Author's Notes:
Shout-out as always to Doreh and Neophilic, who are awesome, wonderful reviewers. 8D

This chapter has been edited to fix italics. Thanks to Doreh for pointing out that apparently, FFN likes to mess up formatting for no apparent reason.

Eleven

D.E.V.A. CLEARANCE LEVEL 1
CLEARANCE ACCEPTED.
DOCUMENT TYPE: DOSSIER
DESIGNATION: D.E.V.A. PERSONNEL CODEX ENTRY #000003
DESCRIPTION: OBJECT CLASSIFICATION SYSTEM
DATE-TIME: LAST EDIT, 11/01/02, 00:01

OVERVIEW: According to standard procedures (see CODEX ENTRY #000002: RETRIEVAL PROTOCOLS), a Committee-selected team from the science department, henceforth known as ALPHA TEAM, are required to submit a full report of their observations and analyses concerning every retrieved or encountered special entity. Based on the containability of the entity as well as the level of threat it presents to civilians, the subject will be assigned one of five classes, listed below:

CLASS 0: Inert
Entities listed as Class 0 pose no threat to civilians and are deemed safe to integrate into the outside world. (See CODEX ENTRY #000005: CLASS 0 RELEASE PROGRAM)
- CLASS EXAMPLES: SE-049 ("Porygon"), SE-056 ("Storage System"), SE-251 ("Leftovers")

CLASS I: Safe
Entities listed as Class I may pose a threat to civilians only if activated by direct interaction. Objects are capable of being contained within a D.E.V.A. facility and are therefore guarded by D.E.V.A. personnel on a constant basis. (See CODEX ENTRY #000004: CLASS I AND II CONTAINMENT PROCEDURES)
- CLASS EXAMPLES: SE-061 ("GS Ball"), SE-186 ("Azure Flute"), SE-704 ("Strange Souvenir")

CLASS II: Containable
Entities listed as Class II pose a definite threat to civilians, even if a bystander does not directly interact with it. Objects under this classification can be contained using standard procedures but may also require use of advanced D.E.V.A. technology and expendable or non-human personnel to maintain.
- CLASS EXAMPLES: SE-442 ("Odd Keystone"), SE-517 ("Dream Mist"), SE-650 ("Ixodida")

CLASS III: Hazardous
Entities listed as Class III pose an extreme threat to civilians and are difficult to contain. Extensive protocols designed for each individual Class III entity are required not only for their containment but also the events of their escape. Complete breaches by Class III entities are generally considered to be end-of-world scenarios. (See CODEX ENTRY #000005: CLASS III BASIC CONTAINMENT PROCEDURES)
- CLASS EXAMPLES: SE-042 ("Teru-sama"), SE-175 ("Bad Egg"), SE-646 ("God Stone")

CLASS IV: Singular
Entities listed as Class IV are exclusively pokémon, collectively known as [REDACTED]. Each Class IV entity possesses power far greater than any ordinary pokémon, and as such, they cannot be adequately contained by D.E.V.A.'s current resources. However, the Committee, through agreements dating back to [REDACTED] have been able to form an agreement with [REDACTED] known as the Arceus Document. According to this agreement, D.E.V.A. agents are permitted to acknowledge Class IV entities and catalogue them according to Class 0 procedures. Class IV entities may also be called upon to [REDACTED] by following the protocols outlined by [REDACTED]. (See [ERROR—DOCUMENT INACCESSIBLE TO CURRENT CLEARANCE LEVEL])
- CLASS EXAMPLES: [ERROR—INFORMATION INACCESSIBLE TO CURRENT CLEARANCE LEVEL]

—

The way Lanette moved was like a dance itself. For anyone who knew her, it might have been difficult to believe that just a year ago, she was a clumsy, shy mouse, the exact kind of person who would never dream of leading a team. Back then, she was only Lanette Chastain, a quiet, plain young woman who passed up any credit for co-inventing the storage system in favor of a life in virtual obscurity. Now, she was Lanette Chastain, the confident, competent, graceful ice queen of Fallarbor Town, the person most likely to be the first to jump into a fight against the ixodida. The person who commanded Fallarbor's defense forces. The person who would see the absolute extermination of the ixodida if it killed her.

And as she moved down the main drag of Fallarbor Town with Thom in tow, she thought about nothing more than that. Absolutely nothing more.

Absolutely no part of her, not even the tiny voice at the back of her mind, thought about the look Bill (the one on whom she pushed all the credit for the storage system, the one she once trusted just as much as her own sister) gave her when she left him.

She would see to the extermination of every ixodida in the region, even if it killed her.

"Wattson. Radio," she snapped.

Behind her, she heard the grunt of her companion. Without looking at him, she held out her hand, only to feel the weight of the radio slap into her palm. Her hazel eyes narrowed at the silent sky. It was too quiet for an attack.

Her thumb jammed the button on the side of the walkie-talkie as she brought it close to her mouth. "Jenny. Status."

Releasing the button, she listened to the static screeching from the speaker. She tilted her head, eyes cast towards the rooftops surrounding her. Gunmen and pokémon lined the street, waiting for the first sign of the ixodida. So they heard the warning scream too.

"Thank gods, ma'am," Officer Jenny's voice responded from the speaker. "No sign of them yet. But a cloud of dust got stirred up about half a mile from the city limits a few seconds ago, so they're clearly on the move."

