Arc Intermission 2

Chapter 16: Beyond the Wall

Jebediah

The armored vehicle swayed and rocked as we drove to the southern border of our empire, preparing to go beyond the walls and into the wild. I was giddy with excitement. Even in my phone call with my half siblings, they shared my excitement. (Even if I had to keep information sparse.) I sat in the back of the vehicle, clutching my machine gun and inspecting my black armour thoroughly. It was beautiful and liberating to wear black.

"Remember the task, Rookie?" Asked the soldier to my immediate left; the oldest of the team, quietly loading his shotgun, shooting the occasional glance at me. Once he was fully loaded, he put the safety of his firearm on and placed it under his chair and started fiddling with his pistol. "Ol' Boomer hopes so."

"Of course, Lieutenant," I nodded at Boomer. He and I were the only ones who didn't wear our masks, other than our driver of course. Boomer was an aged man with greying hair, his braid long and slung over his shoulder. Pale skin and a permanently weary face. "Just a scouting mission, defending the walls, etc."

"...only shoot when you need to." The third member of the team quietly spoke up, sitting to my right. Echo, our shadow agent. I couldn't read the guy in the slightest. He always wore his mask and had a hood up with it. In his hands he held a low caliber sniper rifle. I felt a bit uneasy that we were taking firearms if our only threats were wild Pokemon, but...I suppose they had all those powers and abilities and we didn't. "Wasting ammo is never a good thing."

His rough, accented voice uneased me, but I just nodded.

"Noted, Sergeant-Major." I gulped.

"Not just a scouting mission, Jebediah," My uncle climbed down from the gunner's position of the APC and grabbed held onto the item storage above our chairs. He looked at this small team and nodded. "Lost contact with Recon Team Charlie yesterday, why we've only just been sent in is beyond me, but regardless, we have a job to do. They were last spotted in a southwestern forest by the mountains."

"Probably a Lucario pack got them or something," Echo shrugged, placing a suppressor on his .45. "I hear they live around those parts in numbers."

"Can't have been Lucario," I shook my head. "They're too kind and understanding to do that."

"Boy, I dunno what kind of lucario you've seen, but the ones we have are vicious bastards. Hunt in numbers and have attitude problems."

"...Aura abilities make them…" Echo shrugged, speaking the most I ever heard him in our few days together. "Difficult...you shoot one and it only makes them angrier, desperate, do some Final Gambit shit."

"Final Gambit?" I tilted my head.

"Not important now," Uncle Wolfe listened in on his radio, nodding at the information he was being given. "Copy. Leaving the wall now. Pup, "

The tallest of the soldiers turned to me and nodded.

"I want you on the gun up top," he pointed to the ladder behind him with his thumb and walked past me, patting my shoulder gently. My eyes lit up as I knew exactly why he put me on the gun...just so I could see the outside world. I wished he was my dad, he was a lot more compassionate than my real one. I giddily put my helmet and mask on, throwing my gun under my armpit on its sling. "Want you to be our eyes up there."

"Sir, yes, Sir," I nodded and opened the hatch and sat in the gunner's chair and looked up with a wide mouth. Our vehicle stood at the bottom of our mighty concrete wall that rose high into the sky. We were at one of the many huge, heavily defended portcullises that dotted the walls. Wind blew not down here, as the pillar of concrete blocked it. "Oh, my stars…"

I had never been this close to the wall itself in all twenty-one years of my existence. I only saw it from afar or in pictures. In person, it was a menacing beast. Dark gray and dotted here and there with moss. I felt almost intimidated by it. Either what it stood for or the fact it had at least 25 snipers all looking down at us from atop it or inside it. I gulped and clutched the turret, anticipating and dreading what lay on the other side. How many of us were even allowed past this point without getting shot? This wall was built to keep the feral Pokemon out, but...Why shoot people that went beyond them? It was strange. My train of thought was quickly broken by the sounds of the thick, ten meter thick metal gates opening for our APC. I held my breath.

