Chapter 11: Root of Lives Taken Away


Light poured in from the wide breaks in the cavern ceiling. It was clearly day out, but the sheer height of the massive underground chamber made the sunlight seem far off and cold. The once dammed underground lake had quickly drained into a narrower rapidly flowing river. Much more of the cave's floor had suddenly become visible from the receding basin waters. The distinct smell of brine was heavy in the air, as was the scent of combustion from the dam's destruction.

Had the Team Rocket Executive escaped from the carnage? It was impossible to tell for sure. There was too much smoke released from Koffing and Weezing prior to their unexpected detonation. Not only did a heavy cloud linger in the damp cave, but nearly all traces of the cement dam had vanished. It had been swallowed by the force of the river, which had been strong enough to carry the enormous red Gyarados downstream.

How was such a monstrosity even produced? The sheer size of the creature went well beyond even the most embellished fishing stories. Des was not even a twentieth of the size of the red Gyarados, and — all things considered — Des was a smaller sized member of the species due to Feyera's unintentional siphoning of her potential earlier on.

It was odd that the Pokemon had been so grand as to fill a substantial portion of the lake. Executive Petrel had claimed it was due to radio waves and the Unown, but then there was also mention of the mysterious fossil related to Mew. The Mercurium relating to Mew was what interested Feyera the most. For he still did not know the extent of his own consciousness, and faced a profound query of whether the heart embedded in his chest – including all of its strange urges, its conflicting memories, its inhuman powers, and its unquestionable allurement towards Sana – existed as an inseparable part of himself. The only way to figure this out would be to remove it and that required going back to the source of what started it all: Mew.

Of course there was also the issue involving the Slowpoke tails. This made for quite a conundrum at first, but now that the dust had settled it was time to deconstruct this entire mystery step by step. Fortunately, the cave had been cleared out of other grunts before the encounter with Petrel. From a logical perspective, they must have escaped the cave somehow through an exit passageway. Thus following their trail would be preferable – if not necessary – to move forward.

Feyera stood up, recalling his Pokemon back into their respective Apricorns. He gave Sana's shoulder a squeeze and walked toward one of the many steel barrels that littered the perimeter of where the lake's shore once was. There was some debris nearby from the explosion, including a short metal rod from one of the railings on the dam's bridge. He picked it up off the ground to have it serve as a lever when prying the lid off the barrel in front of him.

The metal grated as he struggled to uncap the round top like an oversized can. With a little effort applied to the edges it finally came loose.

Immediately the noxious smell of decay flooded his nostrils. Only one thing could possibly smelt of this rot. It was the unmistakable odor of death. His eye stung from the repulsive wave of putrefaction, but he kept lifting the lid – for he had to see it to believe it.

He heard Sana approach with soft footsteps from behind him. He tried to tell her not to approach, but he was too much in shock to even lift a hand. Standing there in a paralysis, he realized that his mouth was hanging open aghast as she quickly joined him at his side. He should have expected what he saw, but somehow seeing it – smelling it – made the experience feel more real than his hypothesis predicted.

For there in the canister were corpses, stuffed like anchovies into a bin. The liquid they were drenched in was that of their own blood and bile. All of them were without tails, though it would be incredibly difficult to tell had Feyera not been looking for that particular detail.

"…!" the gasp Sana made next to him seemed to bring him back from the stupor he had fallen into by staring into the barrel.

"Sana… look away…" he said short of breath.

"I c-cant…" she stammered, grabbing his waist in a hug. "W-why… why would they do this…?!"

Feyera dropped his guard ever so slightly and put an arm around her shivering body. What could he possibly tell her as an explanation? He couldn't even think of a rational one for himself, so how could he possibly begin to explain it to an emotional Gardevoir? It was futile to even try. Silently, he lowered the lid back on the can. Sana's ear cartilage was tickling the side of his head as she shook her head repeatedly, but he could not laugh, he could not do anything.

"Why?" she said again and again. "Why this cruelty?"

Why? He didn't know. He could only posit a guess. And judging by how he was feeling, even that was unsatisfactory at best. To try and explain it to Sana would only make things feel worse. She knew the bounds of his own cruelty, but this felt like something else entirely – though the connection could still be made between Progenitor and this operation, both were the byproducts of a pact with Cipher. He hated himself for being involved with such people in the past. In a sense, he knew that trying to rationalize it would only further her conviction that he was in fact once a part of Team Rocket and thus capable of similar gross iniquities.