Lanette brought the radio to her face again. "And your team?"

"Positioned. Ammo stocks are good. Pokémon rested and prepped. We're ready. What's your status, ma'am?"

With that, Lanette pulled a ball from one of her pockets and thumbed the catch on its face. She felt it smoothly expand in her hand, the cold plastic occupying her entire palm.

"Preparing. Two pokémon down, though." She shot a glare at Thom, who tensed and grinned sheepishly.

"Joy's up here with us in Area 3 if you need her."

"I'll be fine. I've still got—"

"Hold on. Fire! Fire, god—"

Shots rang out, and a scream erupted from some distance away from Lanette. Her eyes swung to the sky, just in time to see a black dot loop in the air and pitch downward. She leapt out of the way, planting her feet on the sidewalk along the road before twisting around to look back. There, where she had stood a moment ago, Thom flailed and stumbled backwards. Lanette sighed and gripped her poké ball. She was preparing to rush in and rescue Thom when the black blur slammed into him full force, sending both itself and him tumbling backwards.

And when they stopped, Lanette stopped. She peered down with surprise; the thing that untangled itself from Thom's bulky body wasn't an ixodida but instead a human woman—a young woman in a black uniform, with disheveled, blonde hair and a silver machine on her back. The silver machine, meanwhile, sported a smoking bullet hole in its side. Grunting, the girl pulled it off her shoulders, examined the damage, and cursed loudly.

"That's just great," she groaned as she tossed the device away. Reaching over, she grabbed a white hat where it had fallen beside Thom. Standing up, she shrugged at the sight of Thom—who, at that moment, was still lying in a dazed heap on the concrete—before she started for the sidewalk.

Lanette moved quickly. She pocketed her ball, and with one fluid motion, she reached up to unsheathe her crowbar and swing it at the girl's neck. The intruder stopped short, narrowly missing a moment in which she would have collided with the sharpened end of the crowbar. Her eyes fell on the tool, and her mouth twisted into a surprised grimace.

"Who are you, and how did you get here?" Lanette snapped.

The expression on the woman's face shifted into one of smugness. "Nice stick," she said. "But I'm not interested in you."

She slid to the side and started forward. However, Lanette was faster, blocking Domino's escape again with a jump to the left. Domino stopped short again, once more avoiding Lanette's crowbar. With a heavy sigh, Domino grabbed the sharpened end.

"You're really persistent, aren't you?" She smiled. "I hate it when people I don't like are persistent. That's super-annoying."

With that, she knocked the crowbar to the side and swung her other fist towards Lanette's face. Lanette, eyes narrowed at Domino, tilted herself to the side to let the agent's arm sail past her head. Her hand drove the crowbar down in an arc towards Domino's knees. In the split second after noticing this movement, the agent jumped, kicked the crowbar with her shin, and dropped to the ground to roll out of Lanette's reach. When she broke out of her tumble, her hand flung outwards, and a green and black blur cut across Lanette's cheek and sailed into the pavement behind her. Glancing over her shoulder, Lanette saw the deep black of a tulip blossom swaying where it stood with its stem embedded in the road. When she looked back, her opponent was gone. Lanette rubbed her wrist in thought and glared at the storefronts around her for any sign of the intruder. Everything had gone quiet. She couldn't even hear the Rocket's footsteps. All she could hear was the whistle of the wind between buildings and the soft scratching of Thom sitting up behind her.

Abruptly, a deafening crack broke the silence.

Lanette whirled in the direction of its source. East. East.

At her hip, from its spot clipped to her hip, the radio burst to life.

"Ma'am!" Jenny barked. "Run! They're ground-types!"

Lanette hissed an expletive and dashed for Thom. She grabbed him by the arm and, without stopping, yanked him to his feet.

"Come on!" she screamed. "Let's go! Move!"

Blearily, Thom stumbled after her, his mouth flopping open and closed as he stared at her. "W-whu—"

He never did finish his question. Because in the next instant, the road exploded.

—

Bill wished he could relax. Why did he have to worry, after all? He wasn't the one being dragged into battle. And anyway, this was the pokémon center, possibly the safest place in town when it came to an attack. Not that he would have to worry in the first place. After all, these were ixodida, completely ordinary people stuck in the same situation he was in … right?

Yet for the life of him, he couldn't shake a certain feeling of foreboding. It was the kind of feeling he had whenever he would hear about a security breach or a server crash on another region's storage system. It was the kind he best described as being antsy, the kind where he felt like he had to do something but couldn't figure out what that something was. It was the kind of feeling where every muscle in his body physically ached with the want to move.

But … he couldn't. He had a job to do, and as he wrapped an arm tightly around his sister, he mentally repeated that objective to himself again and again. He had to stay there. He had to protect Raye. He had to, for once, do what Lanette told him to do.

Unfortunately for him, the presence in his brain told him otherwise.

Now would be an appropriate time to discuss our arrangement, Adam stated, its voice strained and low.

"No, it isn't," Bill muttered back under his breath.

On the contrary. This is the first moment where you will be given an opportunity to uphold your end of the bargain. It is only fair that you know exactly what it is you will be up against.

"I'm not going up against anything!" Bill hissed. "I'm staying right here, and—"

Raye stirred beside him. "Nii-chan?"

