This Glaceon was not from her territory. He was not from one of the Villages, was not closely related to any of the local Pokemon, and was not spotted prior to this moment. And yet, he somehow found her. Managed to sneak past all her security. All without her vast sensory network even noticing something amiss.
The building she was in was one of the huts in the middle of Northern Village. Not the Elder's hut, of course. She used that building as a decoy, with visible guards posted there at all times, in case there was a revolt. No, she occupied a hut that previously housed one of the Pokemon that died during her conquest. The building consisted of two rooms, both relatively wide, round, and with comfortably high ceilings. The windows and the entrance were boarded, to create an illusion that the hut was abandoned - although, her Combees did have access through an underground passage, which was usually plugged by a few of their bodies, to give her an early warning if someone tried to sneak in. Outside, the hut was always in view of at least two patrolling Combees roaming through the Northern Village, to create an illusion that it was only as guarded as the rest of the settlement. And inside the hut, she had sentries that were constantly surveilling her immediate surroundings, and could be deployed to deal with any nasty surprises.
All of this was arranged to make sure she never had to deal with a scenario in which she was in a direct contact with an enemy.
And yet, this was exactly what happened.
Somehow, the Glaceon who was never spotted in her territory found the village, found out where to look for her, bypassed all of her security, and was now looking at her in a self-assured manner, as if he had already won.
This was not an ideal situation, but she had ways of dealing with such scenarios.
She kept the pressure on the 'human' and Absol with her slingshot and venom squads, while gathering Combees that were not engaged in that battle closer to the Northern Village to-
"I'd really consider stopping if I were you," Glaceon said with a slightly pained wince. From the ceiling, three ice spears extended in an overlapping pattern, once again stopping just a short way from her body, "That mangy Absol just told me you are not letting up, despite me asking you so nicely."
Telepathy.
Instant communication, especially as long-range, was incredibly valuable in battle, strategy and logistics. The ability to have instant rapport with her troops was one of the main strengths of the Hive, after all - and an enemy that also had access to it was always bad news.
Though judging by his choice of words, he still had no idea about her soldiers converging on his position - which meant she had time between the majority of her forces arriving and the two other intruders reaching this village to deal with him.
Judging by what she had seen, he had a relatively high power output, combined with extremely precise control of ice. This meant that she was at disadvantage in an open fight, and safe disengage was a priority during the first stage of the confrontation. Additionally, it appeared that his ability to become invisible also came from the same source, using rapidly cooled and shaped air currents to create mirages. Which meant he also had an ability to create a displacement effect, physically not being in the place he appeared to be.
To put it simply, she as a commander was currently staring down an assassin, with not enough forces at hand to hamper him for long enough to escape. And the sufficient reinforcements were going to take a minute to arrive, with the ones already in place only starting to work towards her escape strategy.
Her situation was far from ideal. Which was exactly why she commanded her engaging squads to cease the attack, and follow the two intruders while maintaining their altitude.
"Done. What was it you wanted to talk about?" she looked at the Ice Type, who aside from the threats, was not attacking.
He looked to the side, slightly wincing again, before looking at her with a soft, and clearly not friendly, smile.
"Good to see you are reasonable. You see, those two? Are currently relatively important. At least, as long as we all want to live past this year"
Now this was an odd choice of words. Why-
Ah.
"Absol"
"Yes, her. She had this very nasty vision of the world ending, and very, very soon. And you know how Absols are. Ignore their warnings, and you are in for a very bad time. And this particular mangy thing had this very bright idea of gathering a team to prevent it from happening"
End of the world by the end of this year. This was not in her plans. At least as long as she believed what an Absol said. And she knew better than not believing one. This meant that her Hive was in grave danger, and not even from human interference. There was no point in trying to clear the islands of human presence either, not with such a big threat looming over the horizon. No, this required her immediate, and full attention.
Which meant she had to consider a ceasefire with these intruders.
"The Absol had the idea. Not the human"
"Not the human," he shrugged, "The two of them. The two of us. One other Pokemon we are supposed to recruit next. All are necessary to prevent the worst possible outcome"
"You want the help of my Hive to kill whoever is responsible"
"Actually, the Absol believes that we need to help them, rather than trying to kill them"
"Help them with what?"
"Oh, this is the most fascinating part of this puzzle. See, the one who is going to be responsible for the end of the world is trying to kill Arceus and take his place."
Oh. Killing Arceus was a bold goal. Not the one even her Hive could make, regardless of just how many Combees she had under her command. It was nearly improbable, yet if the one with such goal was capable of killing everyone and everything…
"So you are expecting me to bow down to this human and enter their servitude to have a slim chance of saving my Hive in the long run," she stated.
"Only if you are into that kind of thing," Glaceon smirked, "Me? I don't intend to let them capture me until we meet that mysterious godkiller. If they are not as strong as Absol claims, we could always just group up, kill them, and go our separate ways"
"You mean all of them, including the human and the Absol."
He smirked in response.
This meant the Glaceon did not have any loyalty to the group, and was only with them because it benefitted him. This meant that if she was to go with them, she needed to keep an eye on him. Or possibly, come to a mutual agreement.
"Also, consider this," he added, "If that godkiller ends up being powerful enough for us to actually support them? We could ask for preferential treatment. I believe it would not be that difficult for a freshly instated god to fulfil a request from someone who helped them~"
This was also true.
Which meant that she could either prevent that entity from becoming a threat to the world in the first place, or to earn a favour that allowed her Hive to prosper far beyond her current means.
"You have my backing then. In both matters," she nodded.
At this, the Glaceon gave her another smirk, surely glad he managed to form such an alliance.
At her command, Combees began dismantling the door barricades. At the same time, the ones outside retreated, as to not clue the Ice Type into what she planned to do to him. She still kept them close by, just to be safe. The slingshot and venom squads tailing the other two intruders were still above them, just a couple of minutes away. The Village was silent, the Pokemon still sleeping, undisturbed by what happened during this confrontation.
Leaving this territory was not ideal. It was a developed resource base, sustained by the efforts of the conquered Pokemon. Even leaving it for a single moon meant that the local Pokemon would've been able to recover and regroup enough to oppose the Hive, with enough knowledge of her tactics to incur greater losses than the first time. Leaving a contingent of Combees to oversee the operations here was also not the best idea - while she could control her children from a great distance, she had to be present to replenish their ranks, meaning their numbers in this territory was going to slowly but surely dwindle regardless of how carefully she was managing them.
No, if she was going with these intruders, she had to clean this place up. Gather all the available resources, so her Hive had enough to function. The Pokemon that were in her service had to be divided into two groups - those who were going with her, and those who were not. The second group was to be turned into more resources - particularly, food - and the first group was going to carry everything the Hive needed. She was going to leave the three Villages empty, save for the buildings and still growing crops. With this, the territory was almost guaranteed to be discovered by new groups of Pokemon, who were going to settle in without any knowledge of the Hive.
Which meant, even faced with great losses among her children and without any spoils from this new campaign, she could always return here to reconquer and rebuild.
The two intruders slowly walked into the village. The 'human' did not look as bad as she thought they were going to because of the venom, once again raising the question if they were a human at all. The two did not attack, although the Absol looked at her apprehensively.
"Uh… Hello? Did-"
"The Glaceon already told me about your mission. You will have my assistance"
