"Alert! This is not a drill. All battle-ready agents report to repel intruders."

Dr. Oscar Vant had spent years within these walls. Sometimes he would not see the sun for months at a time.

After completing his post-doctoral work, he was able to land a tenure-track professorship at Viridian city university. He was in his mid-thirties at the time, haven taken many years to travel the nations of the world, but he never felt the need to rush. A little old for a new Professor, but the experience with the various Pokémon of the world and the acquaintances he made along the way made his entry into academia smoother than many of his peers, who could not land such an attractive position.

With the startup grant gifted to him by the university, his started his research in earnest. He had a couple of years to establish a presence in his field and make curricula for the courses he would be teaching, and he was eager to make the most of it. Advances in Pokémon-related technologies were incredible, from instant healing to matter-manipulation, but it occurred to Oscar that advances in human-related technologies were comparably lacking. People could not teleport across continents, without the aid of Pokémon. They could not instantly or quickly heal from grievous injury, without the aid of Pokémon. Life expectancy had stopped climbing almost a century ago, stabilizing at around 120. Unless, of course, you had the right Pokémon to extend it.

This left, in Oscar's mind, an empty niche to fill in the research community. There was enough work being done on Pokémon, more needed to be done on humans. Of course, there was a reason this niche was empty; there was no money in the field. It seemed counterintuitive to him, didn't people want to live longer, travel faster, be stronger? Maybe one day have powers of their own? All humans were psychic after all, even if millions of years of evolution since splitting from Pokémon had watered down the trait to almost nothing for the majority of the population. In his travels he learned that people were, by and large, content with the state of things. A vexing and alien concept to Oscar, and one he had to work around if he wanted to get any money for his research.

He couldn't just say in his pitch to the university that "I want to make humans live longer, teleport across the world and have magic powers like Pokémon" because he found long ago he would be met with glassy eyes followed by dismissive laughter. Idiots. So instead he took a page from Dr. Oak's playbook and pitched that he could make Pokémon live longer, make it easier for trainers to travel with their Pokémon and "ethically" enhance the power of Pokémon vis-a-via their trainers. Much like mega evolution, but much more available, and much safer, he assured them. The years of travelling and practicing his pitch on people paid their dues here, because the university ate it up.

In the early days, Oscar found a great deal of difficulty with his work on extending human longevity due to a lack of test subjects. It turns out, while people were perfectly willing to eat Pokémon, they got squeamish when it came to experimenting on them. Many Pokémon had bizarre gene-altering abilities that could in theory be applied to humans, and many Pokémon had unnaturally long lives compared to others in their egg-group. It should have been a simple matter of editing the genes of short-lived Pokémon to match the long lived ones, and then monitor how it turned out. Some wild mutants of Furret lived only a year or two, and would have been perfect candidates for this kind of experimentation. But it was "unethical" according to his peers.

"Alert! This is not a drill. All battle-ready agents report to repel intruders."

Dr. Oscar Vant had spent years within these walls. He loved his time away from the sun, even as he found it exhausting.

Despite the limitations put on him by the research community, he was able to make some respectable progress with tissue-work and more than a few simulations. He never made the progress he wanted, and his papers were not the most cited in his field, but he was able to squeak by. While he grew more disillusioned with his research, he found the teaching to be the bright spot of his time at VCU. Most of the kids (technically adults, but their behavior said otherwise) were pretty useless, but he enjoyed giving extra attention to the one or two bright ones he had every semester. Still, he felt himself falling into a rut. He was nearly 40 at this point, still far from an old man but not having the accomplishments he really wanted out of life by this point. Most people would say he should have been content with a tenure-track professorship at a prestigious university, but most people are idiots. Oscar was convinced of this.

He had contemplated more than once simply quitting and starting his own lab. There was plenty of money to be made in offering gene-therapy for breeders or wealthy citizens to fund research, but there was still the matter of the laws preventing him from doing anything unethical. From doing anything meaningful, really.

It was around this time that Oscar met someone who would set him on the path to truly groundbreaking research, someone unconcerned with the petty, inconsistent morals of society. The leader of the Viridian city gym, Giovanni.

He met the Gym leader and entrepreneur through a mutual acquaintance; a young trainer sponsored by Giovanny who was taking one of Oscar's upper division courses through a trainer-certification program during the off season. It was at the Viridian city fall Gala, where Oscar would frequently schmooze to find private backers for his research under the universities nose. Giovanni was polite but intense, and commanded attention in the room. While Oscar almost never spoke about the real goals behind his research to people, he found himself more willing than normal to open up around Giovanni. He was very charismatic.

Giovanni seemed interested in his research, his real research. As well he should be! Oscar recognized a man who wanted power, in all its formed, and respected the drive. That drive was what set men apart from mon in the first place, and it was refreshing for him to see some humans still had that desire. While they were speaking, he got the feeling that Giovanni was scouting him, testing his knowledge and morals to see if he was a good fit for… whatever the gym leader would need a biologist for. His suspicions were confirmed when the Gym leader, a powerful political figure in society, offered a place on his next yachting trip when the spring came. Oscar politely accepted, and the two exchanged information and parted ways for the rest of the evening.

