End of a Reality
by Blue9Tiger and DarkMutatedBrock
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an-thro-po-cen-tric (an'thre pô'sen'trik) adj. [see ANTHROPO--] centering one's view of everything around man, or humans
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Chapter 6: Fall of a Ceasar
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Again, Ivy was waiting, leaning against the wall just outside the door. She smiled just as she had when Giovanni and the guards brought Gemini. The only difference was.... there was only Giovanni.
".....Good."
She gave him a strange smile. "I'm glad you followed through."
He was silent. Somehow, the fact that he was alone disturbed him. Usually it didn't. It sufficed that he was alone. But it was almost as if Ivy did not want...any witnesses. If only Gemini hadn't knocked out his personal guards.... Yet, what was the worst that could happen? She had promised him a Pokémon. It was 11:00. The time was now.
"Well, come in!" The witch smiled as she interrupted his thoughts, opening the door. She walked through, calling back towards him. "You won't be disappointed, I'm sure!!! With this Pokémon...... you will have more power than you ever imagined."
What was this..false sense of security she was attempting to lead him into? Whatever it was, it did not fool him this time, and he was very wary as he stepped into the horrifying laboratory once again, his eyes narrowing as they darted around its dark, musty interior.
"Where is it?"
Ivy was behind the table.... the table that Brock had been strapped down to earlier. She was sharpening some sort of instrument, and turned her head back towards Giovanni, frowning. "You don't see it?"
"No, I don't. Something with that much power should be at least VISIBLE..." Giovanni said in some disappointment, overrun by rising fear, as his eyes continued to shift about the insufficiently-lighted room. His ears caught the sound of something scraping, but wasn't able to see what it was that Ivy was toying with.
"Hm......" The scientist sighed in a strange sort of exasperation. "Men...... so..... unobservant." She paused, and said into the air. "The specimen will most definitely try to escape.... Computer. Seal off all exits..... activate automatic soundproof panes."
Escape? There is no one here but her and myself.....
The disconcerting sound of an airlock closing behind Giovanni was suddenly heard.
"Oh, yes....." Ivy called back once more, as she went on to her other instruments. "And about the creature?"
Silence.
"Just look down."
Giovanni's flow of aggravated thoughts was cut off by Ivy's intimidating voice. His eyes widened in incredulous disbelief as he heard those three words. "Look down? At what?"
He did so, and as there was nothing to see on the FLOOR, she probably meant---him--self.....but it couldn't be. His head snapped back up and his dark eyes shot an angered glare at the other. "Enough of this foolishness! Where is the--------"
Then he saw Ivy's smile. So full of mockery and ill-feeling, and only then.... it hit him like a hundred bullets shot into his heart: HE WAS THE CREATURE. That would explain the blood... that would explain the condescending stare that Ivy always regarded him with.... but no, not the blood. A memory struggled to enter his mind. He saw an infant: an infant bleeding. An infant bleeding black. The memory was gone. He stared at Ivy in pure shock and disbelief...and then it rose rapidly into rage.
"You... were PLAYING ME for a FOOL this WHOLE TIME!!!"
"A fool? No, no, no....." She turned around, arching an eyebrow. "I never lied, did I?" She had a cloth in her hands, with which she was cleaning a small scalpel. "I never actually said anything untrue, did I?" She paused.
"Did I, Zero-X?"
"No......you didn't..." the other answered, ashamed that he could even FALL for such underhanded deception, him being a good utilizer of it himself.
That name...or was it a number?
"Is...that....my...real..name?"
His anger fled, it being replaced with the escalating fear, that was making his black blood run cold within him.
She continued to clean her instrument, and looked down at the scalpel as she wiped it. "You seem to be accepting this rather quickly, Zero-X..... Or perhaps it's just the preparatory chemicals that I've been administering during your sleep..... In any case, Zero-X, you seem to be acting quite unlike Giovanni."
