2 Weeks Later

Geralt went offline about 10 days ago. Rogue electric types were drawn to generators all around the world, drinking up the energy like a smoothie. Many died from overdosing on the energy, their bodies incapable of containing the energy they craved so much, but others grew all the stronger from it. Because of this, most major cities still don't have power today. I have a generator in my house that I've only used for basic needs, but Geralt requires a much larger power supply, which I'm afraid to use a higher output as there are plenty of hungry electric types out there that'll hone in on my house as soon as I turn it on. I had to shut Geralt down as soon as the city's main power strips went down, I can't risk it.

But about 12 days ago, Geralt finished his analysis.

Between the times of 7:40 and 8:00 pm PST, nearly 25% of the entire world's population had been a part of what the world was starting to call the Catalyst. About 25% of the world died at the same time, I imagine their bodies failed to adapt to the Catalyst. Billions dead, in minutes. Their bodies were left in the streets, piled up, dried out husks that barely resembled their past selves. Hundreds of millions more died in the fallout, as people and pokemon alike brawled in the streets, friends and family failing to recognize each other in the madness.

People from all around the world were transformed into the pokemon that I loved from those century old games.

Geralt found that like the games, the most common types were grass, water, and normal. Rock/ground types and flying types were also pretty common. The others were about even in rarity, although psychic, dark, dragon and fairy were the rarest with each below 1% of the people changed. That is, besides ghost type. Ghost types were made by people who died during those 20 minutes, and even then, it was incredibly rare for someone who died to actually turn into a ghost. Geralt watched through every security camera, phone, any recording device available through Tritech, and recorded less than 20 ghost shifted around the world.

People who shifted into these new forms called themselves the evolved. The Evos have banded together all around the world, but infighting is very common.

Now in a lot of books and movies, the minority, the people who change, are usually ostracized and persecuted by the established governing body. But this changed a quarter of the people on the Earth, elites and plebeians alike. And since people in power also got changed, there haven't been calls to round up/kill the Evos. The US Government isn't trying to draft all the Evos or control them, as a quarter of it's military just got what are essentially superpowers. They're training those Evos to be the best killers possible, and all the non Evos to be able to kill Pokemon just as well as any man. Or at least that's what I think, since the government has failed to intervene in any of the cities where Evos are rampaging all over. They've got to be preparing for something. And that's probably what I would do, in their position. Their current personnel simply aren't qualified enough to handle anything right now, especially with their small numbers from the past couple decades of "peace". Which now that I think of it, they probably are getting in more troops somehow, I'll have to see if people are randomly disappearing near military bases. Although people randomly disappearing has been very commonplace the last two weeks, as with all the power grids and cell towers down, the people you live with are the only people you can contact.

Now as far as who got turned into what, the prime factor seemed to have something to do with personalities.

Geralt found that people with criminal records were found to have a 60% correlation to turn into more aggressive types, like fire, electric, and dark. More in depth analysis showed that people with assault charges and the like were a higher 90% correlation, with other nonviolent crimes having very little correlation to typing. Which a more aggressive nature does make sense to turn into a more aggressive typing. That being said, the majority of fire, electric, and dark types weren't people with criminal records. There were just so many people that got shifted that the criminal population is a small minority.

Other typings had similar correlations, with grass and water being more carefree and steel and ice typing belonging to more rigid and cold personality types.

Geralt found serial killers to be most commonly turned into dark, fairy, and ice types. The fairy typing surprised me, and I'm much more wary about meeting any fairy types in person now.

That being said, fairy types also were inhabited by the most caring and generous people, people who volunteered and donated often. So having some of the most kind people as well as the most sadistic, I'll have to be very careful.

This is just one of hundreds of reasons why I need to go to Tritech and find out what the fuck is going on. I need to find out who and what they did to EDEN to accomplish this.

But after that first day of seeing that Machamp guarding it, I know I can't go in half assed.

Over the last two weeks I've found that I can shift into my Zygarde form at will, albeit with a lot of concentration. And in that form, I have certain forms I can feel I can will myself into, like the dog form and I imagine the others are the giant snake and humanoid form, but I haven't been able to try the latter two in the limited confines of my house. I'm still not quite sure how I made myself into the human form I did on the night of the Catalyst, but I'm trying to figure it out. Being able to shift into anything would be a boon in battle. That being said, I need to make sure not to expose the fact that I'm Zygarde in public.

