Disclaimer: I do not own Pokemon.
Chapter 2: Amber Drei
Dawn was trying to wrap her head around just what it was she had stumbled upon. It was as if she had walked into some kind of chamber of horrors. She knew that Dr. Fuji was a scientist, but she had no idea that he was running such twisted experiments. Dawn recalled what little her friend, Ash Ketchum had told her about Mewtwo and how that he was a Pokemon created by science, but that didn't explain just how the psychic feline had ended up in a tube in some secret lab. Nor did it explain the identity of the young woman floating in the other tube of liquid.
"It seems that someone let their curiosity get the better of them." A voice spoke, causing Dawn to jump. Dawn saw that it was Dr. Fuji.
"What… what the hell is all this?" a frightened Dawn asked. "Who's that girl? And how… how did Mewtwo end up in that tube? What did you do to him?"
"Mewtwo? I see… so you've heard of my creation." Dr. Fuji realized.
"Your… creation?" Dawn asked.
"I mentioned to you before, Ms. Berlitz that I specialized in cloning." Dr. Fuji continued as he wheeled his chair closer to Dawn. "Mewtwo was my ultimate achievement. I had set out to create the world's strongest Pokemon, using the DNA the legendary Pokemon, Mew as a base. Mew is a genetically perfect life form capable of learning almost every known Pokemon technique, the perfect specimen for cloning."
"But… why? What was the point of making Mewtwo?" Dawn asked.
"Partly to satisfy the one who had been funding my experiments at the time." Dr. Fuji answered. "He wanted to have the most powerful Pokemon in existence to use as a weapon. At the time it was a reasonable compromise, as no one else was willing to fund my experiments. Besides, I needed to create a Pokemon who was as strong as possible to survive my cloning techniques, all so that I could perfect them and make them usable for humans."
"You were planning to clone humans too?" a stunned Dawn asked.
"You remember when I told you that my daughter had died?" Dr. Fuji asked. "My work was an attempt to bring her back to life through cloning. At the time, I had almost succeeded in doing just that."
"But… even if you did manage to clone your daughter… that wouldn't really be bringing her back from the dead, would it?" Dawn asked.
"No… it probably wouldn't." Dr. Fuji admitted as he backed his chair away and turned towards the tube with the girl in it. "It's easy enough to clone living tissue, but it is probably impossible to clone the soul. I suppose I was chasing an illusion back then. In any case, when the first clone of Amber died, I devoted myself entirely to Mewtwo. Mewtwo survived the cloning process. He was my greatest achievement… and my greatest mistake. He lashed out at my colleagues and I, destroying our lab soon after he had awakened. That is why I have these scars all over my body and why I'm bound to this chair.
"I would probably have died that day had it not been for one of my benefactor's men finding me and taking me to the hospital. After I had recovered from my ordeal, I decided to move the Kalos Region and disappear, put everything that had happened behind me."
"Well if that's true, then what the hell is all this?" Dawn asked. "You said that you tried to put what happened behind you, but it looks like you've set up another lab and you have Mewtwo in this tube!"
"Yes… I was indeed unable to escape my past. But then I suppose that I never wanted to escape it to begin with." Dr. Fuji admitted. "To answer your question, Ms. Berlitz, that Mewtwo in the tank there is not the original one. It is the second member of its species."
"So… you cloned Mewtwo?" Dawn asked. "But how?"
"This Mewtwo was made from a fresh sample of Mew DNA." Dr. Fuji revealed. "My new benefactor was able to salvage much of my original research notes, and using them I was able to recreate my original experiment."
"New benefactor?" Dawn repeated. "I don't understand. Someone asked you to do all this again?"
"Let me start from the beginning." Dr. Fuji responded. "After I had recovered from my ordeal with the original Mewtwo and moved to the Kalos Region, I found that I was obsessed with trying to figure out what had gone wrong my original clone of Amber. Even after everything that happened, I wanted to try again. Then one day, a man came before me with a very unusual request. Tell me Ms. Berlitz, have you ever heard of something called Mega Evolution?"
"No. What is it?" Dawn asked.
"It's a fairly recent discovery, so I'm not surprised you have heard of it." Dr. Fuji replied. "Unlike normal Pokemon evolution, Mega Evolution is a temporary transformation that some Pokemon are able to undergo during a battle. This transformation heightens the Pokemon's abilities, making them even stronger than before."
"And… what causes this transformation you're talking about?" Dawn asked.