He shook his head and stroked the top of Raye's. "Nothing. It's nothing."

You are wrong. Listen to me. You do not have much time. I must explain to you how this—

Bill glared at the ceiling. I don't care.

Ah. Good. You have finally caught on.

He huffed and shifted his glare towards the front window. Yellowish clouds billowed past and filled the streets. Squinting, he could barely make out the silhouette of a bird falling in the middle of the fog. The sandstorm burst around it, swirling away just enough to reveal the sleek, blue and white body of an altaria. Lanette sprang from the remnants of the golden cloud to leap onto the bird's back, and together, pokémon and rider ascended out of view.

A sandstorm. I had hoped that we would not encounter members of clans stronger than ours so soon, but I suppose it cannot be helped.

"What are you going on about?" Bill sighed. He sank a little into the seat. Raye, following his movement, pressed herself harder into him and buried her face into his side.

Clans, Adam explained. You would call them types. However, there are seventeen to your eighteen. I will not bother going over the politics or differences between each one. That would not be relevant to this situation, unfortunately.

Bill's eyes fell on his sister again. He wanted so badly to snap a response back to Adam, but he couldn't risk worrying his sister. So instead, he remained motionless and silent, watching the window out of the corner of his eye again.

Well, perhaps to be more accurate, the Sun Clan is not that much stronger than us, but any attack we cannot completely defend against may pose a problem, given your combat experience. Or, as I should say, your lack of combat experience.

Bill clenched his teeth and focused on one message. If he couldn't tell Adam off verbally in front of his sister, he was going to put forth a lot of effort to do it mentally.

For someone who's trying his hardest to get me to agree with you, you certainly have an unusual way of doing it, he snapped.

Can you blame me? You could not even figure out how to break out of a human's box on your own.

It was electrified!

In any case, Adam continued, the Sun Clan is clever. As you can likely tell, they have dominion over the earth itself. They share this with the Stone Clan and the Tree Clan in a way, but while the Stone Clan controls rock specifically and the Tree Clan controls plant life, the Sun Clan is limited only to dirt, mud, and sand. An unusual element, I must admit, but I do not make the rules concerning elemental abilities.

Bill narrowed his eyes and turned to look at the window again. The golden cloud had regenerated, but seconds after Bill turned his gaze on it, it was lanced by a bolt of ice-blue energy. A spire of ice grew out of that energy before the dust shrouded it.

So they're ground-types, Bill responded. Glancing at his lap, he swallowed. Oh. And we're steel.

Of the Iron Clan, yes. Are you taking notes?

Adam.

Fine, fine.

Adam hesitated for a moment. As I have said, members of the Sun Clan are clever. They are not the cleverest of my kind, but they are far more creative than the simple-minded Stone people. They are also generally aggressive, unlike the Tree Clan, so in short, you are looking at a vicious, spiteful enemy who knows exactly how to use its element.

A vicious, spiteful enemy with a type advantage, Bill replied.

Perhaps.

Oh. With that, Bill rested his head on the top of the couch and closed his eyes. It's good that I'm in no way interested in battling them.

On the contrary.

Bill's body flung itself off the couch, pulling away from Raye. It took several steps forward before stuttering to a halt, and only then did Bill feel as if he was standing on his own two feet. Raye thumped against the couch behind him, and as she picked herself back up, she gazed at her brother with wide eyes.

"Nii-chan?" she squeaked.

He waved a hand at her. "Stay there!" Frowning, he turned away from her and clenched his teeth. What are you doing?!

Encouraging you to fulfill your end of our bargain, Adam responded.

What on Earth are you talking about?

Your end, Adam replied impatiently. In exchange for the gifts I have given you, my promise that you can trust me, and my vow that I will ensure that your life will never be in danger, you have promised me two things: knowledge and cooperation. You are, of course, fulfilling your end of the bargain concerning knowledge, but it is cooperation that you have withheld so far. Do not tell me now that you are a liar, Bill.

Bill pressed his eyes shut and shook his head vigorously. Oh no. Oh no, no no. You listen to me, Adam. I absolutely will not battle against another ixodida. I'm not good at pokémon battles. If you send me into one, then there's a very good chance that we'll get hurt—or worse! I absolutely refuse to do it.

What else do you suggest? You wish to protect mankind, yet you will not confront the challenge its enemies have put forth. What, then, do you propose to do?

Bill groaned. But what about your part of the agreement? Isn't going into battle unprepared and untrained a life-threatening situation?

Not necessarily, Adam answered. Action leads to victory. Victors survive. So long as you act, you will not be in real danger. Thus, I ask you again: if you wish to protect mankind, then what it is you propose to do?

At that, Bill went quiet. Or, rather, he felt as if he went quiet, but in actuality, a thousand different thoughts ran through his head at once. He again turned to the window, gazing out at the golden cloud. He could hear gunfire roaring, the cracking of concrete, the screeching of something inhuman, the cacophony of pokémon attacks cutting through the air and exploding across the road. Yet all he could see was pure, swirling gold. It occurred to him that he couldn't see any of the ixodida—not even as shadows dancing across the fog of dust. He wondered what they looked like, whether they looked like him.

Whether they felt like him.

"I want to talk to them," he said.

He glanced over his shoulder at Raye. In the past couple of minutes, she had opted to hold her wartortle as a substitute for her brother, and now, as he glanced at her, she stared back with a startled expression.