"During.... my SLEEP? While I recuperate.....you....turn me..into a monster??" He clenched both of his fists, the knuckles whitening. There was no way that he could accept this so easily. He posessed too much pride to submit so quickly and completely. "NO! I am HUMAN! I am the LEADER of TEAM ROCKET and the VIRIDIAN CITY GYM!!! I CANNOT be the MONSTER that you speak of!!!!"
"I thought you would say something like that," Ivy continued to drawl calmly. "Feel the back of your neck. The part that's hidden by your collar."
Fearing immensely what kind of surface his fingers would touch at the indicated part, Giovanni shakily raised his fleshy hand towards the back of his neck, and immediately pulled it away as he yelled in terror. "What are these... dry..... leathery... they feel..... METALLIC.....?"
He felt again, pressing down the cold skin that did not give way to his touch. "Scales....... I have.... SCALES!?! But it is..... no! It CANNOT be true!!"
Yet the hardened scales told him otherwise.
"I'm afraid you do, Giovanni. I'm surprised you didn't notice earlier how much Zero-X seems to shine through you.... Not just physically. Oh, no. It seems as if you've been carrying him around... since.... Oh, since early childhood, I should think. And.... if you don't believe me..... I believe the biological timer that I set in you is going off. Of course, a syringe is needed for the FULL change to occur, but just so I can make my point......" She turned back towards her instrument. "Go ahead and look in the mirror behind you. It'd be a good way for you to deflate your ego. The change will speed up by a hundred when I administer the serum."
The aforementioned gym leader hesitated, not wanting to know what kind of horrid sight he would see. Steeling himself for the shock, he turned around, his eyes meeting the... vermillion eyes...... in the mirror behind him. He turned away.
"What..... IS this?!!"
Giovanni turned back to the mirror, and beheld lengthening, widening fangs that were irregular in size, lining the whole of his mouth. His eyes widened in complete horror as he covered them, as if the sight had burned his retinas, only to see that the scales were crawling up his HANDS, and at the ends of his fingers, nails were sharpening into CLAWS. This..... all of this had to be..... IMPOSSIBLE..... it HAD to be a nightmare..... It could happen.... to a worthless YOUTH, of course.... but.... but HIM?!?!? GIOVANNI DEMONI?!?!? LEADER OF TEAM ROCKET..... No.... it was NOT possible.... this was not........ not........... SUPPOSED TO HAPPEN.....
Afraid to see what else was WRONG about his physical features, he turned away from the mirror again, grasping his head..... Jesus.... Christ........ his HEAD. All of his dark brown hair had disappeared, leaving only the rough, coarse scales..... that were the simultaneously pure and impure color of his blood. Unbelievably, unconceivably, that was not the worst of it. He looked down behind him, only to see a muscular..... TAIL...... grow from his flank, that was beginning to be swallowed up with scales as well. This... combined with the fact that it was completely UNSTOPPABLE.... and would only become worse, sent him lunging backwards into the edge of the dreaded table, giving out a terrified yell of one who thought they were "wrongfully" damned.
Ivy only smiled. She didn't even look behind her, as she heard the perturbing sounds of clothes ripping and flesh growing, "Computer.... administer the automatic restraints."
Almost immediately, six metallic.... ARMS jerked out of the low ceiling just above the table, grabbing Giovanni by his now-scaled arms and legs, and practically throwing him down onto the cold surface. Bands of metal then seemed to lunge out of the table itself, wrapping themselves over the "man" as he struggled in futility. If only... if only that damned GEMINI hadn't knocked out his GUARDS.....
Escape was impossible.
This was a NIGHTMARE.....with no way out. A living, true nightmare. He was trapped...... trapped by the metallic straps, constricting his every movement. He couldn't even BREATHE without difficulty: the bands were wrapped so tightly against his now-scaled chest, below which the lungs were being pressed upon without mercy. He vaguely noted that his body was growing... gradually changing in size and shape, the flesh ripping through his shirt, snapping through his tie, and eventually tearing through his pants and shoes, until he was lying there so unconventionally stripped of his clothes, exposed and vulnerable, and, as Gemini had been so recently before, at the mercy of IVY.