"A special kind of stone that's called a Mega Stone." Dr. Fuji answered. "There are different kinds of stones for specific Pokemon. In fact there are two different stones for the Pokemon, Charizard. Each stone triggers a different Mega Evolution. The man I mentioned before had analyzed various different Mega Stones and managed to create an artificial variety. But he found that there was no Pokemon that his artificial stone would work on though. The only Pokemon who's DNA even came close to being affected by the stone's energy was Mew. When he discovered this, he sought me out and asked me to create a second Mewtwo in order to see if the artificial stone would work on it."
"So you just happily said yes." Dawn realized. "And now you have another Mewtwo."
"I've been calling this one, Mewtwo Zwei." Dr. Fuji revealed. "It seemed a little more elegant than calling it Mewtwo Two. But the main reason I accepted my current benefactor's request was because it gave an opportunity to perfect my work. And now it seems that at last I have. Weren't you ever going to ever ask me about my other specimen?"
Dawn realized that Dr. Fuji was talking about the girl in the other tube. As she turned to look at the other tube, her eyes caught something at the container's base. It was a brass plaque with the word, Drei written on it. Dawn looked down at the base of the Mewtwo's tank and saw another plaque with the word, Zwei. Just then Dawn recalled something that Dr. Fuji had said earlier during their conversation. He had said that he focused totally on creating the original Mewtwo after his first clone of Amber had died. Dawn then remembered the picture of Amber and how she had long green hair just like the girl in the tank.
"That girl… she's a clone of your daughter?" Dawn realized.
"Very astute, Ms. Berlitz." Dr. Fuji confirmed. "The young woman you see before you here is a clone I made using the only fragment of Amber's DNA that I had left. I used what I had learned from my work with the original Mewtwo and figured out a way to successfully clone a human. Do you care to know what the secret is, Ms. Berlitz?"
"I'm… I'm not sure." Dawn answered.
Dr. Fuji merely chuckled. "Part of the reason behind Mewtwo's ability to survive the cloning process was his psychic powers. Taking that into account, I spliced the sample of Amber's DNA with genes from well-known humans with psychic abilities. She contains genes from Sabrina, the leader of the Saffron City Gym in the Kanto Region, as well as genes from Caitlin of the Unova Region's Elite Four. As a result, this clone of Amber possesses the same psychic powers that they do."
"But… that still isn't really your daughter!" Dawn told him. "This whole thing is just nuts!"
Dr. Fuji put his hand on the glass of Amber's tube. "She may not truly be my daughter, but she is the perfect human being."
Suddenly the glass tube containing Dr. Fuji's second Mewtwo began to crack. The sound caused Dawn, Dr. Fuji and Piplup to look and see that the feline Pokemon's eyes had opened and were glowing with a blue light. Suddenly the glass tube shattered and the yellow liquid inside spilled out like a wave. The newly awakened Mewtwo was now sitting on the bottom of what was once its tank.
"Wonderful!" Dr. Fuji declared with excitement. "Our conversation must have caused it to awaken. The time has now come for me to use the item I obtained for this very moment."
Dr. Fuji quickly reached into a bag hanging on the side of his wheelchair and produced a very unique-looking pokeball. The top half of it was purple and had two pink dots on the top, and right above the button on the front was a while letter M. Dawn recognized the pokeball as a Master Ball, the ultimate achievement in pokeball technology. Dr. Fuji threw the ball at Mewtwo before it could react, hitting the psychic feline in the forehead. Mewtwo was turned into a red energy and pulled inside the ball. The ball dropped to the bottom of the broken tank and jiggled for a few moments before making the signal that the capture was complete.
"There we are." Dr. Fuji spoke as he moved his wheelchair over and picked up the ball. "Hopefully this will help to keep history from repeating itself."
"Was that really necessary?" Dawn asked. "That Pokemon only just woke up, and you go and capture it with a pokeball?"
"It was a necessary step for me to take." Dr. Fuji told her. "This will not only keep Mewtwo from destroying the lab the way that the first one did, capturing it was all part of the next phase of the experiment."
Just then, all the pieces of electronic equipment in the room began to beep wildly. Dr. Fuji and Dawn looked and saw that many of the computer screens at the back of the lab were flashing some kind of alert message. At the same time, the glass tube containing Amber began to crack. The glass shattered, releasing another tidal wave of yellow liquid onto the floor. With the liquid gone, the young woman inside dropped to the bottom of her tank and was gasping for air.
"Ms. Berlitz! Quickly! Put that towel over there on her!" Dr. Fuji ordered.
Completely forgetting the strangeness of the entire situation, Dawn saw the large white towel sitting on the metal table that Dr. Fuji was pointing to behind her and grabbed it. She then quickly rushed over and put the towel over Amber as she finished catching her breath. When her breathing finally became regular, the green-haired girl sat up and removed the strange visor that had been covering her eyes.