Our vehicle slowly moved through the gateway with soldiers in the windows watching us, in awe at seeing Strike Team Alpha's armored transport rolling through. We traveled through the wall for a short period of time before reaching the other side; the big outdoors. I immediately felt a gust of wind blow over me as I finally saw the horizon, not blocked by any wall or mountain, like the world just continued on forever. I saw forests, lakes, and mountains in the far off distance beyond this grassy field. I stared back at the wall, knowing life inside would never be the same.

"How is it, Pup?" Boomer asked in a softer tone over the radio. "The outside?"

I couldn't help but stare at the vast world under the clear azure sky. It was beautiful. Just...beautiful. However, I thought of my brother and sister. They would never step foot out of these walls probably. I was only here because I was put on this team, those two wouldn't survive Boot Camp. I gulped and shook my head, pushing that sad thought aside for now.

"It's more than I thought it would be, to be honest," I leaned back in my chair and just took in the world as our vehicle traveled along the roadless field on heavy treads.

"Heading to point O3 now, last known location of Recon Team Charlie, sit tight guys, this'll take an hour or so. And it's only bumpy roads ahead," our technician, Skyguy told us while piloting the vehicle. "Metaphorically speaking, there are no roads out here."

I just sat back and spun the chair (and by extension, the turret) around to have a look at the landscape. With one last look towards the wall, I let myself give a lukewarm sigh, hoping the best for my little brother and sister back home. The wall got further and further away as we continued on our path to the great unknown. Feral Pokemon avoided the loud vehicle like the plague; never before had I seen so many Pokemon in one place before. It was amazing!

After about an hour and forty-five minutes, our vehicle stopped at the entrance to a huge, dense forest, so dark inside I could barely see five feet inside. One by one, we all made it out the vehicle to investigate.

"Alright, guys, we're here," Skyguy told us over the radio and stayed in the driver's position.

"Hold on, team," Commander Wolfe held his hand up and shone his flashlight into the brush, flicking it around in confusion. He pointed at a certain tree and froze. "Something's not right here. Look at that."

Upon closer inspection, the tree seemed...twisted and just...wrong, like reality around it was warped. We were all quiet as we examined it.

"A Plane of Distortion," Adio grimaced and turned his MP5's safety off. "This shouldn't be here. Careful, this is a dangerous place."

"Looks like we found out where Recon Team Charlie went." Boomer sighed and cracked his neck.

"A Plane of Distortion?" With a tilt of my head, I stared at the warped area, meekly turning my safety off, machine gun tightly in hand. "What's that…?"

"A spatial and temporal anomaly, typically encompassing a mile wide area, but…" Adio grimaced and continued to shine his light: which failed to pierce the darkness of the area. "Usually attract wild Pokemon and seem to be filled with valuable resources. They're rare, but...why is one out here? So close to civilization."

"Whatever it is," Boomer humph'd and unslung his shotgun. "Our recon team is in there. And it's up to us to get em out of there."

"Right you are, Boomer," Uncle Wolfe nodded in agreement and looked to the team. "Alright. Skyguy, stay with the APC, keep in contact with HQ. Echo, you're up front. I want you to scout ahead and take in info. Boomer, Pup, you're both with me. We're finding out the source of this anomaly and where our missing recon unit went."

"Sir, yes Sir"! We all said in unison and started approaching the Plane of Distortion.

Before we entered, I bit my lip.

"Don't you think 'Plane of Distortion' is a bit of a lame name for this anomaly?" I spoke up while triple checking my ammo reserves. My team all looked at each other then to me strangely. "Like, c'mon, it needs a cooler name than that. A P.o.D just sounds sterile and surgical!"

I rubbed my temples as best as I could through my gas mask, attempting to think of a cooler name.

"Like...Pokemon live there typically...uh...they're really weird and unknown...mysterious…always filled with valuable objects like uh…dungeon maybe," my inner gamer influenced my choice of words. "Pokemon Mystery Dungeon. That a better name?"

I was met with resounding silence from my team.

"Just get back to the mission at hand." My uncle just pushed into the mysterious dungeon.