"Not so cocky now, are you, Zero-X?" Satan in woman-form asked, waltzing over towards the table. She leered down over him, grinning. In her hand was the syringe. "Just think.... the moment that I plunge this SYRINGE into your INHUMAN, SCALED and utterly REPULSIVE arm....." She smiled again. "You will be MINE. Under my complete control....... much like Gemini is now." She predicted what his response to that would be. "Oh, yes. Gemini is indeed under MY control. Your control will only last for.... oh, a half-hour more. And besides..." She grinned.
"Pokémon can't train Pokémon."
THAT hit him like brass knuckles in the eye, fast and furious, and he was wholly devastated. The fact that all of his ambitions were rapidly heading for the drain, that Gemini would no longer be obedient to him, and.....worst of all, that HE would be SUBORDINATE to Professor IVY.
"NO!! You cannot DORRGGGGGGRRRRGGARGHHH this!!!!"
He was absolutely horrified when he heard that.... inhuman..... monstrous....... roar come from..... HIM. It was a deadly blow to his pride.
"What?" Ivy mocked him, putting a hand to her ear. "I didn't quite catch that, darling----could you growl it again?" She was enjoying all of it. Little did Giovanni know that her goals were not entirely directed by a lust for power and sadistic pleasure. There was a grudge she held, a distinct grudge....
The transformation staggered, and all he could feel was a piercing pain that racked through his slowly deforming body. The man...... that was now half-monster, shut his fearsome eyes and his vile mouth, not wanting to let Ivy derive even MORE pleasure from his horrible, horrible pain that affected both mind and body. But, almost as an instinct, he growled again at the mockery, this time with no words to distinguish it as even remotely human, but an unnatural, abnormal cry much lower in pitch..
"GRRRAAHHHGGGRRRGGH!!!"
"Couldn't help that, could you? Ivy grinned, grabbing his chin with her thumb and forefinger. "Awwwww, poor Giovanni..... If only your MOTHER could see you now....... The LEADER OF TEAM ROCKET...... a FREAK."
Was that..... bitterness in her voice? It wouldn't be surprising. The pleasure she was getting out of the whole thing...... it was sickening.
"She leaned forward, closer to Giovanni's deforming features. "Yes.... GIOVANNI DEMONI..... son of the PRESTIGIOUS GLORIA DEMONI..... The only son, the only heir.... Hah-haaa...."
She smiled again, leaning yet closer, until she was but an inch from the his nose, the scales, the fangs. "And of course, a father never remembered......"
"STOP.....THISRGGGRRRHHHH....." the "man" growled, with each passing second the horrifying sound becoming wilder, more animal, the humanity slowly leaving the syllables of his words. His eyes widened as the hateful woman rubbed it in so thoroughly, about everything, as if she was pouring salt over a fresh wound. All this...reminding him that he was SUPPOSED to be the successor, yet was ending up much, much, MUCH LOWER. He wasn't being transformed into JUST a Pokémon, but a MUTATED Pokémon... the kind of which that could never be accepted among the normal ecosystem. And then... that last thing she said... about a father..... but his thoughts were dimming, now. What could she have meant by that? He was too overcome by the agony to think anymore.
"And why SHOULD I stop it? Did I stop it on Gemini, eh? Did YOU stop it on.... Mewtwo?" Ivy suddenly paused. "Hm. You forgot about that, however....." She then pulled away from the..... CREATURE, taking a scalpel from her instrument tray.
"Now.... for the first incision." She plunged the scalpel into Giovanni's left shoulder, ripping the newly-scaled and rather tender flesh down to the elbow. Then, with revolting glee, she pulled apart the flesh, as if trying to look at the muscles underneath.....
And all the while, the black blood flowed.....
