Alter Persona

Disclaimer: don own pokemon, neva owned pokemon. TT

Author's notes: future chapters will be coming more slowly, because my exams are popping up. This means that other than early in the morning, I probably won't get other times to work on this. Thanks to everyone for the support!

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Ash appeared to be indifferent, but he was very impatient, and very annoyed. As a matter of fact, it was accelerating to the point of anger if this kept up. As the Tauros charged towards him, he strafed, causing it to miss by centimeters. He had been doing this for the past one and a half hour, but the Tauros seemed to keep coming, and coming.

He sidestepped the path again, making the Tauros do what it had been doing the past hour and a half. Missing him. Finally the Tauros paused, snorting and pawing the ground as it rested. Ash quickly tried to near it, not wanting to give it too much time to recover energy.

As he came closer, the pokemon lowered its head and charged. Contrary to what Ash had assumed, it was faking fatigue to try to run the human down when he lowered his defenses.

Ash quickly twisted away from the raging Tauros, but did not manage to move away in time. He grunted as he was gored in the side of his stomach, dropping to one knee. His already crimson eyes seemed to flare in anger as he got to his feet. The Tauros was going to pay. No one made him waste energy and injure him. He didn't care about whatever fucking orders Giovanni had given him.

He looked up just as the Tauros plowed into him, not stopping even though it felt the contact. Dust was thrown up like a fog as Ash's boots dug into the ground. It kept charging, until finally, there was the crunch of a body colliding against the concrete wall, then the crunch as the wall became indented.

The Tauros backed away to observe its kill. But Ash stood up calmly, throwing his ruined glasses away. The Tauros stopped moving to stare at him. It knew no pokemon could survive his charge, but this human still stood, seemingly uninjured.

Ash lifted his hand, licking the blood off his hand. His eyes were narrowed, the black pupils contracted to slits, like a cat, his iris and white of his eyes a shiny amber. He watched unconcerned, as the Tauros ran off to the other side of the field, before charging once again.

The Tauros closed the distance with astonishing quickness. Fifty meters, forty, thirty, twenty, ten, five...

Ka-Shing!

The Tauros had stopped directly in front of Ash, unmoving. Slowly, as Ash retracted the blade back into the form of his human hand, the corpse falling to the ground with a thud. He smirked, as he licked the blood off his hand, his face tilted upwards, eyes half closed in bliss as the warm blood touched his tongue.

The taste of the blood was intoxicating, making feel like drug users after their dose. The scent of blood made him crave for it, pulling him to the corpse. Slowly, he extended his finger to the open wound between the creature's shoulder blades. As he tasted the coppery substance once again, his craving took over. And he did not stop it.

His hands changed into claws which he used to rip open the corpse, his jaws and teeth changing, widening, sharpening. After the process was over, he bent over it, tearing into the flesh, trying to reach the choicest of parts. Blood leaked and seeped into the ground, as he continued to rip out the flesh, gulping them down without much chewing.

The next hour was spent fulfilling his appetite. As he began to feel more full, control also started to return to him slowly. His eyes gradually changed back to crimson, before what he had done finally hit him full in the face. He knew that he needed to inquire about this. He never should've waited for so long. And there was only one person who could answer his questions.

"What is going on, Giovanni?" Ash asked, his eyes glowing like a ruby within the darkness of the leader's office. "You know what happened, don't you?"

"Indeed," Giovanni replied. "Have you only realized this today?" he went on, face shrouded by the impenetratable darkness.

"No. I realized this the day I went to get the orb. I did not want to suspect you, but what I did today was... unforgivable to myself. I want to know what you've done to me. I want to know exactly what happened over a year ago."

"If that is what you insist. You have of heard the book 'Dr Jekyll and Mr. Hyde', have you not?" Giovanni asked, and received a nod in reply. "Like in the story, I believe that there are two sides to a person. One who is partially good and partially evil, and one that is purely evil."

"Contrary to what you believe that we are, Team Rocket is not some stupid 'earth-saving' organization. I intend to conquer the world, and rule it. But with the pathetic peace loving people, my dream will never be fulfilled. So, I had my scientists work on a way to release the evil side of a human. You are the first of our specimens. It didn't really matter that you did not know give us permission to experiment on you, considering that you are nothing but a clone."