"Nii-ch—"

You cannot be serious, Adam said.

"On the contrary," Bill answered, half to Adam and half to his sister. "This is exactly what they need. If I could just talk to them, maybe they'll call off the attack."

Raye shook her head. "Nii-chan…!"

Fine.

That was the complete opposite of what Bill was expecting. Surely, Raye would have wanted peace, while Adam would have wanted him to find a more violent solution … right? Because of that, Bill started forward, unsure of which response to answer first. But it was when Raye reached out to him and lightly gripped his arm with one of her hands that he chose to lean towards her a little more.

"Raye, everything's going to be okay," he said. "If there's one thing I'm good at, it's talking to pokémon."

She shook her head again, and her eyes glistened as if she was about to cry. "No, Nii-chan! Don't go down there!"

He raised his head slightly. "Don't go down…?"

Before he could ask any further, a flash of gold burst from the floor behind the couch and shot towards the ceiling. It slammed through the tiles and continued out of sight into the floor above them. As a result, Bill couldn't quite get a good look at the object, but he could have sworn it was...

"Sand?" Bill murmured.

Abruptly, another burst of gold erupted from the floor, followed by another and another until a gaping hole opened up in the center of the pokémon center lobby. All the while, Raye's grip on her brother's arm tightened until her knuckles were white. The three of them waited: Bill with his eyes on the hole, Raye with her arms wrapped around Bill's, and Raye's wartortle, now standing on the couch and emitting a low, guttural growl.

Then, Bill heard it. A second growl coming from the hole, punctuated by occasional soft barks and scuffling against concrete. Something was down there. Something big. Bill turned to his sister and gently tried to ease his arm out of her grip.

"Raye," he said, "what's down there?"

"The basement," she replied. But after that, she flinched, curling herself against her brother's arm. "No! Don't go down there!"

"H-hey," he murmured. "It'll be all right. Come on. Look."

He pressed the side of his index finger against her chin until she tilted her head up to look at him. With a smile, he pulled his hand away and flicked it in the air to generate a spark of green light. As he spread his fingers, the light danced across his palm until a small, circular barrier hovered before Raye's eyes.

"Do you know what this is?" he asked. When she shook her head, he continued, "Protect. It's a move that will let me deflect all damage a pokémon tries to do to me." He waved his hand to dispel the barrier before resting it on Raye's head. "If anything happens, I'll use that to keep myself safe, and I'll come right back up here. Okay?"

She shook her head and whimpered, and Bill responded by pressing his forehead against hers.

"It's going to be all right," he whispered. "Now I need you to do me a favor. Stay on this couch, and no matter what happens, don't move from it. I need to go down there to make sure whoever's there won't hurt you, but to do that, I need you to promise me you'll stay right here where it's safe. Got it?"

"No," Raye said. "No, Nii-chan, don't. Don't go down there. It's not safe. It's not gonna—"

"Shh." He eased his arm out her grip and gave her wrists a squeeze. "I'll be right back."

Leaving it at that, Bill pulled away and jumped over the couch. It didn't take him long at all to reach the lip of the hole, and after a brief pause to stare into its depths, he took a deep breath and jumped down.

He landed with an ungraceful bang seconds later. While he had intended to land on his feet, what he actually did was land hard on his side. Groaning, he slowly picked himself up and shook off the dull ache that ran through his side, but the moment he did, he felt a sharp, stabbing sensation in his eyes. He sucked in a breath and winced before slowly opening his eyes to the dark basement.

Only it wasn't dark. Or, rather, it was, but at the same time, he could see perfectly. It looked like everything was glowing in soft, gray tones—cardboard boxes, old equipment, rows of cabinets … everything. Although Bill had to pause briefly at the sight of the basement, it didn't take long for him to figure out what it meant.

"Night vision." Bill winced again. "When we get out of this, you're going to tell me everything you did to me."

Unfortunately, I cannot. That would make things easy, and you cannot learn if things are easy.

Ignoring his partner, Bill dropped to all fours and pressed himself into the floor. For once, it wasn't an unconscious action. Instead, it was an attempt to keep as little of himself exposed as possible. It wasn't exactly the best plan of action for going into a diplomatic situation, but the last thing he wanted was to be shot at with another Bonemerang.

Besides, the other ixodida was nowhere to be seen, and in Bill's mind, that was cause for slight alarm.

The hole it used to enter the building lay in the center of the room, just outside the circle of light formed by the gap in the ceiling. It smelled of asphalt and dirt and a sweet-sour scent Bill couldn't immediately place. He crawled to the edge of the hole and peered down, first taking in the scent of the other ixodida. It was only after his first breath that he looked down into the void.

And that's all it was. Deep, dark nothing.

But the scent was strong. The ixodida was still close, and the basement wasn't that big. It couldn't have gotten far.

Bill pulled away from the hole and sat up. But then, he froze at the feeling of something cold looming behind him. Yelping, he rolled out of the way, seconds before a blast of sand crashed down onto the spot where he had perched. Pulling out of the roll, Bill crouched and looked up, directly into the face of another ixodida.

