==Southern Rim of Viridian Forest==

Continuing horseback down the unmarked trail Ash comes across an eroded wooden bridge built over a small stream and he decides it's a good time to fill up his canteen. As he pulls to the water's edge the shade of the canopy finally breaks allowing him to bathe in the comfort of the warming rays. Pikachu catches up to them as Ash works his way down the side of the horse in his best attempt at a dignified dismount. He drops to his knees and begins palming water to his face, the horse follows cue and stoops its head down for a drink. Getting his fill he submerges the canteen below the surface and watches the rush of bubbles rise. A shudder runs down his spine. What a strange sensation, was somebody coming? He looks down the trail but no one is there. He pushes himself back from the water and holds his breathe for a better listen, silence. All he hears is the lapping of the horse's tongue and the steady stream of passing water.

Across the water a grand willow tree's limbs sway in the breeze. That's when he sees it, some sort of coyote hunched over against the trunk: sleeping. Its two hind paws extended outward in pose that almost resembled a resting human. The empty CB in Ash's backpack begins burning in his mind; maybe he could sneak across the bridge and capture this intriguing animal. Clearly it was no ordinary coyote, its tails was too thick and from here he almost make out what looked like opposable thumbs tucked under its paws. He slowly bends his knee to a rising position when a feeling of nostalgia begins to rush over him. His mom's voice echoes through his mind, calling out his name. It rings a familiar tone and his lips begin to quiver. Where were these thoughts manifesting from and how were they so vivid? Her voice is an entire orchestra in his ears screaming louder, this can't be real. He clenches his eyes tight, but the world doesn't go away, it only grows more vibrant. It's as if his eyelids quit working, he immediately opens them to find that the coyote is no longer sleeping, but standing on its hind legs at the opposite edge of the creek. He's taken aback yet can't help but to stare in a transfixed state of part fear and astonishment. The coyote's eyes appear to be fluttering open and shut at the blurred rate of a hummingbird's wings. Its long tail is lingering about like the thick smoke of a cigar cherry, twisting and contorting into impossible position, seemingly stretching to the horizon and back. Ash is frozen in place, too afraid to move a single millimeter. He closes his eyes again and in an instant he's taken to another world. All around him is an infinite deep sky blue, he opens his eyes to escape the void but the vision stays the same. From the distance; coming towards him in the slowed pace of a funeral procession, he can make out the proud faces of all sorts of large predatory birds, and even some he had never seen before. They were all stoic in their posture; each one of them facing center in a pair of symmetrical columns that resembled an almost military stance. As soon as they are close enough for Ash to make out, the birds begin to deteriorate to pieces. Many of them losing limbs, feathers and eyes; revealing the rotten innards beneath. He screams out and opens his eyelids to find that he is back at the stream. Strange, weren't they already open? He's staring down at his palms, his horse pauses from drinking from the water to give him a puzzled gaze. Pikachu comes jumping out of a bush, startled by his cry. Ash gives them both an embarrassed expression and looks over to the trunk of the willow tree but the coyote is no longer there. Bent blades of tall grass remain in the animals wake, confirming to Ash that at least that much was real. What was that, some sort of out of body experience? Maybe he accidentally ate one of those mushrooms Gary told him about.

==Main Building: Parking Lot ==

Chan steps out of his car and stretches the long drive out of his limbs as he looks over his two door, three-cylinder sedan. He was never particularly fond of the car, but it's all he could afford with his meager statistician job with the city. It was days like this made him rue coming in to work, hung over from the extended weekend he adjusts his shirt and tie hoping no one notices he's wearing the same clothes from last week. He decided to not go home over the weekend and instead drive down to the southern towns where beer is a nickel and the only signs of city life are he and his car. There the night sky is ablaze with stars, unlike here -in this concrete jungle- where it shares the stage with overwhelming light pollution and withholds its majesty. He looks up to the clouds hovering around the building bathing in a purple and orange glow from the eminent sunrise. He won't have a chance to see it though since he'll be twelve floors below the surface in a moment. As he approaches the entrance of the lobby, he regrets not stopping by his house during the ride back; at least then he'd have some fresh under garments. He takes one last look at the sky before he's doomed to the cavern below, best not the think of it though, he considers, it'll only help to dull his spirits further. Inside the front desk attendant glares when he sees him as if studying him over, odd for him since he's always been nothing but cordial. Chan shrugs it off and reaches the bank of elevators occupying a corner of the first floor; there are seven sets of doors each of them with a painting above depicting the natural resources that helped build their nation. He steps into doors with the fields of rubber trees above them, this is the grandest of the paintings as it is above the only elevator to occupy its own wall, being that it is the only one with limited access to the basement floors. The descending of the elevator mixed with the spinning in his head disorients him as he leans into the corner before the chamber lurches to a stop at the end of its track, B4. It dings his arrival and he steps out, down here he feels like he's in a prison; just cement blocks stacked up on top of each other and exposed wiring. No floral wallpaper to say, 'hello, welcome to work', or god forbid anything at all really, instead its just policies, and declarations. Rules saying what not to do in big bold letters, he would casually joke with his colleagues this place felt more like a refugee camp than an office to crunch numbers. He took comfort in the fact that he wouldn't be down here much longer; the job they relocated his team for was almost over. He was never quite sure what it was though, or why they had to come down to this musty space to do the work. Just something to do with animal genetics, but he didn't bother with all that, Chan only ever worried about the numbers in front of him and left the bigger picture up to someone else. Though, whoever that person is, he doesn't seem to be doing his job right. Why were they using those archaic computing cabinets for such 'important' data instead of a standard computer, or even the CQC for that matter; its only a few cities away. Instead their work has been running slow, waiting for those old machines to run the numbers. He just wants the assignment over so he can move back upstairs where there were windows and pretty receptionists to stare at. He enters the room where he's supposed to clock in before continuing down to his cubicle on B12, but to his surprise he finds it vacant. Puzzling, he glances down at his watch to make sure his lackadaisical state didn't have him walking in late again. Right on time, he lets out a sigh of chagrin, where is everyone? It's only then that he notices that the halls are deserted as well. They would normally be packed with his coworkers waiting in line for the confined elevator down to the lower floors. Did he miss the memorandum? Ahead of him he hears the rubber tree elevator ding to his relief, finally one of his colleagues to confide in about his strange morning. Yet it's not one of them, no they don't wear concrete grey urban camouflage with steel toe boots, and they definitely don't walk around brandishing a gun in hand.