"Kids these days…" Boomer grumbled and pumped his shotgun, following his leader in.

"I thought it was good…" I huffed and stared at Echo: who was currently watching a couple of pidgeottos through his scope, finger away from the trigger. "Uh...what're you…?"

"Eh," Echo shrugged and walked into the forest. "I thought it was an alright name."

Once inside the mystery dungeon, I noticed how serene the forest seemed. It was a dense, luscious forest, didn't seem too dissimilar to the woods Matt, Lucy and I took Lady out to every week. Just seemed a bit overgrown. I glanced behind me and was immediately confused. It looked like the forest stretched outwards for miles. This place really was a mystery.

We all secured the immediate area by pointing our guns around to make sure we were safe. Once we were sure we were, the commander opened up his communication feed.

"Skyguy. This is Sparky. Come in, can you read us?" He spoke into his radio.

"A bit of radio interference from the P.o.D," Skyguy's voice was fuzzy and somewhat hard to hear, but regardless he wasn't cut off entirely. "But I can hear you, over."

"Keep comms open with HQ, we'll relay any info to you, over," my uncle nodded and looked to our team sniper. "You're up. Scout ahead of us. Be careful, Echo."

"Affirmative," Echo simply nodded, pulled back the bolt of his rifle and climbed a tree, keeping eyes over the dark and damp forest. He jumped from branch to branch carefully. He was pretty flexible and agile considering all the equipment he wore. "Scouting ahead."

My uncle nodded and began leading us, keeping a close eye on surroundings, his loaded gun in hand. Attaching his flashlight to the end of his MP5, he shone it around, watching as bug types scurried away as the light shone on them. I shuddered and held my weapon tightly. I hated bugs. My uncle didn't seem to care very much; I envied him for such a calm and collected demeanor.

All of a sudden, a deafening boom was heard from behind, causing both Sparky and I to turn around, guns ready. Boomer casually stood with his shotgun pointed up to the sky, smoke rising from the barrel. He seemed nonchalaunt. He looked at a sceptile and a few grovyle scurrying away into the trees and pumped his gun back, opening the chamber. He then looked at us and shrugged.

"Bastards were following us, clearly up to no good," He loaded a spare shell into the chamber and shut it, clearly unfazed that we could have been easily slaughtered by those grass types. "Gave 'em a warning, seems to have scared em off, ha!"

"Good work, Boomer, " Sparky sighed and continued patrolling onwards. He then stared at me from behind his red visor. "Always keep your eyes peeled, Pup. You're lucky we're here, but just as a precaution, always stay alert. Absent-Mindedness is the worst killer of soldiers like us."

"N-noted, Sir…" I held my gun as tight as I humanly could; scanning the environment for any and all things that could pose a threat to us. I didn't want to die here, but more importantly, I wanted to keep my new friends safe. "Area looks clear…"

"Look alive, everyone, injured grotle coming up," Echo warned us over the radio. "Expended nine-millimeter rounds, I count three. EIther from a pistol or SMG, can't tell. Thing's been shot in the legs and the side. Doesn't look too bad, but I'd be wary. Can't trust these ferals in your so-called 'Mystery Dungeons."

"Are you seriously listening to Pup's names, Echo?" Boomer grunted but was cut off by commander.

"Let's investigate. We have a clue on our missing Recon Team." He motioned us to follow with a wave of his hand, following Echo's signal with a datapad. After a brief walk through the dark woods, shooing off several ferals, we found the grotle lying up against a tree. He looked hurt, but still strong. Blood dropped out from two gunshot wounds to his legs and one to his side. He was bleeding lightly. I was glad he was only shot with 9mm rounds. "This is the place."

Echo was up a tree, scanning the area through his sniper. Boomer and Sparky looked at the expended casings and started discussing amongst themselves. I felt extremely bad for the poor grass type, who hissed in pain as he struggled to move his injured legs. I approached him: which he noticed immediately and made an awful, threatening noise at me. I slowly showed him my gun and put it down on the ground beside me, holding my hands for him to see and approaching him.

