way in.

"I can't punch my number in... They'll know I was here..." Shadow said, glaring at the pad.

North placed a scanning disk against the pad's box. He then waved a scanning rod over the disk. A chirp was heard and the door popped open.

"I want one of those next time I'm on a mission!" Shadow said.

"All you need do is ask," North said with a wink. "Let's go..."

They headed down the passage towards the cat pens.

"I hope most of the cats are out in their outdoor enclosures," Shadow said as they moved along.

"Why's that?" North asked.

"I never came down here much... the cats had a tendency to get a bit... how should I say..."

"Frisky?"

She looked at North with a smirk. "Yea, you could say that. Here we are..."

Another keypad - another scanning disk - Shadow and North entered the halls where the cats were kept.

"24 is down towards the end on the right," she said, starting down the hall. She stopped when North put his hand on her shoulder.

"Hold your horses there, kiddo..." he said as he scanned the area. "Umm - lucky you - Good thing it's a sunny day out there. All the cats are outside, save our friend down there. Let's go."

They approached the pen. A creature was curled up in the back corner. It was covered in dark gray fur, but unlike Shadow, it looked more like an overgrown house cat curled up like that.

"Lieutenant," North said out loud, causing Shadow to jump and look around.

The creature opened its eyes. Shadow looked at him and saw human eyes, not cat eyes. Blue human eyes, which first were in shock, then sad, then finally angry.

"Lieutenant, can you speak?" North asked, loud and commanding. Shadow looked at him. He now was acting much colder than before.

"Rrrrowlrww, hardly..." the creature said. "Wwwhat is she doing hererrrrrr?"

Shadow looked at the creature in shock.

"Shaun, we are here to help. But we need your help as well..."

"Team Rrrocket left me to rrrot in hererrrrr. Why should I help themmmm?" he growled, getting up from his curled up position.

North now saw why the creature had been titled the way it had. He still stood on his rear feet, but crouched over, his forearms dangling, cat's paws on the ends, but a definite thumb still there. And now that he stood up, his face could be seen more clearly. A cross between ape and cat was the best way to describe it.

"I'm not Team Rocket," North said, scanning him with a rod.

"She issss," he snarled, nearly hissing at Shadow.

"Not by choice," she snarled back.

"Down kiddies..." North said. "No cat fighting while I'm around."

"He started it..."

"HISSSSCK!"

"Lieutenant! Shadow! Stop it, or I'll get the fire hose," North warned.

"Shhhadow? Ah... you were given a nnname, ea?" the creature sniped. "I've been called many thingsss, but neverrr a nnname... just that bogus Latinnnn nnnamerrrr..."

"I take it you never spoke to them..." North said, putting the scanning rod away.

"Nnneverrr gave them a chance. 'Caught themssselvvves a creature, they did... Not a humannn..."

This struck Shadow. "Never say that again!" she said, turning away.

"Phaa!" it said, turning to sack out in the corner again.

"Shaun, do you know what happened to you?" North asked.

He turned and looked at North again. "I knowwrr JUST what happened... I've had five yearrrrs to THINK about it..." He raised a paw at the scientist and shook it. "YOUrrr happen... You launched that damn SHIP beforrrre full flight tests!"

North stood upright and glared down on the creature that had once been his engineer. "Lieutenant, I never gave the command to launch the ship... and I still have the flight recorder to prove it."

Shaun came over to edge of the pen closest to North. "The flight rrrrecorderrr? It should have gone up with the ship!"

"I still have it. It never left my lab. And you know what that means..."

"The shiprrr would nnnot have flownnnn!" Shaun looked about his pen. "Get me out of here, Northrrr."

The scientist smiled and pulled a pen from his breast pocket. He twisted it once then pressed the top of it.

"Computer... lock on to this com unit's signal and prepare to transmat..."

"Standing by," the pen replied.

North tossed the pen into the pen between the bars and under the creature's legs.

"Now..."

The creature shimmered then dematerialized. Shadow and North quickly left the cat house.

They returned quickly to the Jeep. North climbed into the back seat and sighed. Derek handed him a data PADD of what he had heard over the G-R radio. Shadow watched him as he read over the information. He then handed the electronic device over to her. He took off his glasses and rubbed his eyes. She examined the PADD.

"Subject 1," she read aloud. "Philadelphia Zoo - DNA sample says subject is Lieutenant Brandy Stewart - com operator. Health - deteriorating. Subject shows signs of possible rejection - Subject unable or unwilling to speak. Subject 2 - London Zoo - DNA sample says this subject is Team Rocket operative Duce "Baby Face" Nelson. Health - good. Subject is least transformed than others - Works as an assistant to the head keeper – Negative contact as of yet."

Then she saw a note at the bottom.

GORT located it read. Located 371 miles north of the Arctic Circle, at 74º north latitude - 99º west longitude on Prince of Wales Island, within the District of Franklin, Canada.

Shadow looked at North, who was looking back at her. "What first?" she asked.

"Back to base... we need to find out more from Shaun," he replied. Then attempt a rescue of Brandy... then GORT."

Shadow looked at the pad again. "What about this Duce character?"

North closed his eyes and leaned back in his seat. "I have a feeling that we would probably find that he's working for Giovanni still... Derek, have Base check London Zoo's Pokémon theft rate."

He handed North another PADD unit. The scientist shook his head and dropped his glasses back down onto his nose.

"Show off... humm... Make that a definite possibility." He handed it over to Shadow.

"Home, Derek."

The Cherokee dropped into the tunnel again. It was another quiet ride back - And another series of questions.

oOo

Foghorn Leghorn ©2000, 07, 18 Warner Brothers/Time-Warner Corporation
North, The Observers ©2000-03, 05, 07, 18 The Lugia Project/DMS - Used with Permission
"Terminal Solutions" ©2000-03, 05, 07, 18 Steve Brunton - Used with Permission
Ayako & Fuego ©2000-03, 05, 07, 18 Ayako/R. A. Stott/DMS - Used with Permission
Shadowcat (Shadsie, Shadow) ©2000-03, 05, 07, 18 S. E. Nordwall - Used with Permission

Edited 0501.30, 0707.02, 1804.23

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