The boy couldn't have been much older than fourteen when he was infected. His round face still looked like a child's, and there was almost a sense of bewilderment in his wide eyes. Yet that was the only human thing about him. The rest of him was either covered in spikes or scales, with the former running down the length of his back and the latter covering his front. Sand snaked back from the edge of the hole to his hand. It collected there until it formed a bone-shaped mass that fit perfectly in the boy's palm. Bill slowly stood until he reached his full height, towering over the other ixodida.

"Hold on, now," Bill said slowly. He held up his hands, palms towards the other ixodida. "I'm not here to hurt you."

The boy looked at Bill's hands. Without so much as a twitch, he dispelled the bone in his hand, allowing the sand that had formed it to cascade onto his feet. At that, Bill relaxed slightly.

"That's right. I'm a friend," he said.

The boy stared at him for a long, silent while.

Bill inclined his head and held out a hand. "What's your name?"

Nothing. Just a stare. An uneasy feeling sparked in Bill's chest.

"Er," he said, "l-let me start. My name is Bill. I'm a researcher from Kanto. I can help you get out of here. How does that sound?"

The boy's eyes drifted from Bill's hands to his face. Then, in the clear, high-pitched voice of a young man, the boy spoke.

"Monarch."

Bill reeled back. "Monarch?"

Your tail, Adam explained. It must have noticed your tail. Or, well, the way you speak. Either is a dead giveaway, honestly.

"I-I don't understand," Bill replied, his eyes flicking from the boy to the side of the room and back again. In one of these glances, he saw the unmistakable outline of a staircase. So there was a way out if things went sour … and he was quickly getting the feeling that this would be the case.

"Monarch," the boy repeated, a little louder.

Allow me to explain in as few seconds as we have, Adam responded. Within my kind, there are the drones, and then you have us, the monarchs. Monarchs are distinguished by their intelligence and the blade at the tips of their tails. Because we are smarter, drones take orders from us … for the most part.

Bill relaxed again. "Oh. He noticed the blade at the end of my tail? Is that all? Well." He flashed a smile at the boy. "I suppose I am a monarch."

In response, the boy scurried backwards with a long hiss, and the sand twisted through the air and back into his hand until it formed another bone.

Bill's smile faded. "Adam?"

Remember how I just said that drones take orders from monarchs for the most part?

"Yes?"

The "for the most part" actually means "unless they realize you are a rogue."

Bill swallowed hard for the second time that day. "And … and a rogue is…?"

The boy, crouching low now, parroted the word. "Rogue. Rogue."

A rogue is an ixodida who defies the nature of our kind. And you just revealed yourself as one by smiling at this thing. On that note, duck.

Without thinking, Bill did what Adam asked, just as the boy flung the sand bone at him. It sailed cleanly over his head, dissipating in the seconds after it missed its target. In the meantime, Bill moved, swooping back to his full height as he put his hands back up.

"Hey! Wait! Why are you—"

The boy slammed a foot onto the cement floor. It instantly buckled under his touch as the earth itself shook. The floor beneath Bill's feet lurched and pitched him forward, sending him sprawling at the boy's feet. Twisting on the floor, he felt sand grains scrape across his skin, as if someone yanked sandpaper up his back. That alone elicited a sharp cry from him, but it was the realization of what it meant that made him jump. He scrambled, pulling himself to his hands and knees and diving out of the way a moment before another sand bone slammed into the ground where he had lay.

Somehow, Bill managed to pull himself back to his feet as the sand swirled around his opponent again. Frantically, Bill flung his hands out in front of him and concentrated to pool as much of his energy into his now-familiar technique as he could. Green sparks danced in front of him, and a barrier of green light flashed across his field of view for a few seconds … before vanishing.

"What?!" Bill cried.

The boy flung the sand bone at him. He dodged—but just barely. Instead of blocking the bone completely, he felt the tip of it collide with his shoulder, grinding across the metal before dissolving behind him. Hot pain seared into the muscle underneath it, and he instinctively shouted and clutched at his shoulder. Around his toes, he could feel the sand pooling, snaking across the floor once again until it swirled up to the boy's hand. With some effort, Bill flung his hands back out and concentrated again. This time, the green sparks fizzled as soon as they appeared.

"No," he groaned. Focusing again, he watched as green sparks flickered in and out of existence in front of his hands. "No, no, no! Why isn't it working now?!"

Adam said something. Bill was sure of that, but before he could register what it was, another sand bone flew at his face. At once, he screamed, dove out of the way, and sprinted for cover. The ground beneath his feet buckled again, and with that, he was sent sailing head over talons into a bank of old medical pods. He crashed into the top of one and bounced over it and onto the floor behind it. And then, as if to add insult to injury, it toppled over on top of him, crashing into the pod next to it in the process to trap him on the floor.

And for a moment, there he lay, staring in a daze at the broken pod above him.

That went well, Adam quipped. Would you like me to take over?

Once again, Bill opted to ignore the parasite. Instead, he ground his teeth together as he weakly squirmed beneath the weight of the pod.

"I don't get it," he said. "Why didn't it work?"

I just told you. But go on. Tell me, Bill. What are the effects of Protect?

Relaxing himself once again, Bill pushed a forearm into the pod and cast his eyes to the side. All he could see was the bent metal of the pod wall.

"Protect," he recited. "Non-damaging normal-type move. Creates a barrier around a user to block all incoming attacks."

And?

Above him, he could hear the faint scratching of claws on metal. The pungent smell of dirt and sand stung his nose, and he narrowed his eyes at the pod above him.