They would not speak again until the trip some five months later. He was ushered aboard a gorgeous 30 meter long yacht, and by the afternoon they had set off to a private island for a weekend getaway. It was a glamorous as the videos of such things made it out to be. There was partying, women and drugs aplenty, although Oscar did not partake in the latter since his youth. It was on the island that the true nature of the trip became apparent. There were always clues around Giovanni, hints into the deeper reality behind the man. Scarred veterans as guards, who on polite questioning revealed they were once part of government special forces, even though they were far from retirement age. Police chiefs and city councilmen, and more than a few tax collectors. It was very obvious to Oscar that Giovanni was into some shady shit, and that the trip was a recruitment drive. Giovanni would grace each of his guests, of which there were about 50 not counting staff, and ask them if there was anything he could do for them.

There was no strong-arming here. You did not operate as a crime lord at the highest levels of society by instilling mortal fear in everyone you met. That kind of thing was something earned, not carelessly given. No, this was more like a game. Giovanni showed his hand, and left it up to his guests to decide if they wanted to go in deeper or not. Oscar was happy to play. So when Giovanni finally came up to him to ask if there was anything he could, Oscar could only respond with "Well, now that you mention it…"

"Alert! This is not a drill. All battle-ready agents report to repel intruders."

Dr. Oscar Vant had spent years within these walls. And he had done more in ten years here than 40 in proper society.

Things had moved quickly after accepting Giovanni's offer. He quit his position at VCU, and took a couple of his best graduate students with him. Giovanni, as it turned out, was the leader of the notorious terrorist organization Team Rocket. Oscar didn't care, what mattered to him was the money and freedom to pursue his research. Giovanni offered both, and within a decade he had perfected a human version of gene therapy that could add decades of youthful vigor to man. No true biological immortality, but the procedure could in theory be repeated indefinitely. The path to this discovery was littered with many, many dead Pokémon. But Oscar knew that the ends justified the means, and Giovanni did as well.

The same technology used to extend human life could also be used to enhance Pokémon, with some modification. This was in truth the first thing Giovanni had tasked Oscar to do, with assurances that if successful he could spend as much time as he needed to pursue life-extension technology. The Pokémon could be enhanced as much or as little as desired, with more extreme modification like type-swapping or hybridization leaving very powerful but mentally unstable and short-lived Pokémon. Team Rocket would use these creatures sparingly, as they were not subtle, and were more often than not let loose as diversions for a larger operation. More subtle enhancements like a more focused less 'destroy the entire building' hyper beam, or resistances to type-disadvantages were more common. They did not make the Pokémon unstable or shorten their lives, and despite the public's perception most Rocket members did care for their personal Pokémon, and did not want to subject them to extreme mutation if it could be avoided. This was reserved for the stolen or poached Pokémon, who no one had emotional attachment to.

He now found himself working on teleportation technology with Dr. Samuel Kass, a physicist from Sinnoh and literal genius. Oscar, being a biologist, was not privy to the inner workings of the technology but was instead responsible for observing the effects on creatures teleported in this way. He would work with Samuel to propose changes to make the process less… horrifyingly disfiguring for anything unfortunate enough to be put through at this phase. Insides were not called outsides for a reason. They had a potential breakthrough in the form of an 'artifact' attributed to the mystical Pokémon Palkia. It indeed did seem to have space-warping abilities when exposed to Aura, and while they ultimately hoped to recreate this effect artificially, for now they simply wanted to see if they could get the teleportation working without killing the victim first. It was after installing the final upgrades to the machine, a sort of taurus-shaped fusion reactor with Aura converters and focusing lasers directed towards a platform in the center, that the klaxons began to blare.

"Alert! This is not a drill. All battle-ready agents report to repel intruders."

Dr. Oscar Vant had spent years within these walls. And now some punk-ass kids were going to screw everything up.

He had no idea how this facility was found. He had convinced Giovanni years ago to cease stealing or other outward-focused criminal activity from this location. Its value, he argued, was as a research center and could not readily be rebuilt if discovered. Better to not draw any attention if it could be avoided. And yet, a trainer challenger and one of the Elite Four, backed by dozens of police, were currently raiding his home. The grunts and their augmented Pokémon were putting on a good show, trashing the police and holding their own against the trainers, but they were losing the battle of attrition. This was not a heavily guarded compound, its first and best defense was secrecy.

