Chapter 9: A Knock on the Head

Once Dustin and Poochyena woke up the next morning, they got to work looking for Shari. Despite each building in Miner's Village looking nearly identical due to being constructed from the same basic stonework, the fact that it was much smaller than Nebulane made getting directions much easier. The two managed to locate Cutiefly's house where Shari was staying. They knocked on the door and were ushered in by Cutiefly.

"Hi, hey! How can I help you two out?" she asked.

"We're here because we heard about Shari. We would like to talk to her if you're willing to let us!" Poochyena answered.

"Oh, well…" Cutiefly ushered the two into a small, quaint living room. It was astonishingly pink with a plush carpet and cushions. A Mienfoo was laid out carefully across two cushions, a bandage around her arm and a wet towel on her head. "See, she's been like this off and on for the past few days. She'll wake up, mumble some, and then pass right back out. Most I've gotten from her is probably what you already know. No memories, only knows her name."

Dustin stepped up. "I'm Dustin. I'm in the same position that she is. I woke up on the side of the road with nothing but my name and this crystal," he said, pointing to the crystal that had been fashioned into a necklace around his neck. "This crystal seems to help me stay conscious and even remember things, maybe it can help her?"

"Well, it's not very scientific, but I guess anything is worth a shot."

Cutiefly moved to the side as Dustin knelt down and touched the crystal to Shari. She shuddered when it made contact, and began thrashing violently. The crystal never glowed in response to her, and prolonged contact only seemed to make the thrashing more violent. Dustin quickly removed the crystal from her and stepped back.

"No luck there. Seems her case is a bit different, huh?" Poochyena said, disappointed.

"How did you find her?" Dustin asked, turning towards Cutiefly.

"Well, I fished her out of the river actually. There's a river that runs near the edge of town, you see. I head there all the time to gather fresh water for the hospital in town- I work there, actually. Anyway I was on a water run when I saw her floating downstream, so I grabbed a branch and directed her towards shore and assessed her condition."

"What did you learn from that? Anything?" Dustin asked.

"Nothing really. No immediate signs of trauma aside from a gash on her arm that could've come from anything. She was floating face-up too, which means there was no need for CPR or the like. She's just...kinda gone. There's no other way to explain it."

Dustin sat and thought for a minute before pulling the team map out. He identified Miner's Village and looked back to Cutiefly.

"This river, where does it flow from?"

"Uh...I think it flows from the mountains? I think there's a cave up the hill a little ways that it comes out of.'

"We can start there, then," Dustin said, turning to Poochyena. "We should check out that cave, see where the river's source is."

"Oh! Because Shari probably came from there!"

"...Yeah I was implying that," Dustin shook his head.

"If it's ok," Cutiefly said in a small voice, "I'd like to come along. I can leave Shari for observation at the hospital in case anything happens. I want to help her out however I can!"

"Sure!" Poochyena grinned and wagged her tail, "Extra help is always appreciated!"

Dustin nodded and the three began their preparations. Cutiefly and Poochyena worked together to move Shari to the hospital for observation while Dustin prepped the supplies. When they returned, the three headed off towards the river together and followed the current upstream into the mountains. Eventually they arrived at the cave entrance Cutiefly had mentioned prior.

"Any surprises we should be ready for?" Dustin asked as they waded into the river to access the cave entrance. The water was cold; an extremely unpleasant feeling on Dustin's feet.

"Not that I know of. The cave isn't very well mapped since no one found anything worth mining out of it, so we don't really know what's in it past a little ways. We know it isn't a dungeon at least," Cutiefly replied, flitting over the water.

"Well that's a good enough start!" Poochyena smiled, unbothered by the water. "Makes it easier to find the river source!"

Once the team entered the cave, Dustin immediately leapt to the shoreline and shook himself off. The cave was utterly unremarkable inside. It appeared to be largely composed of limestone and other sedimentary rocks with no notable rock formations or similar landmarks. It didn't even have any sort of strange new chambers that he could notice at a cursory glance, aside from wherever the river flowed off to the entire cave was largely just one big chamber.

It was utterly uninteresting, until something about the walls caught Dustin's eyes and something began to make more sense in his mind. He rubbed a hand down the surface of the cave wall nearby, noticing how incredibly smooth to the touch it was.