But who was he trying to fool? Sana already knew all about him. She had seen him at his worst and still managed to see value in preserving his offensive life – albeit for personal motivations. So maybe the barrier was not rationalizing to her, but rather coming to terms with himself.

Biting his lip in frustration, he closed the canister with a loud thump that echoed throughout the otherwise quiet cave. The noise from the adjacent river had died down since now it was flowing freely downstream.

"Can we leave now?" she asked in a shaken voice. "Please…enough is enough."

He agreed with her. Or rather a feeling in his heart agreed with her. But was that him? He tried to take a step back in his mind and consider things rationally. There was no point in staying here. The damage was already done. Meanwhile, other Pokemon might be currently suffering a similar fate elsewhere. All he wanted to do was leave this place behind. After being beaten to a pulp, nearly losing an eye, facing an unnatural monstrosity, and then witnessing this, he wanted nothing more than to rest somewhere else. Somewhere far, far away. Some place safe with Sana and his Pokemon at his side. Feeling the heat of her core pressed so close against him was only exacerbating this already strong feeling.

It took his entire will to fight the inexplicable longing tugging at his heart. If he gave up right now, if he relinquished his mission in order to be with Sana and remain with her until the end, then all the sacrifices prior to this moment would have been in vain. Logically speaking, the decision should have been an easy one. It should have been fine to simply deny her this and move onwards. However her heart so closely adjacent to his own made the choice immeasurably more complex. At this moment, the thought of sharing in the throbbing warmth of one another's hearts was all it would take to change the course of his goal. It made him feel vulnerable to his own suppressed desires.

But wait. Were they even his desires? Or were these just remnants of the heart drawing to her – the way the pole of a magnet would attract its opposite? With no small amount of resistance, he twisted his torso as to avoid having the edges of their cores continue to touch during this close moment. It took him more effort than he'd care to admit to break the contact.

Sana flinched as well in an awkward sort of way, unorthodox of her usual composure. Whenever this happened in the past, there was always a feeling of uncertainty. True, there was comfort in the fact that they both held such insecurity, but it did little to alleviate the intensifying truth that each held their respective reservations for vastly different reasons.

And then it dawned on him, she was the conduit for these memories. He knew it. It was that familiar aroma of tropical hibiscus and gardenia that made him think again of the strawberry haired girl. His memory of her unique perfume included traces of coconut and milky vanilla cream, scents that were different from the floral aroma present on Sana. He found it odd that being in such close proximity to Sana consistently brought such memories to the surface. The memories were primal in a sense — lacking in detail, but vivid in overall meaning. Clearly there was a close bond between Feyera and the girl with strawberry hair, similar to the bond he was now engaged in with Sanaria. The question was: should he continue to channel these memories of the girl by remaining close to Sana if that attractive force was not entirely genuine?

He glanced down at his heart. Was any of this even genuine? Surely, the heat it was radiating meant he was feeling something. But was it actually genuine? Her heart gave off a similar heat and reddish glow alongside his.

What could it all mean? If his heart was still bound to hers, as it undoubtedly was based on the evidence, then that explained what had happened between them before. Those reservations he felt, they were his humanity – or whatever had been left of it. That pill alone was a struggle to swallow, but now he was not sure what Sana felt either based on how she pulled away. From his perspective, her body language was easier to read than her heart's emotions. Did she suspect that he was using her? This question was most pertinent to the current sensation, involving a nagging sensation in his mind that he was using Sana to draw out deeper memories of the strawberry haired girl. The closer he was to Sana, the more the intense the memories of being with her physically became. And yet it was the only way to effectively draw out the memories of the girl that he could no longer remember, but wanted to oh so much!

Bewildered by this inconvenient reality, he could do naught to stop the mounting rise in his pulse as they shared closely synchronized breaths – their hearts separated by but a scant inch.

"We'll leave, don't worry. I promise," he said finally regaining his audacity. He couldn't get bogged down with all of these bizarre feelings; it was not the right time for such introspection. The only reason to remain here would be to gather any intel on the Mercurium fossils but even that objective seemed far out of reach. What were they even supposed to be looking for? Was Petrel bluffing when he claimed there was a motherlode of material in the lake? If not, then how was the earthquake, the unusual radio waves, the giant red Gyarados, and even the dead Slowpoke's tails all related to Mercurium? Did he really want to know how to harness such a power if it meant atrocities for those creatures involved? He could not say for sure with the same conviction he once held.