Chan presses to the wall to allow the soldier to pass him by much like he does when he hears an ambulance while driving.

"HANDS UP! HANDS UP!" The Soldier charges to Chan's side and wraps his fist around the back of his collar, "MOVE NOW!"

Chan obeys as he's hurried stumbling through the halls passing door after door. "Please, I work here this must be a—"

The soldier buries the heel of the pistol into the side of Chan's ribcage. The air escapes his body and he can't find the breath to speak. Where is everyone, he thinks frantically, why is no one around to stop this. The soldier stops at a specific door and swipes his access card, when it opens he shoves Chan in headfirst. The aroma of bleach and heavy chemicals consumes him as he lands onto the metal grates that separate him from the floor by a few centimeters. The door seals shut and he looks up to see the pistol pointed straight at his forehead. I'm going to die, is all that flashes through his mind as his vocal cords begin to vibrate out one last word.

"Ss—" –Chan

The empty shell falls between the grates and rolls down the decline to a mesh screen.

==Floor B12==

Another pod rattles through the obnoxious tubing that runs the length of the Doctor's office, once again throwing off his train of thought. He makes a mental note to write someone upstairs for an immediate ceasing of that bothersome contraption. The pod clangs into the receiving station and he rises up to check its contents. He would rather leave it there untouched and let others pile up as a protest of their invasion of his peace, but the thought of an unchecked letter left him with a mental anxiety he did not want to deal with. He unclasps the top and inside he finds the daily report along with a sealed scroll. He wrinkles his nose; sealed scrolls meant word from the emperors' delegation, something he hardly relished. Throwing it aside he opens the report, it appears the final statistician of the interim group was found, how disappointing. The Doctor couldn't help but smile when he heard word that Chan had eluded the firing squad over the weekend. Now his ashes lie at the bottom of some incinerator, deep below the surface, down here with him in this basement. What a waste, the work he and his team helped to accomplish would be the break through discovery of the decade, if only he were allowed to tell his colleagues in the scientific community that is. He settles himself into his chair and leans back pondering, the great masons that built the pyramids of Hoenn were killed and buried amongst their work, so too are Chan's ashes, entombed within the very walls he is currently staring at. Perhaps he was over thinking it, but being down here in this basement, with his remains somewhere nearby, made his office feel all the more like a grave. He looks over to the left of his desk where a green folder lies; he wonders what that brings the total body count to, perhaps around twenty. A rather large amount, but then again; there is no better way to keep a mouth shut. He flips it open, all he can discern from this distance is the word 'CLASSIFED' across the top, the rest just a grey blur of horizontal stripes. It didn't matter; he's read it a dozen times over by now, this time he's transfixed by the grandeur he can feel emanating from the pages. The weight of the words grapple through his mind, could it be that they were wrong somewhere in the calculations? News like this could change the world, what ostentatious half-wit in this organization has the nerve to hold back something of this scale from the public.

The Doctor rises from his chair; just the thought of all those masses of people out there makes him uneasy. They wouldn't understand his work; he can almost feel their bickering from here and the sudden feeling gives him the urge to go outside for fresh air. How would they possibly comprehend the magnitude his magnum opus when at the core of it he himself doesn't entirely understand the depths of it? They'd probably just refute it and hide behind their masquerade of religions anyway, he convinces himself as he steps out of his office. He turns around to lock his office door with its unique key and tucks it into his breast pocket.