"What's up, Dustin? I can see that mind of yours working overtime," Poochyena said, walking to Dustin's side.

"Notice how there's no cave formations in here?"

"Huh? Not really, why?"

"There should be. A cave with a water source like this should have some kind of rock formations or at least some sign of water carving," he stated, fingers tracing down the walls.

"Wow," Poochyena replied, dumbfounded. "You're really smart. How'd you even know that?"

Dustin straightened up for a moment. How DID he know that? He couldn't remember anything, but suddenly seemed to know everything he needed to about caves? He couldn't even point to any specific stimulus that suddenly gave him that info, once he had stepped in it was like he knew all he needed to.

"I...I don't know. Maybe it's a memory coming back. We can't focus on that yet though, look at the walls," Dustin said, pointing to the wall he had been analyzing. "They're completely smooth. Like they were carved out with tools."

"Oh! I think I know this one!" Cutiefly said. "When we mine stuff out of the caves down in the village, the Drilbur and other workers carve them out with either claws or mining tools. The walls tend to be pretty smooth! Though…" she looked closer at the walls, "Down in the village, the walls tend to have this...scooped out look. They aren't this even overall."

"Exactly," Dustin said. "Something's weird. I don't think this cave is completely natural. There's a tunnel that the river seems to flow from over there, we should follow it and see where it goes."

Following Dustin's lead, the trio of Pokemon headed off in the direction of the river. The river snaked down...or rather up an almost perfectly circular tube of stone. Along the path upwards, the stone changed into a metallic surface of some kind, leading to Poochyena slipping and nearly falling back to the base of the path before she was caught by Dustin and Cutiefly. Despite the minor setback, they managed to climb to the top where the incline evened back out into a flat surface. This was a new chamber, and one that caught everyone by surprise.

The ground, once simply stone and metal, appeared to transition into some kind of tile floor- smooth and cool to the touch. The walls were still the evenly carved stone from before, but the ceiling above was a cross section of wires and tubing. This also appeared to be one room of many, with some walls being constructed out of a material not unlike aggregate stone with built in windows and doorways.

"Wow! This is really weird!" Poochyena said, tip toeing across the tile floor. "It looks almost like an...office building! Like the fancy kinds big cities have! But the stuff it's made of is different. There's no wood! And this rock looks like rock, but different! And the smells-"

She continued on, talking to no one in particular as Dustin and Cutiefly investigated.

"Some of this stuff reminds me of the hospital," Cutiefly said. "Some of the wires and stuff are like what we use to channel electricity from a Pokemon into another to restart a heart or something. These wires though...there's no real source for them. And there's like...orbs in the ceiling?"

She pointed up. Sure enough, there were what appeared to be orbs of glass surrounded by a cage of metal connecting to the wires and bolted into the ceiling of the cave.

"Hey Dustin!" Poochyena shouted, "You're the cave expert, right? What's this about?"

"I don't know," Dustin said, "But it feels….familiar in a way."

He traced the river to the stopping point. A grate of rusted metal that seemed to have corroded away at some point. The hole wasn't large, but it was large enough for a small Pokemon to fit through.

"...I think somehow Shari came out of that?" Dustin said, not entirely convinced by his own words. "I don't know honestly, but it makes sense. Maybe we should head into the next room and see if we can find the source. I don't want to crawl into another dark hole."

The others nodded and pushed through the large, metal door separating the rooms. The next room was much smaller than the one the group had entered through, and appeared to be in a state of decay. Where there were once desks, chairs, and some kind of odd boxes filled with wire and a single glass side, there was now mold, fungus, and general water damage. The entire room reeked of mildew. The boxes caught Dustin's interest, and he moved in to inspect them further. They were hard, like a rock. They weren't rocks, however. When he touched the side with glass in it, he could feel a slight static shock as if the thing had ambient electricity within it. Shaking it off, he turned back to his team and continued into the next room.

The next room opened back up once more, with a long open center area with tables and large tubes lining the walls. The tables were scattered with papers and odd writing utensils. Poochyena propped her paws on one in an attempt to read whatever was written while Dustin inspected the tubes. The lack of lighting made it difficult to see whatever was contained inside, but they were large. Large enough to hold a Pokemon several times his size. One appeared to be smashed open, and he took a chance to peer within it. There was a hole in the bottom, one that dumped into the water below.