"Thanks…" she replied feebly. "When the earthquake happened and I couldn't send messages to your heart any longer, I started to panic… If not for your Pokemon I don't know what I would have done."

"They're not so bad to have around, huh?" Feyera joked. Bits of humor were the only way for him to remain composed.

Sana was still shaking from the sight of the Pokemon. She was still looking around the room with her cherry eyes nervously. "Are all these barrels…?"

He knew what she was asking, but could not find the strength to answer her directly. Truth be told, there must have been over three hundred of them littered throughout the compound. It would be a fair assessment to assume they all contained similar contents based on their uniform white and red labels.

Again she pressured, this time with a force of her cheek against the base of his neck. This time she finished her sentence. "Are all of these full of…death…?"

He nodded. Team Rocket was ruthless when it came to Pokemon. There were very few boundaries to what they would do and this he knew for a fact. The sacks he saw before, the ones the grunts were carrying outside of the cave were full of more carcasses. They had been harvesting the tails no doubt, and these barrels of the tailless remnants were the smoking gun. The only question left was: why? How did it benefit Team Rocket?

It struck him as strange that the tails were completely gone. Also, the presence of them being gathered here in this specific cave seemed to be too much of a coincidence. If only there had been some trace left behind…

"Petrel's computer," he said with determination. "I'm going to hunt that son of a bitch down like the dog he is."

"Huh? Why are you so angry all of a sudden?" It must have surprised her how quickly his shock turned to wrath.

"Because… this needs to end. And the only cure for my anger is action."

"I guess I can't try to stop you then."

"Not a chance of that," Feyera insisted.

"So…what are you going to do if allowing yourself to heal isn't part of the plan?"

"Don't twist my words like that. I'll heal just fine when I'm done doing what needs to be taken care of," he admonished her.

She moved in some discomfort. Times like these were especially taxing on the bond to her heart.

"Listen up: I only have time to explain this once. If I can find where the computer was plugged into, I'll have a means of access to whatever this operation involves. When I was captured, I saw Petrel unplug his portable computer from a wire. That has to be how the interference was dealt with since Petrel was using his computer to hack into Cipher's database. If our telepathy wasn't working because of the radio waves, then there's no way a wireless signal would hold up either. If we can find that track of cable and then proceed to follow it…"

"The whole structure is destroyed though…" Sana sighed.

"There has to be a trace, there has to be something!" he insisted. "Anything!"

"Calm yourself down," she implored. "You're acting really aggressive."

"I need to figure this out Sana!" he said as he squeezed her lithe hand tightly. "Please, just understand that this is more important than anything I've ever faced. If I lose my chance to make amends now I don't know how I can live with my failures."

"I… understand… but this warmth, I don't want you to leave."

"Then come with me," he urged. "We'll figure this out together."

"As if that was ever even a question," she said forcing a soft smile.

"Psh, don't get all excited about it! It'll simply be faster this way, that's all."

"How do you manage to keep that façade up after all this?"

"Practice," he said with a haphazard shrug. "You'll figure it out in due course."

"Despite knowing your heart for as long as I have, now I sometimes feel like I've barely scratched the surface." Her ear cartilage pecked at his cheek as she rocked her head in thought. "You're just a simple man."

"Thanks, I guess." Though her words were not flattering, they did acknowledge that he had some depth as a man. Up until this point, he could barely consider himself a full adult. The childish fantasies and the pseudo academic clout were all just barriers to his otherwise vulnerable self, all of which had been torn down by the state of sheer desperation forcing him to find a new way forward. Of course, he was in no state to denounce anything, since his prior experiences for better or worse had led him up to this point.

"Let's go then. I don't like it here, thas Feyera."

"Right." He squinted at the cave's wall in the distance. "We'll make for the source of the cable lining the wall. That would be the best trail to follow."

Sure enough, there was a thick cable, taut as an umbilical cord resting against the cave's wall. This had to be the way Petrel was able to access a remote server without interference from the nearby ruins.

"What is that exactly?" Sana pondered.

"This is a wire that seems to run through most of the cave. It looks like this was how Team Rocket managed to remain unaffected by the unusual radio waves present here in this cave."

"So…that was how they could still use their form of telepathy?"

"Kinda," Feyera said with a light sigh. "But computers are a little bit different from telepathy."

"How?" she asked curiously.