The grotle seemed to understand the gesture and let me get close to examine his injuries.

"Pup?! The fuck are you doing?!" Boomer shouted at me as Echo quickly aimed at the grotle, his laser pointer over the poor Pokemon's forehead. "Get back here! That thing could—"

"Stand down, Boomer, Echo," My uncle vouched for me and aimed his gun down to the ground. "It can't go anywhere. Let's just see what happens."

I nodded gratefully and examined the grotle's wounds. I reached into my med-kit and took out some tweezers. I debated giving him my morphine, but thought against it. He didn't seem to be in agonising pain. I quickly dug into the wound with the tweezers, finding out his hide was extremely thick and strong. I quickly found the bullet and plucked it out, examining it closely. Definitely a 9mm. As it was removed, the poor grass type hissed, causing me to comfort him by rubbing his chin. I quickly removed the other two bullets and began treating the wounds with a disinfectant. I was glad his hide was far too thick and the bullets were too dinky to cause any serious damage.

Once the wounds were treated, the grotle seemed more trusting of me, letting me pet his head. I looked back to my teammates and smiled under my mask. Boomer rubbed his chin and sighed, Echo pointed his sniper away while my uncle approached me and patted my shoulder.

"I'm proud of you. You took initiative and treated a situation logically, unlike someone," Uncle Wolde picked up one of the bullets I removed and twirled it around in his fingers, disgust in his eyes. Of course I biologist like him would be upset to seeing life be harmed. I was mainly happy he said he was proud of me. Dad never said that to me. He then threw the bullet aside and approached the grotle. "Pokemon are highly intelligent, they take to reading body language easily. Observe."

He placed the side of his hand horizontally on his forehead and looked around. I caught on quickly.

Where.

He then held out an open hand, stretching all five fingers.

Are five? That did not seem right. I clicked my fingers. Are the humans.

He then outstretched his middle and index fingers, closing the rest of his hand and pointed his fingers at the grotle.

That shot you?

"Where are the humans that shot you?" I repeated quickly, whispering to myself.

My uncle repeated the sign language message a few times before the grotle seemed to fully understand. The large turtle pushed itself up, chattering in its own, torterra language and started adamantly staring in one direction, sprouting a vine from the foliage on his back and pointing that way, beckoning us to follow.

"You hear the turtle," My uncle was the first to follow. "This way!"

I began following quickly, then Echo was behind us. Lastly, Boomer followed, grumbling to himself quietly.

I never quite realized pokemon were just this intelligent, I knew they were smart in a pet kind of way, but only after meeting Silvally did I realize they were sapient and just as smart as us humans.

The grotle led us into an opening and pointed over to some kind of strange device planted in the ground before running off. We all readied our weapons and slowly approached the device. Even Echo jumped down from his treetop vantage points. We noticed a broken down vehicle in the corner but wanted to investigate the machine even closer. It was suspicious as all hell.

It was a chrome cylindrical object with many blinking lights and gizmos. It was rooted firmly into the ground. It hummed strangely and had some sort of array on the top that was spinning wildly.

"This is Virtue tech..." I mumbled and looked at the virtue symbol on the side of the device, the barrel of the gun still pointed at it. I looked over to my uncle as he investigated. It was a strange device I had never seen before. "What is it, Sir?"

The virtue scientist shook his head and began fiddling around with a keyboard and screen attached to the side of it.

"I'm not sure…" he grunted. "I've never seen an object like this before. I'll operate it. Boomer, Echo, Pup, investigate the vehicle. I'll work on this."

"Yessir," Boomer nodded and cocked his shotgun, approaching the truck. "You heard the man. Let's go."

The three of us slowly approached the vehicle and looked at the driver's seat. Empty. This was probably Recon Team Charlie's vehicle. No doubt. We then moved to the rear where the passengers would sit. Boomer hit the door a few times and shouted.

"Anyone alive in there?!"

Silence loomed over us for a moment.