He easily could have answered the earlier question, because it only required one word: no. But he hardly had a chance to answer: his flesh was being TORN APART, ripped into chunks by that horrid instrument. He could feel the utter torment of the parts of flesh dropping away, letting that repulsive ebony fluid spill in opaque rivers from the ripped scales, and he growled in hatred and anguish. Yet, he had shown no mercy to the two aforementioned Pokémon. Even though he was not doing it directly, the intention was there. Now that he was living through this torrid hell, he almost--ALMOST--wished that he had shown some....but it was much too late for that.
Ivy indeed let the flesh drop to the ground, but before she could even use these incisions for anything, she moved to the OTHER shoulder, positioning her syringe over the flesh THERE as well.....
"I suppose you DON'T remember your father, then?" she said calmly, as she began to carve into the flesh of THIS arm as well. "Hm... you must have blocked it out, seeing that you have a rather weak mind..... A pity. Do you know his name, at least? You could perhaps contact.... later.... the man who is responsible for your current condition....."
She jerked the scalpel once more, and another large chunk of flesh fell.
"My.....faRRRRRGGGHHther?" the half-man growled in absolute pain, the volume of the sound rising rapidly as the other arm was hacked open in a manner that would ensure the optimal anguish. He grit his... fangs, trying to endure this intense AGONY. Howver, both of his arms being cut open, the muscle beneath exposed, and being told that his FATHER was responsible for all of this sent him to the end of his limits, and the growl rose into a monstrous roar, expressing the full extent of his doubled pain.
"You don't need to revel in your agony," Ivy gave a sigh of exasperation as she moved to Giovanni's twisted calves and thighs, taking out square chunks in each. "It's already obvious that you feel much pain." She smiled as she made an incision. "Your great and wonderful MOTHER never told you about your Daddy?"
He shook his deforming head furiously in answer to the question, and as the upper and lower portion of his leg was opened, feeling the black blood gush down the remaining flesh. He was under such great negative stress that the perspiration coating his head was not sweat, but BLOOD. It was truly a work of the devil to make the leader of Team Rocket sweat BLOOD. However, Ivy and the devil were almost synonymous with one another.
And then the same devil incarnate approached the chest.....
"Hah. I'm surprised she didn't warn you about potential dangers..... Heh-heh.... Then again, you WERE only a.... 'brat child', if I'm correct...
Her voice suddenly turned to ice.
"And yet, you still loved her."
His voice was equally cold.
"Yes... GRRRHHHHHHH.... she was the only one that took caRRRGHHe of me... she did not love me, and made suRRRRGHHe she showed it, but did not..... everRRRGGGHH tRRGHeat me infeRGHHHior because.....of..the...RGHHHblood......EverRGHHyone else..tRGHHheated me as a.....FGHRReak..until I became betterRRGHHHHH......"
He paused to shut his crimson eyes, the memories attacking his mind unrelentlessly. "I loved herRRRRRHGGGGGHHHHH because she.....did me that one favoRRRGGHHHHH."
It was odd for him to be sharing this memory with the abominable woman that was looming over him as the dominant being, but he was in such a pitiable state: with his flesh down from his shoulder to the elbow and from the thigh to the ankle practically gouged open, he was not in the rightest of mind.
Ivy suddenly pulled away, her eyes narrowing. She turned around towards the computer, silent as she began to punch numbers in. "And I suppose....... you don't remember...... Belle, do you?"
"BelleGRRRHHHRRR...?"
He shook his head, that was slowly being swallowed by the raven-hued scales. He had no recollection of the name whatsoever in the currently-hazy cavern that was his mind. And now there was something new to fear, and he strained his dark neck to look at the computer, alarmed as Ivy entered the codes..... However.... the numbers.... Why were they so hard to read....?
"Your sister." Ivy entered a final code, and turned around towards Giovanni once more. There was a definite bitter tone in her voice, of a grudge, long past..... "You don't remember her at all? If I recall my data correctly, she followed you everywhere."
"My.....sistGRRRGAAARGGHH???" All this was coming too quickly for him to withstand. So much information, and a Pokémon brain to absorb it? He couldn't handle it. Anger flashed in his monstrous scarlet eyes, and he accused in the distorted voice: "NoRGHhhhhhHh... I neverRGHHH had one."
