Carter
They were the Void Talkers, and they had come from nowhere. Carter's salvaging team had returned to base with a haul of supplies to find a small army in black cloaks and masks herding people out of their homes. They declared the Falling Stars conquered, and they offered a simple choice: surrender, or fight. Carter was sure that he had made the right decision when he noticed that Karina and Jaden were nowhere to be found.
It had been years since the gym was used for an actual battle. Karina always kept it pristine, in fond memory of the old world. The entire gym drank the light, a pitch black memento to her glory days of commanding her dark-type pokémon against trainers who wished to challenge the league. A series of platforms stood in random places, smooth rectangular blocks trimmed with neon glowing edges of various colors, rising from the floor in no particular arrangement, and sometimes overlapping. During official battles, the arena was darkened, so as to allow Karina's shadow-themed team to move about unseen before their opponents' eyes. The Void Talkers were practically invisible in their black cloaks and masks.
Carter and Lilith stood on opposite sides of the arena among some two dozen pensive and anxious trainers arranged in a line along the length of the walls. The Void Talkers needed people who commanded strong pokémon for something about which no one was answering questions. They had called themselves agents of the Falling Stars, so now they would be tested. It was strictly voluntary, but since civilians would be relocated to someplace west in the Navajo region, trainers were eager to prove their abilities. Black-cloaks guarded the exits, and the room was stagnant with the tension of the conquered exchanging nervous looks.
The audio system began to crackle, and a voice appeared on the speakers, "Each of you will now be given the opportunity to show your worth," the person used a voice modifier that made him sound like nothing organic. "The test is simple. Enemies will appear before you, and you must choose one pokémon to fight them. Each of you will be judged based on your pokémon's performance. Using more than one pokémon will result in an automatic failure."
Four black-cloaks stepped forward, and hurled peculiar black-and-green poké balls into the arena, landing them in random places among the platforms.
The voice resumed, "The test will begin in thirty seconds."
All guards stepped out, shutting the doors behind them. The air grew thick with tension, trainers watching with anticipation of what was to emerge. Some looked determined, but most wore their anxiety plain on their face. Carter reached for a poké ball at his belt, holding his breath for whatever was to follow. He had won a great victory in this arena once before, but the feeling was not at all nostalgic.
The strange capsules opened, and ten buzzwholes emerged from the queer green light in a screeching cacophony. Carter froze in the face of the alien creatures – no one had ever managed to capture an ultra beast inside of a poké ball. A few trainers ran screaming, finding the doors locked, others petrified with fear. Those who stood their ground called out their own pokémon, and the arena plunged into chaos as the ultra beasts descended upon them. The alien insectoids were ruthless, striking and smashing at their opponents as quickly as they appeared. One of them lifted Jeremy's ludicolo above its head, and then hurled it at him, sending trainer and pokémon tumbling into a slump. Owen called out his hypno, and commanded a psychic-type attack. The pokémon began to summon a psychokinetic force, only to be stifled in a chokehold from behind.
Carter pulled a capsule from his belt and called out his scizor, Mantis, who had the strongest beast-killing record of any pokémon of the Falling Stars. The metal pokémon clicked his pincers and buzzed his wings, ready for battle. Carter had fought worse battles than this. Buzzwholes were mighty creatures indeed, but their poor endurance made them vulnerable. A buzzwhole could beat a man to death, but it would expend all of its energy in doing so. All he needed to do was keep his pokémon on his feet, and he would survive.
A buzzwhole leaped shrieking from a platform, landing directly in front of Mantis as he widened his combat stance. The massive insectoid reeled back its arm in preparation for a punch, and was quickly swept away by a geyser of water from Lilith's milotic. Carter offered a nod of gratitude before turning his head to the source of a desperate human scream. Two buzzwholes had grabbed hold of Olly - one by the hips and the other by the pits of his arms. He was a boy of seventeen or maybe eighteen, one of the last-minute additions to the salvaging team. He yelled in agony as the beasts pulled his body in opposite directions over the body of his fallen ursaring. Carter wanted to help, but he knew better. The pitch of the boy's voice grew higher as he was pulled apart. Finally, with a wet, sickening crack, he split in half at the waist, loosing from his belly a cascade of gory entrails. Carter made himself look away - this was no time to mourn.
"Swords dance!" he commanded. Mantis clicked his pincers and sharpened his focus, preparing for the next foe.
The brawl raged on as pokémon and ultra beasts leaped and dropped wildly about the platforms, hurling fists and claws and fire and ice to the tune of scared, desperate battle commands. Carter began to back towards the wall, his scizor creeping alongside in rhythm to his steps. He knew the value of a wall in a fight. A trainer who rushes into battle is as brave as he is stupid, and stupid is deadly.
The limp, broken body of a fallen pachirisu sailed through the air, having been launched from somewhere on the other side of the platforms, and plopped on the matte black floor in front of them. Carter could only blink and wonder what poor fool had sent out such a weakling in a time like this. One of the beasts was scooped from the ground by a long, beige, serpentine tail tipped with beautiful patterns of red and black and blue. At Lilith's command, her milotic raised the wriggling bug into the air, and then slammed it into a second buzzwhole. The two insectoids collapsed to the ground, one on top of the other, as Eve's nidoqueen began to bathe the fallen creatures in fire at her command.
