Maybe Dr. Dillinger had engineered the trapdoor. Maybe she'd designed Spark's labyrinth and provided the thematic lighting in Blanche's crystal obstacle course. But there was no way she'd made this door.
Up close, the amount of detail in the door's carvings boggled Spark's mind. Individual scales were etched into a school of goldeens that flowed in a stone river at the bottom of the door. A field of flowers, all perfectly unique and complete and crisp, framed panels depicting humans and pokémon and mountainous landscapes. High above, depictions of the legendary birds hung in perpetual flight, massive wings sprawling to the corners of the door. Tiny flecks of color clung to the shapes, remnants of paint. The effect of the door was staggering enough in monochrome, and Spark couldn't imagine the impact full color would have had.
"I've never seen anything like this," Blanche whispered.
"Yeah, I wouldn't exactly call this your everyday interior decorating," Spark said.
"No, I mean, this is archaic art, but it's unlike any ancient culture I've ever heard of," Blanche said.
They stood side by side, arms around each other's shoulders, each still acting as the other's crutch. Blanche trailed their hand over the arched back of a stone sandshrew, their fingertips never quite touching it, but clearly aching to.
"How many ancient cultures have you heard of?" Spark asked.
"Enough," Blanche said, and pulled their hand away. "I went through an intense ancient civilization phase as a child. It's passed into hobby since then, but I know enough to recognize that this art style is completely unique."
"Leave it to you to have an 'intense ancient civilization phase,'" Spark said. "I know it's a shot in the dark, but is there any chance this is staged?"
"None of the chisel marks are new, and some parts of the stone have been eroded. This has been around for a very, very long time," said Blanche. They stared at the carvings so penetratingly that Spark half expected the stone to crumble. "It's telling a linear story. Look at the flowers along the riverbank. They start as buds on the left, blossom in the middle, and wilt at the seam between the halves of the double door. It's reversed on the other door. You can read toward the middle from either side."
Now that Blanche had pointed it out, it seemed obvious. Spark followed the path of the story up the door, where more human figures appeared among the pokémon. The scenes were blissful, with frolicking eevees leaping at the heels of humans and venomoths circling a radiant moon that still retained some of its silver paint. Then the rows turned darker, with groups of identical human soldiers and armored pokémon marching toward the seam from both sides, forever poised to clash.
"A war," said Spark. There had been very few such events in the region's history, and any involving pokémon had taken place so long ago it was hard to believe they'd ever happened at all. Using pokémon as weapons of war had become unthinkable, and yet, Spark had the feeling Dr. Dillinger would disagree.
"Once again, it's not a war I know of, and I can't place that armor either," Blanche said. They must have been able to read the question in Spark's eyes, because they continued: "I was very into ancient history."
"No kidding," Spark mumbled. "OK, so we have happy-merry good times down at the bottom, a war, and then…"
"A truce," Blanche filled in, pointing at a trio of human figures about a quarter of the way up the door. These three departed from the previous art style and were more abstract and impressionistic. One stood before the troops of the left door, another stood before the troops of the right door, and both clasped hands with the third, who stood in the middle, split by the seam. The flanking figures were armored, but the middle one wore a long robe rather than the garments of a warlord.
As Spark looked closer, a shiver ran down his spine. The figure on the left wore sharp, spiked armor, and had jagged hair to match. His more feminine counterpart to the right wore rounded armor and had short, wispy hair that rose like a flame. The ambiguous central character's hair fanned behind them, long and straight and still carrying a hint of white dye.
"Blanche…"
"I see it, Spark," Blanche said. "Maybe this is a setup after all. Another mind game."
"Seems a little elaborate, even for Dr. Deplorable," Spark said, rubbing the tension out of his neck with his hand.
"Keep reading," Blanche instructed, pulling Spark back a few steps to get a better angle.
The triptych above the truce scene showed the same trio sitting in tall, geometric thrones, crowned and regal and guarded by images of the three legendaries: Zapdos to the left, Articuno in the middle, Moltres to the right. These were smaller than their versions at the top of the door, but no less majestic. People and pokémon flocked around the thrones, dancing, conversing, smiling again. Many humans were paired with specific pokémon partners who appeared to echo their postures and expressions. The scene projected a sense of unity.
But then the story twisted again, and the royal three were divorced from their thrones. The people who had surrounded them before were now convulsing in agony, their bodies distorting, spikes sprouting along their backs, flame pouring from their mouths, all of them frozen in the midst of some kind of supernatural transformation. The pokémon had vanished. The Zapdos king clasped his head, doubled over as if suffering from an unseen wound. The Moltres queen reared back, her hands bent into claws, consumed by rage. In the center, Articuno's peacekeeper covered their eyes with one hand, and extended the other hand before them, offering something small and spike-like to an unknown audience.