"...Nope, I can't make any sense of this at all," Poochyena said, looking at the papers with frustration. "There are words of some kind here but I can't read any of it."

"Let me try," Cutiefly said, flying over to her side and examining the papers. She too, was left stumped. Dustin wasn't certain it would do any good at this point, but he figured he'd give reading them a shot as well. He walked over and took the papers in hand. To his surprise, he could understand what was written.

"Report: Subject 2341 is showcasing minor irregularities, but the experiment is overall proving a success. The fail safes have been properly installed, dumping subjects into the water stream below for disposal if there are any system failures within the incubation tubes."

He stopped there. The rest of the document was too water damaged to make out.

"Huh?" Poochyena asked, cocking her head to the side. "What does any of that mean? And how come you can read it?"

"I...don't know," Dustin said, placing the paper back on the table. "I don't know what it means and I don't know how I can read it. I don't know how I suddenly knew about caves, and I don't know why this place feels familiar. The whole thing is weirding me out, it's like a memory but I don't feel like it's mine at all."

He clutched his head and doubled over. Poochyena and Cutiefly rushed to his side and helped him sit. Dustin began sobbing, overwhelmed by a sadness he didn't understand. He looked up to Poochyena.

"Something bad happened here. Something really bad," he sputtered between sobs. He attempted to rise to his feet, but banged his head onto something metal. It gave way and rose as he stood, and suddenly the room was awash with a cold, uncaring light. The glass orbs in the ceiling were shining a sterile, white light down on the room. Turning around, Dustin noticed that he had banged his head against a large switch of some kind.

"D-Dustin…" Poochyena whimpered, "L-look…"

The tubes around the room had become illuminated, revealing the contents. Pokemon, all of various sizes and shapes, floated within them in some kind of stasis. Some were completely normal members of their species. Others, however, displayed odd traits from different colors to extra eyes and limbs. Even further down, the tubes contained Pokemon completely unrecognizable as whatever original species they might have been. Despite all of them appearing to be peacefully asleep, Dustin could almost feel their eyes on him. As he looked at each one in horror, he could almost hear a silent voice crying to him for help.

"We should really be getting out of here," Cutiefly said. "I don't like the vibe this place gives off. We shouldn't be here."

"Agreed, let's just…" Poochyena grunted, trying to open the door that they had come in through. "...It's locked. We're locked in!"

"No, we're not!" Cutiefly said, fear creeping into her voice. "There's another door down there, we can just take that way out."

"But we came in this way!" Poochyena shouted. "That door will only lead us deeper into this weird place!"

"We don't have a choice. It's that, or…"

"We hop in one of the tubes," Dustin stated, the overwhelming sadness finally leaving him. "The broken tube has a hole in the bottom. We can slip through there and swim out, it drops into the river."

"Well, it's an option," Cutiefly shrugged. "Let's go."

Dustin helped Poochyena and Cutiefly through before he hopped down the hole behind them. Before he dropped down, however, he took note of a nameplate on the bottom of the tube.

'Specimen 2341: Shari'

He shuddered as he hit the frigid waters below. As the three followed the river back down the cave, Dustin couldn't help but feel as if a set of eyes were watching him from above. Eyes that felt displeased that he existed. To compound his unease further, the three were thrown off their feet and sent sliding down the metal tube into the main cave chamber as the ground began to shudder and tremble beneath them. Dustin and Poochyena landed in a haphazard pile at the bottom.

Cutiefly, seemingly not wanting to be left out, gently landed atop. She leapt off as Dustin and Poochyena rose back to their feet.

"Urgh…" Poochyena groaned, "What was that?"

"An earthquake?" Cutiefly asked to no one in particular. "That's not possible though, there's no active fault lines here. If there was an earthquake….oh no. Oh no no no no!"

She shouted as she began speeding towards the cave exit. Dustin and Poochyena dashed behind her, struggling to keep up.

"What's wrong?!" Poochyena shouted after the panicked Cutiefly.

"The mines! A quake like that can only mean one thing- there's been a cave-in!"