Turo deserved a punch in the face, a twist of the arm, whatever. Nevertheless, Arven could not find it in him to hurt him.
He didn't know what it was. He could bat his father on the shoulder, sure, but not anything else. Was it because he knew that, unlike his mother, his father was alive, or was it because he knew violence wasn't the solution to everything? Scarlet proved that by tinkering with Turo's emotions in the main lab. Surely the cyborg transformation could result in a negotiation. Arven hoped so. If not, then he was a dead teenager.
What would Turo do—dissect him like a Nymble for an eighth grader and put robot parts in him? How did he make Sada pregnant? Arven recalled reading somewhere that someone could take the reproductive organs of a dead woman and create babies from them. If Turo did that, if what he did to Arven was reminiscent of Sada, then that was cause for an emotional outrage.
"What are you going to do to me?" he finally asked Turo. "Is it how you made an AI pregnant?" It was negotiation time. "You know, you don't have to do this." Dang it! That was too soft, wasn't it? It was just like that fairytale, Goldilocks and the Three Ursaring.
Turo tugged Arven's sore wrist (he was sure he sprained it). "You talk too much."
"What are you going to do about it?" Arven probably shouldn't have said that. Then again, he had never dealt with a villain before. His insides froze, and his body shivered under a newfound chill with Turo's two-word answer:
"You'll see." He took Arven to a dome-shaped room. It had a computer the size of one of its walls, and at first glance, it looked like something someone would find in an observatory. Twinkling stars decorated the whole dome. It was so realistic that Arven felt each sun's heat.
He tripped over clusters of cables and scattered Tera crystals. Falling forward, he nearly hit a Terastallized keyboard in the center of the room. Turo didn't bother to save him, so Arven ended up on his hands and knees at the keyboard's legs, eye-length with two pockets colored scarlet and violet. What was this—his key to saving him, Sada, and his little sister or the guillotine? Arven knew it was possibly both, but it all depended on him. He could still find a way to negotiate with his psycho dad.
Turo snatched Arven's arm and jerked him to his feet in time for Celebi and Meowscarada to rejoin them, still cursed, confused, and pained. His Temporal Freeze remote vibrated in his pocket, and he took it out, checking it. "Ah, what do you know? It looks like you're going to have an audience for your experiment, my wonderful son."
"What are you—?" Turo didn't let Arven finish. With his free hand, he gestured at Meowscarada and Celebi. "We're going to make sure he doesn't escape. Right, partners? His friends and mom are going to have front-row seats to this blockbuster."
"Seriously, Dad, you don't have to do this." That was still too soft. Arven would have to try a little more than that negotiating. It was too obvious that didn't know how to deal with a psychopath.