"You're not human, are you?" I asked in Elizabeth's direction. The way her legs were ties to the chair bent them in a way that there couldn't possible be bones. It was a fake person.

The fake's clothes melted into the skin and feature shifted into a heavy pink color. The entire body collapsed down onto itself. It was a ditto. The blob of the pokemon plopped onto the floor without taking so much as a look at him. It let itself crawl towards a crack on the floor with a drain.

I froze. There was a chance Elizabeth was entirely safe. The was also the chance that she was being experimented on. I tried to move to the wall near the door.

The room was mostly empty with nothing sharp I could use to cut. It didn't even have a table. It wasn't a torture room, she didn't need one, although it wouldn't be surprising she if she did have one somewhere in the world. This wasn't an idea place. She, and whoever she was working for were likely desperate.

Sirens sounded outside. Police sirens. If it only met woman was long gone, it was a good thing.

The were stepping sounds, as well a doors being slammed open. Two police officer with firearms came into room, one briefly pointing the gun at me before lowering it, and the other officer did the same at an empty corner of the room. The closest officer kneel down quite surprised.

"Are you okay. You don't look too good," he said while the other cop spoke on his radio.

"How, how old do I look?" I asked.

The officer didn't look perplexed by that question, and too out a knife. "You look fifteen to me. You match the description the professor gave us. Hold still while I cut you lose."

"Elizabeth? Did you find Elizabeth?" I felt my free.

"Was there another Elizabeth? She was the witness."

So, she was safe this entire time?

"So, there are essentially people with the powers of pokemon. No wonder she inexplicably escaped. That's not at all like us," said the women applying makeup to her face. Half of her face looked like it was in her forties. She wasn't quite satisfied with her new look. She looked over to Mary, who was driving the truck. "Well, like most of us."

"Going to such extremes again. I don't see why we bother with you, Violet," Mary said without looking back.

"Hey, I didn't have enough information, and this was a critical mission. If I was given the information properly, things would have turned out better."

"Do you mean it's my fault for you going to such extremes."

"No. What I mean is that I could have succeeded prying something juicy out of him. Information can be more useful than the strongest kick in the testicles. After that , I would have had to extrapolate the high chance that he knew a girl like this and it wouldn't even compare to a face full of water. I would have gotten the proper answers if I wasn't working in the dark. Besides, it won't matter in the end."

Mary frowned even further. "Just because we're close to the end of this cycle doesn't give you carte blanche to be an evil twit. There's a reason you're tolerated, but this recklessness will be the end of you."

Violet grinned as she now seemed to decide on a late thirties look with her face. "We don't work for a spiteful person. As long as my benefits outweigh my cost, you all are stuck with me."

"Never underestimate spite."

Elizabeth was holding the professor's hand tightly.

"It's okay, they said he's okay," Professor Maple said. They saw the cops escorts Luke out of the building. His hand was wrapped up and he looked a bit dazed.

"But, I can feel him from here," Elizabeth said.

Despite basically being a human, she processed her telepathy like a ralts. "You're going to have to not run away. You're a human and you're going to have to act like one. His emotions won't harm you."

"Elizabeth!" Luke shouted. "You're okay!" Luke's face had signs of serious crying and he had blood in his hair. He was very happy to see that Elizabeth was okay.

Elizabeth let got of the Professor's hand. "What are you doing. Stay away." She step behind the professor.

"But, you were…" Luke looked like he was on the verge of another breakdown. Fortunately, Alex came up to huge him.

"Don't worry. You're safe with us," Alex said.

"Your, head is bleeding," Professor Maple said.

"No, it stopped. I just doesn't wash out easily.

Back at the lab, Luke told the professor everything he could remember. Knowing most of it was an illusion help, but it was nerve racking to hear it recalled to her. She wrote notes as her stomach turned.

"So, she never returned after the ditto left," she said.

"Yes."

The professor keep her notes ready. "But that doesn't explain your hand."

"That. I saw my face in the mirror. I realized how foolish I was, and it broke sharply."

"Luke, what you just described to me was no less than torture. An ditto can easily mimic an unconscious human, and even I have no clue of how she did that mirror thing. Plus, the efficiency and confidence of her methods means that this is no mere street performer. There are some people in this world that go to sleep every night thinking about horrible things they can do to others. It's actually quite a strong front you put up."

"What, but I told them about," Luke paused. "They didn't' have it either."

The professor put her pen down stood up. "And you didn't tell her anything about the moemon, even though they may well have that information." She stepped over to a safe to put the notes in.

"So, there's at least three parties involved. We don't know who stole the stone."

"So now it's my responsibility. There are a few suspect organization, and some moestones to be accounted for. Perhaps they need only need one, or they would prefer a monopoly on this power. We now Team Angel will do anything for a stone, and there's still that one in the museum."

"What should I do?" Luke asked.

"Just rest. I think it would do Alex some good to help you with this. There's not much she could learn from me anymore."

Two hours after Luke left, Matt and Kristy came into the lab.

"Hey, Professor. Sorry that we're late. Is there anything we can help you with? Matt said.

"No, I'm just about done with everything. Inventory, Insurance forms, and well, I guess dinner would be nice to start. Well, I can skip that, I'm more tired than hungry," she replied.

"Well, I heard nothing of great value was lost, but it's still scary," Kristy said. "They wreck the place."

"Well, maybe moreso because I'm a biologist and not an archaeologist. I left the door open, apparently," Maple said. "Someone took advantage of my negligence."

"Okay, how about I come and bring you breakfast tomorrow," Kristy said.

"No thanks, but there is one thing I would like you to do. I have reason to believe that there were two separate break ins."

Kristy looked at Matt.

"What is it?" Matt said.

"I would like to see my old fennikin and froaky."

Sorry that it took so long in the worst place possible.