"You weren't followed by him, were you?" A woman's voice called out. Squad leader maybe?

"Not that we're aware of, no, who are you speaking about—?" Boomer began to question but was swiftly interrupted and climbed into the vehicle.

"Something is not right," Echo beckoned us over as he knelt by something. We all looked down. "Thirty-two expended SMG cases. A full magazine has been expended here. But look. No blood anywhere. They fired and missed every shot apparently. How one unload a fully automatic weapon like this, deplete nearly all the ammo and miss every shot? It's a bit puzzling if I say so myself."

I bit my lip and looked at all the discarded casings. Echo had a fair point. I desperately searched around for any blood, but nothing. They were the only bullet casings that we're spent, too.

"Che chazzo?" Echo muttered in his native tongue of Italian while investigating the side of the military vehicle. "Impossible, look at this."

Bullet dents were all across the side of the transport. Thankfully they didn't penetrate the armour. But still.

"What's wrong…?" I muttered and investigated, standing by Echo's side. "Did they meet enemy soldiers…?"

"Negative. There would be more casings lying around if that was the case. But these angles don't make sense, I have an eye for detail, Signore, let me borrow your machine gun," Echo simply held his hand out. Without question, I passed it to him after turning the safety on. With good trigger discipline, he pointed it forward. "See how the access door to the chamber points this way?"

He pointed to his left.

"Yes…?"

"Whoever shot this was facing directly away from the vehicle judging by these footprints in the mud, and by the placement of the casings," he demonstrated by pointing at the footprints. "Today has been without too much wind and these trees would have blocked a majority of wind that could disturb the casings. From the placement of these casings, directly shooting the vehicle would be utterly impossible due to how they are in regards to the access door and footprints. Something is extremely wrong."

His eye for detail was terrifyingly sharp. But he was right, though. How could these bullets have hit the vehicle? I nervously looked around for the answer as Echo handed me my firearm back carefully. Suddenly a beeping came from the sniper, causing him to pull out a strange device that had a radar screen on it.

"Boomer, Sparky," Echo gulped and began stepping back, pulling out his sniper. "Incoming feral, it's a powerful one, eleven o'clock from my position."

We pointed our guns in that direction. Uncle Wolfe stopped tinkering with the Virtue Device and readied his gun. Lastly, Boomer joined us by jumping out of the vehicle, pumping his shotgun.

"IT'S COMING BACK, TAKE COVER!" one of the recon troops shouted as the target was approaching us rapidly.

From the brush appeared a lucario moving at extreme speeds. Something seemed wrong with it though, its yellow fur was much longer, extending to his tail. His hands and feet were also red and had large metal spikes protruding from them.

"Mega lucario!" Uncle Wolfe shouted and opened fire with his machine gun on it. The lucario was so ungodly fast it dodged the bullets and got in his face, grabbing the MP5 by the barrel and easily destroyed the gun with very little resistance. My uncle immediately took a battle stance and tried to disengage. "Open fire!"

Following his orders, I squeezed down on my MP5's trigger, pointing my sights over the aggressive blue canine's leg, cringing as my safety was still on. Damn it! Echo crouched down and looked through his scope, aiming over the head. The lucario noticed this and threw my uncle aside before he could crush his neck. The aura pokemon began zigzagging towards Echo faster than he could point his gun. In a last second gambit I bum rushed the sniper out of the way, watching as the lucario had an outstretched arm where Echo's chest would be, looking to impale him. His red eyes looked down and pierced us. He looked ready to pounce. Before he could, the booming sound of a shotgun filled the area.

Our attacker crossed his arms and created a barrier in front of him: which immediately began cracking due to the focused and near point-blank shotgun blasts Boomer was unloading into him.

"JUST FUCKING GO DOWN!" The verteran shouted as shell casings were ejected from his gun. From behind, Uncle Wolfe was peppering the lucario with his .45. Boomer's shotgun failed to fire after its eighth shot . "I'm out, cover me!"