Another beast charged Carter's way.
"Aerial Ace!"
Mantis moved with speed beyond the human eye. In an instant, he was behind his foe, leaping into the air. Before his target could turn around, the scizor was dropping upon it with his pincers.
"Bullet punch!"
The buzzwhole took a swing, and Mantis ducked to avoid it, returning with a quick jab from an iron fist. The scizor recoiled as the air filled with light and heat - a stream of fire swept in from the side, enveloping ultra beast in. It shrieked and cried as it collapsed in the bath of the nidoqueen's flamethrower attack.
Bodies continued to fall. Carter could count three buzzwholes defeated, but the trainers and their pokémon were dropping just as easily. One of the beasts jumped from the top of a platform, grabbing a hold of Ed's fearow between its muscular arms and taking it to the ground. The bird fell limp as it was slammed to the ground beneath the weight of its attacker. Another one grabbed hold of Blaire's long, blonde hair and swung with such might to lift her right from the ground. She screamed for a brief instant before she hit the floor, the force of the impact breaking her neck with a nauseating snap.
"Horn drill!" commanded Eve, tears streaming down her face.
Her nidoqueen skewered another buzzwhole on its horn, spraying fluorescent yellow blood that seemed to glow in the black of the dark arena. Lilith's milotic had another one in her tail, and hurled it, slamming the insectoid creature against a platform wall. Perry's machoke threw punches left and right while Erik's electivire loosed lightning in all directions. Ed was sitting cross-legged with his forefingers to his temples, red-faced and bawling. A buzzwhole grabbed him from behind from the head, and he screamed in agony as it pressed, and pressed, until finally it crushed his skull like an egg. This is no time to mourn.
"Aerial ace!" Carter commanded as he noticed another buzzwhole bounding over a low-standing platform, charging straight for them.
Mantis leaped forth, bearing pincers, and then dropped on his opponent with a slash from above. The alien insectoid staggered back for a moment, and then quickly shot back with two quick fists, slamming into the scizor's mineral exoskeleton and filling the air with deep metallic clangs. The steel-clad bug fought back with steel fists, to little avail. A second buzzwhole came charging from the side, throwing its whole body forward and tackling Mantis to the ground. The new foe pummeled its steel-type opponent mercilessly with a flurry of fists, while the first set sights on Carter. With one swift strike to the stomach, Carter was on his back. The blow stunned his diaphragm, leaving him curled on the floor, unable to breathe. For a moment he could have sworn to know the cold embrace of death as all heat seemed to drain from the air. He looked up at his alien assailant just as a stream of freezing air swept it from its feet. Eve's nidoqueen stomped towards them, blasting the beasts with an ice beam attack. The beam faded, and the other buzzwhole quickly lost interest in Mantis. It rose and charged forth to meet its poison-type challenger, only to be knocked flat to the ground by a blast of water from Lilith's milotic.
Gasping for air, Carter struggled to pull himself from the floor, stumbling to his pokémon's side.
"Talk to me, buddy," he said in a breathless rasp.
Mantis clicked and moaned in response as he pulled himself to his feet. Three others and their pokémon remained standing and fighting against the last two buzzwholes: Erik with his electivire, Eve with her nidoqueen, and Lilith with her milotic. The beasts huddled at each other's backs as the trainers closed in around them, commanding attacks. Under a torrent of water, lightning, and fire, they finally fell.
Silence fell over the arena as they composed themselves. Slowly regaining his breath, Carter surveyed the arena. Limp, maimed bodies of trainers, pokémon, and ultra beasts alike were sprawled haphazardly about the room, dead or dying. Someone had soiled themselves – he could smell it. Erik had taken a blow to the forehead, and was bleeding over his right eye. Eve stepped away, towards the wall, wearing a face that had seen hell itself. Even Lilith looked distraught as she compulsively tried to flatten the frizz from her hair with her hands. Erik's electivire suddenly pounded its fists to its chest, bellowing in victory. A score of trainers had just been slaughtered in minutes. It was no victory, it was a massacre – and to what end?
Erik wandered towards the center of the arena, walking in an odd, serpentine path in such a way to avoid stepping over anyone's body. He picked up one of the peculiar poké balls that had released the ultra beasts and pushed his shaggy yellow hair out of his eyes as began to inspect it through his square thick-framed glasses. It was a glossy black thing, patterned with a green grid. Eve's nidoqueen lowered to all fours and gingerly approached its trainer, moaning in sympathy as the pale, skinny, black-ponytailed girl pressed her hands to her face and began to sob.
The doors swung open, and three black cloaks entered. The one in the middle wore a white sash over his shoulder, probably to indicate some elevated rank.
The voice appeared on the speakers again, "Please, approach if you are able."
Carter and Lilith exchanged an uneasy look, before hesitantly approaching, followed shortly by Erik. Owen moaned pitifully, slumped against a platform with mangled legs, and Perry strained to stand up, only to quickly collapse, planting his face on the floor. Finally, Eve approached, her face pointed downward, lining up with the other three. No one else appeared to be alive.
He spoke, "Four?"
No one answered him.
"Well then, congratulations. You will be initiated to the Void Talkers."
The four survivors exchanged uneasy glances, hoping to find something reassuring in each other's faces as they began to realize that the chaos had barely begun.