Dr. Fuji wheeled his chair over and smiled at her. "Hello Amber. You don't know how long I've been waiting for this day."
"You… are my father?" Amber spoke.
"She… she can talk?" a stunned Dawn asked.
"The device you saw covering her eyes earlier has been sending information from the lab's main computer directly to her brain since she first started to develop, educating her." Dr. Fuji explained. "It not only taught her how to talk and read, it also gave her knowledge on a vast amount of topics, even giving her complete information on every Pokemon known to exist. I also gave her knowledge of my identity."
After a moment, Amber finally stood up and stepped off the remains of her tank, keeping the towel wrapped around her as she looked around the lab. "Where… is my friend? The one who I've been talking to for as long as I can remember?"
"Her friend?" Dawn repeated with a raised eyebrow.
"Ah, of course! Your friend is right here, Amber." Dr. Fuji told her as he handed her Mewtwo's pokeball. "I apologize for interrupting your long conversation, but I had to put your friend in this ball. Go ahead and throw it and your friend will emerge."
Amber looked at the ball for a moment before finally throwing it like Dr. Fuji told her. The ball opened up in midair and Mewtwo emerged with a burst of light.
The psychic feline looked around the room. "Where am I?"
"It's a girl?" Dawn realized after hearing the Pokemon's distinctly female voice inside her head.
"It would appear so." Dr. Fuji confirmed. "That was something I was not expecting. Either the original DNA sample was from a female Mew, or I tweaked a chromosome without realizing it."
Amber smiled and walked up to Mewtwo. "Hello there. This is the first time we're meeting like this."
"You're… Amber." Mewtwo realized. "The one who I've been conversing with."
"They already know each other?" a confused Dawn asked. "How is that possible?"
"As I suspected, Amber and this Mewtwo have been communicating telepathically this whole time." Dr. Fuji explained. "The same thing happened during my original experiment. Interrupting them by capturing this Mewtwo in a pokeball is likely what caused Amber to awaken."
"Mewtwo?" the Pokemon repeated. "Is that what I am?"
"That's your species, right father?" Amber replied.
"That's correct, Amber." Dr. Fuji confirmed. "You are the second Mewtwo that I created."
"So… I am not the only one of my kind." Mewtwo realized.
"Zwei." Amber spoke. "That's what I'll call you."
"Zwei?" Mewtwo repeated with a quirked brow.
"It's another word for the number two." Amber explained. "It's also the word on your tank. Since you're the second of your kind to exist, it seems appropriate. Plus… I think it's kind of pretty."
"I think it's an excellent nickname." Dr. Fuji agreed.
The psychic feline was silent for a moment. "That name seems acceptable."
"Well, now that all that's settled, I think we should all go to bed." Dr. Fuji decided. "Amber, I'll show you and Zwei to your room. The two of you are going to have a big day ahead of you tomorrow."
"What do you mean, father?" Amber asked.
"I'll explain in the morning." Dr. Fuji told her. "Ms. Berlitz, I think you should go to bed as well. You must be tired after all that's gone on."
"Uh, yeah. Piplup and I really should turn in." Dawn agreed. "It's nice to meet you Amber, Zwei."
Dawn and Piplup left the laboratory as calmly but quickly as possible. Within a few short minutes they were safely back in their room. Piplup had been so unsettled by the night's events that Dawn let him climb into bed with her. The little penguin Pokemon was out like a light in less than a minute, but Dawn was finding it especially hard to get to sleep. Her mind was reeling over everything she had just seen. Not only had she just encountered the second Mewtwo to ever exist, she had also met a young woman who Dr. Fuji had grown in a test tube and programed like a computer. It all seemed so unreal, and yet at the same time the whole thing was too real to deny.
After turning onto her side, Dawn looked at the pokeballs sitting on the dresser of her room. Her eyes settled on a pokeball with a sparkling pink top. That pokeball contained her secret weapon, the one Pokemon she had that could potentially stand against Zwei if things got bad. Taking comfort in the fact that she had an ace in the hole, Dawn finally drifted off into a dreamless sleep.
Author's Note: One of the flaws with Mewtwo's ability to Mega Evolve in the games is, how could it be possible for there to be two different stones in nature that just happened to be able to induce Mega Evolution in an artificially created Pokemon? The only way I could see that happening is that if the Mega Stone for Mewtwo were also synthetically made. So one of my reasons for doing this story was to address that little issue.
Please review and let me know what you think.