As if the lucario knew, he threw the almost destroyed shield at Boomer, knocking him down and shattering the shield. Though in a moment of distraction, the lucario yelped and clutched a new bullet wound in his shoulder given courtesy of my uncle. He snapped his head over to my commander and was about to rush him, catching a few of the bullets mid air with the aura, turning the projectiles around and readying to throw them back. Before he could Echo sprung to action as I fumbled with my safety. The sniper took out his knife and readied to stab the lucario square in the back. However, as my uncle was reloading, the lucario dropped the bullets and grabbed Echo by the throat and began squeezing tightly as I was paralysed with fear and horror. Even with his mask on, I heard Echo choking in pain.

"FLASH OUT!" Hastily shouted Echo as he pulled the pin of a stun grenade and threw it at the lucario's feet. Before it detonated, sensors in my helmet activated and blinded me by turning my glowing red visor off completely and deafened me by muffling out everything with some high tech devices. Even with this protection, I could still vaguely see a flash through my visor and I heard a bang. After a brief moment, sight and hearing was given back to us. Echo was clutching his throat on the ground crawling away as the lucario held its eyes and ears in agony. This was our chance.

"H-humans!" The canine hissed as it struggled to see or hear anything around it. "Wh-why do you meddle with our homes?!"

He sounded desperate and sad. Before Boomer and Echo could get up or my uncle could approach, I jumped to my feet and tackled the lucario from behind, restraining his arms behind his back. I didn't want to kill or hurt him, I wanted to find out how we were 'meddling.' He struggled greatly under me, but my superior height made it somewhat difficult for him. That and the flashbang probably helped. I was successfully restraining it!

"Calm down! We don't wanna hurt you!" I yelled and held him down as hard as I could as my teammates got their bearings and approached us. "Just stay still!"

"Pup!" Bommer roared at me as he ran over. "You're going to get yourself killed! Why did you give him a place on our team, Sparky?!"

"Un-unhand me, Human!" The mega pokemon hissed and struggled to little avail. Wordlessly, Echo joined me and restrained him too.

"Looks like we got him," My uncle sighed and rubbed his temples as he and Boomer pointed their guns at him. "You can talk. Why did you attack our recon team? And us for that matter?"

"You act like I'm the aggressor!" The lucario hissed and began to glow blue, his eyes glowing the same colour and his tendrils starting to hover. I just looked on in confusion. Other things around began to hover too. "Yet your kind is responsible for defining and cursing this land! You distort existence with your accursed devices!"

"F-final Gambit!" My uncle shouted and dived back, to no avail as we all started to hover due to this lucario's aura. Even the vehicle began to float. "Fuck!"

"You humans have meddled with so much…" the lucario's nose and mouth started to bleed from an overextension of his power. "...ever since your kind fell to the planet from the skies above!"

I felt a crushing weight being exerted upon me. I gasped, struggling to even breathe at this point. This lucario was definitely strong. Even my teammates struggled in his aura grasp. The blue canine began hovering off the ground with us. Hopelessness hung over us like a thick blanket, this pokemon was too strong. I thought about Matt and Lucy for a moment, my dear brother and sister. I didn't want them to lose me. I struggled to no avail. However, before we were squeezed to death, something tackled into the lucario and knocked him down; dropping us in the process. It was the grotle from before!

The grassy turtle began angrily speaking to the lucario in his own language, motioning over to me with a vine. Was he...defending me?

"W-what…?" the lucario gasped and looked at me, reverting back to a regular lucario. With his aura power, he dragged me over to get a decent look at me. "Firmis here says so helped him after your comrades injured him...why? Why would humans ruin this forest yet help this grotle after their own race injured him…?"

"Because it's the right thing to do…" I mumbled and looked at my team: who were all regaining their composure. "Is that device the cause of this Mystery Dungeon?"

I pointed over to the Virtue device implanted in the ground.

"The curse began only after your comrades in there placed the machine down…" The lucario pointed at the vehicle while healing his shoulder. "I tried destroying it but it was too strong even for me…I thought you were here for it..."