Rate of success decreases on each consecutive use, Bill thought. But that doesn't make sense! I haven't used it yet!

Is that so? Adam asked.

Yes! Unless… Bill winced. That couldn't have counted. That wasn't in battle, and it wasn't even a full Protect! I was just showing Raye—

What Protect looks like. And in doing so, you used Protect, Adam replied. So fantastic job, Bill. Shall we take a tally of all the bad decisions you have made so far? You chose to talk to a drone in a rather misguided attempt at diplomacy, you reveal yourself as a rogue in the process, and you went into battle knowing only one move—one that you set up to fail. Do you have any other fantastic ideas in that head of yours, or are you done trying to get us killed?

The scratching moved swiftly above him, and soon, his ears filled with the screaming of metal. He couldn't help but cry out and clutch his ears in pain as, little by little, the pod above him moved. Eventually, he saw the ghost-white sliver of a face peer down at him, and his entire body went cold with fear.

What do I do? he thought. What do I do? What do I do?

In his head, Adam growled. What do you do? You fight.

How? I don't … I can't!

The child's face disappeared. The pod groaned and shifted a little more, its edge pushing away from the wall a little more.

Bill, Adam said, you have a power inside you. Use it.

That's not the issue!

Bill protested. I can't fight him! He's just like me inside! I don't understand! Why is he attacking?!

Because the transformation destroys people. This is not a human anymore, Bill. You must fight it.

Bill shut his eyes. I can't. I can't. I can't do this. I can't—

The pod flipped over with a bang, exposing Bill to the cold of the open basement. He froze, his body tensing all over as he watched the boy reach down, down towards the jewel in Bill's chest. In his head, Bill could hear Adam's long hiss, and a numbness rushed into his limbs.

But then, a blast of water hit the boy in the side of the head. He screamed and flailed and scuttled off the pod and away from Bill. Following the jet of water with his eyes, Bill sat up and watched his sister's wartortle fire Water Gun after Water Gun at the other ixodida. Looking up, Bill could see Raye peek over the edge of the hole.

"I thought I told her to stay on the couch," Bill sighed.

Adam released Bill and retreated into his head to reply, The two of you have a lot in common. It is fascinatingly obvious that you two are related.

"Not now," Bill spat as he climbed over the broken pod. As he made his way towards the ground-type, he held his hands out again, palms open. "Please, listen to me! I'm not here to hurt you! I want to help you!"

The boy screeched … but not at Bill. Instead, all of his focus was on the wartortle. Once more, he pounded his feet into the ground, sending shockwaves through the basement. Bill gripped the pod behind him for stability, but Raye's wartortle was instantly flipped off his feet. The turtle landed on his shell and skidded across the floor, riding the Earthquake as his limbs flailed wildly in open air. A long, loud cry burst from his throat as soon as he slammed into a pile of boxes behind him, but thankfully, the pile served as a springboard to bounce him back onto his feet. Unfortunately, the wartortle hesitated, rubbing his head gingerly as he peered back at the ixodida. This was unfortunate only because in that time, sand quickly pooled around the boy's feet and back into his hands.

And what was worse, he was looking straight at Raye. Raye, who had human vision. Raye, who couldn't see into the dark. Raye, who had no idea an attack was coming for her.

"No!" Bill shouted.

He didn't think about the next few seconds. They simply came naturally to him. He swung himself around, and his feet sprang off the ground. His other hand, meanwhile, pulled back. Every muscle in it tensed as the armor of his arm began to glow a bright, hot red. Time felt like it slowed for him as he shot across the room, heading straight for the boy. The distance between them closed, and as soon as the other ixodida was within his reach, he swung his fist into the sand bone. It instantly shattered beneath his touch, spilling into a million grains at his feet while the red glow transferred to his other arm. He didn't give the other ixodida time to react; rather, he twisted in the other direction to swing his glowing arm into the creature's ribcage. Under his fist, he could feel flesh yielding and bone shattering, but he heard no scream. There wasn't enough time. In the next instant, Bill was moving again, spinning himself behind the creature and hooking his arms underneath those of the other ixodida.

Time felt like it returned to normal, and Bill began to hear the sharp, painful screaming. The sand creature thrashed and threw back his head, and from his throat burst round after round of terrible, nails-on-chalkboard shrieking. Bill grimaced. Without free hands, he could do nothing to protect himself from the sound, and that sound made his ears feel like they were about to bleed. Yet somehow, Bill remained standing. He braced himself against the stabbing pain in his head as he threw a glance towards Raye's pokémon.

"Wartortle!" he cried. "Water Pledge! Now!"

The turtle hesitated, moving only to rise to his feet and trill an inquisitive, "War?"

"Listen to Nii-chan!" Raye shouted from the hole. "Please! Make it stop, Wartortle!"

At that, the turtle grunted and nodded. He turned back to the two ixodida and smirked. He stomped a foot into the ground, almost mimicking the ground-type creature's worst attack.

Bill braced himself for a second time, but it wasn't because of the screaming. He watched the blue lights of Wartortle's attack flash across the floor until they formed a perfect circle beneath the ground-type ixodida. He listened as the ground rumbled. And then, he let go as geysers erupted from the floor and struck the ground-type at full-force. Taking a few steps backwards, he kept his eyes on his opponent as the creature flew into the air, hit the ceiling, and fell back towards the ground. The boy hit the cement with a bang, but by that point, his screaming had stopped. He was silent. Unmoving.