Ash stepped back in surprise. He was a clone?

"Yes. You are a clone of the real Ash, whom we killed over two and a half years ago. He had not been supportive of us, so we decided to use him. We knew that persuasion or force would not bring him to us, so we decided to clone him, and kill him."

Ash narrowed his eyes. He was a clone. Nothing but a fucking clone. But...

"Nothing had happened after our experimenting, but I allowed you to live. Because even if you were unsuccessful, you would make a valuable addition to Team Rocket, for we had genetically enhanced your physical body."

He had a soul of his own. Did clones have them? And what had they given him?

"It appears that, however, your Alter Persona, as I call them, was simply dormant, waiting for a time to come out. And it did when you went for that mission. But there appeared to be something wrong, for you managed to control yourself. I had hoped to control the Persona. I had been waiting since after that day, so see when will you come to ask me about it. And you never had."

An Alter Persona. What was it? Was it part of him? It appeared to be, but did not seem to be. And was it possible to control it?

"I do not claim to know exactly what is a Alter Persona. It had been accidentally discovered by one of my scientists who had found a manuscript which dates back a long time ago. But what had been most important, was that the script spoke about armies of pure evil. Thus, I was interested. And now, my interest has paid off," Giovanni ended.

"How so? You have yet to control me," Ash reminded him. "Why did you clone m- Ash?" he asked. "What exactly can my Alter Persona do? Why does it control me?"

Giovanni smirked. "Ash was actively campaigning against us. And we needed a test subject, so we created you. To suffer in his place. As for the latter questions, I do not know. And neither will you ever get to find out."

Ash narrowed his eyes again, as Giovanni snapped his fingers. It was fortunate his instinct took over, making him jump onto the ceiling as the swish of a sharp object cut through the air.

He found himself growling at whatever did that. He looked back at Giovanni, so see him still in his chair.

"I have found a way to overcome every problem, and now I control such a soldier. And I see you're getting introduced," he stated, sardonic pleasure in his voice.

Ash moved away quickly, before hearing a thump as something hit the place he was at. He was fighting a Persona Soldier, something he knew neither about, nor its abilities. He leapt at the sudden movement, both of them still on the wall. But he missed, his palm sticking back on the wall as he did not touch the enemy.

The soldier was fast. Maybe faster than he was. But he knew he had to get out of here. He could not see in the darkness, but the enemy could. And it gave him disadvantage over his foe. He leapt toward the door, only to find it closed by metal. The time taken for him to discover that made him vulnerable.

His back burned as claws slashed deep into his flesh. He twisted to throw the enemy off him, slamming his clawed hand into him - it- and making it fly and collide with the wall with a dull thud. He leaped.

Landing on it, he drove his claws into the enemy, irregardless of where it was. The enemy was powerful, but he was in a killing rage. His anger and frustration fueled his wish to kill, and nothing else but that.

He burrowed his claws, extracted them, and dug them in again and again, until his aggressor had stopped moving entirely. Only then did he get up slowly, shooting a look of hatred at Giovanni. Silent, he turned back to the door and slammed his claw-blades through the metal, and pulling them apart. He wanted to get out of this place as soon as possible.

Giovanni betrayed him. He was an experiment. He was not entirely human. So what was he? Ash could feel the other him in his mind. He did not know when he controlled himself, and when did his other personality took over. He had regained control, as though he had been the one killing all along. Then he realized. He should've taken a look at the creature first.

"Ung," he fell to his knees, both arms stretched in front of his, his palms flat on the floor. He did not know what was happening, but he knew that the faster he got out, the better. But he was not given a chance to do anything, before his arms gave way as he submitted to the darkness.

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Author's note again: Sorry for taking so long to get this chapter up, but I was having my exams, I had a writer's block, and my comp was wiped the third time. After this chapter, I will continue to work on this story, just not as quickly, or as often as when this story began. I hope you understand, and I thank you for your support. Till the next chapter then.