"Oh...I'm sorry…" I gulped as I was carefully placed down, understanding what was going on "We can try turning it off for you, right, Sparky?"

Both Echo and Boomer gave me strange looks from under their masks and then looked at my uncle: the scientist among us. He looked over at the lucario, then to me.

"We can do that, I suppose, only if you tell us more about how this thing got here," Uncle Wolfe walked over to the device and started to type on its buttons. "I wasn't filled in on this Project, 0-6, as the screen suggests. A Plane of Distortion Emitter... Boomer, secure the area, Echo, question those in the vehicle. Pup, I want you to get answers from this lucario as I work on this."

"Roger," Boomer nodded and began reloading his shotgun.

"...On it." Echo nodded and approached the vehicle, leaving me sitting with the lucario.

"Uh…" I rubbed the back of my head and made myself comfortable as the lucario stared at his feet with a guilty look. "So. When did that thing get here?"

"Those humans deployed it here some days ago while chattering to their superiors over your strange devices. They set up camp here to monitor progress, I assume," He pondered and played with his paws. "I injured the leader when trying to make them go away, had to throw the projectiles he shot at me back. I feel he is still alive. But...He was the one who activated the device and was giving orders."

"I see, we'll get his side of the story, I'm sure my uncle over there outranks him and can get answers," I smiled and took my helmet off, pointing at my uncle as he worked on the device. The lucario scanned my face and looked to my uncle too. "For now uh...what was that Final Gambit power? That was really something…"

"Lucario and riolu have the strongest drive and will to live, when we know death is around the corner, we don't yield, we will do anything in our power to turn the tides of battle to our allies' favour. Should it mean dying in order to destroy our enemies or raise our friends from the brink of death," The lucario bitterly explained as the grotle snuggled up by me. "I was willing to kill myself if it meant destroying you four...my judgement was wrong, I do apologise...sincerely... I hadn't realized your intentions were purer than your comrades."

"It's alright…" I threw my arm around his shoulder and patted it, a bit uneasy about that final power of his and how genuinely large wild lucario could be. He was as tall as me! "Never yielding...reminds me of my family motto, I was told never to yield or give up in the face of death. I suppose we both have that in common."

"Whoever came up with such a message deserves respect, I suppose," The lucario mused. "But please...just turn that device off. I don't want my pups getting lost in this mad place…"

"We will. Don't worry." I assured him.

"Report," Echo hopped out of the vehicle and saluted my uncle. "Only one injury. The commander of the recon team. Knocked out but stable. Shot in the abdomen by a reflected bullet. Wearing the science team logo on his outfit. Do you know of this program, Signore Wolfe?"

"...there, it's deactivated," my uncle shook his head as the device shut down, causing the everlasting darkness beyond the mystery dungeon to disappear. Heck, I could even see our vehicle off in the distance. Immediately the forest looked livelier and healthy without this device corrupting it. He then turned to Echo and shook his head. "I'm afraid not. And that concerns me. I'm a level six researcher. I should be aware of every new bio-project...I need a word with higher ups about this. Something feels off about this. Very off. Team. Back to the vehicle. We're calling this a day."

"Maybe the corp just doesn't like you anymore, Boss…" Boomer huffed and walked by. "Knowing some of the stunts you pull, wouldn't surprise me."

I stood up and gathered my things, smiling at the lucario.

"Told you we'd turn it off," I patted his shoulder and walked away from him. "Stay safe, alright? Look after your pups for me. I'm sorry we damaged your home…"

The lucario was silent as he stared at me. He flashed an apologetic smile at me and stood on all fours, slinking away slowly. I knew that's how they were meant to be, but seeing one on all fours was just...wrong to me. Regardless, he and the grotle left together into the forest.

I thought about everything that happened today. I almost died, yet I befriended my would-be killer. The device concerned me, especially the fact that my uncle was unaware of it. Crazy things were happening and I just wanted to protect my brother and sister as much as I could…

'The Wolfe never yields, no matter what…' even when they didn't know what their foe was…?

End of chapter…