"Is that… our thingamajig?" Spark asked, though he could see the answer for himself.
The color drained from Blanche's face. "Dr. Dillinger is still playing games with us. I don't recognize the two cultures shown at war, and none of the bird mythology describes royalty associated with them. I don't know how she pulled it off, but this is a hoax designed to confuse or frighten us."
"Well, it's working on both accounts, and I really don't like how this oversized comic book ends," Spark said.
The three legendary birds at the top of the door were not the peaceful guardians that had appeared in the throne scene. They were huge and predatory, their talons aimed at a large swirl of angular lightning, razor-sharp snowflakes, and curls of fire.
"Do you think it's some kind of joint attack?" Spark asked.
"I don't know what it is, but it doesn't matter. It's fake," Blanche stated before they lunged forward, breaking free of Spark, to pound their fist against the doors.
The action took Spark by surprise, and it took him until Blanche's third strike against the stone to stumble after them and grab their hand to pull them back. They struggled against his hold for a moment before relenting. Even after Blanche had stilled and regained control of their breathing, Spark kept his hands around their wrists, just in case.
"Easy there, fighter!" Spark said, still reeling from the mood swing. "You're supposed to be the levelheaded one, remember? Leave the emotional outbursts to me."
Blanche slipped their wrists away from Spark and tucked a few stray strands of hair behind their ear, grasping for some semblance of decorum. "I'm sorry. I don't know what came over me."
"Don't worry about it. We're tired and stressed out of our skulls. And on top of everything, Candela's still out there somewhere, facing Dr. Dillinger on her own. It's a terrifying thought," Spark said.
"You're not helping," Blanche said.
Spark hung his head. "I know. I'm sorry. I don't know what to do. Are we supposed to find a way to open the door? Because knocking didn't seem to work."
The ground rumbled, and Spark and Blanche grabbed at each other in preparation for another quake. This time, there was no thunder or otherworldly shriek, no rush of power. The cacophony of hidden machinery coming to life behind the stone rattled Spark's ribcage, and he held tighter to Blanche as the two halves of the door shifted. Dust billowed from the split, forcing them to cover their faces. With a bass growl of rock grating against rock, the sides of the door pulled apart, retracting at a slowbro's pace into the wall.
"Or maybe knocking did work," Spark said, and coughed as the dust got into his mouth.
After several minutes of clunking gears and seismic vibrations, the room quieted. Spark uncovered his eyes as the dust settled and gaped at the chamber that had been revealed.
The door opened into a great hall, the kind that should have held nobility, the kind that must have once hosted balls and banquets. A dozen large, fire-filled chandeliers bathed the room in ominous, flickering light. Columns had been carved from the very walls of the cave to form a soaring, vaulted ceiling, each column utterly unique. One was carved to resemble a pillar of rushing water, another appeared to be a twist of vines and flowers, another was a patchwork of stone venomoth and butterfree wings… water, grass, and bug, Spark realized. They all reflected a different pokémon type. He'd only seen such majesty in the illustrations of fairytale books.
But the fairytale effect was ruined by the rows of machinery and wiring that had taken root at the bases of the columns. About 50 men and women in red and black uniforms and long white coats stood by their equipment, watching Blanche and Spark with cold, disinterested eyes. The soft whir of the banks of computers reminded Spark of Willow's lab. It was like the guts of his lab had been wrenched from his modern building and jammed higgledy-piggledy into this storybook setting.
Across the room, a massive curtain, black as a moonless night, hid the end of the hall from view. It drooped from the ceiling, and Spark pondered the effort it must have taken to secure it there. Granted, it created a dramatic, foreboding effect. What was so huge that it could only be hidden by such an enormous curtain?
In the middle of everything, as always, was Dr. Dillinger. She stood in the center of the hall, a crooked, hungry smile on her soft face, the bruises around nose making her eyes seem all the wider. Her coat hung off one shoulder, grayed and filthy. At last, she truly looked the part of a mad scientist.
"You have something of mine," she said. "Why don't you come in and give it back to me?"
"You have a few things of ours as well," Blanche said. "Why don't we trade and call it a day?"
Dr. Dillinger cracked her neck, and the pop made Spark wince. "You aren't funny, Blanche. If you're proposing to trade my key for Candela and your pokémon, you can forget it. Perhaps you've failed to notice how outnumbered you are."
The clicks of opening pokéballs reverberated off the smooth stone floor and walls. Several of Dillinger's scientists had released their pokémon, which were now stalking toward Blanche and Spark. Rather than retreating, Blanche stepped forward, into the hall. Spark followed, doing his best to disguise the severity of his limp. He counted a pair of weezings, an arbok, a golem, and three golbats. Of course, it didn't matter how many were there. One or two would be more than enough to contend with without his own pokémon playing defense. He hoped Blanche knew what they were doing.