Shuddering, Bill wrapped himself with his arms and began walking towards the staircase. Part of him felt sick as what he had done began to register in his head. He had attacked an ixodida. He had hurt someone just like himself. How could he have done that?

After a few seconds, he was vaguely aware of the wartortle padding up to him. Breathing heavily, he kept his eyes on the staircase but somehow managed to croak out a response to the pokémon's presence.

"Good … good job."

He reached out for the stairs' railing, and while he did touch it, he couldn't feel it. At first, he thought it might have to do with his armor—the armor that he no longer wanted anything to do with—but he realized he had no feeling in his arm. He jumped, drawing in a loud gasp while staggering away from the bannister, but as he moved, the numb feeling in his arm swept over him until he could feel nothing at all. Nothing except the distinct feeling of being pulled back to a point in his head. Suddenly, his body moved without him. It turned away from the stairs, moved quietly back to the boy, and crouched low over the creature's prone form.

Adam! Bill screamed. What are you doing?!

"Invoking the protection clause," Adam answered.

It reached down and turned the boy's body over. Then, it stopped and fixed its eyes on his ankle. There, a small, red light pulled itself out from under the creature's heel and began slicing its way up his leg.

"There is something else you do not know about my kind, Bill," Adam said. "You must destroy our cores when you defeat us. Otherwise..."

Adam smacked a hand over the red light. Its fingers curled into the boy's flesh, piercing it as easily, as if the other host was made of clay. Bill could almost feel the child's core—its roundness, its glossy surface, its heat.

"Otherwise," Adam continued, "you place us all in grave danger."

As soon as the last syllable left its lips, the parasite within him yanked the core out of the boy's leg and wrapped its tail around his neck. They screeched—both the child and the creature in Adam's hand—but the host's screams were cut short when Adam squeezed its tail. It turned away from the boy at that moment, but Bill knew exactly what it did—not only from the click of his tail segments meeting but also from the wet thud of a head smacking against concrete. Adam didn't care, however—or it didn't seem to. Its eyes were fixed on the parasite, watching its eight small legs flail beneath its bulbous, tick-like body. Sinewy tendrils swung between each claw-like appendage, and on the underside, a small hole, a mouth, opened and closed with frantic clacks.

"We breed quickly," Adam said. The words were meant in disdain, and Bill knew that from the way Adam's thoughts felt. But the sound of its voice … there was something almost reverent about it. Almost as if Adam was in awe of itself. "We are insects. We use your body to survive, and when we no longer have use for you, we lay our young inside you and discard you. It is done so very easily. So cleanly. You feel nothing at all when you die. That is our last gift to you." It turned the creature back over, holding it between two fingers. "Do you see why you must destroy us, Bill? If you do not, then we will destroy you. You must consume … or we will consume."

By the time Adam reached those last few words, its voice was nothing but a low growl. When the last syllable faded in the quiet of the basement, Adam did the last thing Bill expected.

It slid the parasite into its mouth and bit down.

If Bill could scream—physically scream, not just scream in his head—he would have in that second. He would have shrieked until his voice died out, until his throat went numb, until all breath in his lungs felt like fire. But he couldn't. All he could do was listen to the crunching of the parasite's exoskeleton. Feel his body's tongue toy with fragments of chitin. Hear himself swallow. The blood of the creature was hot in his throat, and it burned with a fire unlike anything else he had ever eaten. And when Adam gave him back full control, all he could taste was metal and acid, like a stinging mix of bile and blood. His next thought was to throw up, but somehow, he had the presence of mind not to stick his fingers in his mouth. They went to his stomach instead, pounding at his torso in a frantic attempt to get himself to reject what he had just consumed. He doubled over, forcing himself to gag, but nothing came up. The fire only went deeper, further down inside of him. And he could string no words together to describe how disgusting it felt.

"Oh gods," he whimpered. "Oh gods no."

He placed his hands flat on the floor and bent lower until his forehead pressed into the cement. His body shook, and he stared unblinkingly until his eyes watered. His throat continued to contract, morphing spasmodic heaves into gasping sobs.

He killed someone. He killed someone. He didn't just attack someone. He attacked a child, and he killed that child.

A door opened. Footsteps fell onto metal stairs. The wartortle barked and growled. A familiar scent of flowers mingled with the stench of death and blood.

"Raye," Bill rasped. "Raye, don't … don't come any closer. You … can't. Can't. Go back. Please, gods. Go back."

"Aww," a sing-song voice responded. "You think I'm someone else!"

Bill looked up, his wide eyes shifting quickly from the floor to the newcomer.

The woman.

The girl with the drill-tail hair.

Domino smiled sweetly at him. Her hand reached up, sneaking underneath her cap to pull out a handful of small, metal balls. She flicked her wrist and flung the orbs at Bill. He didn't move. He simply let them surround him in a neat cube, four on the floor and four hovering in the air. Pink electricity sparked from one ball to the next.

And the trap closed.

