Chapter 3: A New Partner

The captain safely brought the ship to the dock and helped everyone disembark. I was last to get off. I stopped and shook the captain's hand and said thank you. He smiled and nodded. "Good luck Dylan." he said. And with that we departed.

We all gathered by a sign that said NEW FIGHTERS. About twenty or so people were also waiting there. Two women in their early-twenties approached the group.

"Welcome all new fighters. We are pleased to have you come to the island. I am Beth and my co-worker here is Sue. But before we begin, who here was invited with an invitation?" Justin, Emily, myself and about seven others, including Emily's siblings, raised their hands. "Excellent" says Beth, "follow me please."

We all went to the fossil center. I was about to ask what vivosaurs Justin and Emily had gotten, when Beth walked up to me. "You're Dylan, correct?" she asked. I nodded. "Come with me please." She looked over at my friends. "Alone." She walked towards the middle building. "The Fossil Center I assume?" I said. "That is correct" she replied.

We entered the Fossil Center and went to the room on the left. In there was a man in his mid to late thirties. He had green hair and wore a… Caveman toga? 'Alright' I thought, 'Nothing unusual here. Just another day at the office.' He turned around, smiled and said "Ah, hello Dylan. Please, take a seat." I looked around. Papers and books were scattered everywhere. I moved a few papers over and sat down on the couch. "Thank you Beth. You can attend to the other fighters." Beth nodded her head and left.

"Sorry about the mess. You don't get to clean up much when you have to do this much research." I nodded. "I'm Doctor Diggins by the way." he said extending his hand. I shook it and asked, "You know me?" "Well, I didn't until the captain told me that you gave up your chance at a fossil. That was a very honorable thing for you to do." I nodded. "Not many people are that honorable, especially to strangers. And for being such a good sport, I'm going to help you out. I'm going to give you a very special vivosaur." He got up and moved to his desk. He opened the drawer and withdrew a medal. It looked like it was made out of platinum, and not the standard gold.

"This is Spinax-E, a scientifically engineered vivosaur that a group of scientists helped me create. I want you to use and help us gather information about it. We were originally going to use for work but it seems that it is a lot more intelligent than we expected. We didn't plan it to be insanely smart, but it somehow understands human speech and emotions." Dr. Diggins

I looked at him shocked. "That's insane." I said, "How did you manage to make this?" He shrugged mysteriously, "Can't give away all my secrets." he said with a smile. "Also," he said "you won't be able to find his fossils anywhere else, so after rank up battles, I'll give you a new fossil."

I looked at him skeptically. "Why are you giving me, a new fighter, this? Why not one of your own scientists or a more experienced fighter?" "The people who helped us create him asked for you specifically" he said. "How do they…" "Anyway" he said cutting me off, "Let's check him out." He handed me the platinum looking medal and I followed him out.

I decided to dismiss the question. Diggins walked me over to the main lobby. The other nineteen fighters from my group were being led around by Beth and Su, who were giving them the grand tour. We walked into the room on the left this time. "This is the cleaning room" he said, "I'm sure you're smart enough to figure out what goes on in here." "Cooking? No wait, housekeeping? Don't say anything! I'll get it eventually." I said sarcastically. He let out a small chuckle and moved over to a robot in the middle of the room.

"This is CL-34N" he said, "It'll help you with the…" "Cooking!" I shouted. Dr. Diggins started to laugh. "Exactly."

He explained to me how cleaning, resurrection, and storage in the VMM worked. After all that, we exited the Fossil Center and started toward a red-colored building to the right of the Fossil Center.

We entered and a woman at the front desk shouted a hello to Doctor Diggins. He nodded a hello and walked into the room next to the receptionist's desk. "This is the fossil stadium, were all rank-ups and free-for-all matches will be held." We continued to walk down a short hallway, which led to the arena. "Are you ready to learn how to fight?" I pushed my sunglasses up and nodded.

We entered the arena and walked over to different sides. A giant screen with our names and vivosaurs were shown. 'I guess that shows the health during battle.' I thought.

"THROW YOUR MEDAL ON THREE" Diggins shouted. "ONE… TWO…THREEEE!" Diggins tossed out a Stego medal.

I tossed my medal into the middle of the arena. A massive vivosaur popped out. It stood at about thirty feet. It was colored grey with black stripes on its back and legs and a black underbelly. It had red claws and spikes, and, oddly enough, red eyes. It looked somewhat like a robot yet had some reptilian features. IT. LOOKED. AWESOME.

A smile grew across my face. 'Oh yeah buddy, let's do this' I thought. Of course, sir said a metallic British voice. I blinked a couple times. 'You speak through telepathy.' I though utterly confused. The vivosaur gave me an equally confused stare. You can hear me? it asked. 'Yeah.' I replied.

"STOP LOYGAGGING OVER THERE AND GET READY TO BATTLE!" Diggins shouted from across the field. 'What moves you got?' I asked. These. A list of moves ran through my mind.

Use Spinax Fang!

Spike Tail!

The vivosaurs lunged at each other. Stego hit Spinax first lowering him to two-thirds, but Spinax hit harder. He took Stego down to half its health. 'Damn son' I thought. Something that sounded like a laugh echoed in my head.

Use Spinax Fang again!

Stego, Counter with Whirling Dash!

But it was too late, Spinax foresaw the counter and evaded. He closed in on Stego and bit into its side. The vivosaur collapsed to the ground and retreated to its medal. 'YES!' I thought, 'Good job'. Thank you sir. 'I have a feeling this is going to be a very close relationship.'

Diggins and I left the arena. "That was some very fine battling." he said "You're a natural." "You're not too bad yourself." I replied, "I thought with all the work you do, you wouldn't have time for battling." We talked for a bit longer. Finally, I asked "Why didn't you tell me Spinax could talk to me through telepathy?" He looked at me as if I was joking, but saw that I was dead serious. "That's because he doesn't." he replied. "Uh...well he did." "Interesting." he said. It looked like he knew more than he was telling me. I tried pressing the matter, but he dismissed me, saying "I have no idea. I'll look into his programing and see if there's anything. In the meantime, you should join up with the rest of the group in the hotel." "Alright." I said. I then turned and left for the hotel.