"So.... you even deny that she existed," Ivy said in complete callousness, walking towards him again with a syringe in hand. "Your sister, who loved you so much----By the way, these chemicals are to enlarge your muscle strength and body mass."
She stabbed the needle right into the muscle.... and then his OTHER shoulder muscle, and his leg muscles, and then his ABDOMINAL muscles.....
"A sister who wasn't loved by anyone, whose only joy in life was their older brother, a sweet, caring older brother......"
Torturous pain struck every square inch of the five areas that the needle had plunged into, and Giovanni threw back his head, which connected with the unforgiving table, and which increased the horrribly tormented notes of the ensuing roar. He couldn't even THINK......... as the thread-thin objects of torture seared through the muscles, pumping whatever revolting chemical that was contained in that vile glass tube directly into the layers of tissue, bringing on excruciating pain. He didn't seem to HEAR Ivy anymore, so focused on his own torment, but the woman's words registered in his brain, perhaps to make their mark later.
"Yes....." She moved away as Giovanni slowly and in excrutiating PAIN, began to grow in size. "A sister who was left at Pokémon Tech with her brother, who would always protect her, always take care of her when their mother was away...."
Suddenly, inexplicably, she slammed her fist on the control panel in anger. "And then, that day that she pushed him.... she didn't mean to push him... she didn't mean to do it so hard..... He fell.... on his knee..... he CUT himself......"
The terrible roar jumped five decibels and dropped two octaves lower as the mutating figure on the table began to enlarge, two of the smaller straps snapping simultaneously, and the table beginning to crack under the sheer size and weight of the deforming monster. Every minute that passed, all he could feel was pain. Pain as he never felt before, but would feel again, each time doubling and tripling until it became unbearable.
The heavily deformed figure raised his eyes, staring towards the woman in loathing, the words of her again going unanswered, but registering in the brain. There could be no doubt that Ivy hated him for some reason, some reason he could not remember. But why was she talking about his sister? Thad had NO bearing on the subject.
She stared back, not even flinching. "Everyone stared at the blood. The nurse came, and even she refused to touch it. They threw him out of the school. They yelled at his---YOUR wonderful mother. You both left.
"And you left your sister there. No one liked her. She was the freak's sister. She was an outcast. She got straight A's, yes, but no one cared. Even the teachers were cold.
"She finally came home. Her mother didn't pay the least bit attention to her, but she didn't care. She just wanted to see her brother. She saw him..... he was..... sitting in the garden.... staring into the coy fish pond. She yelled. She ran up to hug him."
Ivy's eyes were now burning, with complete and utter hate.
"Do you know what you did, Vanni?"
Vanni........
That name... He was once called that with tenderness..... Ivy only used it with as much malice as humanly possible.
His roar was softer than the last, so overcome by the pain in his muscles...his skin...and EVERYTHING else, that it was draining him af after the zenith of physical torment, and he only had the strength to shake his head. He had no idea of what he could have possibly done to the unfortunate but insignificant girl that Ivy was talking about.
"You looked up at her.... you HATED her. Then you grabbed her by the shoulders and you slapped her.... again.... and again.... and again.... and then you threw her into the coy pond.... and walked off.....
A distant look came to her eyes.
"I think a Goldeen saved her...... She didn't tell anyone. She just went to her room and cried.... still wet, she laid on the bed and cried.... No one loved her. Her brother HATED her. And every time that vacation that he saw her in the hall or after a meal..... He'd punch her in the stomach, or stomp on her foot, or slap her again, or shove her against the wall...... she never said anything. Nothing."
She shook her head, and dropped the bombshell in the form of a an almost-----ALMOST----teary-eyed question, like a small girl asking a cruel adult about something they had done:
"How come you didn't love me anymore?"
Four long minutes entered and left before Ivy recieved an answer. In between her innocent question and his nonthreatening answer, he could only STARE. But while his body remained motionless, his thoughts raced, trying to keep up with floods of memories that piled up within his brain.