"A computer uses electrical signals to convey information. That information can be read by another computer. If there is a cable connecting them then it is easier to connect than relying on a wireless signal that could be easily interfered with."

"They sound similar to our hearts."

He saw what she meant, but was convinced that she was wrong in making the connection. "It's not," he said dismissively. "It's just a similar method of achieving the same goal: transmission of information from A to B."

"I think our hearts transmit a lot more than information…" she said drawing near. "Feelings and warmth are electrical in their own way."

As she rested against his shoulder, his thoughts insistently returned back to the mysterious girl he had only vaguely remembered. Something about feeling Sana's head resting gently against his shoulder brought the memory to surface. He winced slightly as the top of her hair brushed against his ear and near his covered wound. It felt strange, surreal even. Like he was living the same experience once more. He tried to channel this feeling of intense curiosity toward remembering more about the strawberry haired girl. Just as her face was starting to come into view he felt a nudge against his temple.

"How does it feel?" she asked gliding her hand over the silken life fabric covering his eye.

"Weird when you do that," he replied truthfully in response to her stroking the bandage, the motion of her fingers feeling like a strange dancing heat.

"N-no," she stammered. "I meant does it hurt still?"

"Nah, not too bad. This fabric is pretty handy. Numbed the area right up."

"Ahh…maybe I made it too tight…" she said fidgeting her hands together.

"It's fine, you shouldn't worry about it. I'm better off than I was before with an open gash by my eye, right?"

"…I hope…" she softly replied.

"Whadda you mean, 'I hope'?" Feyera asked twisting about the fabric's dangling pieces with uncertainty.

"I told you it would be risky."

"Mmm. I remember you saying that, but c'mon have a little faith. I might never see out of this eye again. Isn't that bad enough?"

"…There could be other consequences if you're not careful. Life Fabric is not meant for human bodies to wear."

"Well yeah, that makes sense. Can't say I've ever seen a person wearing your species' garments."

She shook her head. "It's not even that… most humans don't produce enough heat to cause the Life Fabric to react."

So that's what it was. Heat. His psyonics generated a ton of it in a similar fashion to her species. Oftentimes it felt like his entire body was burning just to use a small amount of the powers and the time it took to vent such temperature was directly related to the amount of psyonic manipulation he had attempted. Sana's physiology was different from his own because she was thinner and always wore this life fabric to handle her abundant use of telekinesis. The fabric must yield a chemical reaction when subject to higher temperatures Gardevoir were frequently subject to, otherwise what purpose did it have? "I'll refrain from using the heart's powers until I can take this bandage off," he promised.

"That's a really good idea for your sake," Sana said seriously.

"Doesn't make me feel any better when you say that… but it'll have to do for now since we need to follow this lead. …Time's of the essence."

The two of them chased the cable against the wall as it snaked around the cave, until it suddenly went directly up – straight through the ceiling.

"This is the spot," he said. "Now, let's look for a way up."

"Over here!" Sana motioned toward a tiny alcove in the cave's wall. It was well hidden on account of all the rubble that had recently settled, but it was certainly leading up to a steep incline.

"Good work," he told her. His weakened sense of depth perception had begun to take a toll on his observational skills.

They climbed up the path, using rocks as handholds to navigate the sharply angled floor. Occasionally one of them would slip, only to have the other catch hold. And so this otherwise perilous climb continued, each supporting the other.

At last, they saw unfiltered daylight streaming in from up ahead. Feyera nearly toppled over in excitement on his way out of the cave and Sana too was overcome with relief.

"We… made it…" he gasped. "Whew, finally."

She wrapped her arms around him and said happily, "We really did it!"

"Whoa now, we're not done yet," he said patting her back. "Still have to find out where that wire leads to."

"Okay," she said enthusiastically as the bright sunlight shone on her pale face.

Taking a look at the local area, there appeared to be no signs of any civilization. However, Sana was keen to point out fresh tracks that lined the outside of the cave. Together they followed the tracks, which led beyond several rocky outcrops and past rugged mass of earth that was shaped like a rounded barrow. From there, the tracks led north judging by the position of the late morning sun.

It took them several minutes and a few shared quips to finally reach a cabin.

Peering through the closed windowpane, the lights were turned off inside but that was no reason to let down their guard. First, he tried to gently open the door, but the nob would not turn. He then pressed up on the window pane but it would not budge. Finally, looked over at Sana and smiled. "How about smashing this door in with some telekinesis?"