—

By the time the dust clouds cleared in Fallarbor Town, bodies littered the streets. A handful were the splattered remains of humans or pokémon lying at the feet of buildings. Many more were the bullet-riddled corpses of ixodida, their cores pierced and oozing luminescent, blue blood. Lanette crouched over the body of an ixodida with a bashed-in head. All of her weight leaned into her crowbar, which was buried several inches deep in the monster's thigh. Blue blood ran freely out of the core pierced by Lanette's weapon, and it left hissing, bubbling trails across the ixodida's skin. At that moment, Lanette stood, placing one of her boots on the hip of her victim to pry her crowbar free. She swept herself off the ground, jumping into the air gracefully while a blur of blue and white swooped down to meet her. With a slight twist of her body, she hooked her legs easily around the altaria's warm, blue form. Her altaria craned her neck and crowed as she took to the skies with a powerful flap of her cloud-like wings.

As Lanette rode her dragon above the street, she took survey of the battle. Her human troops lined each rooftop, kneeling in a constant motion of shooting and reloading any firearm they had. Occasionally, when sand bones flew through the air or Earthquakes shook the foundation of their perches, her soldiers would fall and crunch against the pavement below, but for the most part, the humans had the advantage. It wasn't because they were able to maintain their footing on the rooftops. It was because of their companions. Interspersed with their human owners or swooping down to the fray below was a full legion of pokémon: water-types, grass-types, ghost-types, anything anyone could get their hands on in that part of Hoenn.

And the ixodida themselves? The ixodida were barely visible alive. Their bodies lay all over the road, certainly, but many of them dove in and out of the holes that pitted the surface of the street. They came up in waves and never in tight enough knots for Fallarbor's forces to shoot down all at once, but even so, even if they tried to spread out when they surfaced, a number of them would be instantly consumed with water or leaves or bullets before they could so much as attack. Many more appeared in their places and shook the ground Fallarbor stood on.

It was clear to Lanette that the battle wasn't stopping anytime soon, so she scanned the group carefully for one particular creature. She doubted it would appear. After all, why would the ixodida make that kind of tactical error? Certainly, they were by no means human, and as far as she knew, she had yet to meet a truly intelligent one. Yet she knew that if the creature she was looking for appeared, its presence in the fight would risk the survival of the colony. Surely an animal would seek to preserve itself, right?

Yet it was Fallarbor's only hope at winning the battle.

"Altaria!" she barked. "Fly down and—"

A scream cut her off. It started with only a few voices underground, but it rippled outward to all of the ixodida until their voices merged into one long, piercing screech.

And there it was. Climbing out of a hole carefully, cautiously at the end of town. It held out its hands, palms up as if it was a conductor and the others were its orchestra. Lanette didn't need a closer look at the thing to know what it was.

"There you are." She leaned into her dragon's neck and extended an arm to point directly at the conductor. "Altaria! Use Aerial Ace to get me close!"

With a song-like cry, Altaria folded her wings and cut through the air until she was mere feet from the pavement. The ixodida were in motion, scrambling towards the easternmost holes under fire from both humans and pokémon. Those that made it to their leader dove beneath the ground, save for a select few that gathered close to it to form a shield. This didn't stop Lanette as she drew her crowbar up and prepared to swing it directly at the creature's head. It stared at her blankly before pushing through its throng of followers. One of its arms swung towards Lanette, and a ball of mud suddenly erupted from its palm and escaped its claws. The ball missed Altaria by mere inches, but it hit Lanette's shoulder dead-on, knocking her clean off her bird. At that, the creature's entourage leapt upon Altaria, pinning the dragon to the ground. Lanette, meanwhile, slammed onto her back on the road. She groaned and picked herself up, turning her head to gaze at her struggling, squawking pokémon. The humans stopped attacking at that point, and Lanette couldn't blame anyone. One false shot, and either she or her altaria would be killed. And it was because of that that she felt a pang of true terror.

"No!" she screamed.

The leader crouched down and reached for her. She shrieked and slapped his hand away.

"If you hurt her," she snapped, "I swear—"

"Let us leave peacefully," the leader told her.

"What?" she huffed.

"You are their monarch, are you not?" the creature asked. "Tell them not to attack. I have a warning for you now. One of our own is dead, and it was not by your hand. We have no interest in this battle so long as the force that killed ours remains intact."

Lanette narrowed her eyes. "What the hell are you talking about?"

"This is our warning to you. Destroy the rogue or deliver it to us, and we will ignore the fact that one of yours has trespassed onto our territory. That is all."

With that, it turned and dashed into one of the holes. Its entourage followed shortly thereafter, releasing the squawking, indignant Altaria. Lanette raced forward and grabbed her dragon by the shoulders to stop her from going after the ixodida. All the while, she kept her eyes on the hole, listening carefully for the sound of any new ixodida approaching. For a long while, nothing happened. No one moved. No one spoke. No one made so much of a sound.

There was a bark. Lanette looked over her shoulder at its source: a sleek, white dog-like creature staring at her with grave, red eyes. Instantly, Lanette recognized it. Only one person in Fallarbor owned an absol, after all.

"Raye," she whispered.

The absol barked at her for a second time before turning and racing away. Once it did, a cold feeling of dread hit Lanette's heart.

"No…" Lanette's face twisted. Her teeth clenched into a sneer, and her eyes narrowed at the retreating dog. "Bill. You idiot."

Thus, Lanette Chastain, ice queen of Fallarbor, bolted after the absol with her altaria flying low behind her.