Geralt did find other people being turned into Legendaries. There were multiple counts of legendary trios, with dozens of legendary Kanto birds, Johto Beasts, Regi trio, etc. But Geralt found less than a dozen of the Primordial legendaries. Legendaries with that 680 stat total from the games. Lugia, Rayquaza, Kyogre, Regigigas, etc. all had at least one Evo a piece. The fact that Geralt saw two Lugias means there was not a limit to how many there could be for each species. However, there were some species of pokemon Geralt never saw any shifted of. Pokemon like Arceus, Dialga, Palkia, Giratina, Jirachi, and Celebi were never made. I imagine their abilities were simply too complicated to replicate, even with all of EDENs capabilities. At least that's my hope. The fact that Geralt couldn't find any is good, but absence of evidence is weak evidence of absence.

And the only other known rogue primordial that wasn't immediately picked up by some government was a shiny Rayquaza. The only known mega in existence. Or at least he was the only recorded mega in existence. Giichi Matsuburi, who destroyed the entire city of San Diego the night of the catalyst, who went on to rampage and brutalized multiple other cities in southeast Asia, moving his way up to Nanning China, where they finally decided he was not a threat that could be stopped through conventional means, and dropped a 1.5 megaton nuke to try to kill him, obliterating the city in the process and killing millions. But it didn't kill him. A couple days later, Matsuburi was seen rampaging again farther north, in Novosibirsk Russia, when they dropped another nuke on him, this one 50 megatons, and put him down for good.

Giichi Matsuburi made every Government in the world terrified of the capabilities of the primordials. If I expose myself to the world, Los Angeles might just become a nuclear wasteland. I can't let that happen.

Until I find a way to openly use my powers in public, I'm stuck in my house. It is admittedly a multimillion dollar home, so I can't complain, especially with the nuclear shelter in the basement I've been using to train, but even two weeks of being stuck in isolation with nothing but a comatose baby to keep me company is rather boring. I have no idea how people did this for a whole year back during Covid.

Leo, who is probably my kid, has been randomly shifting in and out of his deoxys form, but never actually leaving the crib I put him in. I've tried feeding him, but whenever I get close he shifts into the deoxys form, which does not like having a milk bottle put into its mouth. I learned that the hard way, getting blasted through the wall the last time I tried. That's why my arm was in a sling for a couple days.

It was a good test though, to see if injuries on my human self were carried over to my Zygarde form. I had no pain when I switched, but the test was ultimately inconclusive however, as Zygarde's form is so unique that I'm not sure how such an injury would be carried over anyway. Shifting did seem to make my injuries in my human form heal faster, which is a good trick to keep in mind later.

I'm not quite sure how Leo is alive, considering he has consumed zero nutrients since he violently ejected himself from my fiance, killing her in the process. I have been training as much and as hard as I can over the last two weeks to distract myself from the fact, but the living reminder that occasionally wakes me up by wailing or obliterating something with psychic powers isn't helping. Not that I actually blame the kid, I just haven't been able to pin the blame on anybody yet as I haven't been able to investigate Tritech.

That's at the top of my priorities, but no solutions have come to mind yet.

The doorbell shook me from my musings, startling me. I have no idea who to expect, maybe the Professor? I tried contacting him in the couple days where cell towers were still active, but I got no response.

I wish my security protocols were still running, but besides the most basic ones, they all went when Geralt did. I should design a simpler program that can monitor the cameras on the house that can run with limited power. Thoughts for later.

I look through the peephole to see a very haggard looking Blue, covered in dirt with clothes that didn't fit that were torn apart, looking more like rags than real attire. His brown hair was unkempt and streaked with mud and blood.

"What the hell I thought you were in the Philippines? And why the hell didn't you answer your phone after the Catalyst? I thought you were dead!" The professor wasn't the only person I tried to contact, and he also wasn't the only person I got no response from.

Blue rushed in for a bear hug, that I returned with just as much force.

"It's been what, 5 years now?" Blue looked at me up and down. 'You've gotten skinny."

Blunt as always.

"Well I didn't have much time to work out anymore, you know, having a pivotal role in a multi-trillion dollar company, first of its kind. Not like you anyway, I bet you had all the time in the world to work out as much as you wanted, truly a paradise for you."

The rags certainly did show off Blue's massive figure. He'd certainly grown in the last couple years, and accumulated a couple scars too by the looks of it.

"Where's Green?"

My face fell. Blue seemed to pick up immediately that something was wrong, as I looked at my feet trying to find a way to explain.