"Hmm… let me think about that…" she said raising her hand to her chin and slanting her eyes mischievously.

"Use Psychic or something and knock the door down," he said with an order.

"But thas Feyera, like you said before, I'm not your Pokemon," she gave a snarky laugh. "You can't tell me what to do!"

"You know damn well I can't do it," he pointed at her fabric being used as a bandage around his eye. "Don't want to mess up the healing process."

"Very good point." She rolled her eyes playfully, clearly enjoying this position of power. "But I'm still not convinced. Maybe you can try to convince me to—"

He took his elbow and smashed with all his might into the window causing it to shatter loudly. If anyone was inside, the noise certainly would have alerted them.

Sana looked surprised. "I was going to help…" she said faintly.

"Yeah…well uh… took you too long," he said wiping shards of glass off the window's wooden threshold. "Since you didn't want to help with breaking in, stand guard out here while I look around inside for clues."

He hopped over the frame and into the cabin. As far as he could tell the room was devoid of inhabitants. Quickly he found the light bulb dangling from the low ceiling and tugged on the string next to it, illuminating the tiny room. It could probably house one person, or maybe two in a pinch. It was very cramped rather than cozy, and had been built right into the rock with two wooden walls as the exterior.

There were several magazines littered around on the desk next to the broken window, some of them pornographic judging from their covers, as well as foodstuffs and wrappers. He sighed, picking one of the tablets and flipped through it precariously. "Whoever was here sure left in a hurry, didn't even think to take their nudie magazines along with them…" he said with a faint laugh. To his dismay, many of the starlets were old news. One issue even featured Miss Unova from five years ago as the headliner on the cover. At first, he was surprised that he remembered her, since that too should have been affected by the amnesia. Then again, his mind could be playing tricks on him. Maybe he saw her sometime after three years ago. It was difficult to tell for certain what he actually remembered and what his mind told him he remembered. What he needed was proof that the memories were real, that the stuff he recalled actually happened according to other people. That would be conclusive evidence that the girl with the strawberry colored hair was as real of a memory as the pictures he remembered her showing him long ago. One thing was certain though: distinct images, photography in particular, seemed to jog his memory better than anything – except for Sana.

After he had finished perusing through the stash of unmentionables, he made his way toward the back of the room. There was a large door left ajar that led into another smaller room. Inside, he saw what he had been looking for. The thick cable jutting out of the ground had found its way into a large terminal. The tower was showing activity, which was a good thing since it indicated the system had been in an idling state rather than fully turned off. Even better, the wireless router it was connected to appeared to be offline judging from a lack of flashing lights. He quickly rebooted up the computer from standby, leaving the wireless router stationed next to it turned off – hoping to intercept another lead on the operation Team Rocket was a part of.

"Mounting Local Disks…Complete.

[3] Disk Volumes Found.

C:\ has no label, index located.

D:\ has no label, index located.

E:\ has no label, index located.

Resuming Previous Session…

Distributed Resources Disconnected.

Connecting to Network Drive…

Z:\ Not Found.

Error: Network Connection Unsuccessful.

Loading Previous Session…Complete."

The screen flashed a few times, then a loading window, and finally the login screen appeared – must have been an older operating system or just a slower processor. "Let me see what's been going through here recently…" he said confidently sitting down at the makeshift workstation.

However, he was soon confronted with an obstacle: the terminal was locked by a passphrase.

"Hail_giovanni" he typed in, recalling what the grunt in the cave had said earlier during the mind interrogation. No dice. He tried using multiple attempts capitalizing characters, adding numbers, substituting names of the executives, failing in every regard at brute forcing through. After losing count of the attempts he had made, he finally leaned back in the chair looking up at the dirty ceiling for an answer that simply would not come. Psyonics were no good here – even if he could use them.

While he was leaning back pondering what else the password could be, he started to feel tired from lack of sleep, and looked back down at the monitor with a sense of urgency. He took a deep breath. There was a faint odor coming from the desk. Curious, he yanked out the desk drawer and found several processed food snacks stuffed inside like some type of edible treasure trove.