"So, it's a key," said Blanche, calmly pulling the crystalline spike out of their jacket. Even with Spark's absurd orange coat on, they looked miles more together than Dillinger. They tested the strength of the key between their fingers. "Seems a little fragile."
"It's tougher than it looks," Dr. Dillinger growled. "Hand it over, and we can proceed peaceably with the experiment."
"99% sure none of us agreed to this case study of yours, so we're gonna pass," Spark said, angling himself slightly ahead of Blanche.
Blanche lifted the key above their head. Dillinger held out her arms, signaling the pokémon to halt their advance.
"A key that can shatter. A considerable design flaw," Blanche said. "Move any closer and I'll throw it to the ground. Use your pokémon to knock us out, and gravity will do the job for me."
Dillinger started to snarl, but then it shifted into her signature condescending smirk. "I'm sure you're both getting tired of the smoke and mirrors, so let me clear the air. I need that key, and I need you alive. I need both of these things or neither of these things. You break that key, I will break you. Give it to me, and you'll live to see your friend again."
Spark caught a change in one of the golbats' flight patterns. "We have a bad listener coming in on your 10 o'clock, Blanche."
Blanche jerked their arm as if to throw, and the golbat backed off again. "I'm done with games, Doctor. Give us Candela and our pokémon, and you can have your key."
Dr. Dillinger clicked her tongue. "Maybe you didn't hear me. I need the three of you and the key. So that negotiation is off the table. I'll be honest with you. I'm seriously contemplating letting you try to smash the key, since there's nothing I can trade you for it. If you break it, fine. Decades of research down the drain. The loss of a previously undiscovered culture. I'll have to kill three people. Do you know the toll murder takes on a person? But it's what I'll have to do in order to clean up this disaster. And in the end, despite everything, Team Rocket will have three legendary pokémon, and Professor Willow will have three dead assistants."
"What undiscovered culture are you railing on about?" Blanche asked through their teeth.
Spark couldn't believe his ears. Even he could tell that Dillinger was baiting them. Perhaps Blanche was stalling?
"I'm railing on about the lost civilization that's been sealed beneath this mountain for a thousand years, and you hold the key to their discovery in your hand," Dr. Dillinger said. "Didn't you see the door? We found it very informative."
"You mean the one with all the war and suffering and spontaneous transformations into monsters? We took that as a warning, not an invitation!" Spark said. He eyed the golbats again, but they kept their distance, as did the golem and weezings.
"Shut up and let the real researchers talk, Sparky-boy," Dr. Dillinger spat. "Blanche, think of the historical implications of this. To tell you the truth, I'm not all that into the lost civilization shtick. I prefer researching the capacities of human-pokémon relations, and I believe these people knew more about that than any living society. But I don't care for fieldwork. After this stage is complete, I can finally have my own state-of-the-art facility, and you can do my spelunking for me. Together, you and I could make unprecedented scientific and archeological strides! All I need is your cooperation and that key you keep carelessly waving about."
"I thought we were part of your experiment, not your research team," Spark reminded her.
"Duality, Spark, and I thought I told you to butt out," Dr. Dillinger said, curling her lip at him. "Full disclosure. I need the three of you and that key to unseal a passageway into the heart of the mountain, where our unnamed mystery society disappeared to."
"After their royalty crumbled and their people turned into demons," Spark added.
Dr. Dillinger hissed a sigh through her teeth and glared at Spark. "Not demons, you neophyte. Hybrids. Anyway, I've had about enough of all the wheel-spinning. Arbok?"
The arbok! How could he have overlooked the arbok? Spark splayed his hands, trying to shield Blanche from their concealed assailant. He turned to the side, following a glimmer of scales, and saw the arbok rear up and spread its hood. Spark's body froze and he found he couldn't tear his eyes away from the undulating serpent.
From behind him, he heard Blanche sputtering, trying to form words in spite of their paralyzed jaw. Dr. Dillinger must have used her diode trick to instruct her arbok to use glare. How had Spark not seen that coming? He commanded his body to move, but remained as frozen as ever, without so much as a twitch of his finger. He could feel his equilibrium slipping, and just before he could fall, two sets of hands caught him under his arms.
The grunts who had caught him dragged Spark and Blanche to Dr. Dillinger, who gazed down at them in disgust. She pried the key from Blanche's fingers. "This could have been so much easier. It's a pity I still need you alive."
Summoning every ounce of willpower he had left, Spark spat at the doctor's feet. She scowled and stepped back.
"A real pity," she repeated. "Now, as you've made clear, I know you're dying to see Candela. Why don't we pay her a visit? We're past due for a heartwarming reunion."