Impossible.....she did not say what she just said right now, did she? It CAN'T be the truth... myeslf... and... HER? Related?!? Unthinkable!! Yet, now there is a memory so clear...... it is almost as if it was yesterday..... I was cruel to her... unnecessarily cruel.... she is human..... and I am..... maybe... was not. Why didn't I love her... as a....... sibling...... anymore?
"Because youRGHHH......you.RGHHHRRRRRR...revealed me to be...not......RGHHHHHHnormal...by shoving me and making me RGHHHHHHHH bleed....I was RGHHHRRR...hated and despised GRRRRReverywhere, same as youRGH----"
The bombshell suddenly hit and exploded with earth-quaking force.
"NORGHHHHHHH!!!!!! NORRRGHHNORRRHHHNORHHHHHH!!!!! WE ARERRGHH NOT KIN!!! NEVERRGHHHHH!!!!!"
The debris settled after a vast amount of time, but it left an enormous rift between the two forces in the conflict within his muddled mind.
"YouRGHHHRR should not wonderRRRGHHHHH why I hated youRHHHHHGGGHH. YouRGHHH made my childhood more hellRHHHH than it already was. I doRGHHHHH not regret hurting youRGHHHG. You brought it upon youRRRGHHself."
There was another long, drawn-out moment of silence after the explosion of noise. One could almost sense the tension and the hatred building as Ivy's arms began to shake in anger, and she began to advance upon Giovanni.
"Then MOTHER left YOU in charge of the corporation. Hah. HAH_HAH_HAH. I had to make a living for MYSELF, VANNI. I had to WORK. I had to TOIL. And did you do anything about it?"
She grabbed a syringe, and her eyes were as hot with anger as the molten lava spewing out from a volcano.
"NO!!!!!!"
I didn't know...... damn it, Ivy------Belina----Belle------I DID_NOT_KNOW!!!!!!!!!!!!!
The hateful syringe...... at the end of which projected the loathsome needle... was coming towards him in the hands of his vengeful sibling. He tried to move, to somehow get off the accursed table, but was entirely FROZEN, engulfed by stark terror.
"Do you know what it's like? To work for OTHER PEOPLE who won't PROMOTE you, won't PAY you unless you have the RIGHT BLOOD?!??! THE RIGHT FRIENDS IN THE RIGHT PLACES?!!?"
She brought the syringe down upon his huge chest.
"NO!!!!"
She stabbed again.
"NO!!!"
She stabbed again, and again, and again.
"NONONONONONONONONONONONO!!!!!!!!!!!!"
The needle had lost its original purpose: now it was being used as a weapon, ripping through the flesh and nearly reaching the vital organs beneath it. The pain overwhelmed him...every breath that was taken was countered by that powerful needle, doubling the torment. Every time his chest rose, down came the syringe, forcing it back down. But as his body suffered under the blows, his mind was clearing.
Is she right in doing this? I ignored her half of my life.... I didn't remember that she actually existed.... but.... I could have intervened..... and..... no..... that doesn't justify it..... not for what she is doing now...... virtaully KILLING me..... No.... NO.... If I had a choice, I would take DEATH over THIS-----torture.....
"DID YOU LIKE THAT?!??! DID YOU?!??! DIDJA??!?!"
If Ivy had been a bit cuckoo in the head before, now she was COMPLETELY off her rocker. She lunged for yet another syringe, and put it over Giovanni's throat this time, just an inch above the leathery hide.
"Communication.... Heh-heh..... seems as if you rely heavily on COMMUNICATION, eh?!? SPEECH?!??! Well, what if you couldn't SPEAK anymore?!? Then what?!?!"
She paused and then shrieked into Giovanni's hideous mask of pain. "THEN WHAT, VANNI?!??!"
"NoRGHHHHH..... not...... not that...... God, no....."
He was growing more subdued by the minute, too exhausted to resist any more of this pain that was being inflicted so mercilessly. He knew his protests were futile, since she would do it anyway. She was too driven by insanity to show mercy.