"Rollout Rolls, Swirlix Surprise, Munchlax Munchies…!" he said reading the colorful labels on the wrapped pastries, candy, and nutritional bars. His stomach growled loudly. Clearly famished, he spared no time in devouring the food he'd come across. Most of it was junk, yet at least there was some sustenance that could hold him over until he procured his next meal. When would that be? He'd left his camping supplies behind containing various provisions he had routinely restocked over the weeks. With his metabolic rate stalled he could ration longer than the average adventurer, but was not free from intense hunger pangs especially after exerting himself. After taking the beating he had, the food was a most welcome and satisfying reprieve; so ravenous was his appetite for fuel, he didn't even think to save any of it for Sana or the others.

After polishing off the snacks, he dug around further in the desk, insatiably searching for more to eat. Something sharp pinched his hand, it felt like stiff card paper. It was tapped down to the very back of the drawer, but he easily managed to pry it out now that the snacks once obstructing it had been cleared out of the desk by his appetite.

"Hmm what's this…?" he said aloud as he flipped the small index card around in his hand. His mind was still contemplating all the delicious sugary goodness, so it took a moment to register what he had just found. "AH, HA! A key card! 'user1: Goldeen need log'. Never would have guessed that…" Swiftly he typed in the credentials, continuing to talk to himself in a sugar induced rush of thought, "Huh, you'd think with a password you'd want to keep others out… doesn't do much good to have the key card so close to the machine. Humph, not that I'm complaining. Easier job for me!"

Excitedly, he waited for the login process to finish, tapping anxiously at the desk – revved up from all the sweets. "…This probably isn't Petrel's computer, but if he connected to it via a landline I can hopefully still cull some info from that contact."

Using a command function he typed out "C:\Users\user1network statistics workstation" and was greeted with a history of the server station's up-time as well as several technical details indicating this particular computer system had been host to quite a number of transmissions since its last boot-up late yesterday's evening.

"Hmm… Whole lot of data going through here…several connections too." While he was no expert on networking, it was clear to a reasonable certainty that this outpost was related to what was going on underground. "Team Rocket did leave here in an awful hurry. Maybe there's still a file in here that wasn't yet sent to its final destination when they got out of dodge. Or at the very least a backup version of a communication stored on the local drive."

For several minutes he slaved at the desk, buried in the nested list of folders in tree view and shift-tabbing his way through, trying to find any promising lead on the underground operations. There had to be a record in here somewhere. Even a routine backup would suffice for his purposes.

He rubbed his eye as the screen's whiteness began to wear on him. Many of the files contained Hexadecimal Digits in Unicode, though without a translator handy it was useless to try and decipher them. Connecting to the internet in order to translate them might very well result in a stored message being sent off to its intended destination, because of the local area network no longer being isolated as it was now with its wireless transmitter turned off. It was not worth the risk. Besides, these were very small files; the clusters of paired numbers and letters probably denoted shipment sizes or otherwise insignificant information.

Eventually after what felt like endless searching through the command tree and opening text files, he came across a suspicious folder named "Sparrowhawk" that contained several iterations of the same document as if frequent amendments had been made to it judging by the consecutive dates which it was updated. Furthermore the most recent update was made a mere two hours ago!

With all hope riding on this being the answer, he punched in a command to open the folder, which prompted him for administrator credentials. "Interesting…" he said rubbing his chin in thought. "Not many of the other files had an administrator lock on them."

He then ran a search on the keyword "Sparrowhawk" and the resulting hits were staggering to say the least. It had several hundred hits in the first few seconds; the numbers continued to rise as the various disk volumes were searched and indexed.

"Got to hand it to them, it sounds like a cool name. Maybe even one I'd use…" he said with a shake of his head.

The only local folders he had privilege to open were "Sparrowhawk_ver_V" and "Sparrowhawk_Plans".

He opened the former first.


C:\Users\user1≥start c:\Storage\Docs\Recent\Sparrowhawk_ver_V\

Project Primer:

The PURPOSE of this Operation is to "Provide a Channel by which to Profit Regardless of Future Global Uncertainties"

***NOTICE: For consistency and increased security please use the term 'Zephyrus' when referring to the organization whose name rhymes with 'heifer'; I don't want to have to explain again how important it is to use code words! Grunts who fail to comply with these policies will be reported for insubordination!*** /P

Two following situations remain unsatisfied and will likely result as Mercurium samples increase over time and perfect sequencing is finalized:

(1.) Deployment of Archangel 44 65 69 72 64 72 65 20 22 44 65 65 22 20 41 6c 64 61 69 6e 65

(2.) Global war on multiple fronts and massive scale instigated by codename "Phaeton Device"

The potential of Zephyrus completing either objective remains questionable at best, but judging from analysis of their administrative data files, we can be assured that societal destruction is their endgame.