He immediately wrapped me up in another hug. He gave me a knowing look. "I'm sorry Red, I really am. She was one of the best of us." I guess with the fatalities in the past two weeks accounting for nearly a third of the Earth's population, it wasn't hard to guess what happened. And fatalities were not uncommon in his line of work anyways. But explaining the specifics wouldn't be easy.

"How about I show you." Blue gave me a confused look as I brought him to one of the smaller rooms in the house, a crib sitting in the middle of it.

"This is Leo, resident superbaby and all around asshole."

"What the hell, I didn't know you had a kid!? You didn't even tell me Green was expecting!"

"Well she was three months in when the Catalyst happened, and Leo decided to tear his way into the world a little early, and Green didn't make it." My eyes remained downcast. I sighed, why did things turn out like this. At least Blue is okay. One less family member I thought was dead.

Blue had a shocked look on his face, "how the hell is this kid alive?"

"He turned into a deoxys, I think it's some adaptation thing unique to his species, but he aged himself up from a fetus to a newborn."

"So this really affected everyone?" Blue looked at me with shaking hands. "I still can't tell if these powers were a gift or a curse, I should have died." He adopted a far away gaze as he was lost in thought.

"You're an Evo? What can you shift into?" As shitty as his story probably was, my childish excitement at having a somewhat randomized chance of any pokemon still entranced me for a second. The fact that we'd become superpowered monsters was equally terrible and incredible.

His form seemingly faded into the shadows as an otherworldly creature rose out of the ground in his stead. A cerulean wispy tail whipped out, with an arrow-like head with red gouges and two glowing yellow catlike eyes that seemed to bore into my soul.

The creature zipped around the room in a blink of an eye, I barely even registered the movement before it resumed its position in the middle of the room. A second later and Blue was looking right back at me.

"Drakloak, that's pretty cool. Those things are damn fast. I could barely even see you when you circled the room."

Blue rubbed the back of his head, "yeah I can feel like I can go a lot faster too, I can finally use my perception to the best of its ability." Blue always was the fastest at sports, video games, having the best reaction times, making the optimal decision in a split second. "What about you, I can't imagine you got anything as good as a pseudo-legendary. Maybe an Alakazam? Actually I can picture you as a Metagross, with that big ass brain of yours."

I concentrated as I felt the green light coalesce around me. I'd been training to be able to immediately shift from human to one of Zygarde's forms, as his tiny nub form was rather useless. In my place stood a dog, about the size of a greyhound, with a slim form and green and black appendages streaming out, the green streamer around my neck almost looking like a scarf.

"What the fuck Seb? You got a goddamn legendary. Your kid got a goddamn legendary. What the fuck kind of pay to win bullshit is this. You must have rigged the system. Zygarde is mad broken too, can you go into his fucking Kaiju size form? What the hell, you even got one of the dragon legendaries. And here I thought my ghost/dragon pseudo was gonna blow your mind. You must have paid an arm and leg to get this shit."

I'd shifted back halfway through his rant. "Well, it did cost me everything." My mood had darkened as I remembered what room I was in.

"Shit sorry Red, we're gonna have to pay those bastards back for what they did to Sasha." Blue had a fiercer look on his face now. "Speaking of, do you know who the hell did this, why they did this, how they did it, you know, all the what the fuck is going on questions."

I realized my problem of investigating Tritech had just solved itself in the form of my subterfuge and conflict savvy superagent brother who had just gained the power to go incorporeal.

"I'm not sure, to all of the above, but I know the answers are at Tritech. The night of the Catalyst, it was the only building being defended, by a Machamp of all things. And EDEN is the only AI that I know about capable of doing something on this scale. The synthesizer had just created a living bulbasaur earlier that day, and it was a massive success. We must have caught the eye of the wrong people, but I have no idea how they would have been prepared to do something like this so fast. Besides, I still have backdoors into their servers, and I've been accessing all the information they've been getting, like if certain Evos can speak and botched evolutions."

"Could it have been someone at Tritech then? They were the only people who really knew about the technology beforehand."

My mind raced as I thought about everyone it could be. Tristan? No he isn't ambitious enough or smart enough to do something on this scale. The Lieutenant? I did give him access to EDEN the day of, but he had an excellent track record. He's even the son of one of the founding fathers. Plus Green loved him, and I trust her judge of character. But there'd also been lab hands in the room, who had come from a different company that we'd just absorbed. That'd probably be the best place to start looking.

"Well Blue, you look and smell like shit, how about you clean yourself up and we'll make a plan."

Blue laughed, "man I haven't had a good shower in weeks, say less."