And he was right.
She very gently thrust it in and pushed down the liquid into his throat muscles, tightening them, loosening them..... At all the WRONG places, and then finally pulled away and leaned in close to the monsters barely-discernible face. "Now.... tell me if that hurts."
"GRRRRRROOOARRRRRRRRRGHHHHH!!!!!!!!!"
No words came out. There were NO_WORDS. None at all. The liquid had warped and mangled the vocal chords....and had "silenced" the "man" who utilized them so frequently.
"As I suspected." Ivy grinned, moving away. "Now, don't you AGREE that a creature WHICH cannot SPEAK isn't worth ANYTHING intellectually?"
She whirled around once more. "WELL?!??!?"
He... that was slowly becoming an it, roared again, in futility trying to answer her, but had lost all verbal communication save for that low-pitched roar.
"I suppose not," her face calmed slightly, as she reached for the final chemical, the last serum..... and more than probably the most dreaded.
"So.... are you finally ready to SUBMIT to the CONTROL of another...... ZERO-X?"
"RRRRROARRRRGHHHHH!!!!!!!"
The fear in his......its blood-red eyes could not be explained by words alone. The syringe was like a knife ready to be plunged into his very heart... it was absolute... it was supreme..... and it was about to render him, Giovanni, the boss of Team Rocket and the leader of the Viridian City Gym, a complete SLAVE to his SISTER.
"I suppose not..... But then again," she smiled that evil, twisted, wicked smile, the smile of a sadist created by festering years of rage, the smile of a falcon just as it swoops down upon its prey. Her power would be total, absolute.
And it was then that she revealed to him what her goal would be.
"But then again....... I don't suppose Team Rocket could go on forever..... without being destroyed...... somehow...."
She raised the syringe above her head, much like she had with Gemini. She was preparing for the final blow, the culmination of the entire diabolical process, and would show no mercy.
The creature that was Giovanni realized the meaning of her words, her foremost goal.... to destroy the organization that her brother led, and he tried to combat it with the essential speech, but only terrified roars, those inhuman cries, rewarded his efforts, all the while with the all-powerful instrument about to destroy him in every imaginable way.
"The only difference is....." She leaned in closer, just as she raised the syringe yet higher.
"YOU will be the destroyer."
Then, after one second of letting Giovanni decipher the meaning of the words, she stabbed it down, straight into his chest, almost---ALMOST--puncturing his heart, as the black blood flowed and the chemicals rushed through his traumatized body.
It took him a split second for him to realize what it meant, but before he could roar in protest, the horrible process began, bringing with it a gigantic onrush of immense agony. A crackle of dark energy engulfed his body, expanding it to its full size, with the knife-like claws growing to their maximum length, the ebony scales hardening to the thickness of stone. The creature's once-straight spinal cord curved into an arch, increasing its already disfigured appearance. The tail shot to its full length, giant spikes protruding along the back of the thick, reptillian limb. The mouth, which foamed with sea-green saliva, was filled with two and three inch fangs that caged a long, lizard-like tongue that projected from the jaws, that were lengthening, as if being stretched out of his face, into the muzzle of so many cold-blooded animals. A scarlet stripe formed along the snout and upper arm, three of them appearing on his arched back, giving sharp contrast between the rest of the flesh. The eyes swelled, growing in size, until they were two distinct basins of the hottest hells, glowing in their perpetul blood-crimson. At last, a razor sharp horn pushed out of the flesh, standing at an angle above the head.
He... that was fully an IT... roared with all its inhuman might, the flesh of its leather-like neck rippling as the sound was amplified by the monster being whole.
This was no longer Giovanni, but Zero-X.
Completely and totally.
"So.... you must be the one who's been living through my brother all these years....." She circled the creature, nodding in approval at it, much like Giovanni had done to Brock earlier. The tables had turned... completely. "I suppose you will be useful......."
She then said in a rather pleasant monotone: "Computer..... Undo straps."
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To be continued........