The bad news is a lot of people and Pokemon will probably die.

The good news is there's tremendous profit in that.

What better way than to play off the uncertainties of the future by promising the future warlords of tomorrow the most premium of biological weaponry?

Those in the know already understand something big is looming on the horizon.

Anyone with access to a satellite already knows about the destruction of all life on Penta Island even though that information has quickly been made "classified" by the Pokemon League.

The corporation bigwigs with satellites to their name have pockets that are deep, and I mean DEEP!

With the Pokéball industry booming, these bastards are absolutely loaded with wealth!

Any company with a hand in this so called "Quantum Superposition Technology" is reaping those earnings as the presence of this method of data processing becomes increasingly commonplace and necessary.

Silph and Devon alone grossed 7.8 trillion last year and those corporate earnings are likely deflated for tax purposes.

Conclusion: we exploit these people with heavy pocketbooks by taking advantage of their desire to avoid an Armageddon situation which will render them powerless.

How?

Simple!

Two Phases, much simpler to implement than anything Zephyrus has planned for "down the line" we make our product available today for the "here and now":

Phase One – Use those special rocks Zephyrus' has been paying us to dig up and generate an electronic frequency similar to that of the legendary Mew's transformative frequency.

First, need to gather a lot of the compound to research the particular frequency we need.

Hacking into Zephyrus' mainframe proves that living samples with beating hearts are superior in every way to fossilized samples.

Christian's research "Concerning the Paranormal" provides a model understanding of this technical relationship.

Turns out Psychic Pokemon share a unique affinity with the compound.

No surprises there considering the Progenitor Project was such a success.

Slight problem: Most Psychic Pokemon are quite dangerous, so we'll settle for the low hanging fruit.

Gather Slowpoke because they're unbelievably dimwitted and make for easy prey.

Plus Azalea is absolutely infested with them!

Their tails are key to their evolution process; the transformative process of energy stored within them for when a Shellder bites down on one is somehow related to Mew.

Slice off the tails, discard the rest; feed the tails to an (unwilling) host

This will make the Pokemon evolve easier because the presence of this high concentration of Mercurium/samples of Mew's genetic code lowers the threshold needed to trigger an evolution.

Thanks to this, the next part will be like aiming at a large, stationary target rather than a tiny, volatile one.

We noted that Magikarp developed to gargantuan proportions, though the jury's out on whether this is due to the increased nutrients or the massive quantities we force fed it.

Now here's the tricky part, need to use a natural signal to trigger evolution.

Fortunately Unown happen to produce a radio wave that affects Pokemon.

I have no idea how since I'm not a scientist, but it must have something to do with potential energy becoming active energy.

That natural signal emitted by the Unown is our ticket to inducing the evolution.

The presence of Mercurium in the subject's bloodstream will make this an easier task since it promotes change at the slightest variable trigger.

As soon as the creature evolves, lock the signal currently being transmitted by the Unown – that's the "Harmonic Resonance" a special type of radio wave that signals change in all Pokemon, though only the ones with enough stored up energy to evolve could respond to it.

We then copy the signal, and amplify it.

We amplify it a lot.

Amplify it to the point where it cannot be ignored, even by Pokemon with minimal amounts of evolutionary energy storage.

Phase Two — Find a tall broadcasting station, preferably in a densely populated area for maximum effect.

Ramp the signal strength up to eleven and force 'spontaneous evolution' to take place en masse.

Since we've already isolated the specific wavelength, it only will require a single burst.

Perhaps two if there are multiple stages in the Pokemon's evolutionary tree.

Doesn't matter if the Pokemon is ready for evolution or not, the signal causes an unavoidable response.

If the Pokemon has insufficient reserves of energy to evolve it might mutate or simply draw in surrounding energy from its local environment in order to balance the equation to equilibrium.

Think of the chaos it will cause people living at home with their Pokemon or taking them out for a stroll.

Next, think of all the Pokemon that work on infrastructure, producing electrical power or otherwise contributing to the wellbeing of society suddenly gaining tremendous untapped potential.

We'll have a biological superweapon before Zephyrus even finishes their projects, shifting the balance of power.

Think of all the money this will make just to keep it out of the wrong hands!

Too bad for everyone that we're the dictionary definition of "the wrong hands".