Samuel was frantically trying to get the teleporter online, and Oscar was helping him. Oscar had no expectation that the machine was ready for human trials, but Samuel was convinced the latest modifications would work and that they could escape this place. When asked where they would end up, Samuel said nothing. Oscar decided he would take his chances with the police, but would help in the meantime. When he got out, he would need to pick up the research and fill in Samuel's replacement. It was not like he could help in the defense of the installation in the first place. His partner, a female Treecko named Gaia, was more of a personal companion than a battler. While Oscar made sure to give her the best enhancements possible, there was only so much you could do without adverse effects, and he wanted to avoid that. She was stronger, faster, more intelligent and more durable than most of her species, but not by factors. She was genetic elite, but not more. The only thing he could give her that no other Treecko had was a resistance to fire. Not an immunity, but it mostly negated the type disadvantage. Mostly.

Instead the eight-year-old Gaia helped him move and check equipment, and prepare the machine for operation.

Do you think it will work? She asked in her mind.

Not a chance. But I am not the expert, let us see where this goes. Oscar responded. All humans are psychic, and it does not take much to awaken that ability. Even being a weak psychic gives incredible advantages, but the people didn't want it. Idiots.

What are we going to do? Gaia asked, fear and indecision was creeping into her.

Let Samuel kill himself, and let ourselves get arrested. It may take a decade, but Giovanni will get us out of prison. It always goes down like this. It paid to have friends in high places. So long as he didn't rat Giovanni out, Oscar was sure he would be out of prison in a few years at most. What he was not sure of is how things would go down when the fight made its way to the teleporter room. Battles were notoriously volatile and unpredictable. He didn't like the uncertainty.

He did not have long to wait to find out. The doors to the teleporter room were blown off and a teenage boy entered with his Pokémon and two companions. Oscar did not pay the others any note, as he recognized the boy as the threat he was.

Ash.

The little shit had been a pain in Giovanni's ass for years now, and by extension a pain in Oscar's ass. The child was dumb as rocks and had a god-complex like no one's business. Carried himself around as a regular chosen one, from what he heard.

Maybe he is a chosen one? I heard he talked to multiple legendaries and even has Aura powers! The Pokémon grapevine in the base had clearly gone unpruned for too long.

Not you too, Gaia. Just focus on not doing anything rash. These types always talk first. Oscar refocused the Treecko. While old for still being a Treecko, she was young in absolute terms and needed to be guided at times.

Ash had a Bayleef, a goddamn Charizard and his freakishly strong mutant Pikachu with him. His two companions had left the room soon after entering, seemingly responding to commotion in the hallway. Oscar had not seen what Pokémon they had with them, but what Ash had would be enough to subdue the two researchers and Treecko in the room.

"Where is it you creeps!" Ash yelled, his two larger Pokémon flanking him and the Pikachu dropping off his shoulder to ground by his feet, all of them taking aggressive stances.

Do not do a goddamn thing, Gaia. Stay calm.

"Small-minded fools, do you have any idea what you are doing? The work you are interrupting?" Samuel yelled back.

Here we go. Absolute genius, no idea how to read the room.

"The space stone, I know it's here. You crooks have no idea what you stole this time. Give it back or you are in for a world of hurt!"

Ah, that is how they found us. Dumb luck, makes sense. This situation should be easy enough to deescalate, all he had to do was offer to remove the stone from the machine and they will all walk out alive, maybe even with a note for good behavior at the hearing. The boy seemed naïve.

"Of course, let me-"

"No! I would let you disrupt my work, foolish boy!" Samuel interrupted Oscar, the physicist practically frothing at the mouth. He remotely triggered the activation sequence for the teleporter. With them all in the room. Without any of them standing in the proper position. Without any of the new safety procedures properly in place. It would take about 30 seconds to power up and fire, but with the boy blocking the door and the insane physicist screaming, Oscar was not sure he could communicate how absolutely fucked they were if they did not leave poste-haste. He never got the chance to try.

Samuel, mid ramble, pulled out a pistol and shot Ash in the stomach.

Firearms really were not very common. It was a cultural thing, where most people all around the world would rather have Pokémon do the fighting and dying, with humans standing off to the side. Guns were taboo even for criminal organizations, as they would escalate any situation to deadly force aimed at humans, and few people wanted that. Better to let the beasts die, that was perfectly ethical.

Things fell apart pretty quickly after Ash got shot. The first thing that happened was the Bayleef went apeshit. It fired the largest razor leaf Oscar had ever seen, and it just about tore Samuel to ribbons. Leaves embedded into the machinery, cutting exposed wires and denting metal, distorting or disrupting the paths of the finely-tuned lasers. Sparks flew, and the machine made the most ungodly screech-hum Oscar ever had the displeasure of hearing. He grabbed Gaia and made a run for the door, but the hateful gaze of the Charizard stopped him cold. Oscar could vaguely see the rampaging Bayleef out of the corner of his eye, or the Pikachu cradling its screaming trainer's head. His attention was on the Charizard, its mouth opening, fire building. He held Gaia tighter and tried to move, to dodge, but it was too late. The fire was let loose, and the next thing Oscar knew, was the sound of leaves rustling in the gentle wind.