/P

***PROJECT UPDATE***

Still working on a way to get through to Pokemon with the Soundproof ability, or the ones inside their Pokéballs for that matter…will work out those inconvenient details later. We're going to need to keep this weakness a secret. Fortunately for us, plenty of people like to keep their Pokemon outside of Pokéballs as pets, so we'll still manage to affect a lot of them as long as they aren't soundproof.

/P

***NEW DATA***

Zephyrus either has their data wrong or has made extensive progress on their first option. At first, I thought it was a joke that they managed to break out a high figure of 0.94112 on a test subject. Then I realized that these figures, like the Mercurium itself, were prone to change. For instance when I ran a stress-test using a Mind Plate, Christian Feyera had a rising deviation of 0.58397 from a previous recorded value of 0.32821. This was unprecedented, but unfortunately I did not have the time to further investigate this strange phenomenon.

/P


Next, he opened the second file.


C:\Users\user1≥start c:\Backups\Other\Blackmail\Sparrowhawk_Plans\

Goldenrod Radio Tower is the perfect place to broadcast our special signal!

Ariana has a killer plan to make it look relatively normal hostage situation at first before we pull out the rug from underneath everyone (and the ransom money could be a nice bonus!)

Always admired how she has a way of luring others into a false sense of security before asserting her authority

Does that make me a masochist?

Maybe she'll get tired of being single one day

Who am I kidding she could have any guy she wants on the team

And besides she's only interested in honoring her precious Giovanni's legacy

Still might be worth a shot now with Archer eating dirt

I know she thinks his brother Proton is a psychopath but that's as obvious as the stench of Muk

I think I'll ask her out when we're at the top of the tower together could be romantic as we watch the city unravel beneath us

The signal sent from way up there is strong enough to span a few kilometers should give the city a good shaking

I'm definitely a sucker for romance

/P

***DELETE THIS!*** /P


Feyera quickly read through the two available files again, jotting down key terms on the reverse side of the index card once attached to the monitor and committing the various code words to writing.

Sana was probably getting restless by now. He logged out of the terminal and made his way back outside, hastily stuffing the scribbled on card in his pocket.

He found her leaning on the door outside and staring down at her heart in the midday sunshine.

"Did you find anything useful?" she asked eagerly looking up at him.

"A lot," he said proudly. "For one, I know exactly what Team Rocket has in mind, and it isn't pretty." Then he took the time to briefly explain to her the notes he pulled from the drive.

"Forcing evolution?" she remarked with a gasp. "So that was what the Slowpoke were sacrificed for."

"You are right. Petrel wasn't lying about there being a motherlode of Mercurium; it was in an organic form that had transformed their test subject Magikarp into a giant red Gyarados. Shame that one got away, but I doubt we could have taken it. Besides, the real problem is that now Team Rocket doesn't even need to gather a bunch of the Slowpoke to isolate the signal since they've matched the particular radio wave corresponding to spontaneous evolution and plan to amplify it!"

"That's terrible!" she started to protest. "…Pokemon should be able to evolve when the time is right, not when there's no choice."

"And it's not even the will of their trainers – as would be the case with stone evolutions."

"Pokemon can choose to use evolution stones too. Gallade use dawn stones on their own. I've seen it take place before with my own eyes!"

"Fair enough, I won't argue that with you. However, right now we only have a precious amount of time to spoil their plans before Team Rocket mobilizes their scheme into action."

"Where do we need to go?"

"To Goldenrod, the very center of Johto."

Sana looked at him quizzically. She did not understand. Goldenrod was probably just a random word to her with little meaning. Given her minimal contact with humans in general, the thought of bringing her into a major city was almost as staggering as trying to explain it.

Feyera rubbed his nose bridge and tried to think of a way to explain it in terms familiar to her. "Think of it as the beating heart of region. That's where they're planning to use the signal since from there it will affect the most number of people with Pokemon. If they manage to broadcast atop the Goldenrod Radio Tower, the effect will be devastating."

"Then we have no time to lose," she nodded, satisfied with the analogy. "How do we get there?"

"Judging by our current position near the Ruins of Alph, it's west of here. We'll cut through the National Park on the way. There will be signs all over the place since it's a major attraction. Should be able to make it there by midafternoon if we hurry."

"What are we waiting for then? Let's go now!" Sana said with a sunny smile.

They headed west with all due speed across open hills and deep valleys. The wind blew at their backs as they left the mountainous region behind.